May 2010
2 posts
November 2009
2 posts
My journey so far........ →
4 months since the last time.... life in...
It seems I am getting worse and worse at writing this, which I guess is only natural as the novelty wears off…. Not just that, but the serious lack of decent-speed computers here really makes it hard to muster up the motivation to write regularly. Having said that, even my diary has suffered, so I guess it is mostly the novelty factor….
Anyways, I am living in Buenos Aires, land of...
June 2009
2 posts
update on the verge of leaving beloved Bogotà....
Well, as is obvious I have been rubbish at updating regularly on this blog, and rather than spending days and days agonisingly trying to translate my diary, I will give a summary of Bogotà, and my other travels around Colombia and then write a better report when I launch my award-winning travel novel, so watch this space! lol
Well, it`s Sunday early afternoon, 28th June 2009 and I am sitting in...
Map update...8th June 2009 →
May 2009
4 posts
Carnival! Feb 21st 2009
Barranquilla! We spend 17 hours on a bus(more about my companions in a bit) and arrive sometime in the afternoon, at lunchtime. The first thing that strikes me is that the weather is so hot here, and the general atmosphere is so so hot and dusty. Barranquilla is not a pretty place, by any stretch of the imagination, and it is evident everywhere. As the hometown of Shakira, perhaps one would wonder...
Things I love about Bogotà....
1- The street art. Grafitti is welcome in most places, and as a result there is some amazing work on display, everywhere you look.
2- The Sunday Cyclovia. The 7th Carrera(more on that later) is closed completely on Sunday mornings so people can take to the streets on their own wheels.
3- The Sunday flea markets. I have bought some seriously cool objects here, you gotta look about but that is all...
Cranky Croc...Part 1
ok, this is the place where I will make my home(not intentionally) for the next 3 months… I was so excited when I finally managed to get bed-space, the beds are so comfy, and it`s the little things like reading lights on all the beds that make the difference…
Chris and Collette arrive from Salento, and we have an absolute monster of a weekend, they are a wicked couple and they tell me...
Bogotà Part 1.... January 2009
Me and Ray get a night bus from Armenia to Bogotà, I felt sad when we left actually cos there had literally just arrived a bunch of really cool people, and you know how it is when you can sense there will be a really good time and you just don`t want to leave it?? But, Bogotà beckons and I really want to spend the weekend there.
We get the overnight bus from the terminal in Armenia, complete with...
March 2009
4 posts
“some gates are open, some gates are closed. this ones open. I think we should go...”
– Vlad Voicu`s unfaultable logic when trying to decide on the route at a fork in the road.
salento pics.... →
Salento coffee country! late January...backdated!
Well! I arrived in the hostal in Calì, feeling totally exhausted and met a group of Aussie guys, who had been in Calì and were leaving in a few hours…considering by now I was truly sick of my own company, coupled with the fact that they said Calì is really only fun over the weekend, and this was like a Monday or Tuesday, I thought fuck it and decided to leave with them. They were going to...
February 2009
8 posts
Where I am now...... →
Losing a day and the Colombian border.......
After Quito I head North to go to Otavalo, a town famed over all of South America for it`s Saturday market. I head to a hostal out of my guidebook(unless you get advised otherwise it`s pretty hard to choose one!) And when I get there I realise there are the remnants of market stalls littering the sides of the streets but I figure it`s just a daily thing, this is marketland after all….
The...
Cuenca...wicked city!
Got to Cuenca, found a really nice hostal, called Cuencita, on Hermano Miguel and Calle Larga if you ever go there! Was feeling quite depressed about being on my own and the stress of travelling, and was really missing Alberto. The son of the hostal, Jonathan took me under his wing, gave me wine and I was happy again! The next day he took me to a bar called Prohibido, kind of a museum, and...
after Perù.......
Ok so when I left Trujillo, I caught an overnight bus to Sullana, but it arrived at 5 or crazy in the morning so I stayed on until Piura…It had been raining too so was proper grotty and dark. Arrived in Piura at 7am and waited an hour or so for a bus to take me to the border with Ecuador.
Got there, crossed over but it had been raining for 3 days, so there was no power so I had to wait for...
bit of ecuador, bit of wrongness →
temple shit →
final days of peru....... →
ps....ruins!
Forgot to say, that on the second day in Trujillo me and Netta went to get cultured by the battleaxe, who drove us in her beaten up old beetle to some ruins nearby, called Chàn Chàn. Basically it`s the biggest city ever discovered by a pre-Inca tribe. There are mad adobe latticed walls, carvings of animals and symbols in the walls, and 2 huge temples, one for the sun and the other for the moon.
...
January 2009
8 posts
Trujillo
Trujillo is so pretty! On first arrival, I was like, this isn’t so great,but it really is! The buildings are so old and colonial, and the whole place has a relaxed vibe about it. The first moment we get there, we are leapt on by taxistas, as always but it’s way easier having Alejandro around, cos they tend to fuck around less with locals or other South Americans! We get an old dude who...
Lima!
I arrive in Lima at about 4.30 or 5pm, relieved cos I didn’t want to end up there in the dark….however(as many other travellers have told me) I decide to stay in Miraflores, a residential suberb, instead of the downtown, which is where I stayed when I first got to Peru and it is terrifying! I soon discover, however, taht aside from being far away and expensive, many taxi drivers are...
Lima, Trujillo.....pics →
Nasca etc pics →
last days in Arequipa...pics →
New year pics etc etc →
Huacachina...desert Oasis!12-01-09
I arrive in Ica from Nasca, about 4 hours by bus. The first thing that strikes me are the weird golf-caddy type taxis buzzing about, some of them are pimped with spiderweb designs and flames, it´s so funny. I estimate I can run faster. After 4 months of fuckall exercise! haha
Anyways, there is not much of interest in Ica either, and I am aware that having spent 3 months in Arequipa, my resources...
Leaving Arequipa....First stop- Nasca!°11-01-09
I left Arequipa last night, felt so sad to leave Alberto, we will meet up hopefully in Bolivia in a few months but it was a super sad ´see you later´.
The overnight bus journey to Nasca was uneventful, arrived at about 7.30am, unfortunately on a Sunday-I have learned my lesson, DON´T TRAVEL TO A NEW PLACE ON A SUNDAY! Everything was shut, and for the first time I had to carry all my stuff(the...
December 2008
14 posts
And now you are up to date!
Ok! since Cusco(which by the way is beautiful, but ridiculously expensive) Arequipa has been quite busy, mostly with Intiwawa stuff. I can´t believe I have been here for 3 months, especially when I only intended to stay for 6 weeks, but you know, circumstances change and I can´t be time-Hitler forever!
We had 4 christmasses too, 2 with the kids (I put on a nativity play with some of the children,...
“I don´t know, maybe it´s cos it was raining or I don´t know what, I think I just...”
– An Intiwawa volunteer expressing rather a different point of view having returned from visiting Machu Picchu, one of the new wonders of the world.
Pictures of the chu! →
Doing the Chu!!!!
Get up at 4, feeling way better than expected, eat breakfast and head out…so exciting! We have to be there before 6 because that´s when the sun rises and Machu Picchu is at it´s most beautiful! We reach the foot of the stairs that climb all the way up to the summit and I am so excited I feel I will burst!
The climb takes about an hour, serious exercise involved, plus already rising heat...
Day 4 Aguas Calientes
Today we were afforded a lie in, but it turns to rat shit when it reaches such crazy temps by 6.30 that we can´t sleep! We are treated to the hilarious sight of Kimmy being attacked by the monkey, not to mention the blood-curdling screams that accompany it! Soooo funny!(Sorry Kimmy) All we can hear is Neil laughing and Kimmy screaming and the more she screams the more the monkey jumps on her, like...
chu chu part 3 →
More Chu Chu trek pics →
Day 3 -Boy there´s a time delay!!!
We are rudely awoken at 4am by a rooster crowing it´s head off. Not just once but every 4 mintues, on the minute, for a few seconds each time. I tolerate it with a few sleepy mutterings for what seems like eternity until one of the other guys gets out of their tent and starts lobbing stones at it. Now I am veggie, and pro animal rights, as most people that know me know, but this bird? I swear if...
Day 2. Toughest Day On Earth.
We wake up at 6am after the most horrid nights sleep(I am coming more and more to realise that I really complain, a LOT, but this really was horrid!lol) We set off up the following hillside when I realise I don´t have my scarf(considering the other one got stolen by some skank in a club in Arequipa, I really need to retrieve it) so I have to walk back down the hillside(we are at this point about...
First days of the trail.... →
Day 1 Salkantay trail(sorry it´s late!)
Our bus arrives at 4.30 in the morning, so we wake up at 4.10. I seriously don´t appreciate it, but it´s for a good cause lol. There´s already one girl on our bus, called Kimmy from Hong Kong but I´m so tired I can´t be assed to talk to anyone! We pick up another couple(older gringo guy, Martin from Canada with a younger pretty peruana woman, Kelly.) They don´t talk much either, it´s seriously...
Final part of Congresso.... →
Congresso pics part 2! →
Photos of the Congresso in the Mountains!! →
November 2008
2 posts
Doing the ´Chu! 24-11-08
Well, the Congresso went really well, but as I can´t be assed to write about something that occured weeks ago, especially since I have my trek through Machu Picchu to write about, you can get the general jist of what happened through the link I will post to my facebook pictures…..
Straight after Congresso(on the 11th November) I left Arequipa once more for the 10 hour bus ride to Cusco, the...
Post Colca to present.... 3-11-08
Hola! Well, those of you with facebook probably know, those without do not, but some unscrupulous individual stole my camera at Halloween(I dont have a áww poor them they´re poor´feeling about it cos I was in a bar at the time. If you´re so poor you need to steal you don´t spend what you do have on bar entry!) So I have no pictures of my time in the last 2 weeks. Boo. Oh well….
I met a...
October 2008
31 posts
Day 5-6 Colca
Today we have a swim am and for the first time since I got to Peru…sunbathe! I don´t get the opportunity to, and it´s soooo nice to do f-all occasionally. We decide to explore the other hostal, and maybe have lunch there cos there really aren´t many people in our place and the lack of men is annoying!lol
When we get to the other place I feel proper gutted, it is 200% better, nicer pool etc...
Day 4...17-10-08
Well, I didn´t get eaten! I feel quite negative about this hostal though, so I am glad when we leave. Knees have over-night healed again, so I have developed a 4 point ealking plan to prevent further damage….(use for going downhill or steps)
1- The ´Lara Croft´(game 1) Turn so you are sideways on to the path you are taking. Bend the leg furthest away from forward and tread sideways down the...
Colca Pics 2 →
Colca Canyon Pics 1 →