juneandnik

We arrived in Buenos Aires just after midnight and headed for a hostal in the San Telmo area, recommended to us by four South African lads we met in Ushuaia. What was ideal for them did not turn out to be ideal for us. We failed to pick up on some subtle clues as we checked in. The hostal was above a bar and all the residents were having a jamming session with bongo drums in the hostal courtyard at 1am in the morning, all a bit worse for wear. We hit the sack and I laid there until 5am chewing my pillow trying to supress the urge to do some bongo insertions. Next morning we checked out and moved to an establishment more suited to us in our advanced years. The plan for the week ... read more

We passed from the Argentinian lake district to the Chilean lake district with only a brief interuption by vigilant Chilean customs officials who found our fresh produce and confiscated eggs, apples and half a cucumber. I think we were lucky with the weather on the Argentine side as by the time we reached the Chilean side it was like a true lake district grey, bleak and chucking it down. The tent was given its sternest test yet and despite waking up surrounded by puddles we were amazingly still dry (ish). We managed a couple of short hikes before pushing on further south into Patagonia. Patagonia is a poorly defined area covering the lower section of South America and shared between Argentina and Chile. The region is famous for its dramatic landscapes and popular for camping, hiking ... read more

Having spent (for us) a relatively long time in Cusco waiting for our Inca trail tour we were keen to push on. We headed towards Bolivia across the undulating Andean highlands of Peru. A scenic drive running parallel to the railway, a sort of Peruvian version of the Orient Express. At one point it crossed the road with its wealthy passengers waving enthusiastically at us. I waved back enthusiastically with my middle finger. Our final destination in Peru was the town of Puno on the shores of lake Titicaca. Lake Titicaca is a 8,000sq km lake, at an altitude of 3,820m divided by the border of Peru and Bolivia. The purpose of our stay was to visit the famous floating islands. The floating islands are literally that, inhabited by the Uros people for many hundreds of ... read more

A relatively straight forward crossing into Peru, a country five times the size of Britain with the Andes running down the centre, jungle to the east and desert to the west which runs down to meet the Pacific Ocean. We headed through the barren desert to the coast making our first stop at Chiclayo. Peru´s claim to fame is its history of ancient civilisations and recently excavated archaeological sites. Feeling somewhat ignorant in these matters we booked ourselves on a ´cram it in´tour of four sites and museums in one day. Our minibus whizzed from site to site as we learnt about the different civilisations dating back to 10,000 B.C. and how each different civilisation made progress in agriculture, construction and organisation. We visited pyramids with uncanny parallels to the customs and beliefs of the Ancient ... read more

We have just arrived back from our holidays, after the eventful road trip through Central America and Colombia we decided we deserved a bit of a treat. Five nights and six days on a budget cruise around the Galapagos Islands. Not cheap but a one off we really wanted to do from the start of our trip. A bit ironic paying out all that to go on a boat when not so many years ago I would happily have paid the same amount to get off one. The Galapagos Islands are approximately 1,000 km off the Pacific Coast of Ecuador, famous for their unique fauna and flora which triggered the theory of evolution by Charles Darwin in the mid 1800's. Tourist numbers are controlled and the do's and don'ts are well established to maintain its truly ... read more