Brrr, it's chilly. I didn't expect that. I'm back into thermal longjohns, woolly hat and socks. But that's just at night. The rest of the time (daylight) it's pretty sunny, so I'll stop moaning for a bit. I have, at present, no plan, but I do have lots of maps and am putting off looking at them again by writing this and drinking coffee, to the strains of abominable pop music, in which the campsite specialises. I'm the only tent. Everyone else is either Italian or German in a campervan, or annoyingly American in a cabin. I cycled all around the [View Full Entry]

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It's 1 o'clock in the morning but, no, it's 10 in the evening, 'cause I've crossed time zones and this computer comes courtesy of a fried rice at Hong Kong airport. I've just 'done' Australia in 10 days, most of which was in a retirement village with top rellies and I'm now in transit, waiting for the next flight outta here to Rome. I am a headless chicken. Mediterranean Europe in the Spring and edging north in the Summer seems to be what's about to be occurring. No actual plan, except camp outside Rome (with my barbarian hordes), until it surrenders, [View Full Entry]

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First off, it's raining. It's been raining for days and that's just not good enough, so I've been drinking lots of coffee and going to the pictures. Before holing up here in Dunedin, it was mainly sunny and lots of good stuff in Wanaka, dismal Queenstown, great gravel road through the hills, dolphins and mountains at Milford Sound and down along the south coast. Tuatapere offered the worst fush n chups yet, but compensated by being self-proclaimed sausage capital of the world and fooling the foolish that a wooden path led into a painted landscape. Stunning. A cafe in Wannaka had [View Full Entry]

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Before I get to that, let me tell you about Okarito. Beautiful wee campsite close to the shore, no shop, no cafe, but jungle behind, sea in front, a lagoon to swim in and a nice man who left me 2 beers in a fridge. This has nothing to do with toilet love, incidentally. I stayed a couple of nights and enjoyed what the highly organised NZ tourist industry tends to trample with its emphasis on concentrating buses and the omnipresent campervans into the scenic highlights, which consequently lose their charm. More swims and camps by lakes going well too, though [View Full Entry]

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Note to self from last entry: try to avoid writing a blog after drinking too much the previous night. Taking my own advice, I'm in a better mood, despite constant rain all day. Yet because I'm now only doing miniscule distances and the novelty of it still being warm, I quite enjoyed it and hope that my hair will now become curly. Come to think of it, the only hair I have IS curly, further ruminations on which now cease. Camping beats hostelling. Except tonight, of course, with the rain. I found a free campsite by the beach in Charlestown on [View Full Entry]

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It's roasting hot and I'm cutting down on the distances, so I can regain enthusism for cycling, which was wobbling loads, but is now beginning to recover. The grind in South America has had a similar effect to drinking too much and feeling sick at the mere thought of another drop or, in this case, pedal. I'm meeting other cyclists quite regularly now and they're all so keen I've felt like Eeyore at a Pooh Bear honey-fest (makes sense to me), but then a couple have said they're only doing about 50 km a day and aren't knackered at all, so [View Full Entry]

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Chau Argentina and kia oro New Zealand. I flew out on new year's day and now I'm in Auckland, stopping for a few days with cousin Gerald, Tresna, two kids and a tubby cat. Creature comforts have dripped down upon me, starting with fush n chups, moving on to (imposter) marmite, earl grey tea, english breakfast tea, christmas tea and Guinness. The last few days in Argentina were great though. I cycled and camped the seven lakes road and ended up in Bariloche after a morning of rain (strangely welcome) and 15 kms of ridiculous wind (not my own), which threatened [View Full Entry]

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Once again, I got it wrong! This time I set off with sunstroke left over from the volcano, when I decided not to drink anything as I couldn´t be bothered opening my pack and didn´t want to pee. Well, more fool me. I managed 2 tiny days not feeling too good, but confident I´d be fine and then on day 3 was back on the ripio gravel heading up and managed the majestic distance of 25 km in 10 hours, interrupted by enforced sleeping by the side of the road and, when actually pushing the bike (cycling by then not an [View Full Entry]

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There´s a monster that lives in the lake. It feeds by night on ducks and on frogs and, when it´s eaten enough, on the weeds that grow in the mud at the bottom, which aid its digestion. There´s a monster that lives in the lake. It leaves trails of broken reeds and grass when it wanders through the shallows or when it comes ashore to rub its scales against the willows. There´s a monster that lives in the lake. It sleeps in the winter and awakens next spring, leaner and hungry and makes hay in the summer when the ducks and [View Full Entry]

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Just a quickie. Because the tryes I ordered from UK are sitting in Customs in Buenos Aires and don´t seem to want to move and because I was knackered, I´ve stayed a couple of extra days here in Villarrica and traipsed up and down the volcano today. The volcano´s pretty impressive and smokes and everything, but it´s nothing compared to sliding back down it on my bum in the snow. No photos of that, I´m sorry to say, as I had to grip my ice axe in case I got carried away - which I did! Towards Argentina again tomorrow then, [View Full Entry]

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