Blogs from South America - page 5665

Well I planned on doing this 3day circut trek up in the mountains behind Huaras, but when I arrived at Laguna Churup at the end of day 1 I liked it so much that I decided to just kick it there for a couple of days and then go back to Huaras. And I had the whole place to myself apart from about 5 other trekkers per day that came up for a look, and a stray dog I called Henry who made sure that not one scrap of my sloppy food went to waste. He was a very hungry and ugly dog, I wish I'd taken a photo of him to show you. next time aye... read more

Right then, after the Caribbean exuberance of Venezuala, and the European austerity of Santiago, it was time to stop arsing about, and get into the REAL South America.. you know; towering Andean mountains, barren plains at dizzying altitudes plunging down to the Amazonian basin and the sultry, sweaty jungle below, Indigenous Indian women with toothless, weather beaten faces, an ill fitting bowler hat and a small child wrapped in a colourful shaw, lllamas, excitable locals who will throw a stike/carnival/fiesta at the drop of a hat, and panpipes.. Oh, the panpipes.. so anyway.. you will find all these things in Bolivia. Arriving in La Paz is spectacular.. a barren plain at over 4000m means you can feel dizzy stepping off the plane, and standing up quickly leaves you light headed.. this plain opens out into a ... read more

Well Lima was nice, a bit expensive but really quite a cool city. I was planning on doing a bit of Para-sailing and swimming at the beach while I was here but the weather has been a bit cold so that'll have to wait untill I'm a bit closer to the equator. Meanwhile I'm off up to Huaras tonight and plan on draging out my tent for a couple of days camping - but apparantly it's been snowing up there in the national park over the last couple of days so we'll see about that too. Hope everyones good back home, I miss you all a lot.... read more

And so, South... after the eventful final day in Venezuala, we spent a long day flying south, to Santiago, the capital of Chile. At first impressions, this is a grey, drab city - the weak spring sun fails to penetrate the blanket of smog, and the stern government buildings seem to be straight out of the 70s cold war architecture handbook. It is rather reminiscent of eastern europe, and the cold wind echos this mood. But on second inpection, you see the modern skyscrapers of western banks and mobile phone companies, and the steets buzz with fast food stores and designer clothes shops. The metro, again, is clean, fast, and there is even large plasma screens playing MTV on the platforms... there is also a real bohemian atmosphere to the place.. our hostel is in a ... read more

Time for a little insight into the day to day trials of travelling. From the previous entries, it may seem as if we are having an amazing time, and doing and seeing loads of exciting things.. while this is undoubtedly true, I havent mentioned the less glamorous nitty gritty daily details... the chaos of bus stations, and finding the right bus with our decidedly basic spanish, of arriving in a town at night, struggling with the humidity and the bulky 20KG backpack that bumps into everything, and thus arriving at our destined hotel too tired to look anywhere else, and as a result sleeping in a dingy cockroach infested hovel... Anyway, just to give you an idea, here´s a little story about our last 36 hours in Venezuala that might give you greater insight... Our penultimate ... read more