The final leg of our 15 months round the world extravaganza takes us from Belem at the mouth of the Amazon 6000km south to Rio which claims to be one of the greatest cities in the world. We set off south on a 28 hour slow and uncomfortable bus journey to Forteleza one of a series of large cities on the north east coast of Brazil. Staying in an OK German / Swiss pousada only 2 minutes walk from the beach. It was like the Gold Coast of Australia with the beach front lined with huge multi-storey tower bocks. A relaxing [View Full Entry]

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Heather left us on the 14 October - we were alone again. We had about 2 months left to travel the 12000km to Rio in Brazil. Our first stage was to cross the Andes for the ninth and final time following which to travel to the Atlantic ocean via the mighty Amazon river. First stop was Chiclayo a small city merely a stopping point for our continuing travel to Chachapoyas. Here we visited the ruined pre Inca city of Kuelap. This is a massive walled city standing on the top of a small hill in the middle of nowhere. In [View Full Entry]

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A long journey from Arequipa to Lima was followed by a nice hotel (to celebrate Anne's birthday). We were waiting for Heather (James' sister) to arrive from USA so had a second day in Lima Miraflores district merely hanging around. An early start to meet Heather's plane from Mexico where she was transiting. We arrived at the airport around 5.30am but much to our annoyance the plane was delayed by over 7 hours. Anne disappeared back to the hotel whilst James sat and let the world drift by for what seemed an age. Finally Heather arrived and [View Full Entry]

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After arriving in Arequipa a city of 1 million we found ourselves a nice hotel for around 8 pounds a night - fully equipped with Cable TV and excellent shower. First point of call was coffee and black jungle cake sitting in a cafe overlooking the central plaza. Life is relaxing at the moment. Some nice Italian food followed by a comfy bed. It was time to do some more exercise. We joined a guide and rather controversially a French guy and set off early the following morning to the base of the volcano El Misti. Our plan was a [View Full Entry]

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So after our climb up Huayna Potosi we deserved a 2 day rest in La Paz doing very little except watching cable TV, eating and buying new jeans for Anne. July 26 saw us set of in a taxi to 4800m and the start of the Choro trek. This time our guide was Sixto who also was our cook and carried all the food. Normally Anne carries the food and fuel so her rucksack was light whereas James still carried the tent so there was no change for him. The great thing about the Choro trek is that it is essentially [View Full Entry]

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Well James and I have had a fantastic week since our last blog! We started off by visiting a tourist agency called "Alberth Bolivia" and somehow ended up booking a guide to take us up Huayna Potosi, a 6,088m mountain (although it is supposed to be the easiest 6,000m peak in the world!) in just 3 days time! We also booked a tour for the next day up Chacaltaya, a 5,395m which is a very easy mountain to climb as you are driven up to 5,200m leaving only 200m to climb. Despite leaving very late due to a broken down minibus [View Full Entry]

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So we have finished our luxurious stage of our South American journey (Chile and Argentina) and now are heading into Bolivia. The plan - a three day trip across the volcanic landscape and largest salt flat in the world in South West Bolivia. After leaving the paved road behind in Chile we drove in 4 X 4 jeeps up to 4600 m to the Bolivian immigration control. After a dubious breakfast of bread, cheese and jam we continued with Juan our driver a couple from Belgium, a girl from Switzerland and another from Canada. Within 20 mins we had reached Laguna [View Full Entry]

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Our bus across the Andes from Salta to San Pedro de Atacama left at 7am so it was a 5.30am start to get to the bus station in time. Another comfortable bus - this was to be our last luxury bus as we will soon be in Bolivia. Unfortunately for both the bus and ourselves within two hours black smoke was pouring out the back and we ground to a halt on the side of the freeway. Luck was on our side however and the drivers managed to flag down a competitors bus into which we all managed to squeeze into. [View Full Entry]

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So a 14 hour comfortable first class bus journey to Buenos Aires from Mendoza was successfully completed. Arriving at 7 am on a Sunday morning to a dead city was accompanied by a tube ride on the relatively safe but slow underground to the Faculty of Medicine. We were greeted by a giant building which looked like an abandoned hospital from the 1920´s. Later we were to find out that this was one of their main tertiary referral centres. Anyway a short walk and we found our hostel - Archies Place - A nice comfortable building (and for once you weren´t [View Full Entry]

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Santiago just happened to be in mid-revolution when we arrived back following our trip to the hardware store to buy a plug adaptor (some pretty fancy Spanish was used to get this). The students in Chile take any opportunity to riot and protest, a few months ago they complained that the bus ticket prices were increased. On this occasion it was something to do with student fees. Clearly they don´t have a Tony Blair government to help smooth out the problems in the world. So we were happily walking back to the hostel when we were suddenly in the middle of [View Full Entry]

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