The best part of travelling around is meeting other travellers. The even better part is when they find out that you will be visiting their city and offer you free accommodation. This was the case for São Paulo. We met Sarah while trekking the Inca Trail, and she was more than happy to have us stay with her for a few days. After convincing the guy at the gate that we were Sarah´s amigos from Australia and realising that he has been saying Asarah or something like that and we agreed that we were talking about the same person, he let [View Full Entry]

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We landed in Sao Paulo got our luggage, changed some money (a massive rip off) and got on a bus to Rio de Janerio. The bus was magical, not only did it have a toilet that worked (everything worked, it flushed, there was water in the tap, toilet paper, soap to wash your hands, paper towel to dry them after, and a bin to place the towel in after!!!!) it even stopped for food. Which we were soon to find out that Brasilians love their food. By the time we arrived in Rio it was night and fter checking into our [View Full Entry]

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About 3 hours into the our bus ride of bladder death, we stopped at a petrol station, not before one of us had used the old bottle and thrown it out the window trick. After this it was once again dehydrate yourself so you could sleep comfortably and without worry. We arrived in Santa Cruz and after bitching for how many weeks about the cold, that definately was not an issue. Getting of the bus was enought to break a sweat, let alone suss out if the guy trying to sell us accommodation was ridgy didge or not. He came in [View Full Entry]

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So we managed to cross the border from Peru to Bolivia, minus drugs attached under our seats of the bus, (which apparently is a favourite way to trap tourists.) The only problem was John's dodgy South African passport and invalid visas. It turned our alright, but some estupido in the Bolivian consulate will be getting a beating for there inability to write the correct number days on a visa. Next stop was Copacabana (the Bolivian version) for a pit stop on our way to La Paz (the world's highest capital city) After being assaulted by various women and their dead, but [View Full Entry]

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The last week has consisted of early starts. It´s a pitty none of us read our tour ticket correctly, otherwise we might have avoided another pre dawn awakening for an excursion in the rain and cold. Have I mentioned it´s the rainy season here, which contray to other countries means it wet and cold, not wet and hot. So after an extended wait we finally got a mini bus to the Puno harbour for a day excusion to some of the islands of Lake Titicaca. Apparently the world´s highest navigable lake at about 3800m, although I read somewhere this is a [View Full Entry]

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After bargin hunting for the best price to get across the border into Peru, we ended up settling on the ´collectivo.´ We rode in style across, in a car similar to an old cadillac. The only thing that was missing was Low Rider on the radio. We were stoked because it fit all 5 of our backpacks in the boot! With our border crossing out of the way we embarked on another 20 hour journey. This time to Cuzco, for the Inca Trail. We arrived 2 days before we left for the trail to aclimitize to the altitude. Sadly my body [View Full Entry]

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After spending Christmas in Punt Arenas we headed back up to the north of Chile to continue our journey. WE covered 10 of the 12 regions in 48hrs, not bad considering it is the longest country in the world. So we ended up in San Pedro de Atacama. The driest or highest (I can´t remember) desert in the world. It was a shock waking up in the desert. We caught an overnight bus and the terrain still had vegetation etc in it, but when I woke on the bus it was just sand, sand sand, the occasional rock, sand and more [View Full Entry]

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Torres del Paine or the towers of blue. This are an iconic part of Patagonia. 3 spires of granite rock that some crazy guy scaled all 3 of them in 51 hours. In the Patagonia weather that is no mean feet. One day the weather is nice, sky blue no wind, picture perfect. 3 hours later its frickin freezing as the wind picks up to 60km/hr bringing horizontal rain on the verge of snow and this is all in the summer! We arrived in Torres del Paine National Park at about 9am in the morning. The perfect day, the sun was [View Full Entry]

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Once we arrived in Puerto Montt we headed out to find some tucker and ended up in a fishing village called Angelmo. All these ladies come up to you and try to convince you to eat at their restuarant. So we followed this lady who promised us a traditional Chilean meal of gurante (not sure on the spelling sorry). It has all different meats in it and is cooked in a stew with potatoe and mussels. It was quite delicious and to top it off, the restuarant (which can fit 10 people max) was situated on the waterfront and we got [View Full Entry]

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So we left Mendoza, Argentina and headed up the Andes to cross the border into Chile. The Fronteira at Los Libertadores was high up in the Andes. High enough that their was still a fair bit of snow around, I was reluctant to go and play in the snow however for many reasons. 1 I thought I might get shot, and two I didn´t want them to refuse me entry. Like all good borders they had doggies that sniffed bags and scary looking guards and people who pointed you in the right direction because I lacked the language capability to understand [View Full Entry]

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