by anna (and david) What can we say here? One week, two sides of the Andes, 10 wineries and some great food. Travel, wine and food: An appropriate way to finish our international tour. It's hard to do things independently in Mendoza as the roads aren't considered very safe (they drive like mad people), the roads aren't well sign posted, and you can't just drop into wineries. For this reason, we paid for two tours of two of the main regions - the Uco Valley and Lujan de Cuyo (the other reason was that it meant we could both taste as [View Full Entry]

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by anna and david The last few weeks have been life "as usual" in Buenos Aires, if characterised by a consciousness that we could count on our fingers and toes how many days we had left here before going home to Sydney. I was back at school for most of the last month and, as there was no one else at the school at the same level as me for two of the three weeks, I had three hours a day one on one. Great to be able to focus on talking and working on my own weaknesses, but it was [View Full Entry]

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by anna (and david) Pues! Well. We have just spent the last week and a half recovering from a hard core week of "touristing" with Ed and Trace (yes, yes, more friends from LEK). The dynamic duo joined us in Buenos Aires after a couple of weeks touring Patagonia, Iguazu Falls, etc, and there was little rest for the wicked. We settled into the week with some beers by the pool in our building, before heading out to one of the many restaurants we sampled over the week. Day one saw us heading south to San Telmo and La Boca, the [View Full Entry]

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by anna and david Well, we finally made it to Buenos Aires. It's about a month after we originally intended, but that was always a plan in sand anyway. We have an apartment here in an area known as Palermo Hollywood, part of the trendy Palermo Viejo in northern Buenos Aires (not too old, not too pristine, with lots of restaurants and groovy shops). We've got down to the business of "living". The apartment is great, and we've enjoyed "moving in". We have joined a "gimnasio" around the corner that's very retro in itself: no air-conditioning, older style machines, people who [View Full Entry]

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by anna (and david) WARNING: Read at your own risk. Some content may offend the overworked Beach. Hut on beach. Hammock. Bikini. Surf. Book. Beer. Friendly mexican to serve beer (and margaritas) while lying in hammock on beach, reading book and gazing at surf. There wasn't much more to it really. After our taxing five days in San Agustinillo, a tiny place on the west coast of Mexico, (as you can imagine we found it a tough place to be. Tremendous to be back on a Pacific beach), we spent 1.5 days checking out [b [View Full Entry]

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by anna and david Walking in a winter wonderland ... well, it wasn't Christmas, but this is how we spent NYE and the first week or so of January. We had spent a few days in NYC before heading to Peru, but were completely knackered, and spent all our waking hours shopping for kit: warm clothes, water bottles, boots, etc. The only NYC thing we squeezed in was an evening started with a drink with Mike, a mate of David's from uni, and continued with a great meal at Asia de Cuba, one of the few "fusion" restaurants I have ever [View Full Entry]

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by anna and david Having spent Christmas overseas before and knowing that it kind of sucks, we wanted to do something special for the few days at the end of December: being in a lodge in the Amazon sounded kind of cool. We spent Christmas Eve in Quito and got a great, unexpected dose of Christmas-ness. We started the evening with a beer while we called home to the family on Christmas morning in Aus, then were really lucky to find a hotel on Plaza de Armas offering a special 3 course Christmas dinner for US$20, including a glass of bubbles. [View Full Entry]

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by anna (and david) It was so exciting to head to a whole new continent! Having just been through India, I expected Peru to be somewhat similar, just south american, but it was a relief to find fewer people. This allowed the stunning landscape to really shine through. We spent a non-descript night in Lima, before heading straight to Cuzco on one of the most spectacular flights I have been on. Flying out of Lima, along the coast and then over the Andes on a brilliantly clear day, was nothing short of breathtaking. So, too was landing in Cuzco, a descent [View Full Entry]

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by anna and david We started our tour of northern India and it's cities with a couple of nights and a day in Mumbai, a city we both loved. Whether it was not having a list of sites to tick off, or whether it was just the great vibe of the place, Mumbai rocks. Having loved it so much made us even sadder when a week later it was attacked. However, when we were there, it was simply a great place to be. Well, it was once we were safely at our hotel after a crazy taxi ride where we weren't [View Full Entry]

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by anna and david Incredible India. I think this is what the ads say. And right they are. What a sensational place. Especially the south. We spent the first five days in India in Chennai, formerly Madras, with David's brother, Craig. We were completely looked after, having the services of Craig's driver, Selvam, and, after work, Craig, who acted as our tour guide to the best restaurants in town. For Anna's first visit to India I couldn't think of a better introduction. Chennai is a big city, one of the largest in India, but one which isn't on the tourist trail [View Full Entry]

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