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Published: December 29th 2006
This is officially the first "Blog" I have ever done in my life, feel free to critisize my blogging skills if you will. Just to fill you all in the reason for this Travel Blog is that I am heading to South America on Jan 1st and traveling abound for 3 months. This has always been a dream of mine and I finally decided to do it. Im at a point in my life where I want to experience as much as possible and what better way than to go alone to a continent where you know absolutly no one and start hiking around. Brilliant idea I must say myself. Anyways the trip will be a little more complex than that. Heres a rough itinerary below. Who knows if Ill stick to it at all, if not it will be about 100 wasted hours of researching and planning.
Day 1-3 "Preliminary Partying"
Tommorow I leave for New York City to meet up with some friends and take in the New Year. Buenos Aires is almost as large as NYC so I figured this would be a good place to acclimate myself to the big city life or maybe just a good place to spend New Years.
Month One "Europe of Latin America"
I am arriving in Buenos Aires on Jan. 2nd and will be living with a single lady in a apartmetn downtown for the month. This was all set up through the spanish school I will be attending. I always have wanted to be able to communicate with my fathers workers and hopefully after this trip I will be a espanol master. ??? So Im going to this school 6 hours a day and going to attempt to learn spanish.... at least enought to ask some argentine woman out. The school also offers some tango lessons, which is like the major dance down there. Since Im such a natural good dancer Im sure Ill pick up this dance pretty quick and be hitting the local milongas in no time. (milonga is like a tango bar). Along with that I plan on doing some light partying from time to time and immersing myself in the culture. Im going to try and stay away from as many tourists as possible in order the learn spanish more quickly.
Month Two "Hitting the Road with a 66 Liter Back Pack and my St Christophers Necklace"
I plan on leaving Buenos Aires sometime in early Feburary and heading up to La Paz, Bolivia, which is the highest altitude capital in the world. Its suppose to be a beautiful city. After checkling that out for a day or two Im going to get a guide and climb Mount Potosi. I think its like 20,000 feet or something. I know what your thinking..Reed isnt a mountain climber is he? Your right I can barely even climb those fake deals at REI, but on this mountain there is none of that steep rock ledge stuff. Just some steep ice cliff which you need ice picks and clamp ons. Im sure Ill figure it out.
From there Im going to go mountain biking down the "Death Road" This is the most deadly road in the world claiming a average of 200 lives a year in a 50 Mile stretch. They compare it to some of those really scary roads we have driven through in the mountains only they are steeper, no guardrails, no pavement, with intoxicated Bolivians driving buses and cars on a road half the width of ours. On a good note the scenary is breath taking so it shoudl be worth the risk.
Then I am off to Peru to a town, which I cannot recall the name of right now. From there I am going to climb the famous ruins of Macchu Picchu. This is a incan civivilization that is on the top of a mountain in the andes mountains. Its known as the number one destination in all of south america. From hear I plan on going to the Manu National Park which is in the amazon and all rainforest. I have read that the amount of wildlife there is astonishing and equal to the amount of rain. I hope the guides have tents on that one.
After roughing it for awhile I am of to the capital, Lima. Im going to tour the city and test out the local pubs and talent on my way to the beach. The surf in Peru is really consistant all year long which lends itself great to surfing. I have never surfed before, but have always wanted to learn so here we go. Im going to stay there for 5 days and then head further up the coast to a small beach town to learn how to Kite Surf. This should be a interesting 10 days to see how my body reacts to a shere beating from all the waves and coral. It will probably feel like after a Michigan hockey series. My little brother is hoping to meet up with me for most of this peru excursion which would be great.
From here I am off to Quito, Ecuador and then off to the Galapagos Islands. Now this is one of the most unique places on the planet. It is where Darwin came up with his theory's of evolution. There are numerous species of wildlife on this island that are found nowhere else in the world and for some reason they have no fear of humans. Im going to try to book a charter that will take me around to all the islands and also get 2-3 Dives in a day. I guess there are tons of sharks, sea lions, penguins, and turtles which I will see in close proximity on all the dive. This may be the highlight of the whole trip based on what I read on other "bloggers" accounts.
Now depending on how long this all takes me I will either go to Columbia for a few days or head back to argentina.
Month 3 "On to the end of the earth, with some fishing along the way"
When I get back to Buenos Aires I am going to rent a car and hit the road and make my way towards the end of the world, which is the most southern part of argentina. On the way I will stop by some national parks and do alot of fly fishing. Argentina is known as the best trout fishing in the world. I sure hope it lives up the the hype.
For now that is the plan. If anyone has any other recomendations let me know. I would love to hear them. I hope to be posting on hear at least once a week to keep an eye out for the updates.
I would also like this Blog to be as interactive as possible so drop me a line here or there to tell me what you think or how crazy you think I am.
See you in Buenos Aires.
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Alex Rust
non-member comment
wanta party in brazil?
hey man. glad to see you doin this. i think you would be crazy not to. life is so short and there is so much in this world to see. anyway just wanted to let you know that i will be headin down to brazil for carnival from feb 15th - 21st and wanted to see if you would want to come join for bit of wildness. understand if you cant make but just wanted to throw out the invite. have fun!!! -alex