RTW 08/09

Welcome to the Jungle!

porridge — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 22:35:00 GMT

After disembarking our totally knackered boat from Belem, Karen, Steve, Cameron, Carolyn, Julie and I checked into a hostel in Manaus.

After the first warm shower in almost a week we decided to go and visit a natural phenomenon that is not far from Manaus, called the meeting of the waters.

It is really an amazing sight to see two river that meet each other and wont mix and this is due to the differences in temperature, speed and water density of the two rivers.

The Rio Negro (dark coffee colour) flows at near 2 km per hour at a temperature of 22°c, while the Rio Solimões (sandy-coloured) flows between 4 to 6 km per hour a temperature of 28°c.

Back at the hostel after some discussions and a very little research of other companies we decided to go on a jungle trip with the company that had an office at our hostel as some of the backpackers that had returned had only good reports.

That evening we met up with all the other from the boat and a mob of 14 backpackers headed off to a local restaurant much to the joy of the owner as we treated ourselves very well after been on the boat for 6days.

A very unwelcome 6am start the next morning to get our jungle trip underway and after a quick breakfast it was off to the bus station for the three hour bus trip and a further one hour on a boat to our jungle home for the next four days.

The lodge we stayed at was really nice and we arrived just in time for lunch which was delicious.

The first day we visited a flooded forest where we didn’t see much wildlife only a toucan but heard lots of animals in the distance.

We also went piranha fishing and the guide got the first bite but caught a catfish.

We made it back in time to view the lovely sunset from the watchtower which overlooks the lodge and the surrounding area.

After dinner our guide took us out in a motorboat and we went alligator spotting.

Eventually after a lot of searching we found a baby alligator and after he posed for a few pictures it was back to the candlelit lodge.

The next morning was suppose to be a 5am start but I think the rum that we shared the night before with our guide bought us an extra half hour in bed.

We got up and paddled our canoes out in the perfectly still river in front of the lodge to see some of the local black dolphins playing around.

We were hopping to see some of the larger pink dolphins so we paddled further out to another area but still the pink dolphins remained elusive.

On the way back Steve and I jumped in to the piranha and the alligator infested waters to see if the dolphins would come close for a swim but they weren’t interested in a couple of gringos and off they went into the flooded forests for breakfast.

After our breakfast it was off to a jungle camp to spend the day and night getting up close and personal with the jungle.

The camp was two hours away from the lodge but felt a lot longer as it was very humid and we had to carry all our gear.

We set up our hammocks and after lunch had a siesta before heading off on a Jungle walk.

Our very knowledgeable guides showed us many of the plants and what the people of the Amazon use them for.

We drank from a water vine; we cut into the bark of trees and watched as liquid, some flammable poured out.

Some of the liquids are used in medicines and the gum can be used to light campfires.

We found some ants nests and let them crawl over our hands and them rubbed them into our skin as the odour they release acts as an insect repellent.

Some of the other ants we saw were not as friendly and a bite from them would leave you in need of medical attention asap.

As it is the rainy season it can be difficult to see the wildlife of the jungle but we did get to see two very scary Tarantulas and a very camouflaged frog.

We heard many birds and got to see two noisy Macaws and our guide would call out to the birds and they would answer him.

It was back to the camp and after a dip in the river beside our home for the night it was time for dinner.

Our guides made plates for our dinner from leaves and forks from tree branches which was a really cool.

After dinner the guides made us a cup of jungle tea made with the bark of a tree that released a flavour that tasted like cloves, it was amazing and a nice way to end the day.

The next morning it was back to the lodge and after some relaxing we headed back to the flooded forest and this time we got to see two howler monkeys.

They were moving at speed through the trees and we had difficulty keeping up with them as we manouvered our canoes through the forest

More piranha fishing followed and we caught about four fish between us which ended up as our dinner later on that evening.

The last morning of our trip we were up at 5:30am to see if we could spot the pink dolphins.

The resident black dolphins were out the front of the lodge but we went further away from the lodge in the lashing rain and as if for our efforts and patience a pink dolphin joined us on the mirror like surface.

He/she was also joined by a black dolphin he would pop up beside us and then a couple of minutes later he would be at the other side of the river.

On the way back for breakfast we went to visit two unfortunate Toucan chicks that were in their nest, in the trunk of a tree in the flooded forest.

As the water level was about a foot below their nest and rising, their parents wouldn’t have the opportunity to teach them to fly and they would probably not survive.

The guides were discussing whether to remove them and take them back to the lodge but we didn’t hear the final decision as we left the lodge that afternoon.

Back to Manaus that evening were we met up with the others as they also arrived back from their jungle trips.

Many photos and stories were passed around before and during dinner.

After dinner it was back to the hostel were I picked up my bag and got a taxi to the airport for my 4am flight to Sao Paulo.

To Belem and Beyond

porridge — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 07:40:00 GMT

After Carnival I travelled by the usual means of transport, on the bus to Recife and Olinda.

I decided to stay in Olinda as according to the guide books and travellers in the know it is a lot more attractive than its very large neighbour Recife and so it is. UNESCO must like towns with tiny cobbled streets and multi coloured cute little houses as this is also a World Heritage site.

I stayed in Olinda for two days wandering aimlessly around the streets, relaxing by the pool at the hostel and taking advantage of their cheaper than most pay by the kilo buffet. Pay by the kilo is very popular here in Brazil and I usually treat it as an all you can eat.

As Olinda also had a Carnival and I arrived a couple of days after it finished the town was really quite. But on Saturday morning just before 12 I heard the sounds of drums and music so I went to investigate and ended up following a group of party people to a local hall and although it was 30 reals to get in they didn’t charge.

The weather is very bad here at the moment and most days it rains very heavy for long periods but it is still warm

From Olinda I travelled further north to Fortaleza. The surrounding areas are blessed with some of the best beaches in South America so I’m told but as the weather was so bad I got to see only a couple.

After another 27 hour on the bus and I made it to Belem, the main port at the mouth of the Amazon River.

I met Julie from France on the bus and we decided to find accommodation when we got to Belem. We ended up staying in Hotel Fortaleza which I would highly not recommend; it was cheap but not very cheerful. The little old lady that owned the hostel was seriously grumpy and would totally ignore us, which was soon reciprocated.

I also noticed that there were fewer mosquitoes around when she was in the vicinity.

Nothing much happens here on Sunday and most businesses are closed apart from some markets and museums which we took the opportunity to visit.

On Monday morning it was off to find out information about getting the boat to Manaus. We visited two agencies offering much the same packages but as the guide books and a little research on the internet warns you’re guaranteed a different story from each agency.

We decided to go with the second agency that we visited, Amazon Star as their office was much nicer, they eventually matched the price that the first agency offered and it was raining outside J

I know some people that follow this blog are off to South America soon and for that reason I have included some more info at the end of this blog when getting the boat from Belem to Manaus and vice versa.

After booking the boat it was off to the markets to find a hammock and as in most places in south America all shops selling the same products are usually in the same street, which is great as a customer as you can easily bargin between the shops or stalls without having too far to go.

There where four recommended hammock shops right beside each other and as Julie wanted to buy 5 hammocks, some as presents, she went on a 1hour bargain hunt which involved me holding up many hammocks and getting very bored.

I was much more easily pleased and chose a cheap green hammock to be my back breaking buddy for the 5day trip to Manaus. The rest of the day was spent buying supplies, packing and we made a visit to the cinema.

The next morning we got a taxi to the docks with another Brazilian from the hotel that was also going to Manaus.

We got to the boat at 10am and found a place to hang our hammocks but it was clear that some people had stayed the night on the boat and the hammock deck was pretty full even at this early stage of the day.

We returned to the boat at 3pm after getting our last internet fix for 5days and our backpacks.

We were due to depart at 6pm but the boat was still been loaded right up to our eventual departure at 8 pm.

The main produce that was loaded on the boat during the day was flour, pet foods, hundreds of boxes of tomatoes, toilet roll and school desks.

Someone said that there were also pallets of vodka onboard but they were well hidden, probably in among the thousands of tomatoes on the lower deck.

I had a really nice spot for my hammock and was relaxing and getting to know some of the locals and the backpackers on the boat when a local and his wife and three kids started hanging up their hammocks around me. Mammy planted herself to my right, daddy on my left and a smaller hammock across the top of my hammock for one of the kids. They had three girls, one was about 6months, one was around two years old and the other was four.

The first evening was spent in the bar on the top deck, actually everyday was spent there, having a few beers and playing cards.

When I returned to my hammock around 11pm I had to crawl under a line of hammocks to get to mine. I squeezed into my hammock in between mum and dad. Mum had the baby in her hammock and Dad had the older girl in his hammock while the two year swung like a pendulum above my head.It was so uncomfortable and I was afraid to move as I didn’t want to wake the baby

Every time the pendulum baby would wake up which was every ten minutes Dad would give her a push and send her on her way again.

I lasted about two hours and couldn’t take anymore. I went for a walk on the deck and watched with interest every time the captain would put on the spotlight to scan the water infront and the jungle around us.

I went back to my cramped sleeping quarters and got an hours sleep before everyone got up at 7am for the very exciting breakfast of a cup of coffee with a bread roll and a choice of butter or no butter.

This time of the morning is the best time to spot some wild life so I spent sometime gazing into the trees and jungle to see if I could spot anything.

Some people spotted some of the pink dolphins which are only found on the Amazon but I was unlucky this time.

The first full day on the boat was filled with making new friends, with the locals and the gringos.

The nations represented on the boat other than the many Brazilians where Ireland of course, England, Scotland, Australia, Malaysia, Hong Kong, Japan, France, Spain and the USA.

On the second and third day we were kept entertained by the locals that live along the river as they would come out in their canoes as the boat passed by.

I think some of the ships and boat that pass must throw out supplies to the locals as a lot of canoes would come out as if they were waiting for something to be offloaded into the river.

Some of the kids would paddled out and catch the waves that the boat created as it passed for fun and others would use a long iron rod with a hook on the end to attach themselves to the boat and hop aboard.

As they hooked on to the tyres along the side of the boat the canoe would be yanked forward and if there was someone at the back of the canoe they would get a good soaking.

It was mostly kids that would board the boat and they would be selling shrimps and fruits from the jungle before unhooking, some an hour later and heading back down stream to their homes.

Of course some of the less experienced kids would be desperately attempting to hook on and if they missed on their first attempt they would have another go before the boat passed, but some just didn’t make it close enough to latch on but they took it all in good spirits and would get a big cheer from us.

One boy would was maybe 10 years old and two girls around the same age boarded for about an hour. When they were unhooking their canoe the boy fell in and the two girls went off to rescue him, we all got a good laugh after he was successfully rescued a couple if minutes later.

I was surprised at the amount of homes and people that live along the river and even more surprised to see large developed towns at various points enroute to Manaus. I expected just to see non stop Jungle for the 5days.

Back in hammock class I swapped places with Dad and he moved his Hammock beside his wife. I was thinking that this would be the solution to my sleep problem. It gave everyone else a good laugh when I explained my hammock situation and of course I had to pose for photos surrounded by my new family :-)

The pictures don’t really do justice as how cramped and close the hammocks actually where.

I arrived back to my hammock on the second night, very tired as I didn’t get much sleep the previous night. I also organised my hammock so that it was higher than Mum and Dads hammock which meant that I was almost at the same height as pendulum baby.

I hopped in and tried a few positions to make myself comfortable but without success. As I lay there I got a whiff of something not very pleasing to my sense of smell and realised that the pendulum brat had peed in her hammock, thankfully she didn’t pee the night before or it would have been baby overboard.

She was very restless and kept waking up and as Mum and Dad where sleeping I would give her a push now and again which helped to settle her.

Soon that wasn’t enough and as she thought I was her Dad she made a couple of attempts to climb into my hammock.

On top of it all she had taken off her probably soaked pyjamas and was just about to land herself in my hammock when I pulled my hammock out of her way.

She disappeared into the night and landed safely in beside her Mum and sister in the hammock below, while I was killing myself laughing above.

The older sister replaced the pendulum baby and I moved to the other side to get away from the smell which meant my ass was hovering above Mum.

After a few head butts and a baby rescue, as when Mum was taking the pendulum to the toilet, the baby had woke up and nearly fell out of the hammock, I decided to go walkabout again and accept the fact I wasn’t going to get any sleep again.

Thankfully the rest of the nights on the boat were different and I managed about 6 hours sleep per night. As we continued up the Amazon people would move their hammocks to better spots as space was freed up by people getting off the boat at the various stops.

Another night the boat was infested with Locusts which was funny as people would frantically jump around or let out a scream trying to offload a nice big locust which would join them in their hammocks.

Thankfully we didn’t have any mosquito problems as the boat was too fast for them and we weren’t close enough to the shore for them to get onboard

On the third day the two engines cut out and the flow of the river had carried up back down stream and the boat ended up stranded up against the shore with a nice big tree into the side of the boat.

We did get to see a baby anaconda which thankfully was in another tree a safe distance from the boat. No damage was caused and a passing tug boat with a platform full of containers pulled us out and we got on our way again but we were on one engine for the rest of the journey.

There was also two Brazilian who showed a few of the gringos how to make bracelets and then within a couple of days a bracelet making craze had swept away the boredom and a production line had taken over in the bar.

We were suppose to dock in Manaus on the Sunday evening but been on one engine that changed and the captain announced that it would be early on Monday morning.

About 3am on Monday morning we could see Manaus in the distance when the other engine finally had enough and gave in. So the final couple of miles we had to get a tow. Everyone stayed on the boat for the rest of the night as the breakfast was too good to miss :-)

Boat info from Belem to Manaus:

The boat that we went on was the N/M Santarem, which according to some blogs on the internet was a good boat and this fortunately turned out to be the case. Always good to google the name of the boat and read some reviews.

1^st agency started at 200 for the aircon hammock deck on the boat or 600 for a cabin which sleeps two.

2^nd agency started at 230 for the aircon hammock deck or 660 for a cabin.

By the time we left the 1^st agency the aircon hammock deck was 180.

When we told Amazon Star this they dropped to the same price after a phone call to the boss and the reason was that it was the low season.

The 1^st agency said that we could sleep on the boat the night before and although food wasn’t included in the price all meals would cost 5 reals apart from breakfast which was free.

Amazon Star said that only people staying in the cabin had access to the boat the night before which turned out to be false as some people where staying onboard two nights before the boat departed.

Food according to this agency was 5reals for breakfast and 10 for lunch and 10 for dinner. The 1^st agency was correct on the food prices.

Food on our boat was always rice, pasta and meat everyday for lunch and dinner.

Amazon Star can be found at Rua Henrique Gurjão, 208 - Belém - PA

Gallery: Bahia and Carnival 2009

porridge — Thu, 5 Mar 2009 02:54:00 GMT

Carnival 2009

porridge — Thu, 26 Feb 2009 02:22:00 GMT

If you want to know what it´s like to have you ear drums literally rattle around in your ears, every organ in your body vibrate to 150,000 watts of bass and dance your socks off for 5days with two million other people then Salvador is the place to be.

I flew with Zete, Renato, Renata and Vaguinho from Sao Paulo on the 13th of February to Salvador.

From there we got a ferry to the beautiful Island of Morro de Sao Paulo, two hours south of Salvador were we stayed for three days. Cars are forbidden on the Island and when you get off the boat many locals with wheelbarrows (with taxi painted on the side) await to take your luggage to your accommodation.

Kilometer after kilometer of amazing beaches and perfectly clear waters surround the Island. It is a very touristy place but even so its very relaxing and there´s parties on the beach every night.

So many tropical fruits are avialable here and in the evening there are stalls that make up fruit smoothies with a bit of vodka or any other spirit that you fancy.

Next we headed off inland from Salvador to Lencois, a very cute town with cobbled streets and multi coloured houses. The town is surrounded by many beautiful waterfalls and natural springs. The national park close to the town, Chapada Diamantina Nat Park, has many underground cave systems and parts of the park look a bit like the Grand Caynon only a little more greener.

After all that relaxing, trekking and appreciating nature it was back to Salvador to join the masses for the Carnival.

Carnival Salvador is officially the biggest party on the planet and takes place every year for 5 days before Ash Wednesday.

Three things that you need to know about Carnival are Trios Electricos, Blocos and Abadas.

Trios Electricos are trucks that haul the huge sound systems with stages on top were the band or DJ play. They are driven very slowly through the streets and depending on the route it can take 4-5 hours to complete a circuit.

The trucks are cordoned off with a rope carried by hundreds of security guards. Inside the ropes is known as a Bloco and if you pay for the very colourful and sometimes expensive t-shirt you have access to the Bloco. The girls usually take the scissors to their t-shirt to make them a little more sexy :-) Following the main party truck is a support truck with toilets, a bar and medical facilities for the people inside the Bloco.

The bigger the band or artist the more expensive the t-shirt. For example Pete Tong and Armin Van Burren played on the last night and the t-shirt for the bloco cost around 80 euros.

Of course if like me you can´t afford to pay for a t-shirt you can simply follow the bloco and stay outside the ropes. The party people on the out side of the Blocos are known as popcorn.

Along the routes of the Carnival there are Camarotes, which are stands that line the circuits and give an excellent view of the streets and the party below. Some of the more expensive Camarotes include drinks and food.

Carnival in Salvador is different to that of Rio. Samba doesn´t feature here, it is all local Bahian music. Another difference is that the Rio Carnival is highly organised, expensive and takes up 700 meters of one street were Salvador has almost 25 kilometers dedicated to the Carnival and you can be part of it all for free.

Sweaty, sexy and not a little strenuous, carnival is a well-oiled machine masquerading as total chaos. (not my words, but I like this quote from the Independent)

Thanks to Elton (Zetes friend) and his family who were very kind and more or less gave us the run of their house for 5days.

Thank you Zete, Renato, Renata and Vaguinho for kindly letting me intrude on your vacation. I really enjoyed my time in Salvador with you all and hope it´s not too long before we have another beer.

Two stops to come before I reach the Amazon

To be continued...............

On the road again!!

porridge — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 15:30:00 GMT

Hola, sorry it took so long to update on here but the past few weeks I have been relaxing and trying to get my enthusiasm back for travelling. I lost my mojo for a bit after getting my gear stolen, especially all my pictures. But as the title says I´m back on the road again :-)

Last update I was in Cuzco, Peru. Cuzco is such a nice town with its huge plaza, old buildings and cobbled streets although it´s a bit touristy. We spent a day there and then planned our trip to the mighty Machu Picchu. Two buses and a train took us to Aguas Caliente were we got a quick sleep and then up at 4am to catch the buses to Machu Picchu. What can I say, a trip to Peru or SA isn´t complete without a trip to this Incá wonder. We spent a few hours exploring the ruins. A few Cork lads who had just completed the four day Inca Trail were running around after a llama trying to drape a Peoples Republic of Cork flag over it.

We got a few nice pictures when the mist rose up from the valley below adding an errieness to this World Wonder.

The next day Claire and I got a bus to Arequipa where she stay for two days and I continued onto Lima to sort out a new passport.

Walter the guy who I ran the Buenos Aires Marathon with is also from Lima and he looked after us very well. One Sunday we went to the most amazing Peruvian seafood restaurant. Walter introduced us to some traditional dishes and I have to say it is the best food I have tasted in South America so far. So good that I returned two days later for lunch, I would have went the next day only it closes on Monday, what a shame :-( It´s called Punto Azul by the way if anyone is ever in Lima.

On the 19th of January Claire got her flight back to Ireland and I left Lima two days later.

I bused it back to Arequipa and then onto Puno where I stayed the night. The next day I crossed back into Bolivia but not after having to pay $25 to immigration for having no entry stamp for Peru. When I got to the Bolivian side the immigration officer only gave me 5 days in the country as I was on a temporary passport. To be honest I can´t blame him as the temporary passport is just a piece of paper with my photo stuck in and a few stamps from the Consulate.

It looks really bad and the one year emergency passport that I now have isn´t much better.

The past couple of weeks I have been staying in La Paz in the Wild Rover PARTY hostel. I stayed there over Christmas and New Years and there was still a few people that got stuck and were still there when I got back. Its such a nice hostel and the craic is good that I got in a bit of a rut while I waited on a new camera and credit card to be sent from home.

I got my one year emergency passport sent to La Paz from the Irish embassey in Mexico, they deal with all the SA passports. I could have got a new one sent from Dublin but it could take at least a month and I didn´t know where I would be.

When I got to immigration I was two days over the five that I got at the Bolivian border the two guys sitting in the corner of the immigration office didn´t give a hoot and stamped me in for 90 days.

I finally left La Paz on Sunday 8th Feb and got the overnight bus to Santa Cruz in the centre of the country. I planned to stay for a night but there was a bus to a town on the Brazilian border two hours after I arrived so I decided to continue.

The worse bus ride of my trip so far awaited. I knew it when I saw the state of the bus and the amount of Mosquitoes that lived there it was going to be bad.

We left Santa Cruz at 5pm and after about an hour we left the safety of the tarmac and onto an unsealed dirt track for the next 15hours.

An hour on the road and then the craic started. I fell asleep only to wake when the bus stopped. It was lashing down with rain which made the road turn to mud. A couple of lorries and cars had slid off the road or were stuck in the mud. We spend the next couple of hours fishtailing along in the dark.

As we were sliding along we had to avoid a lorry that was stuck when the back of the bus decided it needed a rest and we slid off and into a mud bank. Thankfully it only took about 20mins to dig the bus out. Another bus past us when we were stuck and a few of the locals on it had a good laugh at us. But we had the last laugh 40mins later when their nice yellow bus also ditched.

The bus then broke down about 5 times, once for over an hour on this seemingly never ending journey. We were suppose to be in Quijarro on the Brazilian border at 6:30am but didn´t arrive until 12:30pm.

I was expecting some hassle at imigration as the one year paspport looks like I made it myself and sometimes immigration will ask for a yellow fever certificate which I dont have anymore, but all formalities went smoothly and I got my exit stamp and walk across the bridge onto Brazilian soil. I had to get a taxi to Corumba just inside Brazil and go to the immigration office for my entry stamp which was also no problem.

I met an oldie from Spain in his 70´s traveling on his own at immigration and after dinner and a few beers we decided to get the bus together the next morning to Campo Grande.

From Corumba to Campo Grande we had to travel through the Pantanal. The Pantanal is a Tropical wetland and UNESCO World Heritage Site that is mostly located in Brazil but portions spread into Bolivia as well as Paraguay. It is the largest wetland in the world covering almost 75,000 sq miles. The drive through the Pantanal held some nice suprises and my neck was sore with trying to look out both sides of the bus. As well as the many bird species that I spotted I got to see my first Toucan as it glided past the bus. Also from the bus I seen a lot of Caimen basking in the sun by pools of water. I also spotted a deer which I didnt expect to see in a tropical environment. I would have loved to stop off for a few days as there is so much more to see but I hadn´t got the time so it´s on my to do list :-)

I was trying to bus it all the way to Salvador for Carnival but when I got to Brazil I realised I hadn´t got time so I booked a flight from Sao Paulo to Salvador on the 13th of Feb.

I left La Paz on Sunday night and made it to Sao Paulo on Thursday morning after 60hours on buses.

I booked into the hostel I stayed in in November and got picked up the next morning at 5am by Zete, Renato, Renata and Vaguinho and off we went to the airport.

Salvador and Carnival awaits!!!

Gallery: Boliva

porridge — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 17:20:00 GMT

Cops and Robbers

porridge — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 13:30:00 GMT

On the 10th of January Claire and I crossed in Peru to the town of Puno. Puno is also on the shores of lake Titicaca which is shared by both Bolivia and Peru.

It´s just a couple of hours bus trip to Puno from Copacabana in Bolivia and with the hour we gained crossing into Peru we arrived in time to catch a boat tour to the Floating Islands of Lake Titicaca.

Titicaca is notable for a population of people who live on the Uros, a group of 42 or so artificial Islands made of floating reeds (totora, a reed that abounds in the shallows of the lake). Their original purpose was defensive, and they could be moved if a threat arose and many of the Islands contain reed watchtowers.

The Islands are extremely touristy and the locals fall over one another when a boat load of tourists pulls up to sell their arts and crafts.

Back on the road the next morning, we caught the 8am bus from Puno to Cuzco.

The next few hours were the worst of my four and a half months on the road.

The bus stopped off for 10 minutes in a town called Juliaca almost two hours from Puno. I was sitting on the top deck of the bus two seats from the front when a local leaned across the American couple behind us and started to bang on the window as to get someones attention outside the bus.

I passed no remarks and was writing in my diary when the bus was about to pull off and continue to Cuzco I decided to put the diary in my bag which was on shelf above my head or so I thought. Unfortunately the commotion a couple of minutes previous was to distract the people behind us and allow one of a group of three locals the opportunity to slide my bag along the shelf away from me and off the bus.

When I realised what had happened I was in total shock and it took me a while to gather my thoughts. Claire continued to Cuzco to get accommodation organised and I set about trying to recover the bag.

I didn´t have time to put my money belt on as we were rushing for the bus earlier and just put it in my bag. My passport, credit cards, my three cameras, marathon medals, mobile phones and all my pictures from the past four and a half months were in the bag. The only things I was left with was my dirty laundry and the rest of my wardrobe.

The people at the bus company disappeared and didn´t want anything to do with it so I went and phoned the bank and cancelled the credit cards straight away. Next it was off to the Internet to type up a page of what happened and translate it to Spanish for the police. I went to the police and got a report for the embassy and my insurance company.

The rest of the day I spent wandering around the streets of Juliaca in the hope that they may have taken what they wanted and dumped the bag in a skip or along the street. When this wasn´t sucessful I went to the local markets and scanned the electronics sections for anyone that was selling any of my gear, but also to no avail.

I decided to catch the bus 9pm bus to Cuzco but not before one last effort at rcovering some of my stuff.

The only things in the bag that couldn´t be replaced are all the photos from the start of September. I decided to print out some posters offering a reward for anyone that could return the three memory sticks that were in the bag with all my pictures. I think I was the only Gringo in the whole town and people came running out of their homes and businesses when they saw me posting my reward on the lamposts around the town.

Got the bus at 9pm and arrived into a rainy Cuzco at 4am.

After a good nights sleep I decided to treat myself to a big Irish breakfast roll and my first Guinness in four months in Paddys the local Irish pub (the highest in the world, supposedly).

Blame it on the altitude, but when I opened my tin of Guinness in the pub it was like I had struck oil. The tin exploded and a nice fountain of the black stuff sprayed out all over me.

Ever get the feeling that your not welcome somewhere?

Cycling, Coke and Cholitas

porridge — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 04:50:00 GMT

Happy New Year folks!!

Hope the jeans aren´t a bit tight, Santa paid a visit and all the New Years resolutions aren´t in tatters just yet :-)

I really feel as if I have stepped into South America now.

Crossing the border from Chile into Bolivia is like stepping onto another planet.

The first thing you notice when you walk across the border is the women, known as Cholitas in their traditional Bolivian dress of very colorful multilayered skirts, shawls, braided pigtails that are held together with what can only be described as a curtain tie and a little bowler hat to top it off.

Bolwer hats have been wore by some of the women in Peru and Bolivia since the 1920s when supposedly a shipment of bowler hats was sent from Europe to Bolivia via Peru for use by Europeans who were working on the construction of the railroads. The hats were found to be too small and were distributed to locals.

Arrived into La Paz on the evening of the 23rd of December with Matt from Oz who I met in Arica, Chile. He had met a Dutch girl I had talked into going to La Paz for Christmas who in turn had talked him into going also.

We nagviated our way through the busy streets of La Paz and eventually found the hostel. I wasn´t feeling the best with the atitude even though I had been at altitude a couple of times over the past couple of weeks but for no more than a couple of hours. So exposure to 4,500 at the border crossing into Bolivia from Chile to the 3,800 altitude of La Paz didn´t agree with my stomach and my head.

We checked in and headed straight to the hostel bar for some food and to get to know some of the residents whom we would be spending Christmas with.

On Christmas eve a few of us from the hostel went to visit San Pedro prison in the centre of La Paz. This is probably the craziest prison in the world. It is run by the inmates and families live together in the prison as the conditions are usually better than what they are used too on the outside. Guards patrol the perimeter and the families of the imates can come and go as they please.

We visited the side of the prison that holds people that have drug convictions.

Our guide was a man from Portugal in his 50´s who is awaiting trial for drug smuggling. It´s a very strange system, for instance if you serve two years in the prison and then are released you can´t leave Bolivia for two more years if you are a foreigner.

I was surprised at how comfortable the prison actually was. There are lots of little workshops producing toys and other crafts. Most people have some sort of job within the prison to provide an income. The prisoners have to rent or buy their cells for the duration of their sentence and if they have some money they can live very comfortably inside the walls. If they can´t afford a cell they I guess they have to work very hard inside the prison to earn their keep.

Cocaine is produced inside the prison and is trafficked outside which provides income. You can go to the prison, have a look around and then at the end of the tour buy some cocaine and take it out of the prison, or if you prefer you can stay inside and get coked up with the prisoners.

Which is probably a reason that most hostels don´t start serving breakfast until 12pm :-)

Christmas day was a lot different from back home.

At 6.30am everyone in the dorm was rudely awakened by a couple of drunks who fell through our door. I couldnt get back to sleep so off I went for a walk around the almost deserted streets of La Paz with my santa hat on.

As I was walking past some of the market stalls on the pedestrian streets I realised that families were living underneath the plastic sheeting on their stalls, which was a bit disturbing.

Unfortunately the gap between the rich and the poor is very evident in La Paz and it only takes a glance up any street to see it.

Christmas dinner was great, I had seen the menu on the Wild Rover Hostel website when I was in Argentina and decided that I would make the effort to be in La Paz for Christams.

The rest of Christmas week was a pretty quite affair. Spent most of the time relax and visiting some of the sights around La Paz.

On the Sunday after Christmas we went to a a very unique Bolivian spectical which takes place every Sunday just outside La Paz, the Wrestling Cholitas.

I had seen an article on these crazy but very physically fit ladies on the BBC last year and also in the National Geographic Magazine.

The event takes place in a gym in El Alto overlooking La Paz. Every Sunday local wrestling heros take to the ropes much to the joy of the local fanatical supporters of all ages.

The men wrestle the men, then they wrestle the Cholitas which to be honest look well out of it and then out of nowwhere the Cholitas kick ass. Bouncing off the ropes, pulling moves that would put any of us to shame and all in their long dresses.

On the 31st of December I was joined by Claire from Co. Down, a long time friend who wanted to delay the onset of the January blues so she is travelling with me for the next three weeks.

For New Years eve we had a fancy dress night in the hostel and the girls took much pleasure in dressing me up as one of Cinderellas ugly sisters which didn´t take much of an effort.

On the 2nd of January we decided to test our mountain biking skills by taking on the most dangerous road in the world.

It got its title as the most dangerous road becasue of the many deaths that have occured over the years. It used to be a trade route that conected La Paz to Coroico and other small villages in the Amazon basin. Nowadays it is used by mostly tourists to get high on adrenaline over the 64km continuous downhill stretch to Coroico 11,000 feet below the start of the road. Some sections of the road are roughly three meters across with sheers drops of hundreds of feet.

After all that excitement Claire and I left La Paz and headed to a little town called Uyuni, 12 hours on the bus towards the Argentina border.

Salar de Uyuni is the world largest salt flat at almost 11,000 square kilometres and at an altitude of 3,700 metres above sea level. The salt flat was created Some 40,000 years ago when a giant prehistoric lake dried, it left behind what is now know as Salar de Uyuni.

We got of the bus and joined a tour straight away for two nights three days. There were 6 of us in the jeep, two Canadians an Ozzy and an Italian.

The drivers wife was our cook for our trip and also onboard was their three year old daughter who provided us with great entertainment.

Thankfully everyone was really nice and over the next couple of days and we had a great time. We visted the salt flats on the first day and then a few Flamingo filled lagunas shadowed by Volcanoes on the second and third days.

Back to La Paz for ten minutes on the Tuesday and onto another bus to the Bolivian Copabanna along the shores of Lake Titicaca, the largest in South America.

We spent two days here and visited Isla de Sol (Island of the Sun) the main attraction. A pretty Island about two hours in the very slow boat from Copabanna. Apart from the nice walk on the very sunny day we had there are some Inca ruins on the Island and a couple of not very impressive museums.

The next day it was off again and over the border to Peru.

I dont have any pictures to put up at the moment of my Bolivian adventure and the reason will be revealed in my next story.

Ohh the suspense :-)

Gallery: Chile

porridge — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 14:49:00 GMT

Happy Christmas from Chile

porridge — Mon, 22 Dec 2008 13:40:00 GMT

Hola Amigos,

This is my last blog entry of 2008 and concludes my trip in Chile.

After a 31 hour bus journey from Punta Arenas in the south of Chile I got to Puerto Montt halfway up the country. On the bus I met a really nice Australian couple from Brisbane. It´s usually the younger generation that fly the nest and go backpacking around the world for a year but these guys told their kids last year, ages 19 and 22 that they were going on a RTW trip and would see them in February 2009.

Arrived in Puerto Montt and had the same idea as the Ozzy couple to get a bus back the way we came as we had seen a really nice snowcapped Volcano 20km back up the road in Puerto Varas. Got a bus, booked into a hostel and got a good vantage point to watch the sunset turn the snowcapped peak of Volcano Osorno from white to pink.

The next morning we got another bus to Villarrica which is another very relaxed and quite town with Volcano Villarrica across the lake. After another sunset we booked a tour to climb the Volcano the next day.

It took us four hours to reach the top of the Volcano and even though we couldn´t see any lava we could hear the odd rumble in the crater below.

The guide told us that you used to be able to see some lava but a volcano errupted last year and destroyed the town of Chaiten about 300km to the south and borrowed some lava from the surrounding Volcanoes.

Chile has almost 3,000 Volcanoes, of which 250 are active. See I do listen to the tour guides in between my obsession with taking pictures lol.

Anyways, the best part of the tour to Volcano Villarrica is coming back down the mountain on your ass :-).

Everyone is given a canvas nappy to sit on and off you go, sliding all the way back down to the bottom. What takes four hours to climb takes 15 minutes to get back down.

From Villarrica I got a bus to Santiago and then another bus to Valparaiso on the coast. The first over cast day I have had in a long time. I arrived early in the morning and went exploring the narrow and very steep streets of this city, most of which is perched on a hillside overlooking the bay with some very colourful houses.

This is also the HQ of the Chilian Navy and theres plenty of smart looking gents in white uniforms strolling around.

A unique feature in Valparaiso are the 15 ancensors or lifts which look very dodgy and take you up the steep hills to some nice viewpoints overlooking the city. These are used by the locals to access the residential quarters from the lower parts of the city.

I decided that one day here was sufficient so I booked the bus back to Santiago for the next afternoon and then onto San Pedro de Atacama in the north east.

What a contrast in landscapes, after leaving Santiago surrounded by vineyards I woke up the next morning in the Atacama desert.

Got to San Pedro after an uneventful 23hour bus trip and booked a hostel and some tours to the nearby attractions.

San Pedro is a very cute little town in the middle of a flat basin in the Atacama desert with great views of the many volcanoes that form the Andes range and run along the border with Bolivia and Argentina.

My first morning in San Pedro I was up at 3:30am and off to the Tatio Geysers, 90km away. The dusty gravel roads in the area aren´t too kind to vechiles and our minibus broke down. We were rescued by another passing tour bus and spent a nice morning at the geysers as the sun rose.

Tatio is the highest geyser field in the world at 4,300 metres above sea level. It is a flat area with countless blowholes full of bubbling hot water that in the morning time send out large clouds of steam into the minus 10degree air.

Some people even brought their eggs for breakfast to boil in the waterholes.

After a siesta I was on another tour to see the Valle de la Luna (Valley of the moon). This area is called so as it is similar to the lunar landscape of the moon. We visited some cool rock formations and some very large sand dunes.

Next day I visted the Salar de Atacama, at 3,000 square kms it´s the largest salt flat in Chile. We visited one of the many small lakes on the salt flat where flamingoes and other birds make their homes. The lakes are still and give a mirror reflection of the surrounding area and the birds.

Next it was off to visit some deep blue lagunas surrounded by volcanoes high up in the Andes before lunch.

The next day was my first total chillout day in over 3weeks and then in the evening I got a bus to Arica in the northwest of Chile along the coast and close to the Peruvian border.

Got to Arica at 7am and after a warm welcome from the Kiwi hostel owner and the best breakfast I have had in SA so far I met a girl from Mayo and we spent the day visting the sights around Arica.

I wanted to go on a tour to the nearby National Park but there wasn´t enough people for the tour to go ahead so we decided to rent a car ( I wanted to get a jeep but they had none left) and were joined by two lads from Slovenia and a french girl.

Yesterday morning we started our trip at 8am and headed off towards the Bolivian border to Parque Nacional Lauca.

The landscape here varies from barron desert nearer sea level to green pastures in the higher valleys thanks to the rain experineced at altitude.

The main attractions in the park apart from Lolli the Alpaca with her handbag around her neck who entertains the tourists at one of the police checkpoints are the snowcapped Volcanoes. One of which neighbours Laga Chungara and if the water is still you can get a perfect reflection off the lake of the Volcano and surrounds. Thankfully we were lucky and joined the Flamingoes and Vicunas (from the Alpaca and IIama family but they are wild not like there domesticated cousins) for a few nice pictures by the lake.

On the way back we got flagged down by a trucker whos lorry had broken down and we gave his wife a lift to the nearest town to get some food as they had the munchies. This road littered with lorries taking fuel and goods to Bolivia.

That wasn´t our only good deed for the day as when we got back to Arica we left the car back and got something to eat. One of the girls had a craving for papas frittas (chips) so on the way to Mc Donalds I got chatting to a little homeless man who asked me for some money. He had a little pet cat who was perched between his shoulder blades and had a christmas bell on its collar. So instead of giving him money I offered to get hime some food. We took him, the cat and went to Mc Donalds for a Big Mac. The looks we got from the locals and the staff was priceless. Five gringos and homeless man with a cat on his back in Mc Donalds, perfect way to end a great day.

Today I am just relaxing in the hostel and getting ready for the 8hour bus journey to La Paz in Bolivia tomorrow morning.

I will be in La Paz from tomorrow the 23rd until at least the 3rd of January.

I have booked into the Wild Rover Hostel were I am sure to meet a lot of like minded Irish who are going to party hard over the festive period.

I would just like to wish everyone back home, the travellers and the people that I have met over the past almost 4 months who keep uptodate on my blog a Great Christmas 2008 and a Happy New Year.

Over and out for 2008 :-) Chao

Gallery: Patagonia

porridge — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 10:56:00 GMT

Patagonia

porridge — Fri, 12 Dec 2008 10:26:00 GMT

Patagonia has to be one of the most amazing places I have visited, EVER!!

A trekkers dream come through, starting in Bariloche all the way down to El Calafate in South of Argentina and then over the border into Chile.

I just learned by the way for anyone that is interested the difference between hiking and trekking. Hiking is usually a day trip where you return to civilsation were trekking consists of more than one day and usually involves camping.

After my record bus journey of 33 hours on the bumpy Route 40 I got to El Chalten at 5:30am on a very windy and cold Saturday morning. Of course it wouldn´t be a proper South American bus trip without a bit of drama along the way. The bus decided to break down in the middle of nowhere but 45 minutes and a coathanger later we were rocking again.

Not one to hang around I got a few layers on and set off into Los Claciares National Park with Antonio from Italy and Ali from England who I met on the bus.

El Chalten sits nicely beside the starting point of the treks into the park and we headed straight for the main attraction, Mount Fitzroy. It took us 3.5 hours to reach the viewpoint at the top.

Just as I arrived I took about 5 pictures before the clouds started rolling in over the top of the Granite towers of Fitzroy. After some lunch we visited a glacier and then headed back to El Chalten for a well deserved steak after our 9 hours of hiking (remember, hiking is just the one day lol)

Up and on the trails again the next morning at 10am. The weather was great and the cold wind which greeted us the previous day had gone. We hiked to another big attraction in the park, Cerro Torre. This hike was much easier and only took us 2.5 hours to get to the viewpoint.

Torre is a needle like peak with a glacier to the left and a lake in front with ice from the glacier floating around.

After lunch I headed back to Fitzroy for some more pictures as the weather was so good and then back to El Chalten in time for dinner.

The next day Antonio and I got a bus to El Calafate and we booked a tour to the Perito Moreno Glacier. This is one of three Glaciers in Patagonia which are not retreating. The glacier is almost 100 sq miles and 30km long with the face been anywhere between 40 and 60 metres high.

The tour took us to the boardwalks in front of the glacier were everyone waits patiently for some chunks to carve off. The afternoon is the best time to see this spectical when the temperature increases.

After a couple of hours listening to the rumble of the glacier and seeing a few nice chunks crash into the icy water below we went on a boat trip around one side of the glacier.

The next day we were on the road again and crossed over into Chile to a town called Puerto Natales.

This is used as a base for people who want to visit Torres del Paine National Park.

I met Paul from Holland in Mendoza, Bariloche and again in Natales. He was also going to trek the W trail in the park so we decided to share a tent. Antonio didn´t like the idea of camping so he decided to stay at the Refugios (hostels) in the park.

After getting all our gear and food we got the bus to the park the next morning and set off.

The W circuit is the most popular as it usually takes between 3-5 days to complete. There is another bigger circuit which takes at least 8 days to get around but 3 sounded a lot better to us.

The main attractions here are the Fitzroy like peaks of Torres towers and Glacier Grey in the west of the park.

One of the advantages is that you can drink the water from the rivers and streams that comes from the melting snow and glaciers in the park so that saved on a lot of weight.

I didn´t really know a lot about the park before I got there which was great as I didnt have any expectations and was pleasantly suprise at how much there was to see.

On the second day we had a couple of rivers to cross which I didn´t know about. Two of them were a bit dangerous and an American guy fell into one and broke his nose.

He didn´t let it upset his trek and he even made me some porridge the next morning for breakfast as I offered to carry his bag back to catch the boat if he wanted to go to the hospital in Natales.

Depending on which side of the W circuit you start on will determine wether you get a boat on the first day or at the end. We started at the eastside of the park and had to get the boat back on the last day to catch the bus back to civilisation.

After three nights in the park I was glad to get back to Natales for a shower and a good feed.

The next day I was off again and said goodbye to Paul and Antonio and headed south to Punta Arenas, the most southerly city on the continent. I did a tour to see some penguins and also booked the bus to Puerto Montt which is halfway up the country. As there are no roads linking the north and south, the bus has to go into Argentina and then cross back into Chile just above Bariloche. I could have flown or got a boat but both options are very expensive.

I will make my way up through Chile in the next two weeks and hope to cross into Bolivia for Christmas.

To be continued!!

Gallery: Chocolate and Wine

porridge — Tue, 2 Dec 2008 10:47:00 GMT

Chocolate and Wine

porridge — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 06:44:00 GMT

A little bit of indulgence is required you know before heading into the cold unpredictable weather that awaits me in Patagonia.

First stop after I left Salta was the wine capital of Argentina, Mendoza. The city was flaten by an earthquake many moons ago and rebuilt. The streets are wide and are lined with trees. Plazas are dotted around the city as gathering points if another earthquake comes along.

Siesta time is from 1pm until almost 5pm and then the city gets alive again. The Plazas and parks are full of couples mooching on park benches and kids running around till all hours of the night.

I could have stayed longer but that has been the case in a few places I have visted so far.

A trip to Mendoza has to incorporate a trip to some of the vineyards on the outskirts of the city. A few of us from the hostel rented bicycles for the day and off we went on a tour of the wineries. We also stopped off at a chocolate factory and an olive oil producing plant.

Mr Hugo, the guy we rented the bicycles off provided all of his customers with free wine at the end of the day. At one point there were 17 backpackers sitting in Mr Hugo´s front yard having a tipple while him and the wife ran around making sure our glasses were never empty. Nice way to end the day.

After sampling some of Argentinas finest wines, I made my way south last Monday to Bariloche.

This town is the gateway to Patagonia and as you come in on the bus you realise that the flip flops and t-shirts can be packed to the bottom of the backpack for a while. The town is located on a lake surrounded by many snowcapped peaks.

It is also the place to come if like me you have a soft spot for chocolate. There are a lot of Swiss people in this area and they have taken some fine recipes from Europe to satisfy the very sweet tooth that the Argentinians seem to have.

I had just arrived about two hours, got rid of the flip flops and was sampling and stuffing my face in chocolate heaven.

Then went and had a salad to make me feel better :-)

Have spent the past couple of days burning off all the calories and have been out in the hills and mountains around Bariloche hiking on some of the trails. The views to be had around the area from some of the peaks are amazing. Yesterday I did a hike to a really nice snow capped peak and walked and slipped on snow for the first time in a couple of years. Another first for me was seeing a woodpecker. I didn´t know he was a woodpecker until he started abusing a poor tree.

I was having my chicken sandwich at the top of the trail and a Condor glided past, I think he was checking out my picnic.

Tonight I am heading to El Chalten which is my first real taste of Patagonia.

Only thing is its a 35 hour bus journey before I get there which will be my bus journey record so far.

Gallery: Salta Roadtrip

porridge — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 13:20:00 GMT

Northwest Argentina

porridge — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 13:07:00 GMT

After leaving Sao Paulo I got a bus back to Iguazu Falls for just the one night and the next day was on the road again for a 23 hour bus trip to Salta in Northwest Argentina.

I arrived in Salta on the Monday morning and started my hunt for a couple of backpackers to share a rental car with. My efforts paid off and by 8pm I had captured two Israeli guys and a french girl.

We left Salta on Tuesday morning and headed south through some amazing mountains and desert to a little vilage called Cachi. From Cachi we had to endure a very bumpy gravel road for almost 200km. The scenery on the trip was amazing, every 10minutes the colours of the rocks and landscape would change as if someone had planned it.

A puncture stop was also require such was the condition of the road but we made it to our destination for the night Cafayate, just after dark.

Cafayate is the highest wine producing region in Argentina. A cute little town with lush vineyards in the surrounding areas.

We returned to Salta the next evening and then continued our road trip to the north of Salta on Thursday morning.

Once again more dramatic scenery graced us all the way to our stopover for the night Iruya. Remoteness is not the word for this little village. I heard about it through other backpackers and decided it was worth the effort to get there although I think if our car could speak it would have disagreed.

It took us alomost three hours on a dirt track to reach Iruya, crossing rivers and streams on the way. We didnt have a 4x4 by the way just a VW Gol which is the same as a Seat Ibiza back home. A little boy waved us down and as he was a bit away from the nearest village on his own I thought he was looking a lift. We pulled up and opened the window and he smiled, held out his hand and said "Caramelo por favor" (Candy please), the little brat, it was very funny though.

Iruya did turn out to be worth the effort, we didnt arrive until dark but the next morning I was up at 6am exploring the village and getting strange looks from the locals.

I will let the pictures do the talking.

On the way back to the main road and civilization the next morning we got waved down again but this time from a little old lady. I guessed she wasn´t looking for sweets but a lift. Later in the day we gave a policeman a lift and he thought that France was in North America. I didnt even ask where he thought Ireland was :-)

Got back to Salta on Friday evening and yesterday was a nice relaxing day as is today. I am waiting on the bus at 9pm tonight to Mendoza which is Argentinas largest wine producing region and you never know, I might force myself to sample a glass or two :-)

Chao for now

Gallery: Sao Paulo

porridge — Sun, 16 Nov 2008 05:35:00 GMT

Sao Paulo

porridge — Sat, 8 Nov 2008 05:11:00 GMT

My first few hours after landing in South America I met two very nice girls from Sao Paulo in the hostel in Santiago, Zete and Margareth.

They got their camera stolen on their first day in Santiago and as it was the start of their trip I offered to lend them my underwater camera that I used in Tonga. I didnt really plan to go to Brazil at the start of the trip but as you can gather from my last blog it was the best decision I made so far on my travels.

I left Rio on Halloween night and headed to Sao Paulo and arrived in at 6am. Three hours later I was shooting paintballs at the Sao Paulo Police with Zete, Margareth and Anna giving me a hand. They were actually pretty impressed with my shooting skills after a few games. The first game I got a nice yellow paintball in the side of the head within two minutes and was first out, so I had a lot to prove.

The rest of my time in Sao Paulo was spent having a look around the city and chilling out between the hostel and Renato´s house (Zete´s friend).

I havent a word of Portuguese (pork and cheese as I call it) but the translation tools on the internet came in handy as I communicated through the computer with Zete and Margareths friend´s when they weren´t around.

It`s a experience to say the least when you go to a country and cannot speak a word of the language as I have found out numerous times. The simplest task becomes a major problem and the use of hand signals comes into play a lot which can be funny especially when your trying to tell someone that there´s no toilet roll in the bog :-)

Sao Paulo is the third or fourth most populated city in the world and if you think you have seen a traffic jam before then you want to check Sao Paulo out. I was suppose to leave on the Thursday night but the traffic was that bad that I missed the bus after three hours in the car. The next day Zete was leaving me to the bus and we left plenty of time but then had to abandon the car and jump on the metro to make the bus this time.

This entry is really to say a big thank you to my new friends in Sao Paulo, Renato, Vaguinho, Evandro, Vivi, Anna and Andrea for looking after me so well and making me feel just like I was at home.

Zete and Margareth have to get a special mention as they went out of there way to make me feel so welcome and their hospitality is second to none. They were my taxi drivers, translators and tour guides in Sao Paulo and went well beyond the call of duty.

Thank you sooooo much to everyone in Sao Paulo and I hope to see you all again soon.

Carnival in Salvador Anyone??? ;-)

Gallery: Rio de Janeiro II

porridge — Sat, 1 Nov 2008 05:33:00 GMT

Rio Rocks!

porridge — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 02:06:00 GMT

Another big and beautiful South American city has stopped me in my tracks again. I have been in Rio 10 days now and I have to say that Sydney has been knocked of the top spot in my list of favourite cities.

What can I say, I love this place!

When I got to Rio I got a taxi to the hostel from the bus station and I just had a really good feeling about the city.

10minutes earlier tho, I was in a state of paranoia about getting robbed and went hiding in the toilets at the bus station so I could get ready for the wave of people ready to pounce on me and steal all my stuff :-)

Unfortunately Rio has a bad name as been unsafe but I have only witnessed one drive shooting, five muggings and a stabbing in the past 10 days which isn´t too bad I think.

I´m only joking, thankfully :-)

90% of the people I have talked to before coming here had some problems with pickpockets etc. So far I can only say good things about the people and the city and haven´t come across anything like some of the horror stories that some travellers experience.

I have been staying in a hostel 5 minutes walk from the famous Copacabana beach. Walking around the streets here is like reading a beauty magazine (they only make you feel ugly, so dont read them lol).

The beaches are flooded with beautiful people topping up their tans or working out on the beach. Its essential to have the perfect beach bod here especially now the summer is on the way.

There are so many things to see and do in Rio. I spent the last 10 days visiting all the sights like the Sugar Loaf mountain, Christ the Redeemer statue, strutting my new speedos on Copacabana, cycling around the city on the very well thought out cycle lanes as well as taking advantage of the nightlife.

Today we visited the tiled steps in the Santa Theresa area of the city. The guy has been tiling the steps for the past 18years (faster than some of the tilers back home almost)and as he recieves tiles from countries over the world he includes them in his masterpiece.

If anyone has seen the video to the song Beautiful by Snoop Dog and Pharrell Williams there are clips of them singing on the steps. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tFfb_CwBma0 The artist has pictures of U2 and many other famous faces who have visited the 215 multi coloured tiled steps.

Sao Paulo is next on the cards. I am meeting some people that I met in Santiago on my first night in SA. I hope to get a ticket for the final Grand Prix of the season but I doubt it very much.

Gallery: Rio de Janeiro

porridge — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 00:28:00 GMT

Gallery: Iguazu

porridge — Fri, 24 Oct 2008 02:19:00 GMT

Iguazu Falls

porridge — Thu, 23 Oct 2008 05:09:00 GMT

I eventually got out of Buenos Aires after 8 days. I didnt really have a plan of how long my stay would be., but I left enough time for my poor little legs to recover from the run, well that is my excuse for staying just over a week.

I caught a bus in Buenos Aires last Friday evening for the 16 hour bus trip that took 18 hours to Puerto Iguazu.

Anyone that has been to Argentina before will know that not only are their steaks the best in the world but the buses are also. I treated myself to a Cama seat which folds flat just like a bed and I have to say I slept great on the trip which is unusual for me.

We had a steak for our dinner followed by champagne and a couple of movies before nodding off. I haven´t got a picture of the bus yet but I will be booking a Cama in the future when I return to Argentina.

The attraction in this part of the country is the amazing Iguazu Falls. I haven´t been to Niagra but I´m informed that these falls are the best in the world.

You can see the falls from Argentina and also from Brazil. Most people make the effort to see them from both side and it´s well worth it.

On Sunday Orlagh, Kate, Sinead (Balbriggans finest nurses that I met in Buenos Aires) joined me to visit the Argentinian side of the falls. We spent about 6 hours walking around the falls and also did a boat trip which takes you right up to a couple of the waterfalls for a good soaking. I´ll let the pictures do the talking :-)

On Sunday I got a taxi across the border to Brazil and spent about two hours viewing the falls from that side before heading to Foz de Iguazu and catching a bus to Rio De Janerio.

I arrived in Rio on Tuesday afternoon after a nice 21hour trip. I plan to stay here for a week and will update my blog with pictures and a few tales next week.

Thats all for now folks!

Gallery: Buenos Aires

porridge — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 02:54:00 GMT

Gallery: Buenos Aires Marathon

porridge — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 05:47:00 GMT