AprilLord

After the inca trail, Frankie and I spent a day in Cuzco. We used the morning to have a lie in and then went out exploring some of the sights, sounds and tastes of the city. The next morning, we were headed back to the airport to fly to a town called Puerto Maldonado in the amazon rainforest. We then took a boat down the tambopata river to the lodge where we would spend two nights. The weather was hot, with about 80% humidity and although our bungalow was about as cool as it could be, it was pretty sticky! That evening, we went out on a night walk around the lodge and saw lots of different insects and creepy crawlies. We had a few minutes where we turned off all of our torches and were ... read more

So on Friday morning, I checked out of my hotel and headed from the old, historic part of town, to the new town and to the hotel where I would meet my group for the Galápagos tour. When I arrived, my room mate was out so I decided to take a trip up the cable car which overlooks Quito from a height of over 4000m. Unfortunately, that afternoon was rather cloudy so my view was much better on the cable car ride up and down than at the top but I got myself a hot chocolate and was happy! In the evening, we had our welcome meeting for the tour, where I met everyone I would be stuck with for the next ten days and got some basic information about our trip. Afterwards, my room mate ... read more

Hello everyone! So I arrived safely after my rather long 24 hour journey to Quito, the capital of Ecuador. I arrived to my hotel around 1:30 in the morning. This morning, I woke up around 8 and had breakfast overlooking the historical centre of Quito. I then felt rather lazy so went back to my room for a little while. When I eventually got round to leaving, I had a look around the city centre and saw some of the beautiful churches. I then took a four hour trip South to the Black Sheep Inn, an Eco lodge in Chugchillàn. Good tip from Fi and Dunc- thanks guys! It's amazing here. Once I was settled in, I met the guys who were sharing my bunkhouse and we went for a walk to see some of the ... read more

Hello again all! My last two days in New Zealand were spent in Wellington where I spent over 5 hours in the national museum and had quite a few coffee and cakes. Oh and I did some laundry. Pretty much it! On the Wednesday (20th June) I flew from Wellington to Auckland and Auckland to Beijing. I arrived in Beijing at 7 am on the Thursday morning. I was in Beijing for a week and left on the following Wednesday for Shanghai. While I was in Beijing I went to the Olympic Stadium, Tian'anmen Square, the National Exhibition Arts Centre, the Temple of Heaven, the Silk market, the pearl market, the forbidden city and a water park in the old Olympic swimming pool. I met some great friends in the hostel where I stayed when I ... read more

Hi all! Well I've been on a bit of an adventure. After my last blog, I went on from Mount Cook to Rangitata. The bus stops there because there is some amazing white water rafting but unfortunately, because it's Winter in New Zealand now, that was shut and we spent most of the day watching DVDs and playing board games. I flew from Christchurch to Auckland a couple of days later and during my time in Auckland I managed to watch a film at the cinema (on my own - a new experience!), go on a bus tour of the city and bungy jump off the Auckland Harbour Bridge. Yes, that's right, the one thing I said I would never do. But I have to admit that it was great fun. I was absolutely terrified before ... read more