So after Puerto Madryn and our nature adventures we headed south to El Calafate, via the stunningly dull Rio Gallegos.
El Calafate is the trekking capital of southern Argentina with access to the northern Fitz Roy range, the enormous Perito Moreno Glacier and Chile´s Torres del Paine just over the border.
On our second day we headed off for the ´Big Ice´tour which is seven hours of trekking (with crampons, thankfully provided) on one of the world´s few stable advancing glaciers. The face of the glacier is an incredible set of ice spikes which keep falling off into the freezing water below. The glacier advances around 2m every day so there´s always stuff falling off. Add to this the amazing milky blue of the glacier water (something to do with refraction) and the blue-pink-white ice it makes a lasting impression. The trek on the glacier was excellent, although I did manage to break one of my crampons, with stunning sink holes created by rocks (as they´re darker they absorb the sunlight and melt their way to the bottom 70m plus down, making these bright blue holes filled with water - take a look at the photos!). Excellent day´s trekking in perfect weather.
The next day we decided to head to Torres del Paine and booked our buses, packed our waterproofs, popped into the supermarket for some pasta and sandwich soup (a bottle of wine - of course), kissed our lovely soft beds goodbye and headed off for four days of trekking and camping around the famous ´W´ route.
For me this was one of the highlights of the whole trip. We arrived in TDP and caught the catamaran to the far end of the ´W´circuit. Given that we had three days of trekking and three nights of camping we were unable to do the last part of the W to the glacier (but having just spent a day on one we weren´t bothered and from other trekker´s stories we made a good decision! TDP is made up of two spectacular valleys that have massive stone pillars between them. Ten hours of trekking on the first day (after a relaxed wake up in our tent) set the scene for the rest of our time there. Thankfully the weather was good to us and we only got drenched for a few hours on the first day. Otherwise it was an awesome three days, highly recommend it to anyone who comes this way as unmissable. The photos tell the rest of the story (and there are hundreds of them) - I´ll put them on smugmug very soon.
After Torres Del Paine we headed south to Ushuaia, the world´s southernmost city and the staging point for many Antarctica tours (which are a touch out of our budget range at $4,500 per person). We did our tour of the Beagle channel (named after Darwin´s ship) and are having a relaxing day, catching up on sleep and emails, etc after a horrible journey that involved crossing two borders (Chilean borders are stricter than most and take ages) but we got lots of passport stamps so worth it!
So, we´re heading to Buenos Aires tomorrow morning for some culture, sun, a trip to Uruguay, present shopping, tango shows, a Boca Juniors match and a touch of luxury (thanks to the AMREF girls!)
Our trip is coming to a close really quickly, only three weeks left which will see us head to Rio for the carnival (via Sao Paolo and a beach) before taking in Brasil´s Pantanal (the world´s biggest wetland for some more nature), the Iguazu Falls, a bit of Paraguay and then a week of beaches and surfing our way back to Rio to catch our flight home...
Friday, 13 February 2009
Tuesday, 10 February 2009
Chile and Argentina (and a little corner of Wales)
Well, Valparaiso was lovely and a day in Santiago followed where we took the cable car up to the hills above the city for the amazing panoramic view of the city. Santiago is lovely, and really diverse with the trendy bar areas of Bella Vista to the more bohemian (apparently!) area of Barrio Brasil, where we stayed.
We were understandly keen to get to Argentina's famous wine producing valleys of Mendoza so after a night and two days in Santiago we had pretty much seen all we wanted and moved on (we even managed a late night showing of Benjamin Button in the main cinema which was a nice taste of home - sort of!)
The border crossing from Chile to Argentina was a nightmare... they have a ridiculous system of big buses going first so we got stuck in our little bus at the back of the queue, so several hours later we emerged and eventually ended up in Mendoza in the late afternoon having not eaten for the entire day. However, our first (of many) Argentinian steak sandwich put the world to rights and we wandered with our packs to find a place to stay for the night.
The next day we headed out on our hired bikes with a list and map of local vineyards and got increasingly wobbly as the day went on. Brilliant. The first few were really interesting and we learned a lot about wine production (fuelling my pipe dream of one day owning a vineyard... a stunning lifestyle!) but after the third or fourth tasting that{s all we were interested in! We ended up at the nicest, a vineyard called tempus Alba where we ended up having six glasses of lovely wine between us... we were an hour late returning the bikes, the guy who had to wait for us didn't seem too impressed!
The next day we spent in Mendoza, taking in the sights until a freak downpour that made the national news laid us up in a cafe drinking coffee and eating chocolates... it's a tough life!
We caught the night bus to Bariloche that evening... on our way to the Lake District (although a few miles away from Keswick) we're now totally used to the 20hr bus rides that are the only real way to get around in this part of the world. Actually we quite enjoy them as they mean a night's accommodation saved and extra budget for wine and steak!
Bariloche is a lovely town right in the middle of the Lake District and we clambered up a mountain to see the view (rather than take the cable car!) It´s really geared up for the hoardes of trekkers that descend from across the world to this region every January and February. North Face and Salomon stores sit side by side little artesañal stores selling traditional wood carvings and millions of mate (tea) cups and metal straws that are de riguer (alongside a flask of hot water) for every Argentinian from teenagers to old men.
The lakes around Bariloche are a stunning shade of deep blue and looked incredibly inviting, so while Loretta sunbathed I dived in and was quite surprised at just how cold the water was... that little venture didn't last too long.
El Bolson was next. It´s pegged as the ´hippy town´of South America - basically a bunch of pretentious unwashed travellers trying to out-cool each other with their skanky matted hair and stoned dancing. Needless to say I wasn´t hugely impressed, Loretta loved it! While she perused the various craft stalls I took myself up a big hill to work off my irritation and returned suitably relaxed.
We´d heard great things about the east coast of Argentina, particularly about a big flock of penguins, so off we trotted (another night bus, only 12 hours this time) to Puerto Madryn. We were really surprised at how nice the place is; bit of a beach resort for Argentinians. people come from across the world here to see the penguins (largest colony outside of Antarctica) and whales (and the Orcas taking pinnipeds off the beach and throwing them around for fun before eating them, as seen on Planet Earth). However, the whale season had passed and so we only had two really cool trips rather than the hoped-for three.
The first was snorkelling with Sea Lions in the middle of the sea. Brilliant. When they see a boat they all jump into the water to come and play and they were all around us nipping our knees and fins while we stroked them and played in the water. Really stunning experience.
The other trip was to Punta Tombo´s penguin colony, over 500,000 Magellenic Penguins... always good comedy value and they didn't disappoint! They were hilarious. We also had the chance to see some Commerson´s dolphins (black and white, they look like mini-Orcas) which were beautiful.
On the way back from the penguins we stopped off at a Welsh colony... apparently lots of Welsh people came over to Argentina at the beginning of the 1900s and set up a colony so there are loads of Welsh Tea Houses and all the signs are in Welsh, although they grow cherries and garlic as their main crops so that´s a touch different. A trifle bizarre seeing all of the Welsh flags... O, Luce and Carrie if you come to this neck of the woods you have to visit, just for comedy value.
Bariloche is a lovely town right in the middle of the Lake District and we clambered up a mountain to see the view (rather than take the cable car!) It´s really geared up for the hoardes of trekkers that descend from across the world to this region every January and February. North Face and Salomon stores sit side by side little artesañal stores selling traditional wood carvings and millions of mate (tea) cups and metal straws that are de riguer (alongside a flask of hot water) for every Argentinian from teenagers to old men.
The lakes around Bariloche are a stunning shade of deep blue and looked incredibly inviting, so while Loretta sunbathed I dived in and was quite surprised at just how cold the water was... that little venture didn't last too long.
El Bolson was next. It´s pegged as the ´hippy town´of South America - basically a bunch of pretentious unwashed travellers trying to out-cool each other with their skanky matted hair and stoned dancing. Needless to say I wasn´t hugely impressed, Loretta loved it! While she perused the various craft stalls I took myself up a big hill to work off my irritation and returned suitably relaxed.
We´d heard great things about the east coast of Argentina, particularly about a big flock of penguins, so off we trotted (another night bus, only 12 hours this time) to Puerto Madryn. We were really surprised at how nice the place is; bit of a beach resort for Argentinians. people come from across the world here to see the penguins (largest colony outside of Antarctica) and whales (and the Orcas taking pinnipeds off the beach and throwing them around for fun before eating them, as seen on Planet Earth). However, the whale season had passed and so we only had two really cool trips rather than the hoped-for three.
The first was snorkelling with Sea Lions in the middle of the sea. Brilliant. When they see a boat they all jump into the water to come and play and they were all around us nipping our knees and fins while we stroked them and played in the water. Really stunning experience.
The other trip was to Punta Tombo´s penguin colony, over 500,000 Magellenic Penguins... always good comedy value and they didn't disappoint! They were hilarious. We also had the chance to see some Commerson´s dolphins (black and white, they look like mini-Orcas) which were beautiful.
On the way back from the penguins we stopped off at a Welsh colony... apparently lots of Welsh people came over to Argentina at the beginning of the 1900s and set up a colony so there are loads of Welsh Tea Houses and all the signs are in Welsh, although they grow cherries and garlic as their main crops so that´s a touch different. A trifle bizarre seeing all of the Welsh flags... O, Luce and Carrie if you come to this neck of the woods you have to visit, just for comedy value.
Friday, 30 January 2009
Photographs!
I´ve started to upload a few of my photos but it´s taking a really long time (as they´re all 4mb+) so please bear with me.
However, some of my Guatemala ones are now up on Smugmug here. The password is ´photographsbycraig´. I´ll keep adding more as I go along.
Enjoy and if you´ve got any comments on them - feel free!
However, some of my Guatemala ones are now up on Smugmug here. The password is ´photographsbycraig´. I´ll keep adding more as I go along.
Enjoy and if you´ve got any comments on them - feel free!
Friday, 23 January 2009
Chile
Well, I´m finally up to date... phew! Sitting here in Valparaiso after a long bus ride from San Pedro, Valparaiso is the cultural capital of Chile and a UNESCO heritage site. It´s a fascinating labyrinth of colourful steep streets, with cute little cafes and quaint artesañal shops perched on impossibly steep cliffs. They have a system of rustic cable cars to get betweent the different levels, an interesting experience.
All in all a lovely place, although some crazy lady cornered loretta earlier and started making cutting actions across her throat. Loretta thought she was being hexed but another bloke (only slightly more subtley) pointed out that we were happily strolling through a really dangerous part of town taking photos of the grafitti. He simply made a gun out of his fingers and pretended to shoot us... he did explain later properly. These guys need to work on their communication skills.
Anyway, we´re heading to Santiago tomorrow before moving into Argentina´s Mendoza valley for a few days of relaxation, lots of wine and lots of steak. We´re planning on heading back into Chile later in the south to Torres del Paine.
Chile is a lot more European (including how the people look) than the rest of South America, very busy, bustling and tourists don´t seem to register - although there are a lot of Chilean tourists too, a classic sign (alongsode the prices) that Chile is doing a lot better in economic terms than most of its neighbours.
Anyway, I´m going to try to upload some photos now as all this text is getting a bit dry, fingers crossed!
All in all a lovely place, although some crazy lady cornered loretta earlier and started making cutting actions across her throat. Loretta thought she was being hexed but another bloke (only slightly more subtley) pointed out that we were happily strolling through a really dangerous part of town taking photos of the grafitti. He simply made a gun out of his fingers and pretended to shoot us... he did explain later properly. These guys need to work on their communication skills.
Anyway, we´re heading to Santiago tomorrow before moving into Argentina´s Mendoza valley for a few days of relaxation, lots of wine and lots of steak. We´re planning on heading back into Chile later in the south to Torres del Paine.
Chile is a lot more European (including how the people look) than the rest of South America, very busy, bustling and tourists don´t seem to register - although there are a lot of Chilean tourists too, a classic sign (alongsode the prices) that Chile is doing a lot better in economic terms than most of its neighbours.
Anyway, I´m going to try to upload some photos now as all this text is getting a bit dry, fingers crossed!
Salteñas and Bolivia
Salteñas are basically little sweet-pastry pasties with chicken and vegetables but they are probably my favourite food in the entire world... those of you who´ve had them before will understand. I made it my mission to eat as many as possible in Bolivia, which makes the best ones and was delighted on our first morning when I saw a little old lady with a cart in the street selling them. Loretta was shocked as I dropped my bag and ran across the road shouting ´Salteñas!´... funnily enough the lady wasn´t there the next morning.
Anyway, diverting from my stomach for a moment. La Paz was exactly as I remember it, crazy, fascinating, and easy to get around. Thankfully this time I wasn´t ill (in fact I have been totally healthy the whole trip - touching wood). Lyns and Fig (my beloved sisters with whom I last visited La Paz) accidentally bought me laxatives as a cure for my diarrhoea last time and then proceeded to abandon me as they travelled on to Paraguay... charming. However, Loretta was feeling a little peaky and so we chilled for a day having booked a bike ride for the next day.
The first section of the ´world´s most dangerous road´doesn´t feel that dangerous, it´s fast (60-70kph downhills on a big downhill bike is fun but not too taxing as you just sit there) but the second half was brilliant on a dirt track (1.5m wide in some places) which has a drop ranging from between 800-200m on the left hand side. Loretta´s more patient approach soon meant that we were at opposite ends of the pack for the middle (and very wet) section, me just behind the guide storming down the path at (probably stupid on reflection) speeds racing 4x4s and at one point leaning into a curve, and misjudging it. I made the mistake of looking down directly into the 400m drop that I was hanging above about three inches from the edge, overcorrected and very nearly came off the other side... decided to stick with Loretta for the remainder of the stretch! Lots of fun.
We did have a flight from La Paz to Santiago booked but decided to overland it instead and go to travel through the Salt Flats. The scenery in Bolivia is mind blowing, from bright white salt flats that stretch as far as the eye can see, to moonscapes, deserts and red, green, white and black lakes. It was brilliant to see it this time in the other direction seeing the geysers, hot springs (lovely and warm!), flats, deserts, etc at different times of day and in a different season to the last time. There were many, many more jeeps this time (I remember only seeing one or two last time) but it didn´t detract from the experience one bit.
I´ll definitely get the photos uploaded soon, just proving difficult as the files are pretty big.
So, we hopped of the jeep at the border with Chile and headed into San Pedro de Atacama which used to be a one dusty (and unpaved) street village and is now completely different with loads of streets (paved) a main plaza and dozens of gringos.
Bolivia is definitely our top visit so far for spectacular scenery! Chile is next!
Anyway, diverting from my stomach for a moment. La Paz was exactly as I remember it, crazy, fascinating, and easy to get around. Thankfully this time I wasn´t ill (in fact I have been totally healthy the whole trip - touching wood). Lyns and Fig (my beloved sisters with whom I last visited La Paz) accidentally bought me laxatives as a cure for my diarrhoea last time and then proceeded to abandon me as they travelled on to Paraguay... charming. However, Loretta was feeling a little peaky and so we chilled for a day having booked a bike ride for the next day.
The first section of the ´world´s most dangerous road´doesn´t feel that dangerous, it´s fast (60-70kph downhills on a big downhill bike is fun but not too taxing as you just sit there) but the second half was brilliant on a dirt track (1.5m wide in some places) which has a drop ranging from between 800-200m on the left hand side. Loretta´s more patient approach soon meant that we were at opposite ends of the pack for the middle (and very wet) section, me just behind the guide storming down the path at (probably stupid on reflection) speeds racing 4x4s and at one point leaning into a curve, and misjudging it. I made the mistake of looking down directly into the 400m drop that I was hanging above about three inches from the edge, overcorrected and very nearly came off the other side... decided to stick with Loretta for the remainder of the stretch! Lots of fun.
We did have a flight from La Paz to Santiago booked but decided to overland it instead and go to travel through the Salt Flats. The scenery in Bolivia is mind blowing, from bright white salt flats that stretch as far as the eye can see, to moonscapes, deserts and red, green, white and black lakes. It was brilliant to see it this time in the other direction seeing the geysers, hot springs (lovely and warm!), flats, deserts, etc at different times of day and in a different season to the last time. There were many, many more jeeps this time (I remember only seeing one or two last time) but it didn´t detract from the experience one bit.
I´ll definitely get the photos uploaded soon, just proving difficult as the files are pretty big.
So, we hopped of the jeep at the border with Chile and headed into San Pedro de Atacama which used to be a one dusty (and unpaved) street village and is now completely different with loads of streets (paved) a main plaza and dozens of gringos.
Bolivia is definitely our top visit so far for spectacular scenery! Chile is next!
Peru continued
So, the bus journey is over, not that bad really, 25 hours in a semi reclining seat is far from my idea of fun but it passed relatively quietly, apart from the annoying loud family in front who were relatively quiet between 2am and 6am. A few episodes of The Fresh Prince in English eased the journey and Loretta and I are both addicted to the Klondike (patience) game on our ipods.
Anyway, Peru... Aguas Calientes is the town at the base of Machu Picchu and literally means ´hot waters´which, when looking for accommodation in Peru can mean anything from scorching hot showers (with no cold tap to dilute it) through to just off ice cold. It´s changed a lot from the shabby shacks hanging over the trainline to a full and not too bad little town (despite what the lonely planet says). This was our base for the trek up to Putucusi and then the next day we got up at 3.30am and braved the rain and dark to climb to the top for 6am opening, beating the tourists, we got our classic shots of MP through the clouds. Really amazing place, if ever you get the chance to visit I´d recommend it as a must-see before you die!! For those of you who haven´t been it´s not just the scale of the building but where it´s situated, right on top of this steep mountain, what the location lacks in practicality it makes up for in impact. The other fascinating thing is that no one really knows why it was situated there and what its function was... all very mysterious.
We were meeting our tour guide at 8am which (of course) gave us plenty of time to trek to the sun gate (cooly named ínti punku´) which is incredible - again to see the early morning mist rising and falling back over the ruins is stunning. We managed to get back to meet our tour guide in the nick of time and it was a really interesting talk. There are now very limited numbers of visitors allowed up to MP and the steep Huanya Picchu (the spiky mountain behind MP in the pictures) so I was relieved to not repeat the experience of the rickety wet path with the 1km drop...
While we were having the tour some muppet of a mother was letting her child play with his toys on the edge of a 10-12ft drop. All we heard was a sickening thud and a scream from aforementioned stupid mother. The kid landed on his head on the stone steps and was knocked out cold, luckily he regained consciousness and we found a doctor to tend to him, although trying to stop the mother from picking him up and trying to keep him still was impossible... he started crying, which is, I guess, a good sign and he was whisked away by a posse of guides and the doctor (probably more concerned with spoiling the tour!) Hopefully there was no lasting damage but for a second there I thought he was surely dead.
Anyway, after that little bit of excitement we were back in Cusco by the end of the day. We had been staying in Los Niños hostel, which was set up to help orphaned street kids... 72% of the hostel´s income goes directly to help the kids who are constantly wandering through on their way to and from school and for meals, really nice. If anyone´s interested in making a donation direct to a charity that is making a difference then let me know, I have their details and can put you in touch.
We´d decided to have a relaxing last day in Cusco, catching up on emails, journals, etc but decided at the last minute to do a paraglide over the Sacred Valley... well why not? (Jem, totally know why you´re hooked now!) It was awesome and surprisingly relaxing, not an adrenaline rush at all, one of the best things I´ve ever done. I went first with the instructor and we caught (I say we, my role was mainly just sitting there enjoying the view and moving from side to side when prodded in the ribs) a thermal and headed up to over 4200m. Stunning views over the Urumbamba valley, which bears a striking resemblance to Tuscany, and a relatively decent landing and then Loretta was up, loving it.
So, Puno was next which is on the shores of lake titicaca... we had a terribly ´touristy´tour to the reed islands which although interesting felt very much exploitative and false. We very much think of ourselves as travellers rather than tourists and very much don´t like to be told what to do so it was very strange to be told to stay with the /herd and do everything together for the day... although we did abscond at the first opportunity just to get some peace and quiet - definitely our first and last such tour of the trip!
After Puno we headed to La Paz, Bolivia´s capital which at just over 4,000m is the highest capital in the world - it may (or may not!) be interesting to know that it has the longest runway in the world as the air pressure is so low and planes need special tyres to land as the have to come in much faster...
Sad to be leaving Peru which is our favourite so far by a long way, just in terms of its spectacular scenery, people, activities, ease of travel and sheer fun. Could definitely live here!!
Anyway, Peru... Aguas Calientes is the town at the base of Machu Picchu and literally means ´hot waters´which, when looking for accommodation in Peru can mean anything from scorching hot showers (with no cold tap to dilute it) through to just off ice cold. It´s changed a lot from the shabby shacks hanging over the trainline to a full and not too bad little town (despite what the lonely planet says). This was our base for the trek up to Putucusi and then the next day we got up at 3.30am and braved the rain and dark to climb to the top for 6am opening, beating the tourists, we got our classic shots of MP through the clouds. Really amazing place, if ever you get the chance to visit I´d recommend it as a must-see before you die!! For those of you who haven´t been it´s not just the scale of the building but where it´s situated, right on top of this steep mountain, what the location lacks in practicality it makes up for in impact. The other fascinating thing is that no one really knows why it was situated there and what its function was... all very mysterious.
We were meeting our tour guide at 8am which (of course) gave us plenty of time to trek to the sun gate (cooly named ínti punku´) which is incredible - again to see the early morning mist rising and falling back over the ruins is stunning. We managed to get back to meet our tour guide in the nick of time and it was a really interesting talk. There are now very limited numbers of visitors allowed up to MP and the steep Huanya Picchu (the spiky mountain behind MP in the pictures) so I was relieved to not repeat the experience of the rickety wet path with the 1km drop...
While we were having the tour some muppet of a mother was letting her child play with his toys on the edge of a 10-12ft drop. All we heard was a sickening thud and a scream from aforementioned stupid mother. The kid landed on his head on the stone steps and was knocked out cold, luckily he regained consciousness and we found a doctor to tend to him, although trying to stop the mother from picking him up and trying to keep him still was impossible... he started crying, which is, I guess, a good sign and he was whisked away by a posse of guides and the doctor (probably more concerned with spoiling the tour!) Hopefully there was no lasting damage but for a second there I thought he was surely dead.
Anyway, after that little bit of excitement we were back in Cusco by the end of the day. We had been staying in Los Niños hostel, which was set up to help orphaned street kids... 72% of the hostel´s income goes directly to help the kids who are constantly wandering through on their way to and from school and for meals, really nice. If anyone´s interested in making a donation direct to a charity that is making a difference then let me know, I have their details and can put you in touch.
We´d decided to have a relaxing last day in Cusco, catching up on emails, journals, etc but decided at the last minute to do a paraglide over the Sacred Valley... well why not? (Jem, totally know why you´re hooked now!) It was awesome and surprisingly relaxing, not an adrenaline rush at all, one of the best things I´ve ever done. I went first with the instructor and we caught (I say we, my role was mainly just sitting there enjoying the view and moving from side to side when prodded in the ribs) a thermal and headed up to over 4200m. Stunning views over the Urumbamba valley, which bears a striking resemblance to Tuscany, and a relatively decent landing and then Loretta was up, loving it.
So, Puno was next which is on the shores of lake titicaca... we had a terribly ´touristy´tour to the reed islands which although interesting felt very much exploitative and false. We very much think of ourselves as travellers rather than tourists and very much don´t like to be told what to do so it was very strange to be told to stay with the /herd and do everything together for the day... although we did abscond at the first opportunity just to get some peace and quiet - definitely our first and last such tour of the trip!
After Puno we headed to La Paz, Bolivia´s capital which at just over 4,000m is the highest capital in the world - it may (or may not!) be interesting to know that it has the longest runway in the world as the air pressure is so low and planes need special tyres to land as the have to come in much faster...
Sad to be leaving Peru which is our favourite so far by a long way, just in terms of its spectacular scenery, people, activities, ease of travel and sheer fun. Could definitely live here!!
Thursday, 22 January 2009
Peru: Lima, Nasca and Putucusi
We're currently awaiting a bus from San Pedro de Atacama to Valparaiso in Chile, 24hours of fun... so will be brief and provide a full update soon.
It has been brilliant to come back to Peru and Bolivia, I was last here with Lyns and Fig in 2001 and it has all changed so much. Many, many more tourists but happily the more streetwise locals on the gringo trail haven{t dented the awesome experience of these two spectacular countries.
So, Lima was our first stop in Peru, one of my favourite cities in the world, we stayed in the Barranco area and wandered around Miraflores for the day, eating street food and taking in the sights (pork sandwiches with a cup of apple sauce, stunning!)
The next day we caught the bus down to Nasca to see the lines (the enormous glyphs that were made by the Incas in the desert, no-one really knows what they are, but they are spectacular). We took a flight over the lines and weren're really expecting too much from the town but a few hours of r and r by the pool of a posh hotel put that to rights. The flight wasn't my favourite event of the trip, it's tiny and was flipping around onto it's side so that everyone got a lovely view of the lines.
My stomach was flipping and twisting the whole time and I turned a strange shade of yellow, luckily I'd skipped breakfast... seeing that I was struggling the pilot handed me a piece of damp cotton wool which I diligently sniffed for the duration of the flight. Never questioning what this was I started to wonder when I began to fall asleep and then both my hands and feet went numb. Marvellous... I looked at the stuff he'd sprayed onto the cotton wool and realised it was pure alcohol. Now, I remember being warned in A Level biology while preparing slides for the microscope that sniffing pure alcohol can be fatal. Mrs Lynn would not be impressed. Thankfully it stopped the airsickness but made me feel awful for the rest of the day.
After resting in Nasca we headed to Cusco. I had many fond memories of Cusco from my last visit and it hasn't really changed, it's a gorgeous town, very safe and set up for tourism. We had missed the opportunity to do the Inca trail to Machu Picchu (again! Although from the sound of it it was packed) so we decided to train it and make ourselves feel better by trekking around the area for a few days.
Now I do love a bit of a trek, however everywhere around Machu Picchu is vertical and I'm not a big fan of heights, especially 400ft of wet vertical ladders... Loretta's bright idea to trek up Putucusi was met with something less than enthusiasm from me when I saw the photos, but we did it anyway. Putucusi (aka the Happy Mountain, what irony) is the vertical cliff facing Machu Picchu and you get to the half way point by rickety ladders, no ropes or harnesses and many wobbly knees.
An hour of pure adrenaline got me up there (of course with plenty of compaining to Loretta who was happily bouncing up these ladders and sheer vertical cliffs) but the view from the top of Machu Picchu is incredible and definitely rivals the traditional one. We stayed at the top for half an hour until the encroaching darkness forced me down. I'd have been happy to stay there forever rather than go back down the slippery scary ladders.
However, despite lots of drama from me we did make it down and I got my revenge that evening on Loretta by eating half a Guinea Pig that evening which thoroughly put her off her Lomo Saltado (alpaca meat!). He, he, he!
Anyway, got to dash to the bus, we've got 24hours to central Chile... fun, fun, fun.
It has been brilliant to come back to Peru and Bolivia, I was last here with Lyns and Fig in 2001 and it has all changed so much. Many, many more tourists but happily the more streetwise locals on the gringo trail haven{t dented the awesome experience of these two spectacular countries.
So, Lima was our first stop in Peru, one of my favourite cities in the world, we stayed in the Barranco area and wandered around Miraflores for the day, eating street food and taking in the sights (pork sandwiches with a cup of apple sauce, stunning!)
The next day we caught the bus down to Nasca to see the lines (the enormous glyphs that were made by the Incas in the desert, no-one really knows what they are, but they are spectacular). We took a flight over the lines and weren're really expecting too much from the town but a few hours of r and r by the pool of a posh hotel put that to rights. The flight wasn't my favourite event of the trip, it's tiny and was flipping around onto it's side so that everyone got a lovely view of the lines.
My stomach was flipping and twisting the whole time and I turned a strange shade of yellow, luckily I'd skipped breakfast... seeing that I was struggling the pilot handed me a piece of damp cotton wool which I diligently sniffed for the duration of the flight. Never questioning what this was I started to wonder when I began to fall asleep and then both my hands and feet went numb. Marvellous... I looked at the stuff he'd sprayed onto the cotton wool and realised it was pure alcohol. Now, I remember being warned in A Level biology while preparing slides for the microscope that sniffing pure alcohol can be fatal. Mrs Lynn would not be impressed. Thankfully it stopped the airsickness but made me feel awful for the rest of the day.
After resting in Nasca we headed to Cusco. I had many fond memories of Cusco from my last visit and it hasn't really changed, it's a gorgeous town, very safe and set up for tourism. We had missed the opportunity to do the Inca trail to Machu Picchu (again! Although from the sound of it it was packed) so we decided to train it and make ourselves feel better by trekking around the area for a few days.
Now I do love a bit of a trek, however everywhere around Machu Picchu is vertical and I'm not a big fan of heights, especially 400ft of wet vertical ladders... Loretta's bright idea to trek up Putucusi was met with something less than enthusiasm from me when I saw the photos, but we did it anyway. Putucusi (aka the Happy Mountain, what irony) is the vertical cliff facing Machu Picchu and you get to the half way point by rickety ladders, no ropes or harnesses and many wobbly knees.
An hour of pure adrenaline got me up there (of course with plenty of compaining to Loretta who was happily bouncing up these ladders and sheer vertical cliffs) but the view from the top of Machu Picchu is incredible and definitely rivals the traditional one. We stayed at the top for half an hour until the encroaching darkness forced me down. I'd have been happy to stay there forever rather than go back down the slippery scary ladders.
However, despite lots of drama from me we did make it down and I got my revenge that evening on Loretta by eating half a Guinea Pig that evening which thoroughly put her off her Lomo Saltado (alpaca meat!). He, he, he!
Anyway, got to dash to the bus, we've got 24hours to central Chile... fun, fun, fun.
Thursday, 8 January 2009
Costa Rica and Panama
So, I´m currently sitting in an internet cafe in Cusco, Peru so have fallen a bit behind with the old updates. Loving being back, all very familiar but really excited for Loretta to see the highlights too!
Anyway...
Our original plan was to skip through Costa Rica with one overnight stay in San Jose, but we decided to take in a few days of sunshine in the coastal villages of Cahuita and Puerto Viaje and maybe fit in a bit of surfing. Costa Rica is a lot more touristy (and hence expensive) than many of the other places we´ve stayed and although Loretta was very excited by the promise of lovely modern hostels, me not so much. My stereotypical view of the brash, semi drunken, young, holidaying, american was reinforced within thirty seconds of arriving in San Jose, the hostel was stunning but the fellow travellers, not so much.
We were keen to get to the coast so pleaded with the bus driver to let us sit on the floor, he generously gave us the steps and it was a really nice ride with a lovely view of the extensive banana plantations and the spectacular rivers and mountains. Costa Rica is beautiful.
Cahuita is a gorgeous little village on the Caribbean (northern) coast in the far east, we stayed there for a night. The surf was great, shame these surfers didn´t have the skills to match the waves - that´ll teach us for using semi professional boards, bring on the styrofoam boats next time. Although I did manage to stand up twice in around two hours and both times Loretta was looking in the other direction...
Puerto Viaje was a half hour bus ride closer to Panama, which, when we started didn´t seem like it was going to be anything special but each reading of the lonely planet was increasing our excitement at the prospect of lush coffee plantations, new year in Bocas del Toro and Panama city itself.
Anyway, Puerto Viaje is a lovely beachy type place which we thoroughly enjoyed. The next day we headed closer to the border on a local bus which left us on a road somewhere closer to the border... handy, given that we didn´t have a clue where we were. Anyway, a Costa Rican wide boy with his souped up green toyota supra saved the day answering the call of my raised thumb and took us to the border at great speed.
This was a bit of a quality ride compared to most taxis in Central America, which are pretty much consistent with those across Asia and Africa. Window winders are rare and if you want to be ventilated then it requires pulling over and the driver pushing the glass down from the outside. I tend to step out of most taxis having accidentally sent the car slightly closer to its inevitable end on the scrap heap. Pulling out my rucksac from the green supra (obviously his pride and joy) I noticed that part of the door trim had come with me, I hastily put it back and slammed the door - only for the window to come part out of its frame... thankfully he didn´t notice.
The border crossing to Panama bears a striking resemblance to the Bridge over the River Kwai, so a quick check for trains (and explosives) and we were in no mans land. Getting into Panama was a little tricker as we had to prove that we weren´t going to stay there forever, once we´d found an Internet cafe and printed off our e-ticket from Panama City to peru they let us in.
One dodgy exchange rate later and we were on our way to Bocas del Toro in Panama. This being New Year´s Eve our travelling companions cracked open the beers and shared them around the bus.
A few hours later (bus rides are beginning to merge into three categories - quick skips in chicken buses which generally last up to three hours, middle distance which range from the minging to the bearable up to eight hours, and the longer ones that slowly destroy the nerves between your knees and lower back with every bump and sway) we were on the boat to Bocas del Toro, the island archipelago off the coast of north western Panama.
New Year´s Eve is quite busy, everywhere and after an hours search (while Loretta sat in a cafe exercising amazing self control by not eating my share of the chips she´d ordered) we (I) found a decent hostel. We managed to stay up until midnight but had both been in bed for a few hours by then watching a film. Rock and roll. The next morning we felt a bit bad as we really ahdn´t made the most out of the festive period... oh well, there´s always next year.
New Year´s Day involved a trip out into the sea to spot dolphins and we were really lucky, a dozen or so were in playful mood and we got a few good snaps - really brilliant as I´ve never seen dolphins in the wild before...
After Bocas, we headed to the lovely mountain town of Boquete which is world famous for its coffee so a coffee tour, the next day followed by an afternoon on the river sunning ourselves really chilled us out.
Actually mentioning the river, many of Panama´s roads, coffee plantations and houses have been completely wiped out in the last few months by a massive flood. The river had obviously burst its banks a few weeks earlier and people were only just coming to terms with the devastation. In the buses there are dozens of scarred hillsides where the land has collapsed and wiped out homes, roads, and acres of tropical forest. It was a real reminder to me that the consumerism in the ´developed´world is driving us towards an unsustainable future where our demand for cheap commodites and levels of pollution is literally destroying people´s lives in far off places. In the UK, we won´t suffer until the oil, water, cheap wood, coffee, sugar, etc run out but people are suffering right now meeting the demands of our greed and are suffering as the climate changes irrevocably. (steps down from the soap box)
Panama city is amazing, we stayed in Casco Viejo (the old quarter) which is now a UNESCO heritage site and, despite being boxed in by very dangerous areas where tourists shouldn´t venture during the day, nevermind the night, it´ll be amazing in four or five years.
Any trip to Panama isn´t complete without a ride on the crazy diablos rojos buses (red devils) although they didn´t seem any more crazy than the other central american buses! We used these to get around while we were here and took them to Panama´s other unmissable sight - the canal. Brilliant seeing a massive oil tanker going through the Miraflores Locks (although somewhat ironically it had a huge green banner emblazoned on it saying ¿¡´protect the environment´?!) Hmmm.
Flying out of Panama City the next morning marked the end of our speedy trip through Central America - it´s been fun and although we´ve been going pretty quickly we´ve got a really good taste of the region and have had loads of amazing moments. We´re both really excited about the main event which, of course, is South America. We´ve booked our flights and having realised (sadly) that Colombia and venezuela will have to wait for our next visit, we´re going to Peru, Bolivia, Chile, Argentina to be in Rio for Carnival before heading to the Pantanal and Iguazu for a few weeks before heading home in around two months time.
And photos - they´re coming soon... I promise!!
Anyway...
Our original plan was to skip through Costa Rica with one overnight stay in San Jose, but we decided to take in a few days of sunshine in the coastal villages of Cahuita and Puerto Viaje and maybe fit in a bit of surfing. Costa Rica is a lot more touristy (and hence expensive) than many of the other places we´ve stayed and although Loretta was very excited by the promise of lovely modern hostels, me not so much. My stereotypical view of the brash, semi drunken, young, holidaying, american was reinforced within thirty seconds of arriving in San Jose, the hostel was stunning but the fellow travellers, not so much.
We were keen to get to the coast so pleaded with the bus driver to let us sit on the floor, he generously gave us the steps and it was a really nice ride with a lovely view of the extensive banana plantations and the spectacular rivers and mountains. Costa Rica is beautiful.
Cahuita is a gorgeous little village on the Caribbean (northern) coast in the far east, we stayed there for a night. The surf was great, shame these surfers didn´t have the skills to match the waves - that´ll teach us for using semi professional boards, bring on the styrofoam boats next time. Although I did manage to stand up twice in around two hours and both times Loretta was looking in the other direction...
Puerto Viaje was a half hour bus ride closer to Panama, which, when we started didn´t seem like it was going to be anything special but each reading of the lonely planet was increasing our excitement at the prospect of lush coffee plantations, new year in Bocas del Toro and Panama city itself.
Anyway, Puerto Viaje is a lovely beachy type place which we thoroughly enjoyed. The next day we headed closer to the border on a local bus which left us on a road somewhere closer to the border... handy, given that we didn´t have a clue where we were. Anyway, a Costa Rican wide boy with his souped up green toyota supra saved the day answering the call of my raised thumb and took us to the border at great speed.
This was a bit of a quality ride compared to most taxis in Central America, which are pretty much consistent with those across Asia and Africa. Window winders are rare and if you want to be ventilated then it requires pulling over and the driver pushing the glass down from the outside. I tend to step out of most taxis having accidentally sent the car slightly closer to its inevitable end on the scrap heap. Pulling out my rucksac from the green supra (obviously his pride and joy) I noticed that part of the door trim had come with me, I hastily put it back and slammed the door - only for the window to come part out of its frame... thankfully he didn´t notice.
The border crossing to Panama bears a striking resemblance to the Bridge over the River Kwai, so a quick check for trains (and explosives) and we were in no mans land. Getting into Panama was a little tricker as we had to prove that we weren´t going to stay there forever, once we´d found an Internet cafe and printed off our e-ticket from Panama City to peru they let us in.
One dodgy exchange rate later and we were on our way to Bocas del Toro in Panama. This being New Year´s Eve our travelling companions cracked open the beers and shared them around the bus.
A few hours later (bus rides are beginning to merge into three categories - quick skips in chicken buses which generally last up to three hours, middle distance which range from the minging to the bearable up to eight hours, and the longer ones that slowly destroy the nerves between your knees and lower back with every bump and sway) we were on the boat to Bocas del Toro, the island archipelago off the coast of north western Panama.
New Year´s Eve is quite busy, everywhere and after an hours search (while Loretta sat in a cafe exercising amazing self control by not eating my share of the chips she´d ordered) we (I) found a decent hostel. We managed to stay up until midnight but had both been in bed for a few hours by then watching a film. Rock and roll. The next morning we felt a bit bad as we really ahdn´t made the most out of the festive period... oh well, there´s always next year.
New Year´s Day involved a trip out into the sea to spot dolphins and we were really lucky, a dozen or so were in playful mood and we got a few good snaps - really brilliant as I´ve never seen dolphins in the wild before...
After Bocas, we headed to the lovely mountain town of Boquete which is world famous for its coffee so a coffee tour, the next day followed by an afternoon on the river sunning ourselves really chilled us out.
Actually mentioning the river, many of Panama´s roads, coffee plantations and houses have been completely wiped out in the last few months by a massive flood. The river had obviously burst its banks a few weeks earlier and people were only just coming to terms with the devastation. In the buses there are dozens of scarred hillsides where the land has collapsed and wiped out homes, roads, and acres of tropical forest. It was a real reminder to me that the consumerism in the ´developed´world is driving us towards an unsustainable future where our demand for cheap commodites and levels of pollution is literally destroying people´s lives in far off places. In the UK, we won´t suffer until the oil, water, cheap wood, coffee, sugar, etc run out but people are suffering right now meeting the demands of our greed and are suffering as the climate changes irrevocably. (steps down from the soap box)
Panama city is amazing, we stayed in Casco Viejo (the old quarter) which is now a UNESCO heritage site and, despite being boxed in by very dangerous areas where tourists shouldn´t venture during the day, nevermind the night, it´ll be amazing in four or five years.
Any trip to Panama isn´t complete without a ride on the crazy diablos rojos buses (red devils) although they didn´t seem any more crazy than the other central american buses! We used these to get around while we were here and took them to Panama´s other unmissable sight - the canal. Brilliant seeing a massive oil tanker going through the Miraflores Locks (although somewhat ironically it had a huge green banner emblazoned on it saying ¿¡´protect the environment´?!) Hmmm.
Flying out of Panama City the next morning marked the end of our speedy trip through Central America - it´s been fun and although we´ve been going pretty quickly we´ve got a really good taste of the region and have had loads of amazing moments. We´re both really excited about the main event which, of course, is South America. We´ve booked our flights and having realised (sadly) that Colombia and venezuela will have to wait for our next visit, we´re going to Peru, Bolivia, Chile, Argentina to be in Rio for Carnival before heading to the Pantanal and Iguazu for a few weeks before heading home in around two months time.
And photos - they´re coming soon... I promise!!
Monday, 29 December 2008
Nicaragua
So all of our border crossings (so far - fingers crossed) have been pretty straightforward, just the usual minor bureaucracy, none of the West African style nightmares. We´re in Costa Rica at the moment, going surfing in the next few days and maybe a bit more diving...
It always amazes me how much more trusting you have to become when travelling, whilst still being aware. When you´re in a mental bus station with hundreds of buses and people and some complete stranger at the bus station tells you that this is the bus you need, tells you to pay on board and throws your sizeable rucksac onto the roof in around three seconds. Or, when some dodgy looking bloke at the border with a calculator and a bundle of money looks at you and tells you an exchange rate that you haven´t researched (just add 10% to their first rate seems to be a good rule of thumb here). Also, I guess it´s all about making connections and finding tiny bits of common ground. Like our taxi driver in Guatemala City who didn´t speak a word of english and chattered away while rooting through his cds, selected one and with an enormous grin pressed play and stated "ingleterra" - out of the speakers blared "lonely, I´m so lonely" as sung by Kim Il Jong in team America. Random and hilarious.
So, anyway, Nicaragua. The most volcanic country of Central Amercia, still largely undiscovered and all the more lovely for the fewer travellers. We were on a mission to get to Granada for Christmas so sadly had to miss out on Leon... always hard, but reality is beginning to dawn that our trip´was pretty optimistic, given the amount of ground we have to cover in three months!
Christmas day was like no other, a long walk around the historic town of Granada (in need of a big clean up and a little diosappointing after what we've heard about it)and a bit of breakfast saw us watching Lord of the Rings on HBO (not too disimilar to a UK Christmas in the Pollard household!) Fellow travellers will understand our love of the ever reliable HBO for a little bit of familiar entertainment! To do Granada justice we took a lovely horsedrawn tour of the town (in the rain), with a lovely Spanish guide who gave us a really thoughtful insight into the history. Thankfully our Spanish is now good enough to understand and communicate effectively so we got a lot out of it.
The Spanish and US have a lot to answer for in this region of the world, millions of deaths over the last five centuries, and more recently political meddling, coups, general war mongering... for resources, access to the Panama canal, etc. Although, the UK's record isn't much better in many other corners of the world.
Anyway, a few days in Granada and we headed off to Ometepe, an island in the middle of Lago de Nicaragua that was formed by two volcanoes erupting. Naturally, we had to climb one (a touch higher than Ben Nevis). Naturally, it was chucking it down. We'd got quite excited about trekking through cloud forest (which seemed like quite a romantic prospect, however the reality was a little different but fun all the same!) The path up seemed to be made up of a small stream bed that on the way up was okay, just very muddy but trying to stay relatively mud free, lots of slipping and close calls but we were soaked close to the top. The view from the top was amazing, if the mist lifted, but typically the clouds were down and we could just about make out the near shore of the crater lake, never mind the other side. The mud added a bit of danger to the path down and Loretta was in prime position for the muddiest of the group until the army bloke in our group stacked it in brilliant style ten metres from the end of the trail.
The rest of Nicaragua passed by relatively quietly as we bussed our way to the border and jumped on a bus to San Jose in Costa Rica. Nicaragua´s a stunning, gentle and relaxed place and we left with a nagging feeling that we hadn´t done it justice. next stop the slightly less chilled and much more American Costa Rica was lying in wait, an interesting contrast.
The reality dawned on us that there was no way we could fit in Colombia and Venezuela to our itinerary and make Rio carnival so they´ve been put on the back burner for our next trip to South America and we´re flying to Lima, Peru on 6th Jan for the main event of our trip... South America.
It always amazes me how much more trusting you have to become when travelling, whilst still being aware. When you´re in a mental bus station with hundreds of buses and people and some complete stranger at the bus station tells you that this is the bus you need, tells you to pay on board and throws your sizeable rucksac onto the roof in around three seconds. Or, when some dodgy looking bloke at the border with a calculator and a bundle of money looks at you and tells you an exchange rate that you haven´t researched (just add 10% to their first rate seems to be a good rule of thumb here). Also, I guess it´s all about making connections and finding tiny bits of common ground. Like our taxi driver in Guatemala City who didn´t speak a word of english and chattered away while rooting through his cds, selected one and with an enormous grin pressed play and stated "ingleterra" - out of the speakers blared "lonely, I´m so lonely" as sung by Kim Il Jong in team America. Random and hilarious.
So, anyway, Nicaragua. The most volcanic country of Central Amercia, still largely undiscovered and all the more lovely for the fewer travellers. We were on a mission to get to Granada for Christmas so sadly had to miss out on Leon... always hard, but reality is beginning to dawn that our trip´was pretty optimistic, given the amount of ground we have to cover in three months!
Christmas day was like no other, a long walk around the historic town of Granada (in need of a big clean up and a little diosappointing after what we've heard about it)and a bit of breakfast saw us watching Lord of the Rings on HBO (not too disimilar to a UK Christmas in the Pollard household!) Fellow travellers will understand our love of the ever reliable HBO for a little bit of familiar entertainment! To do Granada justice we took a lovely horsedrawn tour of the town (in the rain), with a lovely Spanish guide who gave us a really thoughtful insight into the history. Thankfully our Spanish is now good enough to understand and communicate effectively so we got a lot out of it.
The Spanish and US have a lot to answer for in this region of the world, millions of deaths over the last five centuries, and more recently political meddling, coups, general war mongering... for resources, access to the Panama canal, etc. Although, the UK's record isn't much better in many other corners of the world.
Anyway, a few days in Granada and we headed off to Ometepe, an island in the middle of Lago de Nicaragua that was formed by two volcanoes erupting. Naturally, we had to climb one (a touch higher than Ben Nevis). Naturally, it was chucking it down. We'd got quite excited about trekking through cloud forest (which seemed like quite a romantic prospect, however the reality was a little different but fun all the same!) The path up seemed to be made up of a small stream bed that on the way up was okay, just very muddy but trying to stay relatively mud free, lots of slipping and close calls but we were soaked close to the top. The view from the top was amazing, if the mist lifted, but typically the clouds were down and we could just about make out the near shore of the crater lake, never mind the other side. The mud added a bit of danger to the path down and Loretta was in prime position for the muddiest of the group until the army bloke in our group stacked it in brilliant style ten metres from the end of the trail.
The rest of Nicaragua passed by relatively quietly as we bussed our way to the border and jumped on a bus to San Jose in Costa Rica. Nicaragua´s a stunning, gentle and relaxed place and we left with a nagging feeling that we hadn´t done it justice. next stop the slightly less chilled and much more American Costa Rica was lying in wait, an interesting contrast.
The reality dawned on us that there was no way we could fit in Colombia and Venezuela to our itinerary and make Rio carnival so they´ve been put on the back burner for our next trip to South America and we´re flying to Lima, Peru on 6th Jan for the main event of our trip... South America.
Honduras... the honeymoon is over
We arrived safely in our little boat and winged our way to La Ceiba, which is the ferry port for boats to the Bay Islands - reputedly some of the best scuba diving in the world.
In spite of our driver´s best efforts, we also arrived safely in La Ceiba to be confronted with a very ´special´ hostel and an argument with the driver who had his own "official" inflated exchange rate which we were having none of...
The hostel only had dorm beds left and they were truly horrific, skanky sheets and minging washrooms. Loretta declared the honeymoon well and truly over and nestled down into her sleeping bag - making sure that no single part of her body made contact with any sheet, towel, floor... Now, as many of you know, I don´t take too well when things get between me and my sleep. We were in a seven bed dorm room and eventually (around 1am) the loud conversation/argument between an obnoxious Israeli and an equally arrogant American directly outside our window had died down and they´d switched off the flashing christmas lights that covered our window. Not the greatest start to a night´s rest but I was hoping to get a little sleep. That was until the extremely hirsuite Mr Tumnus lookalike at the opposite corner began to snore. I´ve never heard anything like it. It sounded like when you let the air out a balloon and stretch the neck... a kind of whistling grunt. Even my my ipod couldn´t drown it out. After twenty minutes and because no one else in the dorm would, i went over and tapped his leg and asked him politely to turn over as his snoring was keeping everybody else awake. After ten minutes he was back asleep and snoring. A few snatches of sleep later and one of the other inhabitants of the dorm went and did the same, ten minutes of peace until once again he started up again. After a few hours of sleep between the worst bouts he started again around five. At this point I couldn´t take anymore and threw the spare pillow which landed on his head and woke him up. He wasn´t too amused but the rest of the dorm found it funny.
Anyway, the next day we were off to Roatan, one of the islands and what follwoed was three days of relaxing and diving, a deep wreck dive, drift dive, night dive and one other and we´re well on our way to being advanced divers, we´re probably going to finish it off in Panama. Stunning visibility and thousands of fish, lots of luminescence, coral, etc really brilliant. There was a minor incident on our last dive when one of my fins got caught between the bench and the edge of the boat which, on a backwards roll entry led to me dangling for a few moments with my head in the water... when I´d been levered free I rolled in the water and whacked my head on the boat... quite a noise and everyone was worried but I was fine, although my tank was a buit skewed by the impact so I spent most of the night dive rolled onto my left side...
We were hoping to make Granada in Nicaragua for Christmas so legged it through the rest of Honduras, staying one night in the capital Tegucigalpa, before crossing into Nicaragua overland.
In spite of our driver´s best efforts, we also arrived safely in La Ceiba to be confronted with a very ´special´ hostel and an argument with the driver who had his own "official" inflated exchange rate which we were having none of...
The hostel only had dorm beds left and they were truly horrific, skanky sheets and minging washrooms. Loretta declared the honeymoon well and truly over and nestled down into her sleeping bag - making sure that no single part of her body made contact with any sheet, towel, floor... Now, as many of you know, I don´t take too well when things get between me and my sleep. We were in a seven bed dorm room and eventually (around 1am) the loud conversation/argument between an obnoxious Israeli and an equally arrogant American directly outside our window had died down and they´d switched off the flashing christmas lights that covered our window. Not the greatest start to a night´s rest but I was hoping to get a little sleep. That was until the extremely hirsuite Mr Tumnus lookalike at the opposite corner began to snore. I´ve never heard anything like it. It sounded like when you let the air out a balloon and stretch the neck... a kind of whistling grunt. Even my my ipod couldn´t drown it out. After twenty minutes and because no one else in the dorm would, i went over and tapped his leg and asked him politely to turn over as his snoring was keeping everybody else awake. After ten minutes he was back asleep and snoring. A few snatches of sleep later and one of the other inhabitants of the dorm went and did the same, ten minutes of peace until once again he started up again. After a few hours of sleep between the worst bouts he started again around five. At this point I couldn´t take anymore and threw the spare pillow which landed on his head and woke him up. He wasn´t too amused but the rest of the dorm found it funny.
Anyway, the next day we were off to Roatan, one of the islands and what follwoed was three days of relaxing and diving, a deep wreck dive, drift dive, night dive and one other and we´re well on our way to being advanced divers, we´re probably going to finish it off in Panama. Stunning visibility and thousands of fish, lots of luminescence, coral, etc really brilliant. There was a minor incident on our last dive when one of my fins got caught between the bench and the edge of the boat which, on a backwards roll entry led to me dangling for a few moments with my head in the water... when I´d been levered free I rolled in the water and whacked my head on the boat... quite a noise and everyone was worried but I was fine, although my tank was a buit skewed by the impact so I spent most of the night dive rolled onto my left side...
We were hoping to make Granada in Nicaragua for Christmas so legged it through the rest of Honduras, staying one night in the capital Tegucigalpa, before crossing into Nicaragua overland.
Monday, 22 December 2008
Merry Christmas!!!
So, most of you will have finished work for Christmas and I imagine that the build up is as always spectacular, we're in real danger of forgetting to celebrate as it's boiling over here (ha, ha, ha!)
Anyway, just to wish you all an amazing and lovely Christmas, hope it's a fun time - we're thinking of you all and missing you, however we're fully expecting the Christmas sunshine and view of the lake in Granada (Nicaragua) to make up for it.
Take care and lots of love.
PS Mum, Dad, Fig and Grandma - we'll try to ring you in the early afternoon as we're six hours behind you guys... x
Anyway, just to wish you all an amazing and lovely Christmas, hope it's a fun time - we're thinking of you all and missing you, however we're fully expecting the Christmas sunshine and view of the lake in Granada (Nicaragua) to make up for it.
Take care and lots of love.
PS Mum, Dad, Fig and Grandma - we'll try to ring you in the early afternoon as we're six hours behind you guys... x
Belize (in three nights)
Before arriving, I always thought that Belize was going to be a tropical paradise with amazing diving and palm fringed white sand beaches. My first impressions were somewhat different, with scrubland as far as the eye can see and a surprising number of burnt out/rusted cars lining the road from the border crossing to Belmopan (the capital, which I previously thought was Belize City... probably should have read the guidebook beforehand).
However, things drastically improved once we'd made it to Belize City and then hopped onto the ferry to Caye Caulker - one of the small islands off the coast). Lovely beaches, baking hot sunshine and the very laid back vibe of a country known for it's offshoot of Rastafarianism - the Garifuna.
Signs all over the place simply read 'go slow'. You get the picture.
We had planned to dive the Blue Hole - as it is one of the most famous in the world (it was a bit of a glorious legend in Berwick Diving Club all those years ago), however our timing was a little off and we had a last minute change of plan, if we wanted to get to Honduras (on a dodgy little boak across the sea) then we would have to be down south in 48 hours... otherwise we'd miss the twice weekly boat. Not that gutted as we had been planning on getting some diving done in Honduras and from what we've heard subsequently, the Blue Hole isn't all it's cracked up to be.
So, after a few relaxing days and nights on the Caye we made our way by local bus (belting out the standard reggae tunes, including some quality reggae style Christmas tunes) and to a tiny backwater called Mango Creek- cool name. A short (very fast and very bumpy) water taxi ride later we arrived at Placenia and the next morning made the boat.
Once two hours of immigration bureaucracy had been completed it was relatively plain sailing... although it was a pretty small boat and the 12-15ft swell made most of the younger kids hurl - always nice when you're trying to keep your own breakfast down. One mother had been feeding her astonishingly fat children coke, biscuits and sweets for the first few hours of the journey (it was amazing to watch them put those snack away) and she seemed surprised when they became ill... the little girl was quite cute until her splash back started to inch closer to my flip flopped feet.
Everyone was pretty pleased when we arrived on the north coast of Honduras, if only to avoid the puke.
However, things drastically improved once we'd made it to Belize City and then hopped onto the ferry to Caye Caulker - one of the small islands off the coast). Lovely beaches, baking hot sunshine and the very laid back vibe of a country known for it's offshoot of Rastafarianism - the Garifuna.
Signs all over the place simply read 'go slow'. You get the picture.
We had planned to dive the Blue Hole - as it is one of the most famous in the world (it was a bit of a glorious legend in Berwick Diving Club all those years ago), however our timing was a little off and we had a last minute change of plan, if we wanted to get to Honduras (on a dodgy little boak across the sea) then we would have to be down south in 48 hours... otherwise we'd miss the twice weekly boat. Not that gutted as we had been planning on getting some diving done in Honduras and from what we've heard subsequently, the Blue Hole isn't all it's cracked up to be.
So, after a few relaxing days and nights on the Caye we made our way by local bus (belting out the standard reggae tunes, including some quality reggae style Christmas tunes) and to a tiny backwater called Mango Creek- cool name. A short (very fast and very bumpy) water taxi ride later we arrived at Placenia and the next morning made the boat.
Once two hours of immigration bureaucracy had been completed it was relatively plain sailing... although it was a pretty small boat and the 12-15ft swell made most of the younger kids hurl - always nice when you're trying to keep your own breakfast down. One mother had been feeding her astonishingly fat children coke, biscuits and sweets for the first few hours of the journey (it was amazing to watch them put those snack away) and she seemed surprised when they became ill... the little girl was quite cute until her splash back started to inch closer to my flip flopped feet.
Everyone was pretty pleased when we arrived on the north coast of Honduras, if only to avoid the puke.
New Job!!!!
Before I left I applied for a few jobs in London and a few days before the wedding I popped down to London for a final interview (much to Loretta's amusement!)
After a long distance phone call while in Guatemala I found out that it had worked out well and from the end of March I'll be the Head of Fundraising at SOAS (the University of London's School of Oriental and African Studies, where I did my Masters). A really exciting opportunity with lots of potential and the usual challenges...
I guess that means we definitely have to come back...
After a long distance phone call while in Guatemala I found out that it had worked out well and from the end of March I'll be the Head of Fundraising at SOAS (the University of London's School of Oriental and African Studies, where I did my Masters). A really exciting opportunity with lots of potential and the usual challenges...
I guess that means we definitely have to come back...
Sunday, 21 December 2008
Guatemala
After a night in the Sheraton at Heathrow (fulfilling Loretta´s lofty lifetime ambition!), a very early morning and rearranging our flights with Iberia at the check in desk (the agent had accidentally booked us on a flight that no longer existed) we arrived in Guatemala via Costa Rica.
We had no real plans at this stage except for five nights of good hotels booked in Antigua and Lake Atitlan - after all it is our honeymoon, so a little luxury was very welcome.
Having heard only bad things about Guatemala city we went straight to the gorgeous colonial town of Antigua. After a fairly hectic week we were both exhausted and it was lovely to chill out for a few days (although our chill-out did include a climb up the local live volcano). Continuing the theme we moved on to Lake Atitlan which is probably one of the most stunning places we´ve ever been to (and a contender for one of the new official seven wonders of the world - apparently). San Marcos was a short bus and boat ride away and had been recommended by a friend (thanks Minta) and it didn´t disappoint - massage, yoga, conoeing on the lake, walking to the next village and eating lots of good, healthy food was the perfect start.
Guatemala is beautiful, very laid back and friendly, but surprisingly expensive therefore we commtted to using the local ´Chicken Buses´as often as possible - these were surprisingly good and there wasn´t a chicken in sight.
Guatemala City was our next stop to catch the night bus to the Mayan site of Tikal in the north. ´Él Guate´as the city is affectionately know is pretty hideous. We had a few hours to kill so ventured out to Central Park, amidst the druggies, tramps, defaecating and urinating men we planned the next leg of our trip and decided that the honeymoon was truly over. Heading back through the most dangerous part of town (Zona 1) is depressing, loads of formerly grand Spanish colonial buildings have been left to rot or form the bases of many hideous grey monolithic concrete apartment blocks. The only place to eat was a McDonalds (vile even by home standards) so we decided to while away the remaining three or four hours in the bus station.
Christmas is huge over here and there´s more tatty decorations than in Alnwick, believe it or not. Our favourite (?) so far was the singing christmas tree in the bus station whose monotonous beep belted out a medley mix of Santa Claus is coming to town, jingle bells and we wish you a merry christmas on a permanant loop. It had stiff competition in the volume/annoying stakes from the raucous Guatemalan Semi-pro Cage Fighting event taking place next door and the Guatemalan equivalent of the X Factor belting out from the TV... you´ve gotta love those travelling bus station moments!
We arrived at Tikal the next morning and despite the minging and very expensive accommodation four or five hours in the ruins definitely made the trip worth it. The huge Mayan ruins set in deep tropical forest were spectacular, we braved the rickety wooden steps, climbing nearly 180ft to the top and were rewarded with brilliant views of the forest canopy stretching out as far as the eye can see, which bore a striking resemblance to some scenes from Star Wars (Ed - not sure if any of them were filmed here?)
We decided that rather than retracing our steps back to Guatemala City, to pop into Belize (not on the original plan but an interesting detour - this is what I love about not having anything booked, just wake up one day and change the plans, depending on what we fancy!) for a few days...
We had no real plans at this stage except for five nights of good hotels booked in Antigua and Lake Atitlan - after all it is our honeymoon, so a little luxury was very welcome.
Having heard only bad things about Guatemala city we went straight to the gorgeous colonial town of Antigua. After a fairly hectic week we were both exhausted and it was lovely to chill out for a few days (although our chill-out did include a climb up the local live volcano). Continuing the theme we moved on to Lake Atitlan which is probably one of the most stunning places we´ve ever been to (and a contender for one of the new official seven wonders of the world - apparently). San Marcos was a short bus and boat ride away and had been recommended by a friend (thanks Minta) and it didn´t disappoint - massage, yoga, conoeing on the lake, walking to the next village and eating lots of good, healthy food was the perfect start.
Guatemala is beautiful, very laid back and friendly, but surprisingly expensive therefore we commtted to using the local ´Chicken Buses´as often as possible - these were surprisingly good and there wasn´t a chicken in sight.
Guatemala City was our next stop to catch the night bus to the Mayan site of Tikal in the north. ´Él Guate´as the city is affectionately know is pretty hideous. We had a few hours to kill so ventured out to Central Park, amidst the druggies, tramps, defaecating and urinating men we planned the next leg of our trip and decided that the honeymoon was truly over. Heading back through the most dangerous part of town (Zona 1) is depressing, loads of formerly grand Spanish colonial buildings have been left to rot or form the bases of many hideous grey monolithic concrete apartment blocks. The only place to eat was a McDonalds (vile even by home standards) so we decided to while away the remaining three or four hours in the bus station.
Christmas is huge over here and there´s more tatty decorations than in Alnwick, believe it or not. Our favourite (?) so far was the singing christmas tree in the bus station whose monotonous beep belted out a medley mix of Santa Claus is coming to town, jingle bells and we wish you a merry christmas on a permanant loop. It had stiff competition in the volume/annoying stakes from the raucous Guatemalan Semi-pro Cage Fighting event taking place next door and the Guatemalan equivalent of the X Factor belting out from the TV... you´ve gotta love those travelling bus station moments!
We arrived at Tikal the next morning and despite the minging and very expensive accommodation four or five hours in the ruins definitely made the trip worth it. The huge Mayan ruins set in deep tropical forest were spectacular, we braved the rickety wooden steps, climbing nearly 180ft to the top and were rewarded with brilliant views of the forest canopy stretching out as far as the eye can see, which bore a striking resemblance to some scenes from Star Wars (Ed - not sure if any of them were filmed here?)
We decided that rather than retracing our steps back to Guatemala City, to pop into Belize (not on the original plan but an interesting detour - this is what I love about not having anything booked, just wake up one day and change the plans, depending on what we fancy!) for a few days...
Tuesday, 9 December 2008
Hi all...
Hi all, first things first, thank you all so much for making Saturday absolutely perfect! We hope you all had as much fun as we did.
So, rather than bore you all to tears over the next few months with long, smug emails of our adventures in central and south america I've set up this blog, to keep all of the boring smugness in one place. If you're interested in hearing about our travels you can subscribe to email update things by clicking the link at the bottom of this page, or you can just check it at your leisure when you are having a particularly slow day at the office. We'll miss you all so please keep in touch by posting your comments, or even using the traditional email, as it's always nice to hear that home and the world as we know it hasn't changed too much.
Also, I'll be adding photos so you can see for yourself what we've been doing.
And finally, we know that loads of you have travelled in central and south america so any suggestions would be most gratefully received. Please add your comments to the post below...
So, rather than bore you all to tears over the next few months with long, smug emails of our adventures in central and south america I've set up this blog, to keep all of the boring smugness in one place. If you're interested in hearing about our travels you can subscribe to email update things by clicking the link at the bottom of this page, or you can just check it at your leisure when you are having a particularly slow day at the office. We'll miss you all so please keep in touch by posting your comments, or even using the traditional email, as it's always nice to hear that home and the world as we know it hasn't changed too much.
Also, I'll be adding photos so you can see for yourself what we've been doing.
And finally, we know that loads of you have travelled in central and south america so any suggestions would be most gratefully received. Please add your comments to the post below...
Travelling suggestions
We've got no firm plans as yet and loads of you have been around this neck of the woods so please do share your suggestions and highlights of central and south america and let us know what we shouldn't miss... all ideas gratefully received.
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