* 500 g pasta
* 2 zuchinni (about 200g)
* 1 onion (about 200g)
* 1.5 punnets of cherry tomatoes (~375g)
* 15g or 2 tablespoons of basil - finely chopped
* fetta - 125g or a bit more

Cook pasta.
Separately, fry chopped onion; then add sliced zuchinni.
Separately, in severing bowl; put the halved tomatoes with basil and chopped up fetta. Add pasta and onion/zuchinni when ready.

In the Centre Ring
Rhapsody for Flugelhorn and Symphonic Band
Poet and Peasant Overture
Back To The Future
Incantation and Dance
Theme from Schindler's List
Stephenson's Rocket
Aegean Festival Overture
The Rakes of Mallow

Mendoza was pretty cool. Lots of tree lined streets with lots of places to eat with, water channels in the streets, glacier melt, need due to the desert thing. Hot temperatures, but lots of icecream places helped things.

We got back yesterday afternoon from Galapagos islands. They were great - really interesting wildlife, and good scenery. Snorkling was heaps of fun. Although being less than a metre away from several sharks and another time being a metre or two from a sting ray or two was slightly disconcerting. Swiming with the sea turles and sea lions was great.

I´m now, slowly, trying to copy pictures of my camera memory card, and onto another (phone card), as a backup. Many many photos slows things down a bit.! Plus, this machine is old, very old...

... while I wait ...

So, the Galapagos was excellent. Basically, each day there would be one or two walks on one or two of the islands, and one or two snorkelling sessions. I really enjoyed this - it basically combined several things that I enjoy - walking out in the bush, swimming in the ocean, learning about new stuff, seeing new stuff. The snorkelling was excellent, although, I should have (a) brought contact lenses (though wasn´t too bad because everything was close), and (b) brought an underwater camera. Oh well. I´ll be trying to do some snorkelling when I´m back in Australia. Life on the boat was pretty good (although the boat itself was getting a little bit old). Was sick once (due to the sea) halfway through, which was annoying. Getting there was a bit dubious, the flight was supposed to be from Quito to Galapagos direct (what we were told), but ended up going via Guiyaquil - an awesome place, lol. Unfortunately, the plane that we were to leave on was delayed. The airline´s status information on the information board was lacking. It was listed at 10.30am and on time, despite, when talking to the person behind the counter that it would be 12. After 10.30, the status changed to ´talk to customer rep´. At about 12? the flight got removed from the screen. Left at about 1pm, with one minimal notification. Just how I wanted to spend Christmas morning, lol. The afternoon swimming was good though.

Comparing Galapagos and Antarctica, you´d have to say that Galapagos is for the wildlife, Antarctica is for the scenery.

Quito seems to be an interesting city. Ecuador is probably more developed than Bolivia, but less than Peru or Argentina, maybe? The hotel that I stayed at had great views - on the top of a hill. But was directly under the flight path. The airport is not very far away either... there´s a signalling light at the top of the hotel. The city is built in a big valley, so the planes have to come up that, I suppose.

Tonight I´ll be flying to Guiyaquil, and then to Santiago. I need to figure out where I actually leave Ecuador (either Quito or Guayaquil). The airline routes in South America are more like the bus system back home - people get on and off the planes. You may or may not get kicked off the plane at an intermediatory airport. You may or may not know about the intermediate airport when you get your ticket....

Quito is also a bit high up. I think at 2400m ??. Enough to start getting short of breath. There´s a trolley bus system that has several lines running up and down the main valley.

Oh, while I remember, in Buenos Aires, in the equivalent to Queen Street mall, there was, at one point, a MacDonalds on one side, and then on the other, a Havanas (Cuban cigar) on the other. When I went past it a week and a half? ago, the cigar place had a lot more people in it.

Anyhow, after getting in late, I took a cab to the hotel, and spent the evening wandering around. BA seems to be pretty busy, lots of people out and about. I had an icecream for desert - yummo, the Argentinians know their stuff about all things beef.

Anyhow, tomorrow is another travel day, leaving early morning for a 10am flight, and probably finishing just before dinner, with a 2 hour time zone change as well... oh well, that's what it takes to get from one end of the continent to the other...

Antarctica was an awesome experience: fanastic scenery, environment, wildlife. Some of the highlights were: sitting in a zodiac listening to the glaciers move (very harmonious), camping out overnight one of the nights, the penguins, seals, and whales (well, two of them were orcas, technically dolphins, I think?); the icebergs, etc, etc.

Took way too many photos, but that probably was to be expected.

Tonight is back, sleeping on the ship, but then tomorrow morning I'm off to the airport to head up to Ecuador (via Buenos Aires).

Great stuff.