Barrie

19/05/09 The alarm went off at 5.30am but I didn’t mind. Waking up knowing you’re about to cross the Colombian border gives you the urge to jump out of bed anyway! Pete and I got a taxi from outside our hotel to the border for only $3 and during that short 15 minute taxi journey both Pete and I both admitted we had no idea to what to expect. I’ve done my fair share of hairy border crossings and I was kind of expecting this one to add to my experiences of those. We arrived and were both shocked but in a good way. There were no queues, plenty of security guards and men exchanging currencies that didn’t jump down your throat as soon as you stepped out of the taxi. We exchanged our money for ... read more

27/04/09 Walking around Cuenca looking for somewhere to have breakfast we soon noticed a few things. The beauty of the city. Its such an historical city lined with pebbled streets and old buildings. But that wasn't the first thing that came to our attention. We realised within seconds of leaving our hotel that it wasn't a destination used to seeing travellers. The amount of attention we were getting was unbelievable. To the point where we were walking around the streets and a group of young police girls came up to us and asked if they could take our photos. Locals in the shops and in cars passing by were laughing. After eating a huge breakfast we caught a taxi to the bus terminal and booked our bus tickets to the beach town of Montanita for ... read more

31/03/09 We finally arrived in Cusco by 4.30am after a journey that threw many suprises into our faces. It was still pitch black and according to the Lonley Planet, Cusco wasn't a safe place to be walking around in the dark with all your bags. So we decided to stay in the terminal till the sun started to warm our shivering bodies. It was a lot colder than i thought it was going to be! Within seconds Mike got his sleeping bag out and had fallen asleep along side our bags. With quite a few dodgey looking people around i didn't feel that comfortable about closing my eyes longer than a blink. After a few hours a lady came up to me and started telling me off for staying in the terminal. From what i could ... read more

8/04/09 Its an automatic reaction for your eyes to open when the bus stops and the bus stopped in a shanty dirt town for about an hour around 6am. I have no idea why? We all woke up, looked out the window and then looked at each other with confused expressions on our faces. It wasn't long till they started playing movies so the movie marathon had begun. Looking out the window all you could see was desert and baron mountains. Come around 11am we came to a stop. There was road works taking place and and it didn't take long for us to realise we were going to be there for a long time! Like many others i stepped out the bus to stretch my legs and notced a couple getting out of the bus ... read more

16/03/09 So Mike and I left our hostel and headed to the travel shop from where we booked our salt flat trip through to pick up our bus tickets. We had an extra spring in our step after an amazing few days on the salt flats. Either that or it was because we had hardly any clothes in our backpacks!ha We walked through the doors and we could tell within a split second by the mans face that he had forgot to book our tickets to Potosi. We jumped into his car and raced us down to the bus terminal. Well, a sandy street with a few run down looking huts. The bus was full but he managed to persuade the driver to let us sit in the isle if we gave him cash. Our man ... read more