Blogs from South America - page 3

The cooking class comes a bit earlier in our trip than normal, but finding one here was very difficult. I am always looking for hands on, not stand and watch and they are becoming more difficult to find. Perhaps part of the problem is that people just don’t cook anymore, especially those under 40. By cooking I mean, doing more than opening up a delivered box and heating up, I mean actually cook, from scratch, with spices and herbs and real food. Ok, I will stop the rant of the destruction of society before I go down the rabbit hole to far. Before the cooking class was of course breakfast. The selection was not much different, except we did learn that they will not only make omelets for you but cook your eggs anyway you would ... read more

So it begins, another trip, another travel day. There is no easy way to get to Buenos Aires from Providence and flying out of Providence just adds another layover. So, the day started at 5:00 in order to get ready and then be to the train station by 8:00. Phase one, Acela to Boston, which is a quick 38 minutes to South Station. Phase 2, the Silverline 1 bus to the airport. This is a quick 20 minutes (without traffic) to the airport and directly to your terminal. The bus was pretty empty and there was no traffic. Phase 3, check in and TSA precheck. Easy as pie, the entire check in and security took 15 minutes. The screws in my ankle did set off the scanner, but other than that no issues. We are now ... read more

It is very hard country. Dry country. Stony country. Arid country. Barren country. A barely hospitable landscape. Sand and grit, rock and pebble. Desert mountains and empty seaward lowlands. Not semi-arid. For vast tracts there is no vegetation. A single very hardy thistle of spiky grass, or rare cactus, startles. It is so ugly it is almost beautiful. The Peruvian desert, that includes most of the nation's western flank between the Andes Mountains and Pacific Ocean, is not of any exceptional width, between 100km and 200km. But it is a long land of nigh nothing, a moonscape, running near the length of the country, 3,000km, 10 percent of the nation. A few tatty towns dot the local base of the raised spine along the entire continent: from heavy snow and 'Swiss lakes' in deep-south Patagonia northwards ... read more

Hello! This one is for all the naysayers out there who said we'd never make it...we're OK here in hot and humid Buenos Aires. The BA journey was pretty long, not helped by the slobbering character sleeping next to me on the plane (no, not Laura) and the 25 Argentinian youngsters returning from their degree course at the Finsbury Park School of Applied English (cash only, terms and conditions apply). I arrived without incident and successfully booked into the wonderful Garden House Hostel in the San Telmo neighborhood of the city. Great hotel - not too many people staying, so no late-night raucous mobs to disrupt my beauty sleep...sort ly tailored toward the traveling population in a good way.My only complaint is a lack of air conditioning (that we've noticed) and the lack of a private ... read more

We left Cape Town a week ago, sailing into the South Atlantic. Our destination was to be Tristan de Cunha, the most remote island in the world. I had been looking forward to landing here as very few ships stop there and it would be a unique experience. We had some rougher weather on the way but everyone was hoping all would be well when we got there as we had to tender to shore. Meanwhile our routine of three quizzes a day, choir practice, dinner with our table and much reading, eating and drinking continued. We won some ,we lost some but we now have a team of 6 including three Poms which helps with the British bias in the questions . We reached Tristan but much to everyone's disappointment the sea was too choppy ... read more

Anyway, we're back... in South America. Our crazy trip around the world brought us back here for five amazing weeks to see everything we missed the first time around (that's the plan anyway).On to Chile.Santiago is another well known city.. . fog The city is located in a beautiful location at the foot of the Andes, surrounded by mountains. The downside to this is that the area is exposed to low cloud cover, which in turn picks up the noise from cars and city factories. I'll keep my return intact by running until I leave Santiago.Our hostel, Happy House in the Barrio Brasil area of ​​the city, was possibly the best we stayed at on the entire trip (no mean feat). Not much to look at from the outside, the place is huge, beautifully restored in ... read more