Travel Blog Posts
January 11th 2011
Over three months since my last blog and I am still living the sweet life in the Caribbean. Myself and my Renault Clio have been darting around the island and have been reunited with Simon after a month of lonlieness. From the humble beginnings of staying in a boarding school and at the weekend, being followed by some rather unsavoury characters to an empty boarding school, in the middle of nowhere was enough for me to flee my lodgings to the house of my contact teacher. She kindly let me stay with her until I found my 'logement'. So I set about my search and rather luckily stumbled upon a fine gite (villa). Myself and Simon are now the proud renters of the the top part of a beautiful villa just beside La Grande Anse. In ... read more
October 17th 2010
I found out in May this year that my application was successful to work as an English Language Assistant in Guadeloupe, a French département in the Caribbean. My contract began on the 1st of October, so to kick things off, I flew over a couple of weeks beforehand to get everything sorted before starting work. My previous experience in France had taught me that getting things sorted can take time and I was hoping to get paid before the New Year sets in! I flew to Paris first in order to take a direct flight to Guadeloupe. My parents decided to accompany me to Paris and we spent a fantastic day wandering around in the sunshine, taking in the sights such as Napoleon’s tomb at Invalides, walk’s along the Seine and a trip on the infamous ... read more
October 10th 2010
Having had our fill of all thing's old, we moved Northwards. Coincidentally enough, to get to our next destination by the beach, we had a stopover in the town of Palenque in Mexico, which is also famous for its Mayan archaeological ruins. We decided to give this one a miss and hightailed it to Puerto Escondido on the Pacific coast for sun, sand and suntans. We stayed in a hostel run by the most peculiar English man and kicked back and relaxed with some Ozzies and Kiwis, who were also staying there. The next day, ready to take on the sun, we were greeted with sheets of rain, interspersed with pockets of sunshine. Undeterred, we made for the beach along a beautiful walkway along the cliffs of the town witnessing crabs of all shapes and sizes ... read more
October 5th 2010
We left our scuba diving paradise and headed South towards the Honduras / Guatemalan border, to the town of Copán Ruinas. Conveniently enough our next point of interest, the Mayan archaeological site of Copán Ruins was located just beside the town. The ruins represent what was once a capital city of a major Classical period kingdom from the 5th to the 7th Century. Upon entry, we noticed the security guards were armed with machetes and guns and looked no more than 15 years old. Rather unnerved we quickly shuffled past them and entered to the magnificent Copán Ruins. We wandered around in awe of the great Mayan constructions that lay before us. We were lucky enough for the sun to be beating down upon us, which gave the ruins an even more regal splendour, basked in ... read more
This must be Underwater Love
Published: October 4th 2010Central America Caribbean » Honduras » Bay Islands » Utila
October 3rd 2010
From San Jose we took a bus to Tegucigalpa in Honduras, which involved an overnight stop in Nicaragua. After a 48 hour journey, we finally arrived in the awful capital city of Honduras that is Tegucigalpa. Wanting to leave as soon as possible, but not able to stomach another bus journey, we hightailed it to the airport and managed to get a cheap flight to Utila Island in the Caribbean. Utila is famous for being the second least expensive place in the world to get a scuba diving license, Thailand being the cheapest. We took advantage of this and signed up for a four day NAUI Open Water course with Alton’s Dive Centre. The NAUI certificate is similar to the more common PADI certificate, but the differences include; introduction to skin diving before commencing scuba diving, ... read more
Cavorting in Costa Rica
Published: September 28th 2010Central America Caribbean » Costa Rica » Puntarenas » Montezuma
September 28th 2010
We left Quito, Ecuador to fly to San Jose, Costa Rica. We stayed in San Jose for one night. We had seen enough of cities and wanted only the good life on the beach. In addition to this, Simon’s big birthday was fast approaching, so we had to ensure we were somewhere special for this occasion. As we didn’t have much time to spend in Central America, we could only pick one destination in Costa Rica for several days. We wanted to pick somewhere outstanding, but Costa Rica is made for exploring and there are so many places to choose from, that to decide on just one place is near impossible. We read our guide book and internet blogs into the night and decided on settling down in the hippy village of Montezuma on the Pacific ... read more
August 31st 2010
Our next journey was a two hour flight from Guayaquil to the Galápagos islands. Our flight landed on one of the main islands, Isla Santa Cruz. A lofty sum of $100 USD is required before entering the Galápagos and we paid this through gritted teeth, assuring ourselves it would be worth it in the end. We checked into a cheap hostel and went out straight away to check out the sights, sounds, flora and fauna on the island. First stop, the Charles Darwin Research Centre, to pay a visit to Lonesome George and the other giant tortoises. The first time we spotted them, we thought they were statues. They are so slow moving and gigantic. To see them up close is like looking at something pre-historic and truly astounding. Giant tortoises can live up to 200 ... read more
August 11th 2010
From Trujillo, we headed north to Mancora, a gringo's paradise. A quaint little surfing village, with mainly English speaking establishments, in the very northern part of Peru. When we arrived, we tried to check into the famous Loki hostel, a massive hostel complex, resembling a hotel moreso than a hostel. As it was the final of the World Cup while we were there, we wanted to stay somewhere with a good athmosphere. Unfortunately, there was no room at the inn at The Loki hostel, so we booked ourselves into another small hotel nearby. We watched the World Cup in the Loki hostel and the Dutch fans were out in force. So I became a fairweather Dutch supporter for the day, to fit in with the crowd. Unfortunately, we were disappointed, the Dutch fans presumably more than ... read more
August 2nd 2010
To get to Lima, we took an overnight bus from Cusco. This time, our entertainment comprised of a preacher standing behind our seats, trying to convert us to Christianity (at least, I think thats what he was talking about) and a woman compulsively vomiting into a shopping bag in front of us. After an eventful and somewhat stinky journey, we arrived in the early hours of the morning in the sprawling metropolis of Lima, capital city of Peru. From April to December, Lima is blanketed in a garua (coastal fog), so when we arrived the city appeared very grey, as opposed to the sunny Cusco, we had left behind. We shacked up in a hostel in Miraflores, on the coast of Lima, with plenty of restaurants and bars to choose from and the impressive LarcoMar (American ... read more
July 28th 2010
We took a bus from Copacabana to Cusco, accompanied by chickens and screaming babies. One of the Bolivian women set up camp beside us, sprawling out on the aisle of our bus, a novel idea, but made it impossible to pass her if a toilet stop was imminent! We arrived in Cusco at 4am, a bit earlier than expected and stood bleary eyed outside our hostel and waited for the night porter to let us in. We were in Cusco, Peru and Machu Picchu was at the forefront of our minds. After a lot of debating about whether to the Inca trail or one of the alternative trails, we decided to take the easy and option and go by bus! This was a scenic, two day journey, with an overnight stop in the awful town of ... read more
Tot: 0.09s; Tpl: 0.003s; cc: 18; qc: 61; dbt: 0.0575s; 1; s:notus w:www (50.28.60.10); sld: 1; ; mem: 1.5mb
