J M
James & Marissa Joined: November 10th 2006
Logged in: December 11th 2009
Logged in: December 11th 2009
Travel Blog Posts
Buenos Aires
A story in 3 parts. Turn Left at the Winged Angel Welcome to Buenos Aires, the capital of Argentina and a very European city. A place where there are enough cafes and restaurants to feed the entire continent. A place where Pepsi is more popular than Coke. A city where a journey on the metro costs 11p and while you are there you are visited at your seat by a variety of entrepreneurial vendors selling phone chargers, blank CDs and hair brushes. This is a city whose main thorough fair is the widest road in the world, at a colossal eighteen lanes, but yet due to its spacious design feels far from imposing. This is a city made up of many charming suburbs all with their own individual characteristics, meaning you can wander for days without ... read more
Water Slide for Nutters
The last stop in Brazil was the Iguazu Falls, which form part of the border between Brazil and Argentina. Iguazu is a system of about 250 waterfalls along a 2.7km stretch of the Igauzu river. Although the majority of the falls lie in Argentinian territory we decided to see them from both sides, spending one last day in Brazil before crossing into Argentina - our last stop of the entire trip. How time flies ... As waterfalls go, Igauzu doesn´t break any records. Its not the biggest, longest, highest or wettest, but hey awards aren´t everything. The falls are extremely impressive and on the Argentinian side especially there are so many viewpoints to check out, it takes a full day to see them all. After Victoria Falls it was great to be able to get so ... read more
When in Rome
The Brazilians are very proud of Rio de Janeiro. So proud that they believe the big man upstairs actually created the world in 6 days and spent the whole of the next just on Rio. They have every right to be proud, it is a truly stunning city. Situated on the edge of Guanabara bay amongst various mounds of rock and tumbling wooded mountains it is a city to rival Cape Town and Sydney for natural beauty. Add to that the Brazilian party spirit and we had great spot for our weekend city break. But before we arrived in Rio, we had some other stopovers to make. Having left the state of Bahia we headed south on an 18hr bus ride to Rio State, to the coast about 200km east of Rio itself. Still keen to ... read more
We´ve arrived in Paradise!
Oi, oi. I hope you are keeping up with the Portuguese lessons. If so, you are probably doing better than us, who are still struggling. We have taken to speaking to people in Spanish whether they understand it or not. To them it makes as much difference as us speaking English, but to us we feel like we are putting in more effort! The Pantanal had left us in particularly good spirits. We had loved what we had seen of Brazil thus far, so decided we should see more of it than just Rio. We also figured it was nearly 5 months since we had sunned our selves on a beach so we were in definite need of a holiday. All this travelling can be hard work you know ... So we found ourselves a cheap ... read more
Mother´s Meeting
It is amazing how different two places can be; leaving Bolivia for Brazil was like going to a different country. Brazil is nothing like what we have seen of the rest of South America; it has more money for a start, the streets are filled with kids playing football and sound systems blast out music on every street corner. Everything is so, well, Brazilian! The food is also a welcome change and somewhat quirky. Most main courses actually serve 2 people (meaning you and your dinner companion have to eat the same thing) or if you want different stuff you can indulge in the pay per weight buffet. Yup, you got it, just help yourself to what ever you like and the more it weighs the more it costs! The real gem however is the rodizio. ... read more
Bolivian Cloth
Next up La Paz, capital of Bolivia. Although it isn´t actually the capital of Bolivia, that is Sucre, but everyone thinks and acts like La Paz is the capital, so that is what I´ll call it. A fascinating place which gets a lot of recognition for being the highest capital city in the world, but then I have already mentioned the major flaw in that statement. Arriving here is pretty spectacular. We were driving through the outer suburb of El Alto, about 4km high in the middle of the Andies, when suddenly from out of nowhere a massive great crater appeared. In that crater the city stands, situated there because the Spanish wanted some shelter from the bitter mountain wind. We then descended into a thriving metropolis that awaited us below. Interesting Fact: La Paz is ... read more
Street Stalls
How time flies. Before we knew it we had been in Peru a month which was not really part of the plan. No regrets, we loved it there, but the problem is we only have 8 weeks left until we fly home. To add further complication we have now decided to add Brazil to the itinerary. We had better get our skates on. Our route to Brazil takes us back through Bolivia and first and foremost Lake Titicaca. This is the worlds highest navigable lake at 3800m above sea level and it forms part of the border between Peru and Bolivia. Needless to say it is a beautiful spot, with some lovely islands to be visited. We started in Puno, still on the Peruvian side of the lake. We weren´t expecting too much from this city ... read more
Jungle Massive
"There are 200 species of snake in our jungle, 4 of them are deadly. We don´t stock any anti venom in our lodge and if you are bitten by a bushmaster you have 4 hours to get it administered. I have to warn you now, that you won´t get it in time and you will most probably die." You gotta love these introductionary pep talks! Nothing like putting the mind at rest. Yes, we are in the jungle baby, and as Axl Rose once howled "we´re gonna die!" OK so melodramatics over, there is actually no (known) history of anyone being killed by a deadly snake in this part of the forest, so we were in relatively safe hands. This part of the adventure finds us in the Tambopata Reserve in the Peruvian section of the ... read more
Machu Picchu
This part of the trip not only has been booked for the longest, but has received most build up (in our heads anyway). The 50 km Inca Trail was upon us and it was judgement day for our fitness levels. In preparation we had done lots of walking in Africa, but not only was that at sea level, but it was a very long time ago. I´ve drunk a lot of beer since then. Before we left London, Matt, Anna, Jules and George had all expressed an interest in joining us for this leg of the trip. We left the arrangments in their capable hands and here we all were at last. Thankfully, it wasn´t straight into the walking; we had 5 days in Cusco together to allow the others to acclimatise to the altitude. Having ... read more
Yummy!
Arriving in new countries means border crossings, and our arrival in Peru featured another interesting one. We were determined to make the first bus of the day into Peru and to do that we needed to get a collectivo from Arica (in Chile) to the border, through no mans land and into Tacna, which is the first city inside Peru. Getting the car was no problem, we had a whole host of 1970 big American fuel guzzlers to pick from, all we had to do was pay the man and wait for the car to fill up. And fill up it did, with 3 other punters (you get 3 in the front in these old beasts) one of whom insisted on farting the entire journey. It is possible that this wasn´t due to flatulence and actually ... read more
