Chaotic. Polluted. Ugly. An unplanned, messy urbal sprawl. Yet somehow intriguing.... Welcome to La Paz, capital of Bolivia! So far, most cities I have visited have had at least a vague gridlike system to their streets. There has been some vague notion of planning to the layout. But not with La Paz. With this city, the layout must have been designed by a blind man on crack. Or maybe by someone dipping a spider in ink and letting it run across a page. The very centre does have some sense to it, but venture further away and you enter a crazy network of roads that twist and wind around each other, heading up steep hills and plunging down again in a stomach-turning kind of way. Cars and buses are continually chugging and grinding their way around, ... read more

It was midday. I was in the middle of the Nevada Desert. I had just climbed a ladder onto a truck that had been converted into a magnificent 50-foot golden dragon. Huge speakers were strapped to the outside, pumping out dance music, and a plethora of people in crazy costumes were on the top deck, mixing cocktails and dancing to the beat. A huge flamethrower at the head of the dragon threw out a belch of flame and smoke, and then the truck set off, slowly driving into the heart of the desert Welcome to The Burning Man Festival. A festival unlike any other you will ever visit, and an experience that will stay with you for the rest of your life. Quite possibly the most extreme festival in the world, but also the most exhilarating. ... read more

After failing to find any condor steaks in South Peru, we headed to the East in search of new and tasty meats. At the indecent time of 5am we boarded a flight to the mountain town of Cusco. Once on the plane I thought it was strange that they didn´t give us a lifejacket demonstration. "Probably because we´re not flying over the sea" someone said. "But what if we overshoot and land in Lake Titicaca?" piped up Steve from the seat behind. "It´s irrelevant anyway" said Gus, and went on to explain why. For flights passing over bodies of water, you always get a full lifejacket demonstration. If you look on the safety card there are diagrams of a nice inflatable slide which extends down from each emergency exit. Now, ladies and gentlemen, this is the ... read more

Our next stop was Colca Canyon, "The Deepest Canyon in the World". This is actually a bare-faced lie. It´s the second deepest in the world, but is generally misrepresented and misquoted. The deepest canyon is a few doors down, but is rarely visited for some reason. Our accommodation was in a nearby village, and it was here that I feasted on a new type of meat. VEGETARIANS PLEASE STOP READING HERE. Every county I visit, I always try the local cuisine and national dishes, and I am particularly keen on trying new meats. On my carnivorous travels I have tried frogs, crocodile, buffalo, snails, guinea pig, wild boar, bison, kangaroo, horse, antelope, rabbit and ostrich. (my personal favourite is horse. Rich and very tender) So I was delighted to try alpaca! For those of you who ... read more

My next stop was Huaraz, a mountain town known as the "capital" of the Peruvian Alps. This journey involved three buses and twenty consecutive hours of travelling time. At one of my bus changes, I noticed a family with a sheep in the bus terminal. This raises a couple of questions. 1. How did they get to the bus terminal? Trujilan was a large city, so I can´t imagine they walked from the countryside. Perhaps they took a cab. A sheep in a taxi? Imagine 2. They must have been in the bus terminal to catch a bus, since this is the primary purpose of a bus station!. Where exactly was the sheep going to go? In the luggage compartment underneath? Strapped to the roof? Wandering up and down the aisle of the bus? Or maybe ... read more