December 25, 2010

At last the rain stopped and it got a little bit warmer, somewhere between 15 and 20 degrees C ( 59 and 68 F) during the day. We used the opportunity to play some soccer in the morning with July and Yara. I might have a future career waiting for me as a sports photographer. I took this photo the very moment July scored on Helene:

Iseline and I also took a stroll around the neighborhood to get an idea of where we were. We are very close to the center of Villa La Angostura, just a 5 minute drive, yet we are in the countryside. The houses in the neighborhood are of different standards. These 3 are more or less neighbors:

Here is Jorge and Carmens house:

They have 3 dogs. One is Negra, who is quiet and likes to mind her own business:

Then there is Polaqua. She is also very quiet and her face makes her look a bit sad. She loves to be cuddled and will come and poke you until you do so:

Finally there is the blood hound, Cleto. He is one year old, in dog years he is only 7, and still a child, With his 70 kilos (150 pounds) and massive muscles this makes for an interesting combination, Can you imagine having a 70 kilo massively muscular 7 year old kid around the house? Cleto is just as clumsy as you would expect. He comes running towards you at maximum speed  (which is substantial) and doesn´t care to slow down before he hits you. He wanders too close to people and things and knocks everything and everyone with his hard-striking wagging tail:

Jorge was busy in the garden all morning preparing the Christmas Day lunch. He barbecued a whole goat kid:

At around 2pm the guests arrived, the neighbors, Fernando and Lili and Lili´s parents; Carmen and Juan Carlos. We had another great Christmas meal:

In the afternoon we went down to one of the many beaches of the enormous lake Nahuel Huapi which completely dominates the landscape here. Our surroundings are absolutely beautiful and reminds us very much of the French Alps. There are great views wherever you look:

even from the beach:

The water was a bit chilly and only Adrian, Iseline and Cleto dared to go in:

I took off my watch and put it in the water.

I got my watch as a gift when I held a presentation in Geneva 5 years ago and have come to love it. It is the watch equivalent of a Swiss Army Knife. It has a thermometer, a barometer showing air pressure tendency (and thus probability of good or bad weather), an altimeter and a compass. It is water tight down to 40 meters and in addition it shows the time.

More or less normal Norwegian swimming temperature; 16.2 C (61 F):

We just relaxed and had a good time at the beach:

In the evening we celebrated Adrian´s birthday. He turned 13 today! Unfortunately we only had one candle, so he had to blow it out thirteen times:

Later in the evening I misplaced my head. Luckily Helene found it on a shelf in the living room:

Whew! Close call.

Eirik

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