Clare Fenton

Taxi'd to the Bus Terminal with all my gear (now growing larger by the day) and sat around waiting for the overnight bus down to Uyuni where my 3 day landcruiser tour of the Salt Flats & the Bolivian Desert would begin. At around 3 am it appeared we weren't driving on a road anymore, as we furiously shuddered along. Would've been more fun having someone grab you by the shoulders and shake you for several hours. Met a Bolivian guy from Santa Cruz named Javier, who was telling me all about his family and especially his brother, who was a cosmetic surgeon. The poor bloke had the unfortunate task of performing a breast augmentation on his own mother. The things one does for their family.... Arrived in Uyuni at 7 am with another pounding headache ... read more

Rio has been under a cloud of haze & rain the entire time so far, so no adventures to the beach :( It just means i am going to have to come back here one day! We are staying in Copa, Copacabana, which is not the safest of areas. Went to a shopping mall over in the next suburb. Now, Brasilian retail assistants have this interesting customer service approach where they superglue themselves to you the moment you enter the store and shadow you the entire time, trying desperately to sell you whatever they catch you looking at. Drives you batty. Went for dinner in Ipanema, which is far nicer and a lot more plush than Copacabana. The residents are all stylish, attractive, and rich. We liked the area so much we went back the next ... read more

We set off from Ilha Grande on the dodgiest of small boats, with rainclouds looming & water sloshing in from the side. We arrived at the port where we were picked up by a van and a car. 4 of us dove for the car, me shotgunning for passenger seat and set off for the final destination of our tour, Rio de Janeiro. Oh my god we´re going to RIO!!! We arrived at our hotel a block back from Copacabana beach, flung our gear in our rooms, raided the ATM (all the while watching over our shoulders, there´d been plenty of scaremongering about how dodgy the area is and how susceptible we will be to getting mugged), and were picked up to go on a tour of this lovely, and ridiculously large, city of Rio de ... read more

Leaving Montevideo we were heading to Brazil but had a stopover in Salto, not really worthy of anything apart from thermal pools. Highlight of Salto was having the best pedicure i have ever had, i made everyone line up to stroke my newly smooth hooves. That evening we were driven by taxis over the border into Argentina and to the bus terminal where we waited for a good few hours to get on an overnight bus to Iguassu Falls, Brazil. Bored to tears we got the beers in and sat & gossed, while others played cards. I´m an old hand now at these overnight buses so i was looking forward to the reclining chairs, blankets, etc. Oh my god, how could i have been so naive! The chairs barely reclined and were hard as rock, no ... read more

Today was our last full day in BA so we were up early with plans to do our sightseeing, and taxi-ed over to Recoleta, the nicest suburb where we visited the cemetery where Eva Peron´s tomb lies. The prettiest cemetery i have ever visited, all coffins enclosed in magnificent tombs rather than buried in the ground.. I refrained from bellowing out Evita tunes, i predict i would have been ushered out quite quickly for ruining the serenity. Then we went over to La Boca, a notoriously bad neighbourhood with a few famous streets with bold multi-coloured houses. The place was abuzz with tourists, street performers, market stalls. Spent a few hours there lapping it all up... Our last night in BA we went to an all-you-can-eat buffet for 59 pesos. The place had a 4 metre ... read more