The Kuna are an admirable little bunch in that they are one of the few indigenous peoples in the Americas that managed to resist European domination or, as often was the case, extermination. Their historical tenacity is in sharp contrast to their current peaceful and welcoming nature. But this veneer belies the fact that as recently as 1925 they kicked the Panamanian police of their islands in protest of an attempt to suppress their traditional ways. This act contributed toward the Kuna having a remarkable amount of political autonomy, some claim more than any other indigenous group in [View Full Entry]

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I don’t need to start this blog claiming that Colombia is the new Peru or Costa Rica. An unexplored, undiscovered tourist mecca, with glorious mountains, beaches, rainforests and happening cities, blah, blah, blah. All of those things are true except for the unexplored and undiscovered parts. Colombia is already discovered and is very popular. The idea of it being a terrifyingly dangerous country with kidnappers, murderers and cocaine traffickers on every corner, is very outdated. The number of tourists here testifies to that fact. True, there are areas that you shouldn’t vis [View Full Entry]

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Continuing on my vain, pointless and futile quest to climb the highest mountain of every country on Earth, I found myself heading to Cerro Chirripó in Costa Rica. This is not as unlikely as it sounds, given that I now live in Costa Rica. In fact you could say that it was inevitable that I would end up there. Due to having to work five Saturdays on and five off, for 50% of the year I get a three day weekend (the school is closed Fridays). This is not really sufficient time to attempt climbing Chirripó because it takes a day [View Full Entry]

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Being a paid volunteer does away with the necessity of obtaining a work visa. This is in operation for English teachers around the world where having the correct work permit often involves unfathomable bureaucracy and a lot of money. One advantage of this slightly fishy scam/entirely legal opportunity, is visa runs. Basically, every ninety days I am given some time off and a bit of extra cash, to leave the country for seventy-two hours. I managed to time this particular visa run with Semana Santa, or Easter week. The school and indeed most of Costa Rica, shuts down for eight days. [View Full Entry]

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The reason for deciding on Costa Rica as a destination to spend a year (minimum) living and working was that it had both mountains and beaches. True, many other countries around the world have mountains and beaches too. In fact, probably all of them. Except Holland. Costa Rica is a little country but it has an unfair wealth of natural wonders. Again I’m struggling to think of a country that doesn’t but such comparisons are not the point of these particular ambling scribblings. Fortunately, Heredia, where I live, is just outside San Jose, right in the centre of the cou [View Full Entry]

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After spending most of 2007 travelling, I wanted to settle a little bit the following year. I wanted to have the same bed for more than three nights in a row, I wanted to be able to pick from more than five t-shirts each morning, I wanted to make more permanent friends, I wanted a cupboard full of food, etc, etc. However, I was sure that i didn't want to be in the UK. Tried that, not too keen. So, as discussed in the Mexico blog a while back, I decided on taking an English teaching course, as a passport to [View Full Entry]

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My plan had been to head out to some of the distant southern cayes off of Belize. However, I met more and more people who had either just come from there or had tried to get there and all told similar stories. Because it is low season, either the water taxi's aren't running, or, you can get to the islands but you'll be the only one there. Not good when most diveboats require a minimum of four to put out to sea. An English/Finnish couple came to my rescue telling me about a cheap airline on which I could fly to [View Full Entry]

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Before I went to Central America I didn't know much about the Maya. I put them in a group with the Inca's and Aztec's as a once great civilisation that were flattened by the arrival of the Europeans. Turns out I was completely wrong. I can remember thinking when in Peru that while Machu Pichu is spectacular, the church in my village at home in Yorkshire is much older. This didn’t dampen my experience at all but it made me realise that architecturally at least, the Inca’s, and therefore I thought all of the American civilisations were way behind the rest [View Full Entry]

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Before I went to Belize I had tried to find some definitive information about the Blue Hole. If you do a bit of diving then this place is legendary. According to guide books and tourist info websites; the hole is not far off being the greatest thing on Earth. But when you read blogs on websites like this one, you can come across highly conflicting views. This is what I thought: Booking the trip was straight forward despite the fact that I found myself on Caya Caulker during low season. All the dive shops took my name and asked me to [View Full Entry]

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It’s strange how the most spontaneous decisions always lead to the best experiences. I think my time in Mexico was one of the most challenging, but also the most fun, months of my life. After my Eastern Europe jaunt, during my week or so as a tourist in London (I was the only English person at most of the sites), I decided that I wanted to live and work abroad. There is plenty of work out there for an engineer but it tends to be in English speaking countries. It was Slovenia that I really fancied after falling in love with [View Full Entry]

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