LauraandDan

The border crossing from Bolivia to Argentina was simple and didn’t take long. We jumped in a taxi that took us to the nearest bus station. Our luck was in, a bus was literally about to leave to the town we wanted to get to – Salta, about 6 hours south of the border. It was rather painful to part with the £18 each for the coach ticket - we paid £2.50 for a similar length journey in Bolivia! We were grateful for the smooth roads and comfortable bus though – a welcome improvement. There was also a drinks machine on board which Dan assumed just provided hot water. So we raid our supplies and found a tea bag stolen from breakfast and he went off to make a drink. He came back with a coffee ... read more

After the surprisingly smooth border crossing from Ecuador, we were dropped in the town of Tumbes at 9pm. A short tuk tuk ride took us to a public bus which was departing for Mancora, 2 hours south. It was again a very slow journey offering almost door to door service for the many locals on board. We eventually pulled into Mancora and managed to find a cheap hostel still open with a spare room. It felt great to finally arrive after 16 hours of frustratingly slow buses. We slept well that night and woke up the next day ready to explore the small town. Mancora is a rustic beach destination where you can surf. Again it was not a patch on the Caribbean but the weather was warm and the sea refreshingly cool. We spent the ... read more

Sorry for the 2 month delay in getting this written and online, we quite simply have been having too much fun doing better things! Better late than never..... We caught a colectivo taxi across the border between Chile and Peru. It was fairly straight forward and our clocks went backwards by two hours due to the time difference. Tacna is a shabby looking border town, so the plan was to get a bus out asap - we were heading up to Cuzco to prepare for our Inca Trail trek. We arrived at the bus station with a Dutch couple we had shared the taxi with, we were approached by ticket touts, which usually we ignore, but for some silly reason we went with them this time. Bad move.... we had to pay for 2 taxi rides ... read more

We travelled on a ‘Tur bus’ through the stunning Andes. We took loads of photos through the glass of the coach window – we’d have like to get out and take some properly. It was a landscape completely different to anything we’d seen so far, very dry, the only real vegetation being cactuses, and some of the steepest and windiest roads yet! Another new experience was the ‘in-flight’ coach service. We were handed blankets, pillows, a drink and some snacks, plus the bus was one of the comfiest yet (this mainly due to the massive investment in the transport system due to the railroads being broken up). The border crossing was fairly quick and simple, and we soon arrived into Mendoza – which was much larger than we were expecting. We’d book a hostel based on ... read more

Kia Ora! New Zealand, wow what a country! We landed into Christchurch airport and got a shuttle to a nice hostel with really comfy beds! Unfortunately, they didn’t supply bedding (well it was $2 more per night and we didn’t want to pay that), and we assumed we’d be fine with our sleeping bag liners and stolen Jetstar blankets (from the aeroplane), how wrong we were! New Zealand is COLD! We had 2 nights here to explore the city, and the first thing that struck us was how small and empty it felt! We treated ourselves to a meal out on Valentine’s Day, in the romantic setting of Wagamamas! We also hit the shops in search of winter clothes – Laura bagged a bargain – some brand new Levis jeans for £11 from a charity shop ... read more