After catching the train down from Oruro to Uyuni we were all set to leave for the Salt Flats and head into Chile. It would be 3 days on a jeep with 6 of us crossing the Altiplano and arriving in San Pedro De Atacama. The first day we started at a train cemetary which was a bit of a bizzare attraction as it basically consisted of all the old rusty trains that used to e used across Bolivia - not that appealing really. After that we set off into the Salir de Uyuni (Salt Flats of Uyuni) and were immediately [View Full Entry]

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Arrived in Arica after another eventful 10hr bus journey - people being sick left right and centre, police checking passports and some old woman wiping her grandchilds sick on the back of my chair - cheers! The hostal we stayed in was fantastic - Sunny days - and Ross who owned it was a really nice guy - obviously knew Paulines weak spot and he gave us cake when we arrived! The next day was spent arguing over many things such as the colour of the grass, black being white and other generally picking! The real issue was whether or not [View Full Entry]

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After 6 hours on our first bus ride off of Dragoman we arrived in Puno. as soon as we stepped off the bus this strange man was persuing us with offers of tours, taxi´s, accomodation and anything he could think of. He ended up in our hostal room and only took the hint to kindly leave us alone when we didn´t speak to him for 15 mins! Puno wasn't anywhere near as attractive as its Bolivian counterpart, but we arranged a tour to look at the Uros Islands (Floating reed islands) and Isla Taquile. The floating islands were ok, but they [View Full Entry]

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Up again at 5.30, for what was going to be a great day - Machu Picchu at last! We had a short walk to the train station and then jumped on board for an hour and a bit before getting the bus up to the place itself. Not the way i wanted to arrive but it was going to be great whatever! We got our passports stamped for the cheesy sake of it, and then walked up a few stairs and into the lost ancient Inca City! What a sight! Immediately everyone started taking photo´s and videos as the guide was [View Full Entry]

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On our first day we started off by looking at some ruins just outside of Cusco town called Saqchsaywaman (sounds like ´Sexy Woman!´), we also went to Pisac where we saw more ruins but they were much more impressive. They had built a magnitude of terraces on which to grow and irrigate their crops, pretty impressive considering the height of the land and the fact that I felt tired out after a few steps! That evening we made our way to our first campsite for the trail which was in a small viallage called Quisharani or something similiar! Our tents were [View Full Entry]

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Fresh off the back of El Misti we arrived in the tiny village of Raqchi for an unexpected homestay. Pauline and I were greeted by our Peruvian family and whisked of through some tiny back streets by Emily the 7 year old little girl of the family. Obviously more at home with running down dark alleys dodging puddles that would consume a small elephant and equally large piles of fresh llama s%&t, Emily disappeared round corner after corner with us 2 bumbling along quite some distance behind her. Eventually after nearly klling myself almost falling down some extremely dark stone steps [View Full Entry]

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On the way into Arequipa we saw the towering beast of the volcano called El Misti... no pun intended Meadows! Arriving at around 4 in the afternoon Luca, our driver, had mentioned we could do a 2 day climb of the 5825m active volcano but i could rally no support to join me on the mission. Not put off i ventured out into Arequipa to find a tour that would leave the next day and allow me to climb the beast of Misti! After an exhaustive 2 hours round town i ended up right back at the hotel and booked it [View Full Entry]

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Another early start but this time to catch a flight above the Nazca lines. We knew we would be flying in a small plane but I was quite suprised by just how small when we arrived at the airport. The plane had room for 5 passengers plus the pilot and that was it, it was quite an experience! The take off was actually really smooth and so was the flight to get to the lines with some pretty cool scenery of the mountains and desert. The pilot flew us over all of the 15 shapes, tilting the wing of his plane [View Full Entry]

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An early start this morning to catch a boat to the Ballestas Islands where more sea lions lurked. We caught a speedboat across and it was one of the bumpiest boat trips I have been on that at times we were hanging on for our lives!! When getting closer to the island all we could see was a black mass of something........as we got nearer we realised that it was the sheer number of Nazca Boobies all congregated together on the island. There were thousands of them.. that Steve and I both decided to put our hoods up in fear of [View Full Entry]

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Finally we have left Lima never to return again! Today we travelled to Paracas National Park with our new buddies that joined the group, 12 of us in total. It was a short drive much to our delight and we had the chance to try out the roof seats again on the top of the truck. I went straight up onto the top only to find that there were gale force winds blowing and in a sandy desert that is not really ideal. There was not a great deal to see when I was able to open my eyes but Steve [View Full Entry]

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