Turning 30 South American Style With the dreaded 30th birthday looming, I ran away to South America to celebrate the landmark birthday in style.

Calling something legendary tends to overlook the fact that 36 hours of spine bashing discomfort on an unpaved road through the middle of nowhere is very few people´s idea of fun. We should have known when the bus we were travelling on dissapeared for half an hour to return with iron grates over the window. Fortunately for us a dodgy geezer from Brighton had thought ahead and supplied us with some sleeping pills to render us unconcious for most of the journey. Bizarely he was washing his down with the caffine laden energy drink Gatorade. Did see one of those very rare mountain minature deer though and lots of condors. Very big!