The lost tribe

Our second to last destination was an estancia (ranch) int he North Western region of Argentina called Salta. The estancia was founded in 1609 and has 60,000 hectares of land, most of it used for growing sugar cane and sorghum but about 5,000 hectares still left as forests with ponds. The estancia has hundreds of horses and we went riding every day with a gaucho named Gallardo, who didn't speak any English so was great for practicing our Spanish. We rode all over the ranch on great horses that could really run and Alicja and Emma were often at a full gallop. There were many beautiful sites during our rides, but our favorite might have been when we would ride out into the fields and be surrounded by the herds of horses running free. We also ... read more

Hola! Alicja here. From the 8th to the 15th of August, we were on a cruise of the Galapagos. On the first day, we were collected from the airport by a small dinghy which took us to our boat, the Cormorant. After we settled in, we were taken to explore the island of Santa Cruz. Immediately we were greeted by hundreds of marine iguanas by the dock, from the size of 3 cm to 1.5 meters! After that we went to the Darwin center- home to the worlds rarest animal, lonesome George, the last Pinta Island Tortoise. He has been attempted to breed with other tortoises, but without success. On Monday morning we were at Espanola island. It was the most bountiful island of our trip, being the breedIng site of nearly all of the worlds ... read more

Emma here! When we went to Quito, mommy and I went to many churches while Dad and the rest hung out at the hotel. The churches were all very beautiful and detailed and were located in market squares. Also in the markets we saw a number of marches which were quite spectacular because it was Ecuadorian Independence day. We also saw a wedding take place where the police were all waiting outside for the ceremony to end so they could put their swords to form an arc for the couple to walk through.... read more

We celebrated Emma's 12th birthday in great style in Santiago, Chile with dad's good friend Antonio and his family. Antonio and his son Stefano were so nice that they picked us up right at the airport and whisked us off through Santiago and up into the mountains on the outskirts of the city to Antonio's club. We had a delicious buffet lunch with Antonio's mom (who looks so much like grandma they could be sisters) and dad (84 years young) and their friends. After lunch, we all looked around the amazing club which had everything: tennis, golf, horses, basketball, indoor and outdoor pools and, most amazing of all, canopying - where you fly through the air in a harness stapped to a wire - which we absolutely had to try. We all got ready in our ... read more

Hi everybody, Emma here. Today was the second day of our stay at the Atacama dessert in Chile. After having the best sleep in a long time we had breakfast and started to get ready for our first horse riding trip in the Atacama dessert! To get ready we had to put on helmets and chaps which are ankle to knee leg protectors. We met our horse riding instructor and he led us to the horses. When we got to the stable we got on our horses mine called Diamond, Alicja´s Lascar after a volcano, Patrick´s Resongon which means impatient and Antonina´s called Guinda which means Cherry. It was Patricks first time horse riding and he fell in love with it at once. We went riding around town and we looked so extraordinary that tourists even ... read more