Acrid smoke filled my nostrils and the man running towards us seemed to be on fire. The night air was filled with a mix of screams, squeals, laughter, cheering and the strains of an oompa loompa brass band who were onto their 253rd rendition of the same song. It was a celebration in the main square of Taxco, a tiny town in Mexico famous for its cobbled streets, icecream and fantastic silver jewellary. The locals were enraptured with the spectacle of people trying to blow their own eyebrows off with homemade fireworks. The flimsy wooden contraptions were set alight with a [View Full Entry]

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We clamboured aboard the contraption with some hesitation. It was a motorbike adorned with planks of wood either side and resting on the train tracks. It could comfortably seat 5 but up to 25 people could be squeezed on with some contortion. The residents of San Sipriano, unable to reach their town by any other means, had crafted an excellent method for ferrying people, essential goods and an increasing number of tourists. There was only one track and should you meet a bike coming the other way, custom required that the bike with the least number of people or objects was [View Full Entry]

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I love travelling with my mum because she will..... 1. Fly across a raging river and through a canyon on a flying fox 2. Make my hostel bed and sleep on the top bunk 3. Cook me dinner and make me breakfast 4. Tell dirty jokes to all the people on our tour 5. Party with the best of us at karaoke until 1am 6. Throw herself headfirst down a waterslide and take her first ever jump off a diving board.....when she can't really even swim! 7. Put her foot in her mouth by saying inappropriate things like how hairy the [View Full Entry]

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Cartagena pulsates with a rhythm unlike any other. As I stood on the balcony of our lustful hotel, couples made out on the couch in the darkened loungeroom while they waited for rooms that were rented by the hour. Across the road, pimps hawked the scantily clad young girls outside the door of a conspicuous brothel. Along the path, a man sat on the sidewalk and worked on smashing open a safe. No one paid him any attention. Below, backpackers waited amongst piles of garbage for a room. Narrowly saving their washing from being scooped up by the garbage men. On [View Full Entry]

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What they say is true. The food in Cuba is terrible. We managed to find a Chinese restaurant amongst the garbage strewn streets of Havana. The broken neon lights blinked halfheartedly and a man in a white shirt and dress pants sweated as he waved a menu at us. As we trudged up the dimly lit stairs I wondered if we would live to regret this. An elderly Chinese men showed us to our table and leant an air of authenticity to the place. Fidel and Raul had eaten here and beamed from black and white photos, their chopsticks poised over [View Full Entry]

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ORIENTATION The city is laid out in a simple grid system and streets can be identified by the intensity of the smell of urine. Unique cracks in the pavement filled with rotting food or human faeces provide a more detailed indicator of your location. If you need to get to the market, follow the trail of rubbish along the ground and as the smell of septicemia itensifies you know you are getting close. PEOPLE AND CULTURE Santa Marta prides itself on posessing more prostitutes per capita than the rest of South America. The silicon assisted beauties ply their trade over bannisters [View Full Entry]

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The old man chewed his tobacco in a slimy clump and then spat it in a drooling mess to the ground. The pig laying next to him didn't move but the cat was quick to give it a lick. He was aged somewhere upwards of 100 years old. They think 120 but noone knows for sure. Found as an 11 year old boy in the bush in the Vinales mountains, his rescuers were long since dead but he lived on. His feet were tough as leather as he had never worn shoes and he looked pretty good for someone who had [View Full Entry]

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The horse reared on its hindlegs in protest of my hand on the brakes. I eased him down and forced a sideways shuffle to curb his appetite for destruction. We caught up with the others and I was pleased to see things were seemingly a bit more under control. We were on the last day of a gruelling 2 day horsetrek to Cotapaxhi volcano. Riding up to 5000ft the winds from the ice capped volcano had been chilling. The terrain was spectacular but rough going and prickled cactus had claimed the better part of my shins. To conserve energy at altitude [View Full Entry]

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¨Hands against the wall, drop your pants and spread your butt cheeks´¨. The military man bent over until he was eye level with my mates arse and peered into the depths looking for a stash of drugs. He took severl moments to inspect his quarry whilst my friend stood with his face pushed against the wall. Disgruntled when there was nothing other than a few hairs and a chocolate smear he looked for ways to confiscate our bottle of rum. Laughing on the inside I wasn´t one to point the finger. A few hours earlier our bus had been stopped randomly [View Full Entry]

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The old man stood in the classic catalogue pose. One foot on a rock, one hand on his hip. Ensconed in his whites, his ankle socks were pulled tight against his calves, a long way from the bottom of his shorts. His hat was perched at a cocky angle and the shirt tucked tightly in. He was creased and weathered from a life outdoors and his tanned skin had never seen the touch of suncream. His eyes were small and amongst his wrinkled face his features were not unlike a tortoise. He took a deep breath and steadied himself. With a [View Full Entry]

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