lazyal
Alan O´Neill Joined: October 7th 2008
Logged in: January 26th 2012
Logged in: January 26th 2012
Travel Blog Posts
ago letic
Oooh - I'm back home and though this part of the trip was around June or July - it seems like ages ago. Agostin and I exited the jungle by boat but through some cock up or other not for once on our part we got dropped off early along the river and had to walk a fair distance through a different type of forest to a road where we were to be picked up by taxi. There was a bundle of wild life a long the dirt road, mostly different types of monkeys- One of our guides caught up to us after a while, on a motorbike that he had to find fuel for and the idea was that he would ferry us to the end of the road individually - the track was hilly ... read more
Photo 1
So we left Loki backpackers in Lima- (Agostino -aka Mexico, and I) and it was total nightmare. The previous night had involved the police chase in the taxi, the drunken off duty cop and loosing my fleece which I realised the next day but thought nothing of it until we were justabout to leave (late) to catch the bus to Tarapoto on our long trip to the jungle near Iquitos. The trip was to involve a bus to Tarapoto, a combi to Yurimaguas and a three day boat trip to Iquitos followed by whatever trip we could get to take us in to the jungle. It was an ignominious start. My passport was no where to be found!! With less than twenty minutes and a taxi ride to the bus station panic struck in. The plan ... read more
Photo 1
Blimmin heck I’ve got to stop travelling as the backlog of blogs is beginning to get to be oppressive. This one is for the 1st week of the Galapagos. Being me I got excited about the trip the night before and went on the tiles straight after a late salsa class and met up with Rachel and Victor , and then later with Caroline, Hannah and John. It got a little bit late and I was a little shattered when in the morning the hostel porter remembered to book my taxi but not my wake up call. Caroline and Rachel were also heading to the airport so there were a few heads available to sort out getting me on the plane. I was sat next to my cabin mate from Canada, Brett and he challenged me ... read more
alan 083
So I left some place oh yeah - La Paz and I was on the way to Uyunni to see the salt flats. No hang on I went to Sucre first - then I went to the Uyunni. It’s getting harder and harder to remember the places especially the one where you only break the journey. Sucre wasn't much shakes but then I didn't give it much of a chance. ON the recommendation of Marta and Philipe from Poland I stayed in a lovely B&B and tried out the local market for the lunch and didn’t get sick and on the second night I met two Ozzies I'd met in La Paz who told me how they nearly got abandoned by their 4x4 driver in the middle of the desert when he went on a bender ... read more
Sunset
So here goes - time flies when you are having fun but apart from that its very problematic trying to get photos off dvd´s and onto the web - I´m thinking of just writing the text and getting my brother to load up some photos once he´s received the discs in the post. Lord knows he has very little to be doing with just 3 kids a job and a wife to keep in line :) (Hi all - love ye lots, except Lenan... only a mother could love the little antichrist ;) Anyhoo as I have pictures from the land expedition side of the Galapagos trip I thought I´d get the blog for it underway. This is about half of the trip - I´m sure I´m going to have to do a land expedition part ... read more
No photos as half the time the camera was in the shop getting the CCD cleaned and can´t manage to upload the slasa videos So I got on the plane to Quito from Santiago via Lima (Hi Liam ;) I was a little tired and emotional after having spent the afternoon haring around looking for some place showing the Ireland v England Rugby which I managed to do by half time but caught up anyway. The plane to Quito was about 262 pounds but had I wanted to get off half way to visit Derek in Lima it would have been 500 ;) Go figure! Having received word that Tom and Hannah were heading off to Galapagos the morning I got in at 6.30 I hung around the airport when I got in at 3am and ... read more
I forgot that I had written this one ' no photos taken this time either....its the entry before the previous one. I got out of Puerto Natales eventually and got on the bus to Santiago Chile. Never does my lack of preparation of knowledge of where I´m going or the route I´m taking show up more than when I´m about to set foot on a bus. Here was I thinking that i was about to take a bus north up through Chile to Santiago with the added bonus of passing an exploding volcano in Chaiten when in fact the bus headed south back into Argentina and went back into Chile near Bariloche so I had another billion argentinian and chilean stamps in my five page visa that was already full of a batch of them + ... read more
mapatorres
It took two days of rest in Ushuaia before I was ready to head to Torres del Paine.This place near Puerto Natales is a mecca for trekkers so I was about to test out my fitness havinggiven up the fags for two weeks on the ship. The idea was to get there and have a look at it to see whether I would go for the 'W' or the W plus the circuit. About 10 days was recommended to put by for the whole lot in case the weather turned against you. The major factors are the winds and then the cold on top of them. The winds in this area are an entity unto themselves.Normally at home the wind is generally a part of bad weather. Here the wind just turns up on its own ... read more
Photo 10
Where was I - oh yeah, getting into Ushuaia from El Chalten - it was sleeping tablets all round as I think this was the 37 hour bus trip passing out of Argentina, into Chile and back into Argentina again - a total mare of customs and immigration - muchos stamps on my 5 page temporary passport! Anyhoo - Tom and Hannah were off to a B&B and I'd arranged to meet Celine at the Irish Pub - having spent 37 hours on the bus and getting to know half the occupants they were all invited too. The scenery down through Patagonia is amazing - its soo flat in places that you imagine you can see the curvature of the earth in the distance out both sides of the bus - amazing, and the sunsets are..well..hard ... read more
0001PeregrineAntarctica
right there a few missing places before this but i'll get back to them Previously Alan Tom and Hannah were waiting with bated breath in Ushuaia hoping the could get cheap passages to Antarctica and then finally they were off - having partied for the previous two nights til 6 I didn't get my act together to get drink in for the cruise - couldn't even look at it ;) Had drunk dialled Dee when we left the club that morning at 6am to tell her how excited I was to see our ship the Academik Sergei Vavilov in the dock - she was ever so pleased to hear the news at about 9am on a saturday morning. Tom and Hannah and I shared a cabin - immediately we got on we met Barbara and Tanya ... read more
