http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/Clare-Fenton/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Clare Fenton en-us Wed, 16 Dec 2009 03:36:13 +0000 Wed, 16 Dec 2009 03:36:13 +0000 A few pics of my last days in San Pedro de Atacama and Santiago...Note to self Wearing black is not practical in a desert environment. http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Chile/Atacama/blog-335934.html 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 fo http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Bolivia/Potosi-Department/Salar-de-Uyuni/blog-330165.html Arriving at my hostel in La Paz i had 4 delightful flights to climb with all my gear to my room a normal double bed thank god and passed out probably still puffing.Woke with the rudest thumping headache and thought there is no way i am leaving La Paz today feeling this hellish and booked another night in the hostel. My room was already booked so i moved into a 4 bed girls dorm.Went to an ar http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Bolivia/La-Paz-Department/La-Paz/blog-327602.html 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 http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Brazil/Sao-Paulo/S-o-Paulo/blog-327589.html Having witnessed a few very large Favelas slums driving through Sao Paulo and of course who hasn't seen or heard of the movie City of God i admit i was very keen to do a tour through a Favela to see it all first hand. We got picked up our tour guide advised us that although it might seem a little scary the people are very friendly.. we get to the entrance of a Favela called Rocinha. We ju http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Brazil/Rio-de-Janeiro/Rio-de-Janeiro/Botafogo/blog-326085.html 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 were going to RIOWe arrived at our hotel a block back from Copacabana http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Brazil/Rio-de-Janeiro/Rio-de-Janeiro/Copacabana/blog-326073.html Still sore from the previous overnight bus myself and another girl Jenny thought wed be a bit clever and upgraded to a first class bus for the trip to Sao Paulo the first leg of what would be 24 hours travelling to Paraty. Seriously worth it. We had a 3 hour wait at Sao Paulos mega bus terminal. Another 5 hours of bus to get to Paraty on which we saw our first good looking person so far in http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Brazil/Rio-de-Janeiro/Ilha-Grande/blog-325071.html 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 ove http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Brazil/blog-325017.html We were up ridiculously early to leave from BA to sail across the Rio de la plata to Colonia del Sacramento Uruguay. The ferry took 3 hours and was quite plush apart from the bathrooms and on the lower deck they even had a cabaret singer making up her own words to english songs.We arrived in Colonia and we all cottoned onto something reasonably quickly it was warmer Who knew Colonia is http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Uruguay/District-of-Montevideo/Montevideo/blog-322889.html Today was our last full day in BA so we were up early with plans to do our sightseeing and taxied over to Recoleta the nicest suburb where we visited the cemetery where Eva Perons 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 o http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Argentina/Buenos-Aires/Buenos-Aires/blog-322757.html Waking up with a dirty hangover and knowing you have to check out of your hotel speed down to the bus terminal where you will await your 20 hour bus ride is never much fun.... we took quite a while to get going that day. We arrived down at the bus terminal. Leigh was in charge of getting us some iceblocks while i lay slumped over our bags. The highlight of my morning was being in the kiosk a http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Argentina/Buenos-Aires/Buenos-Aires/blog-319829.html And he lives in Argentina....Let me backtrack a little. We were heading overnight to Puerto Montt where we were hoping to sail the Andes across 3 lakes into Argentina. But our luck was out.. the boats werent running again until 1 September. We stayed in Puerto Montt the day. It rained the entire time. Puerto Montt is a quiet port town with its claim to fame being the entry to Patagonia http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Argentina/blog-318059.html Got picked up early this morning in a people mover after not getting our wake up call from reception... lucky for us leigh had set the alarm. Also lucky for us that we had both been wide awake since 2 am with our jetlag. Plus we had two separate occasions of people bounding into our room. Some geek came in about 4 am calling out Phoebe PHOEBE.. WRONG ROOM The joys of staying in http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Chile/Santiago-Region/Valle-Nevado/blog-318051.html Leigh and I arrived in Santiago after a reasonably uneventful flight on Lan Chile. Just the usual splay of bodies in cattle class as everyone tried to get comfy enough to sleep. Hoovesheads spilling over into the aisles. you get the idea. First impressions of Santiago oh my god look at the Andes in the horizon Truly spectacular and quite surreal as you have to peer through the smog to see it. http://www.travelblog.org/South-America/Chile/Santiago-Region/Santiago/blog-316161.html