Adios & Gracias to South America

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Hola todos,

This is our last blog entry from South America. It´s so hard to believe that we are half way through our trip as at times it feels like we have only been away a few days. We have that fantastic feeling when you really know you´re on holday - when you have no idea what day or date it is.

Since we last wrote we have done a trip south to Puno and Lake Titicaca, then to the White City of Arequipa, into the mountains to Colca Canyon, then along the coast to Lima via Nasca. Quite a bit of travelling so these will be the edited highlights.

Lake Titicaca was an amazing experience. There are 3000 people there who live on about 40 islands of Uros which are the islands made of reeds. You have to see it to believe it, and yes the islands are a bit squidgy in places and you feel a little at risk of sinking through. Not only are the islands made of reeds, but so are the houses, boats and some of the furniture. They also eat the reeds. We went in a boat made of reeds. It didn´t go very fast but didn´t sink either so we felt lucky.

The people on the islands are very welcoming - not all the islands let tourists come and stare at them, and although the ones that did were all set up with little markets for us gringos they certainly seem to have been able to maintain their traditions and identity. We also visited a normal island on the lake and puffed our way to the top (again the altitude got to us and we, well me, struggled a bit) for beautiful views back to Peru and into Bolivia.

We got a bus to Arequipa, which although it broke down was not the worst trip we have had. Arequipa is called the White City, supposedly due to the number fo building made of white sparkly volcanic rock. I can´t verify this and I think it´s really due to the low white fog that envelopes the city for days on end - like the days we were there. There are lovely views of the mountains behind grand old colonial churches, however we didn´t see them, only the cloud. Actually one day the mountains did peep through - it gave us such a fright we thought it was a billboard. We actually didn´t love Arequipa as we felt the most unsafe we have done for the whole trip.

We did a detour back into the mountains to Colca Canyon to see the second highest canyon in the world and see condors flying. It was freezing cold and actually snowing at one point - I was ill prepared for such conditions. And again the dastardly fog settled in and we didn´t see the bottom of the high canyon, nor did we see any condors flying. Luckily, a man on the reed islands had a baby condor in his house, which we were able to have a chat with so we don´t leave Peru condor-view-less. Even without the canyon and condors, the trip was worthwhile for the remote mountain hot springs where we sat in the middle of nowhere in hot hot water, with cold cold rain softly falling onto us and a nice lady bringing us cold cold cerveza. That night we were (well, I was highly) entertained by local musicians and dancers over dinner. I´ll leave it to Bill to fill you in on that story.

From there we endured a 10 hour trip through the hot hot desert in a bus with windows that didn´t open, no air conditioning, bad movies en Espanol at full volume and screaming children. We didn´t have much of a sense of humour about that. Arriving in Nasca was great though, we had a really nice hotel with swimming pool and found someone to sell us cold beer so we perked up pretty quickly. The next morning we did a flight in a tiny six-seater Cessnas over the Nasca lines. Google them if you are interested as my photos wont show them well at this size. They are bizarre and the flight was well worth it, even the bits when he flew sideways. Nasca is a nice little town, although the large number of agricultural stores made us suspect we were in the Levin of Peru. I was also alarmed at the number of chicken shops which displayed their whole raw chickens out on the street in the 30 degree heat. Needless to say I ate vegetarian in Nasca.

To get to Lima, we treated outselves to a luxury bus with big leather laziboy-esque seats which were more comfy than half of the beds we´ve slept in. We only have a day in Lima and have walked and walked around Miraflores (the nice bit of the city) and enjoyed being back in civilisation for a while. It´s bustling and interesting here in Lima, but we are off to Mexico tonight and we can´t wait. We have 10 days on the Carribean coast of the Yucatan Peninsular. Sun and cocktails coming right up.

Hope all is just swell back at home and work is fulfilling for you all.

Love Nic.

Hey all,

As Nic has pointed out we´ve actually had a pretty busy week or so since we last wrote and most of it was pretty good fun. The bus trips have been pretty interesting but well what do you expect I guess. The bus from Nazca to Lima was quite out of this world though.

Anyway my recollections of the last few places is actually a bit iffy as I can´t really remember that many places for some reason.

I liked Puno, thought it was nice and small and the people were pretty friendly and I didn´t feel the least bit unsafe or out of place. The boats that go out the islands are not too dissimilar to the trains, remarkably slow, but enjoyable nonetheless. The islands really are quite out of it and I´m really not sure how the hell they manage to stay sane. There didn´t appear to be anything to do out there except wait for Gringos like us to turn up and take over their island and take photos of you and your kids. Bizarre and probably quite tedious.

From there we went to Arequipa which is actaully the second largest city in Peru after Lima. It was a bit of a dive and I didn´t really like the place a helluva lot. It did provide us with a chance to catch a movie that was in English with Spanish subtitles. I don´t really have a lot to say about Arequipa as we didn´t actually do a helluva lot. Nic did drag me to some nunnery or monestary thingy. That was very very big and not that intersting although Nic may think otherwise. Whilst being based in Arequipa this was where we had a chance to do an overnighter in Colca Canyon. It was well worth the money and the hotsprings and stuff was pretty good times. We went out for dinner and a show as part of our tour and the show meant that some of us got dragged up by the natives and danced with. A young lady dragged me up and started putting on a show for me personally which I thought was all well and good. She then got me on the floor and started whipping me with some freaking thing and then putting her skirt over my head wanting some sort of oral pleasures. I very quickly advised her that she would have to buy me a drink first. She said no and let me get up and go back to my seat. You can safely say that Nic found this to be very funny.

Onto Nazca where it really did feel like we were in Levin or Otaki or something like that. Very small but not all bad. The flight over the lines was pretty cool and I´m a little speechless as to hoe to explain these lines.

We´re now in Lima and trying to find a way to pass the time before our midnight flight to Mexico city and then we have a flight to Cancun tomorrow morning. Can´t wait to just chill out for a few days and not have to worry about when the bus is leaving and rubbish like that.

So all in all South America has been quite an eye opener for me. Out of the three counties we´ve been to I have to say that I´ve enjoyed Peru the most, probably because we gave it more time than the others and we got to see more of the country.

I hope you´ve all enjoyed the South America part and you´ll be hearing from us next in Cancun, Mexico. For those lads that are wondering, it is not Spring Break time so I don´t think there will be any wild scenes.

If anyone sees or talks to Jimmy Boyle please congratulate him on his hundred on Saturday.

All the rest peace out and talk to youse laters.

Billy

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Photos

Petrol Station Island Style
Not sure if that´s cheap or not...

Baby Condor
This was (sadly) captive on the island made of reeds. He is 11 months old and apparently will grow quite a lot bigger. Those reed houses are pretty small, so hopefully not too much bigger.

Bill and friends
These little girls were our friends while on the Uros Islands.

Bill, Nic and Canyon
This was the shallow bit not so obscured by clouds.... high enough to freak me out standing so close to the edge though!

Little Mountain Girl
So sweet. I think she and her lamb make a good living selling photo opportunities.

Bill and new friend
Bill doing his best to look up the dancer´s skirt, but they wear quite a few layers over here so not much luck.