Hola Well I last left you when Eng and I were awaiting our overnight bus to Lima.... it was more exciting than we imagined. Our plush leather seats in the front of the upper level of the bus were enormous and super comfortable. Our bus left on time and then our little bus attendant brought us empanadas, peach juice, and fuzzy blankets. I reclined 160 degrees and actually got some sleep which is a major step for me on a night bus. We rocked up to Lima on time at 7:15 and tried to sort out Eng’s next bus the following [View Full Entry]

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Hola I feel like I haven’t done much in the last week except eat food and take buses, but here we go. I absolutely loved Banos - the quiet gringo town in Ecuador. I was hanging out with a very cool girl from South Africa (whose parents own an ostrich farm, yet I am the one who has ridden one, not her), and a slightly high maintenance vegetarian British boy. After another 2 hour Spanish class in the morning, we rented bikes and started on the road to Puyo, mostly downhill but with some major peddling required. Along the way we [View Full Entry]

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Hola When I arrived at the secret garden hostel in Quito I met two London boys who agreed to do the equator with me the following day. I was writing my blog and they went for pizza without me, so I walked across the street to what must be the best pizza deal going in Ecuador. I ordered a personal Hawaiian pizza with a tasty passion fruit drink for $3.30 - and joined a group of 6 Brits who were already eating. Found out they were going to the equator the following day and agreed to join the girls at 7:15 [View Full Entry]

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Hola! Well, my journey from Colombia to Ecuador was a less than fun one. From Popayan to the border was 8 hours - my bus was slightly delayed due to a landslide on the highway in the mountains, but they pushed the largest rock off the cliff and then our bus ploughed through the gravel and kept on trucking. I decided to stop to see a big church in a valley at the border which was beautiful but was a lot of work. I had to take a shared taxi to the border, and my driver drove right on past a [View Full Entry]

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Hola! Well I have had a crazy week in Southern Colombia. On my way to Salento (a cute colonial style town famous for coffee, cowboys and trout) I sat beside a beautiful young Colombian girl who did not speak English, but when she found out that I was travelling by myself she decided to take me to meet her friends, two of who could speak perfect English. I spent the afternoon walking around the town which was packed with Sunday Colombian tourists and I had a new fruit juice - Guanabana, absolutely delicious with milk. The next day I did a [View Full Entry]

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Hola! Lena and I said goodbye to Matt and got on the Sunday tourist ferry, the only option on Sundays to get to Playa Blanca. Well, welcome to the tourist boat from hell - we had a two hour boat ride to an island with an aquarium we were too cheap to visit, then had another hour to the beach - all aboard the reggae boat crammed with local tourists taking advantage of Colombia’s love and friendship weekend. We arrived slightly annoyed by all of the people, took advantage of our lunch with the boat tour (which was actually quite good) [View Full Entry]

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Hola! I rewarded myself with a couple of very lazy days following our jungle trek. Lena took in some diving while I slacked about. We met a very cute Swedish boy who spent the afternoon with us - we heard the next beach over from Taganga was nice, after the 15 minute walk we found out it was a shit hole too but enjoyed some speedo spotting from the locals. Ben - our adorable gay austrailian friend was very upset that Lena and I got to see Carl with his shirt off. That night we went for some unbelievable hawaiian pizza [View Full Entry]

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Hello all, Team St. Albert T8N (me, lena and Matt Johnson) decided to leave for the Lost City a day after meeting up in Taganga. Even though we are on the carribean coast - this place is sort of a hole and basically a jumping off point for the lost city, to go diving, or to buy cocaine from whacked out locals on the beach. Our group of five included the three of us, a high maintanance girl from London and adorable Ben from Sydney. After 2 hours in the back of a jeep we set off with our guide Alfredo [View Full Entry]

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So many people seemed worried when I told them my first country in South America would be Colombia. Apparently the reputation for cocaine and drug wars have painted a less than pretty picture. For your entertainment - here is what the Canadian government has listed on their website. There is no specific information about future terrorist activities or threats against Canadians citizens in Colombia. However, the security situation remains unpredictable. Possible terrorist targets include military and police vehicles and installations, restaurants, underground garages, nightclubs, hotels, ban [View Full Entry]

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Hello all. ·In case you missed the memo, I've left a job I love to travel South America. My plans of buying a one-way ticket to Colombia were slightly foiled at the airport in Toronto when the Air Canada agent told me you are required to have a ticket out of the country. I told her I was taking a bus to Equator, but she wasn't budging. Panic mode set in as she told me the flight was closing in 15 minutes and I had to go buy a ticket out of the country. I promptly "borrowed" a baggage cart from [View Full Entry]

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