Graham Williams's Travel Writing

Colombia - the real risk

will — Thu, 24 May 2007 17:15:00 GMT

I’ve had a number of mails recently from people asking about safety in Colombia and I thought it would be useful to place things in context. The picture above is a chart in a Colombian bus station, which are displayed in all the bus stations in the country. On it are the names of the bus companies operating from that station and the number of passengers who were killed or injured travelling with them in the previous month. Every company managed to mangle someone. Of course Colombia, despite its reputation, is a fairly efficiently run place, so it can insist on these statistics being collected and displayed. Who knows what the figures would be in other countries in South America, let alone Africa or South Asia, where only the most spectacular crashes (body count 10+) make the headlines. Travelling on the roads anywhere in the developing world is risky, especially at night. It’s probably the most dangerous thing you will ever do. The risk of being robbed or kidnapped on a bus does exist in Colombia, as it does in other countries of the world; but this risk is dwarfed by those you run - just riding it in the first place.

When it's time to head home....

will — Sun, 29 Apr 2007 16:50:00 GMT

There comes a point in every trip when you realize that there are only a few weeks left and you have to come to terms with going home. For most of us that means reconnecting with their previous life and going back to work, the free and easy days of travel and doing what you want when you want are over. Arriving back can be a ghastly crash landing as I discovered after my first long period abroad. My friends were sitting in the same pub talking about their car sunroofs and had no comprehension of the experiences that I’d had, nor were they interested in finding out. To cap it all there was a pile of letters from the Inland Revenue waiting for me at home and the next day it was pouring with rain. It took a couple of weeks for me to reconnect with my old life. With a little planning, the trip back can be an enjoyable part of the whole travel experience; you may well be heading home with a new appreciation of what you are going back to; there will be friends and family to meet up with and simple and forgotten pleasures to be enjoyed. So make the most of it. Iron rule number one - always come home to some money. I have met people who were endlessly ringing up to change that last flight, prolonging their trip until there were as good as broke, with their cards maxed out. Trying to survive with almost no money is difficult in any country, your own is no exception. No matter how much in demand your skills may be, finding a job and actually getting a pay check is likely to take several weeks. Especially if you have been away for a long time, it’s nice to rediscover your home slowly, meet up with people and have a few drinks. Even simple expenses like getting about and paying for food will soon mount up, let along putting down deposits for flats or buying a car. Soon you will be regretting that extra rafting trip you took, when you are counting every penny. Try and plan coming home into your overall trip plan. I have always come home in the Spring, a positive time of year when you will feel like restarting your ‘home’ life again, and you have the summer ahead of you. If you have been in the tropics and you head home in the middle of winter, to dark days, cold and rain; there’s no way you are going to feel good about it. If you don’t feel that your backpacking days are over then you probably feel some regret at having to finish your trip, but try and get things in perspective. Look at your time at home as an interlude, a period where you can plan your next campaign and more importantly raise the cash to make it happen. I’ve always enjoyed the reading and scheming for the next trip almost as much as travelling itself. Always believe there will be a next time. Psyche yourself up for the change in lifestyle. Arrival home can be a nice surprise, think of all the things that you’ve missed while you were away, the company of family and friends. Even simple things can give a great deal of pleasure, small indulgences like having your favourite food or drink again. Make a list of these things while you are on the plane home. Arrival back in the ‘real’ world may be quite a shock especially if it is early morning and after a long flight. Try not to take on the world all at once. If you can, have a friend pick you up at the Airport and get some rest in a quiet place. There’s time enough to hit town later. When you do get out and about don’t expect anyone to really understand what you’ve experienced. For most people, travel is a two week holiday on a beach. Going off the beaten track or even being abroad for a long time is something that many people cannot get to grips with, and they probably won’t even make the attempt. Tell a couple of colourful anecdotes, which will keep most people interested and try not to go on and on about your trip. Many of your friends will be envious and you won’t endear yourself to people if you become in their eyes, a travel bore. You probably met some great people on your travels and many of them became friends. Some of them you will keep up with but be prepared for most of them to fall by the wayside, for the simple reason that the one thing you had in common with them- you were all travelling, no longer exists. My partner and I travelled in China with another English couple for several weeks before going our separate ways. Back in the UK we met them again by chance in a cinema queue. We exchanged news but after the film was over no arrangements were made to meet again as we all realized we had nothing more to say to each other. If you are returning to a rich, western country you will probably start appreciating it for the first time. After my first trip, where I lived in the Sudan for a year, I was just staggered when I got home by how rich Britain was. I’d supposed I’d never realized before. You may have been to countries with better weather or a more laid back lifestyle but if you living in any first world country in the early twenty first century, you have won a prize in life’s lottery. I’ve had rows with people at home when they come out with trivial moans about life, or rant on about how much tax they pay. Most of the world’s population would give their right arms to have their opportunities and problems. If you’ve seen women in Africa digging into riverbeds for water before carrying it for miles, you’re not going to have much time for people whinging about their mobiles not working. As T.S. Elliot put it, “to arrive where we started, and know the place for the first time.” Make the most of it.

The New India

will — Wed, 14 Mar 2007 07:32:00 GMT

I’ve now been in India for almost three months. It’s always been a favourite country of mine, a place that’s always been very good for the ‘WOW’ factor, always full of surprises. Even in the centre of the cities you can see people on the streets that looked like they’ve just walked out of the Old Testament or just come down from the hills of the North West frontier. Orange robed and painted fakirs wander around, as do lots of cows and even the occasional elephant. I was last here nine years ago and my first visit was in 1989, and what is really surprising is how little has changed over that time.

India is thought of in the west as the next economic powerhouse where the cheaper well educated workers will soon be taking all our jobs. Seeing the country as a traveler there is little evidence of all this, just an increased prosperity for some sections of the population. Just as everywhere in the world, everyone who can afford one now has a mobile phone, with five million new subscribers being added every month. There are lots more new cars on the road but they are easily outnumbered by scooters and motorbikes which are much more affordable. This has added to the noise and stress levels in towns as every scooter rider feels he (although sometimes she) has the right to drive down the street as fast as he can with horn blaring. The onus is on the pedestrians to get out of the way. In India every street supports a small pack of dogs (as well as a couple of cows), but what is really new are people having dogs as pets, mostly small breeds, as most Indians live in cramped houses. Their owners walk them in the streets on tight leashes, and often carry a big stick as well, to keep the rough street doggies away from their pooches.

India is a country that rejects rules and has an aversion to change; which has made it a land of great liberties. A European equivalent would be Italy. Laws may exist on the statue book but people only heed the ones that suit them or which they cannot get away with. Lax policing and a live and let live attitude keeps the whole system running. For example, drivers can and do pull out into the road, even major highways, without a signal or even bothering to look in their mirror (if they have one). There is an expectation that the traffic in the road will make way for them even if it risks an accident, and I’ve seen lots of close calls. Usually the only admonishment from the other drivers who have to swerve or brake will be a blast on the horn, because they know that the next time they also want to pull out, they will do exactly the same thing, and so life goes on - in a semi chaotic way.

When journalists write about the new India they are usually referring to the shiny new offices and businesses parks on the outskirts of the cities. These look like they have been dropped from somewhere in Europe and are full of earnest young people for whom the good times really are rolling. The middle classes have forsaken the trains and now get around country on the start up airlines that are competing hard for their business. Some of them (I particularly recommend Kingfisher Airlines) are really excellent. Another showcase of the New India is the Delhi Metro. This is work in progress with several lines being built that will by 2012 cover the whole city even reaching the international airport, (which technically is in another state), with most of the lines being built on cheaper elevated track. Most of this is being paid for by Japanese money, and unusually most of the equipment is imported rather than made in India. And it is impressive, unlike everywhere else in Delhi, it shines, you could eat your dinner off the floor in the stations and potted plants line the sides of the walls. Constant announcements tell people not to walk across the tracks(!), spit or throw rubbish and unusually for India, people heed them. One of reasons may be because security is so tight, with police with sub machine guns patrolling the trains and metal detector and bag searches just to get onto the platforms.

Outside these showcases life in India goes on much as it did when I first came here in 1989; this is particularly so in the countryside where most Indians still live. At dawn, people still walk out into the fields to do their ablutions; water comes from wells and bullock pull huge carts filled with straw. Cooking is done on Indian fuel cells which are made of cow dung mixed with straw and which are heaped in piles and sold on the side of the road. Also on the roadsides are brickworks where the bricks are still made by hand and fired in primitive kilns. The families who do this work live in the most desperate poverty, their ‘houses’ are little more than primitive tents made from rags and rubbish in the corner of the brickyard. One of the reasons these people live on the job, is because they cannot leave, they are indentured workers who work to pay off a past debt, sometimes from a previous generation, in conditions of virtual slavery. In one region I saw another agricultural/industrial process, the rendering down of sugar from sugar cane. These primitive factories on the roadsides crush the cane bought in from the surrounding fields with the ‘juice’ then boiled up in huge pans. Lines of these factories belching black smoke, with workers ladling the hot sugar out of the vats gives the impression of an early industrial scene, rather like the first days of Coalbrookdale. Yet this is modern India.

Where India is particularly unchanging is in anything in which the state is has any involvement, and as a hangover from the socialist planning era, it’s involved in a great deal. Its interests range from banks and insurance to (on a state level) running juice stands but by far its biggest interest is running the railways. Apart from there no longer being any steam engines around the railway system doesn’t seem to have changed at all over the last eighteen years. The train carriages have a chunky, metal, built to last feel to them, which is just as well as there doesn’t seem to been a penny of new investment for decades. Booking a berth involves filling in a cheap paper form then joining the queuing hoards so that someone can input your details into a seventies era computer system. Indian railways are the largest employer in the world with 1.6 million on the staff, and it looks just like a giant job creation scheme. As elsewhere in government run India, there are lots of ‘supervisors’ sitting around reading the paper and everyone knocks off for lunch. Surprisingly, the whole system does work very well, even if everything (even the journeys) usually happens very slowly.

In Delhi, Ambassador cars still line up outside the Lutyens Government buildings. These cars are based on the 1948 Morris Oxford design and are still made in India today. Although the President now has a BMW, the lower ranks will be motoring around in their sixty year old cars for some time. One of reasons Ambassador have kept on going is because they are strong enough to cope with India’s roads. Road widening is now commonly seen as the poor roads are seen as a brake on economic growth. Much of the digging work is done by (locally made) JCB’s, but a lot is still done by labourers, usually women who excavate earth in baskets and carry it away on their heads. What would these people do if they were all replaced by machines? In many ways everyone has a vested interest in resisting change, as doing these people out of their jobs who just mean more beggars living on the streets of the cities.

For the tourist India can be overwhelming, and it has certainly become a more stressful place to visit. Touts seem to be almost everywhere and the traveler is bombarded by questions all the time. ’Do you want a rickshaw?’ ‘Look in my shop?’ ‘What country?’ or simply ‘What do you want?’ Even more irritating are the people who seem to think they know want you want, so they give you orders like, ‘You need to go over there now’ or having supposedly read your mind, tell you where the ticket office is, even as you walk down the street minding your own business. Normally there is an ulterior motive for all this free advice, usually a postcard or rickshaw sales pitch. Add to all this, the children following you down the street shouting ‘Hello, Hello’ and tourists often feel they are under siege.

Also the Indian tourist industry hasn’t worked out what foreign tourists really want. So in a country awash with cheap labour, hotel walls are grubby, and things often look like they haven’t had a good clean for years. Of course if you pay out real money you can expect the best but for most Indians in the tourist trade, if they think they can offer it to you cheaply, then everything will be all right, no matter if every corner is cut. After all, it wouldn’t do to interfere with all that newspaper reading time. In Nepal, they’ve worked out the standards that tourists expect and consequently, overall, it offers a much better travel experience. Not surprisingly, it’s a country that allows foreigners to own a business, which pulls the standards up; in India this is almost impossible.

So what’s the future for India? The economy is supposed to be overheating and a downturn is expected. Inflation is on the increase and the Congress party recently got hammered in state polls because of the price of onions, which shows what really matters for most Indians. I think though, due to strength of numbers alone the economy will continue to grow and people will get richer in relative terms. I can’t imagine large parts of the country will be like the Delhi metro anytime soon; there are too many vested interests in keeping things the same. But the cities will become even more frantic, with more traffic and gridlock and the blare of the horns being heard on the other side of the world. See it now.

Namaste – Impressions of Nepal

will — Sun, 11 Mar 2007 07:22:00 GMT

Nepal has had rather a mixed press over the last few years; countries going through a Civil War tend not to be on the list of ‘must see’ places for most travelers. Since late 2006, the countryside has been quiet with the Maoists now in the government and their guerrilla army in camps. So now is the time to make that trip.

I was last in Nepal in 1998 and I had forgotten what a pleasant and welcoming country it is. Arriving from India the differences soon become apparent once you get past the border zone. The country is better tended, the streets for the most part are clean and there is less traffic and noise. When the people here say ‘Namaste’ (the all purpose greeting) they genuinely greeting you, not saying ‘Namaste’, would you like to look in my shop, do you want a taxi etc,etc. Women also play a bigger role in daily life, working in shops, taking part in discussions in the street and even waiting on tables, which gives the whole society a more mellow feel.

Where Nepal is far ahead of India is in the provision of tourist services. This is a country that lives on tourism and has worked out what tourists want. So the hotels really are clean and there really is hot water. Although the tourist menus are pretty much the same everywhere, the quality is consistently good. Even up in the villages on the trekking trails you can always get something tasty to eat.

In Pokhara I was surprised by how much the Lakeside tourist area had expanded, obviously things had been going well until the downturn during the war. What was very different were the tourists themselves. On my last visit, most of the tourists and trekkers were European, now they are outnumbered two to one by Asian travelers. The Nepali’s had worked out that if the Westerners were going to be scared off , they should try and attract tourists from countries closer to home, where people were keen to travel - like the Chinese. Nepal offers free Visas to the Mainland Chinese and there are direct flights to Kathmandu while the Koreans have direct charter flights all through the peak season. Many businesses had signs up in Chinese, Japanese and Korean and some restaurants and hotels catered only for one particular nationality.

The Chinese were mainly groups of young women (I suppose the men are all at home building the economic miracle), all of whom spoke good English and were from the prosperous Eastern cities. They are all kitted out in brand new outdoor clothes and nearly all carried a big digital camera. Unfortunately, city life had not prepared them for the rigours of mountain trekking, and even with guides and porters carrying their bags, many of them found it very hard work. As one poor girl said to me as she was helped through the snow by a porter, ‘I don’t think I’m going to make it out of these mountains alive!’

No doubt these are the vanguard of the new Chinese middle class tourists, who as more countries open up to them, we will be bumping into more and more often around the world. This is great as they are pleasant and good company.

Despite the tourists coming back, there are still signs everywhere of the problems the country has had. Army posts and principal buildings are surrounded by coils of razor wire and heavily armed soldiers man sand bagged gun emplacements. The Maoists are now part of the government and their soldiers have surrendered their arms to the UN on a temporary/permanent basis. What they need now are jobs. To help things along the USA has now cut their aid budget to Nepal by 25% as it regards the Maoists as ‘terrorists’, which will make things interesting if they should win the forthcoming election. I didn’t dare ask the young Chinese what they thought of Maoism, no doubt they would have no idea what it meant and the great helmsman himself would just be a figure from history.

With the new government and the removal of the monarchy from power the ‘Royal’ word is being expunged from society, so the Royal has been painted out of some of the signs for what was the ‘Royal Chitwan National Park’. It was interesting to see that many businesses and houses, particularly up in the mountains, had pictures of the Royal family on the walls. Unfortunately all those in the picture died on the same night on 1^st June 2001 when they were gunned down by the Royal Prince. It seems that the Royal Family per se were quite popular, hence all those pin ups, it was the last King, the evil uncle Gyanendra who really alienated the country.

As elections are on the way, various interested interests are jockeying for position. In Nepal that means that if you are traveling around the country you will soon be taking part in the great Nepali Participation event – the road block or strike. My trip was delayed a couple of times by bus strikes, which doesn’t always mean the drivers are on strike but that the main roads have been blocked by stone wielding youths. I had the same thing happen when I was last in Nepal so nothing much has changed in that regard. On one journey on this trip I had to wait for a couple of hours in a mini van because of a road block. This had been caused by a bus hitting and injuring some children as it passed through a road side village. Given the terrible standard of Nepali driving, this sort of thing is fairly common; I saw the wreck of one bus that had crashed into a river valley a few days previously, killing 16 people, and two overturned Lorries on one 100 km stretch of main road. In a country with no third party insurance this means that the local lads blockade the road until some agreement for compensation is made, which involves getting a senior policeman from the nearest main town, plus a couple of passing monks to make a deal with a bunch of emotional youths. This all takes a long time.

Most of these kinds of problems can happen in any third world country; I endured plenty of such incidents when traveling in the Andes last year. What Nepal does offer is a World Class outdoor experience, from trekking with varying degrees of difficultly, rafting, mountain biking and paragliding. It also has accessible wildlife in the Chitwan National Park and historic towns. This along with affordable and good quality services for tourists and very friendly people make it a great country to travel in. So don’t let recent headlines stop you from making the trip, like me you will find yourself going back again and again.

To see pictures click here

Learning to cook Indian, in India

will — Wed, 14 Feb 2007 09:14:00 GMT

I really enjoy Indian food but had never considered cooking it at home; after all if I wanted to eat it, it always seemed easier to walk out to an Indian restaurant or pick up the phone and order a take away, than go to the trouble of making it myself. Unlike say cooking Italian where the food is simple and familiar, Indian recipes always seemed so daunting, with their endless lists of ingredients which are usually a pinch of this or a gram of that, including many things I'd never heard of and all of which have to combined together in just the right way. Even if I was able to amass all these spices, it seemed such an effort - best to leave it to the experts.

When I arrived in Udaipur in Rajasthan, I found that quite a few places offered Indian Cookery lessons, so I it seemed a good opportunity to discover the mysteries of making a good curry, is it really that difficult and if so how can the local take away knock one together in twenty minutes? So I signed up for two three-hour lessons at two separate schools, as they both offered slightly different dishes.

My first class ⁽¹⁾ was with Shakti, a chef who taught from behind a workbench with a gas stove and a chopping board. Helpfully he had mirrors arranged on the walls so that you could see what he was doing and what was cooking without having to stand up. As there were only three of us in the class we all had a go at donning the apron and having a go. Also provided was a printout with idiot-proof instructions to making the dishes. What was good about this school was that Shakti had an assistant who could prepare things while the lesson was going on, so there were no delays getting ingredients ready. The School had been running for seven years and when they first started all the pupils had to make the dishes from scratch; this meant that some classes lasted up to eight hours while the pupils had their turn boiling up their potatoes or whatever

Firstly we were introduced to the ‘Spice Box’ a large round metal tin with seven smaller tins inside that held the basic spices, which most dishes contain. Some of them are familiar, like Red Chilli Powder, while others like Fenugreek Seeds are not. Apparently they can all be bought in Indian delis around the world.

The base ingredients of most dishes are also quite simple, mashed onions and garlic and some of the basic spices cooked together in cooking oil make up most of the ‘gravy’ in Indian dishes; just adding tomato paste to this makes the base for tomato dishes. From there adding vegetables, meat or Indian cheese (Paneer) allows you to make many of the dishes Westerners are familiar with. We also learnt to make Korma, which uses the base spices and ingredients plus cream, ground seeds and coconut powder.

Other straightforward dishes that can be learnt in a three-hour lesson are Vegetable Cutlets, Biryani Rice and rotis (chapattis). Rotis are incredibly simple to make, just flour and water mixed into a dough and rolled out, then heated in a dry saucepan.

On the second day I went to another school ⁽²⁾ where the lessons were given by Shree, a woman who had also been teaching for seven years and who claimed to be the first person in Udaipur to start cooking lessons. She had a kitchen classroom worthy of any TV chef, with a large cooking bench and spices and ingredients arrayed on the shelves around her. Unfortunately, a very much simpler recipe handout was only given to us at the end of the lesson, so we spent a lot of the time making notes. Also Shree did everything herself, so a lot of time as taken up with her preparing ingredients.

This lesson was more of a cookery demonstration than a lesson, the four us in the class didn’t get to do much apart from make our own Samosas. Again these are fairly simple, rolled out dough is folded into triangles and filled with a potato/spice mix and then fried (although they can be baked). Getting the edges to stick is the tricky part.

Again we had the introduction to the Spice Box, which slightly different from the day before, I guess you learn what you use the most as you do more cooking. We also learnt some old favourites like Dal, which again is the basic spice, onion/garlic mix plus lentils, plus another paneer (cheese) dish.

Of course at the end of the lessons you get to eat all this tasty food for lunch.

If you are interested in Cookery and are travelling in India I would recommend heading to Udaipur and trying a basic class. If you are really interested, both the schools I attended offered longer courses and speciality courses, such as for South Indian dishes. Surprisingly, for one of the world’s great cuisines I found it very difficult to find out information on Cookery Classes in India and Udaipur is the only city I’ve been to that has a choice of schools. I guess Indians take it all for granted. Also most Westerners believe that if you want Indian food at home, it’s a lot easier to pick up the phone and order that take away, than trying to make it yourself. Dare to be different.

¹Indian Spice Box, 38 Lal Ghat, Udaipur,Ragastahan. Ph: 0091 294 2424713

²Sushma’s Cooking Classes, 35 Lal Ghat, Udaipur, Ragasthan. Ph: 0091 294 2420163

Security for Travelers - staying safe on the Road

will — Sun, 24 Dec 2006 06:51:00 GMT

Many travelers have some apprehension when go abroad, especially if they are traveling for the first time. Despite what you may think from the media, most people’s trips are trouble free and violence against tourists is particularly rare. Of course there is a level of crime everywhere, but most of this is opportunistic; criminals just like everyone else, look for the easy option and generally don’t want any trouble themselves. By taking simple precautions you can do a lot to keep yourself and your processions safe. These notes are based on my travel experiences over thirty years and ninety five countries and particularly on my current trip through Central and South America and Africa, and are aimed at independent travelers on a budget. A lot of these tips may just seem like common sense, but that often seems in short supply and a lot of people get into trouble because they don’t think about what they are doing. Please feel free to add new comments; criminals are inventive and there are always new scams and tricks.

Protecting your valuables

What do you carry that would give you the most hassle if you were to lose them? For most travelers these are their Passport, Money (either in cash or credit/debit cards) and their air ticket home, if they have one, and these are the things which you must do the most to protect. You should keep them in a money belt under your clothes, if the thieves can’t see them, they can’t steal them and NEVER in a bag which you are carrying. I have met several people who put their valuables in a bag which they then left on a rack on a night bus, and were surprised when it was stolen. Of course, thieves know about money belts but they are very difficult to steal without direct confrontation. Have a cheap wallet to carry only the money that you need that day and avoid opening your money belt during the day, particularly on the street, do it in a toilet. Never put you wallet in your back pocket. There are now lots of clothes aimed at travelers that have zipper pockets, and although they aren’t completely secure are better than just carrying a purse or wallet loose. A variation on the money belt is the leg wallet which you carry on your leg, which you can buy in travel shops. Another way to conceal your cash is using tubagrip, an elasticated bandage, which you wrap around your leg with you valuables (inside a plastic bag) inside. This is not that comfortable and I only use in very dangerous cities or on night buses. It is however, very secure, I have been frisked at Airports and my stuff has not been found. Buy the largest size of tubagrip and experiment.

Instead of carrying your valuables around it is usually safer to put them in a hotel safe, if they have one. Assess if you feel comfortable about doing this, if they put them in a draw in reception and the person on the desk is often away, you may be better off carrying them. Theft by hotel staff is also a possibility; usually just a few notes are taken which is not so obvious. Some hotels seal your valuables with tape and have you sign across the seals to prevent this happening and you could insist on this. In particularly dangerous cities, like Mexico City or Rio de Janeiro, it is always better to leave valuables in the hotel safe. Never leave them in a hotel room not even for the shortest time. I met one traveler (in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania) who left her room for fifteen minutes to have breakfast. In that time her room had been turned over (probably by the staff) and her valuables and gadgets taken.

Everyone now seems to carry a couple of gadgets, ipods, cameras, phones and even laptops; these are all highly prized by thieves - everywhere. If you are traveling for a long time you may want to consider trading down some of your toys, like buying a cheap phone just for your trip. Is photography important for you, or could you make do with a compact camera? Again only use them when you have to, if they can’t see them etc. Flashy jewelry will get you noticed everywhere. I traveled on a truck through Africa with a man who wore a $5000 Swiss watch on his wrist; in those kinds of places I make do with a $20 digital. Some insurers, like World Nomads offer cover for gadgets.

Protecting your bags

Like most budget travelers I carry a rucksack and it is worth considering security when you go to buy yours. Try and get one with an internal frame, where the bag is riveted to the metal frame inside the pack. You can then get a flexible metal cable (sold at bike shops) and a padlock and secure you bag to immovable objects. This is particularly useful when you are traveling on buses and trains as you can padlock your pack to the luggage rack or bus hold. I’ve been on a bus (in India) where people have arrived and their bags did not, thrown off the roof somewhere along the way. It is also good if you are staying in dorms where you can padlock the pack to the bed, even if the thieves get your clothes at least they won’t be able to carry them off in your rucksack. Another scam this prevents (from Lima, Peru) is a thief getting into a hostel and throwing the packs out of the window to an accomplice in the street.

On my most recent trip I have been using a Pacsafe, which is a steel wire mesh which you wrap around you pack and secure with a padlock. This can also then be attached to things. The wire mesh stops your bag being slashed open when you can’t see it, like in the hold of a bus. I also put my gadgets in my pack when I leave them in my room which is wrapped in the Pacsafe and then padlocked to the bed. The disadvantages of Pacsafe are that its quite fiddlerly to put on and it weighs around 1kg. They are also quite expensive at around $100 each. Even a rucksack cover will stop little fingers opening zips when you are standing around.

It is important to bear in mind that all physical defenses will be defeated, given enough time and the right tools and knowledge but padlocks and wire will deter the opportunist thief; you don’t see many people wandering around with saws and wire cutters. The harder it is for them, the less likely you are to lose your bag. Try and buy good quality locks, cheap combination locks particularly, often go wrong and you may end up having to saw them off yourself (as I had to recently). It is useful to carry a padlock or even two of different sizes, to lock up lockers in hostels or even hotel room doors, sometimes a padlock is the only lock on a room and it would be safer to use your own. Keep the spare keys in your money belt or with your partner if you are traveling with someone else.

Always be careful who you give your rucksack too. One traveler I met (in Ecuador) had given her bag to a man in a hotel lobby, thinking he worked at the hotel. She then started walking up the stairs to her room, just in time to see him run out of the door with her pack. Never give your bag to anyone in a rail or bus station unless you are certain they are legitimate. I don’t even allow taxi drivers to touch my pack.

Another simple precaution against bag snatchers, especially for day packs is to use some paracord to attach them to things. You can buy cord and carabineers in most outdoor stores. Use them to clip your bags to a table or chairs, then if some tries to run off with it they either can’t move it or they take some extra furniture with them. On night buses I clip my day pack using paracord to my belt, making it difficult for people to move it without me knowing.

Daypacks are vulnerable to being pulled off your shoulder if you only have one strap on, either wear them on the front of your body or wear it with both straps on (and the belt if it has one). You can buy small padlocks to lock the zips together, which will deter the opportunistic thief.

Safety when traveling

Railway and bus stations, and increasingly Airports are particular hangouts for thieves. This is a universal truth, no matter how developed the country they attract the lowlifes; I was almost robbed standing in a queue in the Frankfurt Central Station. These are always places where you need to keep a close eye on your processions and try and be alert. These are also places where you will get the most hassle, from touts and taxi drivers, stand your ground and take your time. Avoid arriving at them at night. In many countries (like Mexico) there is a system of checking bags into the hold of the bus, and you are given a ticket to present when you reach your destination. Bags checked in this way are usually secure, it’s usual to tip the bag checkers.

One way to avoid a lot of problems is to not travel at night. There is a risk of theft but a far bigger risk is having an accident. Traveling on a bus in a third world country is probably the most dangerous thing you will ever do, crashes with fatalities are not unusual and are much more common at night. Of course your stuff is at more risk as you are likely to be half asleep and it’s difficult to see what’s going on when the bus stops. Unfortunately, in many countries you have little choice as long distance buses only go at night. Trains are much safer, as are planes.

Although flying may be a smarter way to travel, this does not mean that there aren’t opportunistic thieves wandering around Airports. Always keep a close eye on your bags. Many airports offer plastic wrapping for bags and it is worth the couple of dollars to have this done, as rucksacks are particularly vulnerable to theft by luggage handlers, and this should deter most of them. It is not foolproof though, I wrapped my pack to fly to Johannesburg Airport (which is notorious for theft) and left a carabineer on the strap. When I picked the bag up, someone had made a hole in the plastic and stolen the carabineer, worth about $4!

City metros and subways carry their own risks, there are lots of crowds and pickpockets are active. One of the few times I was robbed was on the metro in Mexico City (which has bad reputation for crime) where a gang of men charged into my back when the doors were closing and went through my pockets. They managed to take my guidebook and were very intimidating so I got off at the next stop. Don’t expect other passengers to get involved. Although pickpockets are everywhere, bag slashing is not as common and I have only ever seen one example on the MTR in Hong Kong. Metros which are safe by day can be very dangerous at night, even in relativity safe cities, at night it’s usually safer to take a taxi.

Taxis are usually recognizable the world over, they are black or yellow or have a big sign on top, and most taxi drivers are friendly and hardworking people. However there is problem in some countries with people getting into taxis which are not driven by legitimate taxi drivers but by thieves. It is too easy to stick a ‘Taxi’ sign in the window of a car and pick up some tourists and then rob them. Some towns have a particular reputation for this, Cochabamba in Bolivia for one. In Cusco in Peru, official taxis have a large black and yellow checkerboard design painted on their doors, as illegal taxis were a particular problem there. Find out the plates or registration stickers legitimate taxis should have displayed in the place in the country/town you are in; and don’t get in a car that doesn’t have them.

People are more likely to get in an unofficial taxi late at night, when they are tired or pissed and what to get home. Not surprisingly, this is when most of the robberies happen. Apart from just sticking a knife or gun in your face and asking for your cash, victims are often taken to an ATM and ordered to take out money. This often happens around midnight as the robbers can then take you to another ATM and get you to take out the next day’s daily limit. In countries where this type of crime is a problem, like Brazil, ATM’s only dispense small amounts during night hours.

Usually illegal taxis pick up the drivers ‘friend’ who robs you while the driver drives. In many countries legitimate collective and shared taxis are common. Find out the local protocol, or insist you want the taxi to yourself. If it’s not usual to share a taxi and someone else gets in, try and get out of it as soon as you can.

Some legitimate taxi drivers and not above some theft (apart from the fares) like driving off with your rucksack. If you are traveling alone, try and put your bag in the back seat of the taxi and sit next to it, avoid putting it in the boot (trunk). If there are two of you, use the following drill. When you hail a taxi wait for the driver to get out and come to the back of the car to open the boot. One person then gets in the car while the other puts the bags in. Wait for the driver to close the boot and walk back to the front of the car, then the second person gets in. When you get to your destination, wait for the driver to get out of the car and walk to the back. One person then gets out and starts taking the bags out; the second person then gets out. Never hand over any cash (find out the fare and get the money ready while you are in the car) until you and your bags are out of the taxi.

Protecting yourself – staying safe on the Street

Most people traveling are on holiday, they are relaxed usually not thinking about looking out for danger on the street. Again most places in the world are safe and walking down the street or sitting in a café will present no danger at all but there are places where they do and where you should be on your guard. Some countries and cities (Barcelona springs to mind) are well known for street crime, and in these places you should be on your guard.

If you travel long enough you should build up a street sense - you will spot the group of youths on the street corner who may spell trouble, and learn to avoid problems. As ever the risks of being robbed on the street go up at night and in some places it’s always safer to take a cab. If you can’t find a ride and have to walk in a town late at night, don’t draw attention to yourself. Don’t talk or use a torch (flashlight) unless you have to. If there is no traffic, walk down the middle of the road to avoid anyone hiding in shadows. Don’t forget to look behind you.

Walking around in any city, you should try and be aware of your surroundings and the people around you. Try and look confident and alert and walk with purpose. In some places it helps not to look like a tourist, although this can be difficult (like in Africa if you are white) and to carry a big camera or a guide book. I usually wear shoes or boots when walking around cities as against sandals or flip flops. That way I can run from or after people. If you wear flip flops and a mugger stamps on your foot and grabs your bag there is not much you are going to do about it.

One method to get at your wallet that seems to be universal is the bird shit trick. This is where one guy sprays mustard (or some other nasty substance) on you; his accomplices then surround you and ‘help’ you to brush it off. As they do so they go through your pockets then run off. It’s never happened to me but apparently it’s done very quickly. If you feel something land on you (and it may be real bird shit) put your hand on your wallet or bag and get away from any ‘helpers’ as fast as you can.

Another common scam is the bogus policeman. A man approaches you in the street and pulls out what looks like Police ID; he then says he wants to search you. He then either finds your wallet or moneybelt and helps himself or he plants drugs on you. A variation is the bogus policeman tells you to get into a car, he needs to take you to the policestation. You are then taken somewhere remote and robbed, although I have heard of the thieves (in Ecuador) creating a bogus policestation, so as to hold their victims longer and extract information like PIN numbers. If you are stopped by someone claiming to be a plainclothes policeman start looking around for a policeman in uniform and insist on finding one. Start shouting if you have to, this should usually get rid of the bogus ones. Whatever you do don’t get into a car.

When arriving in a town, ask at your hotel which areas are safe to walk in, particularly at night. If the locals say don’t go there - don’t go there. For example, the safe area of a tourist town like Cusco is a couple of blocks in the centre; away from there the streets quickly become dark and dangerous. Even in the most crime ridden cities most of the problems are in areas where tourists have no reason to go, and the violence is between the locals, usually gangs. If you want to see these areas (like South African townships) go on a tour.

If you are going for a night out on the sauce, try and go with someone else or better still in a group. It would help if one of the group stays reasonably sober to sort out transport or problems later on, a sort of designated minder. If you walk home late even in a group, try not to draw attention to yourselves like yelling or singing. Walking alone, pissed and late at night is a recipe for disaster just about anywhere on earth.

Some cities have reputations for crime that go before them; think of San Paulo (Brazil), Johannesburg (South Africa) or Manila (Philippines). Consider if you need to stay in these cities and if not don’t go, there are often towns close by which are safer and if you want to see a particular sight, either visit on a day trip or take a tour.

Don’t underestimate the risk of street crime in countries that are usually regarded as safe. The only time I’ve seen someone robbed in broad daylight (in a park on a Sunday afternoon) was in Boston USA. The only time I’ve ever seen a policeman go for his gun was on a Saturday morning in downtown Vancouver, which is quite a risky place anyway.

No matter how careful you are there may time when you are confronted by some robbers wheedling guns or knives. Unless you think you can make a run for it there is not much you can do, apart from do what they say, despite how unpleasant that may be. Handing over some cash should be enough in most cases, don’t give them an opportunity to rough you up or search you. Muggers also want quick results and no trouble, its best just to get the whole thing over quickly and learn from your mistake. Don’t underestimate the threat a knife poses, you are just as likely to receive a lethal wound from a knife as a gun.

ATMs (Autoteller machines or ‘Hole in the Wall’ ) have become the easiest way for travelers to get at their cash when they are abroad. In most countries using them is straightforward and poses little risk. They are very tempting for thieves, as they can not only steal the cash you have taken out but with a little effort steal what you have in your account as well, so some care needs to be taken.

I usually try and check out a couple of ATM’s when I arrive in a town, firstly to check they take my card and for security. Always use them in daylight hours. I always try and find one that is inside a bank, and if it has a guard all the better. Also then, if the machine ‘eats’ your card you can get it back. Second best is a machine in a lobby and the worst option is one directly on the street. Always have your card in your pocket ready, don’t go digging around in your money belt. Check the card slot for anything unusual, pieces of tape or plastic or an appendage that shouldn’t be there. Stand in front of the machine to stop anyone seeing your PIN number. If there are two of you one should look out into the bank or lobby to see if anyone is taking an undue interest in what you are doing. Travelers are often robbed the same day they have been to an ATM. In some countries (like South Africa) where PIN theft is a problem, screens have been put in front of the machines to stop people seeing your PIN. If anyone approaches you and offers to ‘help’, walk away. If I’m in a bank I put the cash away in my money belt, if in the street I put it in my pocket with my hand over it and walk quickly back to my hotel and sort things out there. If you are staying in a town for some time, vary the times of day you get out money or use different machines.

Never hand your card over to anyone in a foreign bank; they should normally have no reason to see it. One scam I heard of (in Ecuador) is a smartly dressed man looking like a bank official, comes up and says there is a problem with your card. He carries a hand held card reader and swipes your card though it, this captures all the data on it including your PIN. He gives it back and later makes a copy of your card and empties your account.

Never give anyone your PIN number. This may seem very obvious, but I did meet one traveler who used to give her card and PIN to her friends to save herself the trouble of going to the cashpoint. She got cured of this habit when a ‘friend’ of one of her friends completely cleaned out her account, having ‘borrowed’ her card while they were all at a party. This was in the USA.

Cons have been around since the dawn of time. They come in and out of fashion and many are particular to certain countries. Usually a well spoken man or woman spins a hard luck story about how if you give them some money then can then find or free up something and you stand to make a fortune, all it needs is some of your cash. Most people’s inboxs receive these kinds of messages; when you travel you get them delivered in person. There are always enough greedy and stupid people around to make these cons worthwhile. If it sounds too good to be true, it is.

One con that has been around ever since I have been traveling (it’s probably of ancient lineage) is the Gemstone/Ruby scam, and is fairly common in Thailand and South America. A man tells you that due to family problems he needs some money fast so he is forced to sell his collection of gemstones (usually Rubies). If you buy them, when you get home you can sell them at a much higher price, and make a big profit for your trouble. There are various variations on this theme. This con can be quite elaborate, you can be taken to a (bogus) Jeweler to have the gems value verified, and grand certificates can be produced. You hand over the cash and when you get them home you find out they’re glass, or in one case I heard, red plastic from the stop light on a car polished up. It’s amazing that people are still falling for this old chestnut.

Hotels and Hostels.

I have not had anything stolen from a hotel room as far as I can remember and in most cases hotels and hostels are owned by honest people who don’t want trouble. In some parts of the world where crime is a problem, many of them employ guards and bars on the window come as standard. Hostels particularly, are careful about who they allow in off the street. Although there is the risk of theft from staff, and you should not tempt them by leaving valuables around, most theft is by walk in thieves. Note the precautions above concerning locking your rucksacks up and carrying your valuables in your money belt. Try and assess how safe a place is when you check in, that’s also the time to find out how you would get out of the place if it caught fire. In some countries fire regulations and precautions are non existent and some countries (like the Philippines) have a reputation for hotel fires.

Usually the less secure places like beach huts are the most vulnerable to theft, particularly if the thieves know that everyone is at a party. Generally I always carry my room key with me, the staff will nearly always have a duplicate but it prevents the walk in thief from helping themselves if the reception is unattended.

One trick I heard of (in Colombia) is thieves using poles with hooks to lift valuables out of hotel room windows, which they do even when people are asleep in the room. Keep your gadgets in your pack; I always sleep with my money belt under my pillow.

The higher class hotels are not immune to theft; the pickings are usually better there with most business travelers carrying a laptop and phone. Once I was staying at a conference hotel in a leafy suburb (in the UK) and a thief got in via an open window and stole the MD’s suits. He had to go to dinner in his track suit!

Staying in dorms implies an element of trust between travelers and usually you should have no problems. The era of the traveler who seemed to exist on practically nothing and knew the price of everything seems to have passed. They had often been on the road for years and were the sort of people that you had to watch out for. Although they are not so obvious, there are still travelers who supplement their funds by stealing off others. Never tell other travelers how much money you have or where you keep your valuables, or allow them to keep hold of them, unless you are absolutely certain you can trust them. In hostels it’s usually safer to allow the hostel to look after your valuables or use a locker and your own padlock.

The Nature of risk

If you have read everything above you are probably thinking that traveling abroad is very dangerous and if you haven’t traveled before you may be reconsidering your trip. In the West we have been conditioned by the media to think that crime is everywhere, yet in Europe, Australia and most of North America you would be unlucky to be a victim of a crime, particularly a violent one. Most of the crime in developing countries occurs in areas where most travelers never go, and although in some places tourists are targeted, the locals are much more likely to be victims. If you use your common sense there is no reason why you shouldn’t have a trouble free trip. I have just traveled in South America for nine months with no problems, nor did I personally meet anyone who had been robbed. Considering the numbers of travelers there are scattered across the world the odds of you having any trouble are very low, just use your common sense, heed the precautions above and have a great time.

For up to date information on the risk of traveling in different countries, look at travel bulletin boards like Lonely Planets Thorn Tree, or the scams and robberies section of World Nomads Journals. The British Foreign Office and the US State Department’s advice to travelers are full of useful information on areas that are risky and they often know about the latest cons in circulation.

South Africa – the Backpacker Experience

will — Sat, 23 Dec 2006 09:14:00 GMT

For most of 2006 I have been traveling in South America as a backpacker and had enjoyed how easy it was to travel there. The quality of budget hotels was good and transport was affordable and mainly comfortable. In most cities I went around by cab as these were plentiful and cheap. Living there on a budget was easy. From South America I was traveling onto South Africa.

I had been to South Africa in 2000 so I knew that traveling there would be more of a challenge compared to South America. My first visit was a two week holiday and I hired a car and drove around KwaZulu Natal, this time I was staying a month and traveling as a backpacker on a budget. What was interesting was that South Africa is perceived as being very backpacker friendly and a must on many travelers’ counties to visit, yet the reality is quite different.

The social situation in South Africa where the whites have most of the money while the blacks do not, throws up a host of problems for the traveler, not least with transport. Firstly, white people don’t walk – anywhere; they go everywhere by car and only the very poorest use public transport. When I arrived in Pretoria, the hostel manager had no idea of how I could get to the center on public transport; she had only ever been there by car. So as a white backpacker you have to use the transport the blacks’ use, which are shared mini vans which you hail on the street; or the rare regular city buses. The problem with the mini buses is that they don’t run regular routes and don’t have destination signs, so you may have to take a couple to get near where you want to go, and there is an element of risk, not only of crime but also of accidents. Suburban trains (with a few exceptions) are regarded as too dangerous for whites to use even in daytime. Taxis are rare and expensive, whites don’t use them, and blacks can’t afford them. Some sights, particularly the ones which may be on the outskirts of a town are pretty much out of bounds to backpackers as there are no convenient or cheap way to get to them. To get to some places, the only way is to pay out for a tour.

Some of these gaps are filled in big tourist towns like Cape Town by companies like Riki taxis, which cater to tourists but only go to certain areas. If you want to go to Kirsentbosch Botanical Gardens (the third most visited sight in Cape Town) you will have to get a group together and hire a Riki taxi, or go on a tour. There are a couple of public buses a day, early in the morning and late in the afternoon for the convenience of domestic workers, not tourists. If you want to go to somewhere unusual, like the Rhodes memorial, forget it. I ended up walking there.

Traveling long distance is easier; there are some good quality long distance bus companies that travel between the main cities. However if you want to go somewhere off the beaten track, you will either have to hire a car or go on the ‘Baz Bus’. The Baz Bus travels on a couple of routes and drives between backpacker hostels, many of which are outside of towns and so difficult to get too affordably. Most of Baz Bus’s marketing empathizes how safe and fun it is, what they should be pointing out is the obvious truth – you haven’t got a rats chance of getting to half these places, unless you go on the Baz Bus. Of course there are some downsides to this, the fares are not cheap (almost double what you would pay for the same distance on a regular bus), you have to stay on the fixed route and you have no flexibility, you have to travel when the Baz Bus leaves.

I carried a couple of guide books and I was interested in seeing the main sights in each city. What I quickly discovered in Pretoria is that I was almost the only white person walking around in the centre of the town. This was quite unnerving and I got some hostile looks. I was almost mugged walking out of the central station in Cape Town at six in the evening, as again I was the only white face around. At most of the tourist sights I went to like the Union Buildings or Paul Kruger’s house, the only other tourists I saw had arrived on a tour. Whites don’t walk, particularly in the Central Business Districts, where many of the sights are, yet none of the guide books mention this.

Another aspect of the divide in society is that internet facilities and international phones are difficult to find. Whites have PC’s and phones at home, blacks can’t afford them and don’t make international calls, so there is not much provision. Compared to South America, using the internet was very expensive, which is not likely to help the South Africa’s development. In tourist areas of Cape Town it is easier to find internet cafes but they’re still not cheap. As a general rule of thumb, the richer the country the more difficult and expensive it is to use the internet. It was only when I got up to Tanzania that it really became affordable again.

Unlike South America, most budget travelers in South Africa can’t afford to stay in regular hotels, so ‘Backpacker’ hostels have been developed to cater for them. Most of them offer a bed, usually in a dorm and basic facilities, some of them very basic indeed. As they cater for backpackers you would assume that they offer a good deal but this is not always the case. One or two I stayed in were little better than slums. If you only stay in Backpackers you will only ever meet other backpackers and the same goes for traveling on Baz Bus. South Africa has a good network of guesthouses and B and B’s, usually a room in someone’s home, but often of a very high quality. If you are traveling as a couple it is worth checking these out, as they often have some good deals. Even traveling alone I stayed in some great guest houses for little more than I would have paid in a backpackers. The word ‘Backpacker’ in the name of a hostel or anything else, does not always mean that you are getting a good deal, yet many travelers accept them at face value and wouldn’t consider staying anywhere else.

South Africa is a wonderful country and would like to go back and see more of it but as a budget traveler it is not an easy country to travel in, hence the irony that it has become a great backpacker destination. It reminds me of Australia, another backpacker favourite and another country where traveling is hard work and expensive. The quality of the travel experience in other parts of the world like South America and South East Asia is much higher than in South Africa or Australia. If you are considering where to go in the world, bare this in mind.

Zanzibar

will — Sat, 16 Dec 2006 08:16:00 GMT

Zanzibar, even the name has an exotic ring to it and conjures up images of Sultans, Spices and Slaves. One of the great island ports of the mystic east, ships traded the goods of Africa, the Middle East, and India and out across the Indian Ocean to the Far East and the Spice Islands. Even now as the Dhows with their lanteen sails ply the waters between island and mainland you get that sense of the past, when these same boats traded to Arabia and the sub continent which one senses are only just over the horizon.

Zanzibar glory days are now behind it and as much of its wealth was based on slavery this is perhaps no bad thing. Its existence as in independent Sultanate has also ended and it’s now part of Tanzania although travelers still have to show their passports on entry and are stamped in as if it were entering a separate state.

Much of Zanzibar’s attraction lies in its position and its distinctive culture. The landscape and people of Tanzania are what most would think of as Africa, the animals, the savanna landscapes and the colourful tribes; but by then making the short trip to Zanzibar you are suddenly dropped into another world, one that is Arab and Muslim. It is the juxtaposition with the African that makes it such an interesting contrast.

Arriving in Stone Town is to enter an ancient Arab city a warren of small streets and squares. Although such places are found all over North Africa, the smallness and randomness of it all marks is out as special when compared to the sprawl of mainland towns across the straits. Wandering around is a delight, the narrow streets have a vague order but by taking a wrong turn you can end up on the other side of town from where you started but it doesn’t matter, as the town is too small for you to get really lost. Along the sea front are grand houses, some now luxury hotels with wonderfully green and refreshing gardens lining the road behind them. The streets are full of those small shops so distinctive of the Arab world, selling non perishable essentials like washing powder and tea, although some areas are now given over to shops selling to tourists. Each street seems to have a small mosque in it, which are often not obvious as I discovered one morning when I was blasted out of bed at a quarter to five in the morning by the Muezzins call to prayer from the mosque which was just across the street. This is town where life is lived on the streets, people sit out on their doorsteps at all hours of the day, talking and drinking tea. The men are traditionally dressed with the dish dash and round hats, while the women are completely covered. At some times of day the streets are filled with children as they pour out of the madrasahs, which are often located being ornate wooden doors, all dressed like miniature versions of their parents.

From Stone Town I took a bus up to the north of the island to the village of Nungwi. The bus traveled through a lush green land of small villages and for some reason, lots of police checkpoints. Nungwi is a large traditional village which also happens to have a beach resort attached. The coast all around the northern tip is now being developed at an enormous rate and some of luxury hotels there are very big indeed. Land at the coast is now at a premium and one plot was recently sold for a million dollars. The business of Nungwi is the repair and building of dhows, which are beached to enable the work to be done, while the women and girls walk across the exposed beach at low tide collecting shellfish. The village is very traditional and the local people have very little to do with the thin tourist strip where most of the workers are from the mainland. What the locals think of Westerners lying around practically naked and guzzling beer I wasn’t able to discover.

The beach however is wonderful; the sand is white and the sea turquoise and the sky usually blue. This is in contrast to say Dar es Salaam just across the straits where the weather was usually horrible, hot, wet and humid. Zanzibar seems to be blessed to have its own more pleasant climate. The quality of accommodation is also very good, as good as places I’ve been in say Thailand and other backpacker resorts.

One drawback of Zanzibar however are the number of touts. A word you will learn very fast is ‘Jambo’, which means basically Hello in Swahili, but its multi purpose, so the are ‘Jambo Inns’, ‘Jambo Bros’, Jambo this, Jambo that, Jambo, Jambo, Jambo; pretty much all day as you are approached by men saying Jambo, and you can hardly not reply, who then want to sell you something or get you into their taxi. After the hundredth Jambo of the day you are almost ready to wring someone’s neck.

Zanzibar is a great destination, distinctive and exotic but with great facilities for the traveler. If you are going to Tanzania it is a must see, as interesting and unique as any of the great game parks. Three fast boats a day link Dar es Salaam with Stone Town and take two hours, with a cost for foreigners of $35. There are slow boats which are cheaper ($20) but some of these are very slow indeed so do check the travel times and try and buy the fast boat tickets the day before as they often sell out at peak times. Don’t forget your passport.

Africa by Overland Truck - Two

will — Thu, 7 Dec 2006 10:25:00 GMT

By chance I caught up with the ATC truck I’d been traveling on when I saw it stopped at lights in Dar es Salaam; I then spent a day with everyone at a beach on Zanzibar. What was surprising was the contrast to the experience I had had and the current moral of the passengers and crew, which was very low indeed. Lots of people did not seem to be enjoying themselves at all and were planning to leave the trip early. This had been bought to a head by a group of people the previous evening when there was a large row which ended with the tour leader saying she wanted to resign.

There seemed to be various reasons for this. Most of the passengers who left Victoria Falls consisted of small groups who had got there on other trucks. They had made their own friendships (mainly based on nationality) and a communal spirit was very lacking. The consequences of this was that jobs like taking down the camp each day took longer and this had a knock on effect, on one day the truck didn’t reach camp until nightfall which meant everything had to be put up in the dark. On my trip everyone started together in Cape Town. Anyone considering joining a tour at the mid point should bare this potential problem in mind.

Another factor was lack of clarity in the itinerary, which as I’ve already mentioned should be studied carefully. Many people were not expecting the long drives that are part of traveling in Africa. The itineraries usually say, ‘Today we shall travel from A to B’, what they should be saying is, ‘Today we will be spending seven hours driving on crap roads to get from A to B’. This may deter a few people from signing up but at least those that do will have no illusions about what to expect. What should be obvious from the current itinerary is that you are on a tour and touring across a very big continent and this means pretty much constant movement. This is one aspect I myself found quite wearying (like being on exercise in the Army) so think carefully before signing up for the full seven week experience.

Traveling for seven hours on crap roads and it’s pouring with rain the whole time makes the experience even more dreary. It may sound obvious but if you are going to sign up for a three week camping trip – anywhere, it helps to know in advance what the weathers going to be like. As the wet season has now started in East Africa there was a lot of having to take down and put up tents in the rain. In those kinds of conditions everything becomes damp eventually – which is depressing.

The group also suffered from a disproportional number of injuries, none of them serious but this led to further delays as people were taken to hospitals for treatment.

There seemed to be some very unrealistic expectations made of the tour leader who to some people should be everything from social role model to surrogate mother. A clearer defining of the tour leaders’ job and role at the beginning of the trip would probably help all concerned. For example, they cannot normally deviate from the route or stay at campsites not designated by the company, although some people expected this. There was also some bad feeling as she did not accompany the injured people to the hospital, is that part of the role?

I would imagine that none of these problems are new as ATC makes each passenger sign an Indemnity form so that everyone is aware of what they are letting themselves in for. This form is very useful in spelling out exactly what to expect and it say amongst other things – there are long driving days, roads are very rugged and tough on vehicles and clients, you will be living in tents, the cook may not always be able to buy food and that the tours are frequented by young people. The core of it is summed up in one sentence, “If you approach your trip with a spirit of adventure and a positive attitude, you and your fellow traveler’s will get the most out of the journey”. Obviously, some people either did not read or understand it or they just left their positive attitude at home.

Africa by Overland Truck

will — Tue, 21 Nov 2006 09:22:00 GMT

I had heard several stories from travelers about the overland trucks that do the route from South Africa up to Kenya, and most of them were bad. They seemed to have spent their trip with people who spend most of the time drunk or were just noisy and boring, with the rest of the passengers working out who was going to sleep with whom. Don’t do it they said - you’ll hate it. When it comes to traveling in Africa there’s no doubt the Overland trucks serve a purpose, making it fairly straightforward to travel up through the continent without the hassles of using local transport. The reason I signed up for a trip was because it allowed to me to see countries like Namibia and Botswana which are difficult and expensive to travel in independently. The tips below are based on my experiences on a truck journey from Cape Town to Victoria Falls which I did with the African Travel Company which took about three weeks, and are aimed at people thinking of signing up for a trip and don’t know what to expect.

Firstly the people, probably the most important factor and the one you can’t do much about. I was very fortunate to travel with a great group of people which made the experience very enjoyable. It helped that the average age was late twenties for most of the group although the range was from 18 to 68; so most of the people had jobs and some life experiences to talk about. My group was also very Northern European mainly British/Irish or German with a few Belgians and Swiss, which meant that most of us were pretty much on the same wavelength. For quite a few of the Germans this trip was their three week annual holiday. There are a few factors that push some groups towards certain overland companies. The companies that are based in London seem to have an overwhelming number of Australians and New Zealanders on them, this is because ‘doing Africa’ is quite a popular thing to do if you’ve just spent two years in London and you’re on your way home. Some companies provide German or Spanish translators which of course encourages those nationalities to sign up. At the end of the day there’s not a lot you can do about your companions and there is always someone who does not get on with anybody. I saw one truck which had ten eighteen year old girls on it; it would be a long three weeks if you didn’t fit into a group like that.

The Crew. I had three crew on my truck, the tour leader an Australian woman, and a driver and cook who were Kenyan. Its worth checking the number of crew before you sign up, if your truck only has two crew it means there’s no cook, so the passengers will being doing the cooking, so a lot more extra work for everyone. The tour leader has been on the road continually for eighteen months, starting in the Congo (to see the Gorillas) then heading all the way back to Cape Town with a two day turn around there before starting the trip back up the continent again. She lived pretty much on the truck and was paid at local rates. If you ever thought the job had an element of glamour, talking to her quickly dispelled that notion. The Kenyans were very friendly and considered they had good jobs.

The truck was large, rather like a coach inside with enough legroom and space to move around. All the equipment was stored underneath. Valuables like money belts were stored in a communal safe on board and the tour leader slept on the truck most nights. There was also a safe for cameras and gadgets. Don’t expect frills like Air Con or toilets on board; the usual procedure was for men to head off into the bush in one direction and the girls in another. One cause of friction was that the tour leader insisted that everyone sat somewhere different each day, so the people at the front of the bus moved to the back of the bus the next day. Of course there were disputes about which seats in the middle were in the front or back, or someone didn’t move. It also meant that you were usually sitting with the same people the whole time from day one.

Traveling overland usually means camping. All the companies seem to use the same tents which are large heavy duty Army style things made in South Africa. Most people have to share a tent and you had to put it up and down each day yourself. It seems to be standard for all companies that you provide your own sleeping bag and mat/mattress. The facilities on the campsites varied, from one night wild camping with just a drop toilet to some very smart places with hot water and bars. In many places you have the chance to upgrade to a room, which are usually poor value for money but which may look attractive if you tent has been packed soaking wet. It really helps if you like camping and to have done some before, for me three weeks was about my tolerance level, I was looking for to a bed and a roof after that. All the jobs on the truck/camp were done on a rota system, with each group alternating each day including a day off each week. The jobs were usually fairly easy liking sweeping out the truck to helping with the food preparation for meals. The most disliked job was ‘pot wash’, cleaning the cook’s pots each evening, often a real challenge when you only have a bowl of cold water. Everyone washed their own plates and as there are no cloths to dry them for hygiene reasons, everyone ‘flaps’ their plates dry which looks pretty bizarre when you first see people doing it. Our tour leader was also very hot on hygiene; everyone had to wash their hands in disinfected water before meals and after going to the toilet, Detol, as someone commented - the smell of Africa.

The food on my trip was good, filling and plenty of it. It was nearly always some form of meat and we quite often had steak. We had one Vegetarian on the truck who was often given fish so if you don’t eat that either you’d better check at the start. Some of the food was a little bland as our cook didn’t seem to use any flavorings at all, not even salt. Lunch seems to be standard on all trucks, salad, bread and usually cheese and cold meats. This is the same everyday. Breakfast was cereals and toast (grilled on a brazier) and sometimes eggs and baked beans. On a couple of occasions we had canned spaghetti, much to the bemusement of the Germans.

The itinerary. It pays to look at this very carefully before you sign up. All the companies offer optional ‘extras’, tours into parks for example or guided walks. The main ‘extra’ on my tour was a three day trip into the Okavanga Delta. On the itinerary I received the delta trip was listed as part of the trip but it is in fact an extra $130 on top of the tour cost. What they don’t tell you is that if you don’t take up the ‘option’ you have to sit around in a campsite for three days with nothing to do. One guy didn’t take up the option and had to do just that. You may be quoted a price for an overland tour that looks really good but in fact all the interesting activities are extras. On my tour we also spent three days in Swakopmund so that people could do activities. Some of the people on holiday did a lot of these but the rest of us had a long time sitting around the town. Another feature of overland trips is the early start, on about a third of the days wake up was at 0430 so that we could be off at 0600. Very often this was so that we could get to places so that people could do activities in the afternoon but often we arrived at places at lunchtime where there was nothing to do. Some days could easily have been combined just by driving a few extra hours the previous day. Africa is big, on a couple of days we drove for up to six hours so pack plenty of paperbacks.

Overall I enjoyed my trip and it was good value for money especially if you are short of time. To see the Parks and countries that I did independently would have involved hiring a 4 X 4 and camping equipment with living costs on top. On the truck someone else did the cooking and driving and sorted out the problems. To anyone thinking about a overland trip I would suggest going through the itinerary very carefully and try and get some recommendations from other travelers. Once you’re on the truck, it’s difficult to get off.

This article has also been posted on the Lonely Planet Thorn Tree bulletin board and more comments from other travellers have been added, view them here.

Hogsback in the Eastern Cape

will — Thu, 19 Oct 2006 18:54:00 GMT

Most Backpackers who travel in South Africa stick pretty much to the coastal route from Cape Town to Jo’berg and totally ignore the interior. But there are some great places to visit just off the coastal route which really reward those who seek them out. One of these is the small mountain village of Hogsback, which is very much a destination for South Africans visitors and should be for backpackers too.

Hogsback has a magical setting in the Amatola Mountains which themselves are an extension of the Drakensburgs. The name comes from the eroded edges of basalt sills that cap the peaks and which from a distance resemble the line of hair on a hogs back. The village residents are a bohemian, arty crowd who like to put it about that the wonderful setting inspired Tolkein when he was conjuring up Middle Earth, and there are places named Hobbiton and Riverdell in the village. The problem with that theory is although Tolkien was born in South Africa (a little known fact), in Bloemfontein, he never went to Hogsback and in fact left South Africa for good when he was three years old.

Apart from craft shops and guest houses Hogsback has few sights as such, what it does have is wonderful countryside all around it. Just below the village is a reserve of Afromontane rain forest which has lots of well way marked trails in it and information boards to tell you what you are looking at. The forest is filled with birds, including the rare and endangered Cape Parrot, butterflies and monkeys as well are more elusive creatures. Running through the forest are several waterfalls which pour over the lips of the hard basalt rock and they are particularly spectacular after rain; several of the trails take you right up to them. You can also climb high onto the Hogs themselves and subject to the weather this makes a good day hike. Even if you don’t want to do anything energetic, Hogsback makes a nice place to chill out and just look at the view.

There are numerous places to stay and eat in village, and many of them are booked solid during the summer. I stayed at a really friendly backpacker hostel called ‘Away with the Fairies’ which is run by a young English couple who came here eight years ago and never left. It has fantastic views across to the mountains; one of the hiking trails starts in the garden and the hostel have free maps and advice on where to go. They have a range of accommodation from a self contained cottage (called Hog End) to dorms. One of the best reasons to go there is the food. A Scottish genius resides in the kitchen and although there is only one set dish each evening it is always outstanding, with exotica like Kudu and Warthog on the menu. Many of the locals go there just to eat. The hostel runs a shuttle most days from East London (ask at the SugarShack hostel) so there is no reason to miss out on Hogsback because you don’t have your own car or are on the Baz Bus.

The one thing you cannot always expect is perfect weather; a rain forest is a rain forest because it rains a lot. What you can expect is the weather to be changeable; the days I was there I had a couple of days of hot sunshine and one of mist and rain, but even if it starts bad it can often clear by the afternoon.

So don’t let your trip by yet another one on the beaten track, make your way up to Hogsback, you won’t regret it.

To see more pictures of Hogsback click here

South America - the highlights

will — Fri, 22 Sep 2006 16:09:00 GMT

After nine months travelling through South America it is now time to move on, so I though a retrospective might be in order.

Best Country

It has to be Peru, a country with world class sights, mountains, great trekking and a well developed tourist infrastructure; and it’s very affordable. The Andean culture is colourful and interesting and the people friendly. I spent two months there. Argentina, despite lacking big things to see was the one country I felt I could live. A nice climate, a cultured European society, great infrastructure and a relaxing pace of life made it a very difficult to leave. Colombia was a great surprise; vibrate cities and towns, great countryside and very friendly people.

Best City

I spent a month in and around Cusco, a very pleasant city with a lot to see and do in the area around it. There was a good travellers’ buzz there and lots of good cafes to while away the time between treks. Buenos Aires is another great city, great cafes and a relaxed European feel. Arequipa in Southern Peru is another gem, just as you imagine an American Colonial city to look like.

Best Journey

Going up the River Madeira a tributary of the Amazon to Manaus. The rivers define the Amazon area and the best way to get a feel for it is to travel by boat. It was the only way to appreciate the immensity of the area. For further details click here. Crossing the Andes was also a great thrill. In Bolivia the best trip was going down the Death Road from La Paz to Coroico. The established backpacker thing to do is to do this on a mountain bike tour, but for real gut wrenching terror the only way to do this route is by bus. At some points if you sit on the left hand side of the bus you could look straight down a one kilometer drop, with the wheel less than half a meter from the edge and no crash barrier. The route from Mendoza to Santiago in Chile is pretty tame in comparison but still one of the world’s great mountain journeys. Fantastic Andean scenery.

Best Great Outdoors

Trekking in the Sacred Valley Peru was a big highlight. I didn’t do the organized tours or the Inca trail but did some independent treks with my girlfriend. The best was from Urabamba to Lares (more detail here.) where on the second night we camped alone at 4200 meters and only saw only two other trekkers in three days out. There are some great routes and the mountains are outstanding. Colca Canyon in Peru is also a good place to trek.

Another great experience was the Salar de Uyuni in Bolivia. This unworldly landscape is just as amazing as the pictures promise, not to be missed. Click for more info and pictures.

Best Sight

For want of being accused of going for the obvious choice, it has to be Machu Pichu. Nowhere else did I feel such an immediate sense of place. These ruins were not only one of those places I’d always wanted to see but that I would never forget seeing them. Of course you have to choose your moment, getting up before dawn to take the ride up to the site is well worth it. At first you can’t see anything but as the mist clears and the ruins reveal themselves – it’s breathtaking. The setting of thick primordial forest on the mountains all around adds to drama of the scene. The number two best sight was the Galapagos Islands, one never gets over the abundance of wildlife around you nor how tame it is. Swimming with sharks and sea lions were particular thrills as was being on a beautiful white tropical beach with only giant lizards to share it with. Well worth the expense of getting there. Iguazu Falls is also an outstanding sight, particularly from the Argentinian side.

Best Museum

No question – The Lord of Sipan Museum near Chiclayo in Northern Peru. This is a museum that exhibites the finds from a number of tombs, the reconstructions of which you can also visit. This is the complete antithsis of tomb raider. You start at the top of the building (which is shaped like a pyrimid) then slowly descend with the exhibits being displayed in the order the Archaeologists removed the layers, millimeter by millimeter. And what exhibits! I have never seen a muesum anywhere that has so much treasure in it.

One of the most unusual places to visit in South America and the only industrial heritage site that I know of is the former ‘Anglo’ meat packing plant in Frey Bentos in Uruguay. There is an excellent museum and guided tour, with the place being left just as it was when the place shut at the beginning of the seventies.

Best Hotel

Tricky, the standard of hotels and value for money is pretty good in South America. The Inka Fe Hotel (www.inkafe.com.pe)in Cusco was one of the best probably because the room we had was so nice, large with it’s own sun terrace on the roof.

Best Restaurant

‘Jacks’ in Cusco was easily the best. Good fresh interesting food served quickly by friendly staff, I often ate here twice a day. The Brazilian chain ‘Aipo and Aipim’ was also a great place to eat. They use the great concept of selling food by weight, so you fill your plate from their outstanding choice of salads and hot food and you only pay for what you want. The Colombian chain ‘Crepes and Waffles’ had some delicious things served up in stylish surroundings.

Best Food

South America is not noted for its gastronomic delights, and at times I thought that Chicken and Chips was the national dish in many countries. Certainly Santiago and parts of Brazil are fast food heaven if that is what you like. Still a few things stand out; Argentinean steak just about anywhere in the country is always wonderful. I’d heard of steaks that melt in the mouth but never eaten one until I came here. Ceviche on the North Pacific coast was also often very good. The best ones I had were in the Galapagos on Charles Binford Street in Pte Ayora. Empanadas in the Southern Cone countries were also excellent nearly everywhere, these are small pasties, usually baked with lightly spiced meat, pieces of boiled egg or olives in them. They vary slightly from country to country with Chile making slightly larger versions. Always good though.

Hidden Gems

Sucre in Bolivia is a lovely town especially if you go there after the cold and thin air of the Andes. A pleasant warm climate, fine white buildings and palm trees makes it like being suddenly dropped in the South of France.

Salento in Colombia was another lovely place, a colonial town with nice cafes and craft shops and the beautiful Wax Palm valley nearby.

Other impressions

Bars on the windows of houses. First seen as we approached the Mexican border at San Diego and omnipresent ever since.

An obcession with early nineties Western music particularly bands like Roxette and Guns and Roses. Every person on the continent must know the Bangles ‘Enternal Flame’ word perfect. In the Southern Cone countries, Robbie Williams is in ascendance.

Goooooooooooooooooooooooooooooool

The World Cup, which was a constant theme for the first half of the year. Only Latin American commentators could get so wound up over a goal, regardless of who scored it. Being in Brazil when they got knocked out of the Cup was quite an experience. This was total football, when not a person walked on the street or a car moved, a whole nation was watching T.V.

I always had some reservations about traveling in South America, partly because of the ‘aura of menace’ that seemed to surround it. Crime, gangs and rip offs seemed to be the sub text of many peoples experiences here. I have to say that I no problems at all, having had nothing stolen and not even being threatened let alone robbed. I met some people who did have things taken, often with some contributory negligence on their part, like leaving bags with credit cards on the luggage racks of night buses, but I never personally met anyone who had been mugged or robbed.

One of the best investments I made was joining the South American Explorers Club. The clubhouses in Quito, Cusco and Buenos Aires have been homes from home along the way and it’s been a great opportunity to meet some very interesting people. The libraries and trip reports have also been very useful. I would recommend joining to anyone spending time in the region, particularly if they are going to be in the cities with clubhouses. Click here for more details.

The Latin American Suicide Shower

will — Wed, 6 Sep 2006 16:29:00 GMT

Some areas of the world have particular things that define them, and although a good idea they are only found in one continent or region and nowhere else. This even applies to electrical appliances and for Central and South America one of the defining bathroom fixtures is the Suicide Shower. I was first told about them by some American friends in London who told me to watch out for a contraption that fits over the shower head and is plugged into the electric mains. Pretty scary until you get used to them, I was told.

The idea behind suicide showers is to provide hot water where the plumbing system does not run to a hot water boiler, which is the norm in most of tropical America. The water is heated inside the shower head and usually provides a constant and dependable stream of hot water. Getting the stream of water right is something of an art that comes with practice, if the water flow is low it will come out boiling hot, to high and it’s only lukewarm. Controlling the flow to the optimum level can take some time and in some hotels there are detailed instructions on the back of the bathroom door.

Of course the really scary thing about suicide showers is that they combine that lethal combination of water and electricity. They need a lot of power in order to work and so are wired straight into the mains; you know they are working because when you turn on the water all the lights go dim. Being South America you can buy one of these things in any hardware store and simply wire it up yourself using a few bits of insulation tape. Some of the bodge jobs I’ve seen have been truly terrifying, like you really feel you are taking your life in your hands. Do I really want to be clean that much? Sometimes when you turn the water up too quickly an electric blue flash of comes out of the side of the shower head and you really feel - this is it. One of the guide books says that they are perfectly safe as long as you don’t fiddle with them and I have only experience a mild shock off one, so this does seem to be true.

Of course some suicide showers are better than others, with most of the best made in Brazil. South of the tropic and the Rio/San Paulo area they are no longer found as its cold enough in winter here for hotels to install real heating and hot water systems. As I am leaving South America soon it is farewell to the suicide shower, a part of the Latin experience.

Argentina

will — Tue, 5 Sep 2006 21:07:00 GMT

Unlike every other South American country I’ve seen on this trip, Argentina is a country I have visited before, on a two week holiday in which I went to Buenos Aires and Patagonia, flying around the country in order to see as much as I could in the time I had. This was in November 2001 and Argentina was an expensive country to visit then, as the government was holding the Argentinean Peso to parity with the US dollar, a position which was under relentless pressure. There was a subdued feeling in the country, as if everyone knew that the economy was on the edge, an edge over which it fell a week after I’d left. For the rest of the year the cities were rocked by mass demonstrations with police shooting protestors dead in the street.

Argentina took a long time to recover from its economic collapse and is still one of the world’s most indebted countries. Arriving here now almost five years is to see a real contrast. This is a fat and happy nation again with real prosperity evident by the booming malls and smart cars on the roads. Most people seem to be doing very well indeed and there is sense that the country is going somewhere. But not everyone has recovered from the crash and part of the evening scene in Buenos Aires are groups of people going through the garbage looking for things to scavenge, plastic bottles having particular value. Even in the smartest areas men push supermarket trolleys around the streets loaded up with their booty from the bins. In the streets and restaurants, men and even children hawk small items like pens and calculators. They make quite a few sales too; hard times are a recent memory for many people.

In many ways this is a European country that just happens to be in South America. Most of the immigrants were originally from Italy and Spain and they bought their culture with them, including good food, wine and corruption, as well as an obsession for smoking at every opportunity and a liking for lingerie shops. Buenos Aires was laid out by French architects at the end of the 19^th Century and arriving there is like finding yourself in Paris but at a fraction of the price. In comfortable cafes, attentive waiters serve decent coffee and people write in pads and read books, a sight unseen in the rest of South America. Street performers with some original wit compete against each other on the pedestrian streets, while the buskers are made up of bands who really know how to play their instruments. Argentineans have a more sophisticated society than exists in most of the rest of the continent, and they know it.

So grateful are the Argentineans to their current President, Nestor Kitchner, for delivering the good times again that they have allowed him to increase his power at the expense of the Congress, which happily voted to hand over more responsibilities to him. For better or worse, Mr Kitchner has also dragged out some issues from the recent past, which is an uncomfortable place for many people.

The Mothers of Plaza de Mayo are well known around the world, helped along by Sting having written a song about them. They are the Mothers of the people who disappeared in the dirty war when the Army dictatorship ran the country in the 1970’ and 80’s. Every Thursday afternoon they gather in Plaza de Mayo, one of the main squares to march and remember; this has now turned into a tourist event with coach loads of mainly foreigners taking pictures. The Mothers have their own logo, a white scarf, which is painted on the paving stones where they march and they run their own souvenir stand. Most of them are now very elderly and the whole occasion is like an OAP get together as the ladies exchange gossip and chat about the events of the week. Now thanks to Mr Kitchner they really do have something to talk about, as he has removed immunity to prosecution from the Army torturers and even former government ministers and they are now being bought to justice.

Another issue from the recent past now revived by Mr Kitchner is the Falklands or Malvinas Islands, a sore point for many Argentineans after they were ejected by force during the 1982 war with Britain. Banging the Nationalist drum over this issue he hopes will help the Peronist party’s re-election chances next year. What is surprising are the number of new and very grand memorials that have been built around the country over the last year or so. Every town of any size has a Malvinas memorial, even if only one son of the town died there, usually the dead of the whole province are added on as well. The main memorial in Buenos Aires is very grand affair indeed with an eternal flame and honour guard. In Cordoba, there is a street stand which is manned most days by Malvinas conspiracy theorists claiming that the British ‘occupation’ is part of a wider plot to expand the British Antarctic Territory? Most of this is winging, as there is little Argentina can practically do to get the islands back. For example the TV weather gives the weather forecast for the islands, and it’s illegal to own a map of Argentina that does not show the Falklands as part of the country. Why a country with vast areas of empty space would want such a barren, useless place is a question someone here should be asking but no one is. The islands whichever name you use, will continue to be British as it would be political suicide for any British politician to hand them over.

The irony is that previous to 1982, the British and the Argentineans had always got on very well. Britain helped build the railways (now mostly in ruins) and develop the meat trade and the well to do of Buenos Aires, with their love of horses, dogs and Rugby have always been Anglophone in outlook. When telling people I am British I have received only kind words, usually with some comment on Beckham or Princess Diana (a sort of British Evita, pretty and died young) and British brands from Landrover and Cadburys chocolate to Robbie Williams are widely liked. So why rake up the issue again? Most people in Argentina and Britain just don’t care.

Politics aside if you want to visit a country where you can live well, with a great outdoors as well as nice cities, come to Argentina, before the prices start going up.

_{Check out the Photo Gallery on the sidebar called Argentina for some photos on this topic.}