Gastonbury 2009

Fun times in fields with friends, music, cider and sunshine..... Good times!!!

So good they named it twice.

NEW YORK.

Well, the cherry on the icing! What can we say, other than NYC was all and more than we could have wished for, the perfect end in every way to our travels.

After a smooth flight from Mexico city to Newark airport NY, we caught the train to Penn station before hopping in a taxi to the mighty Bryneths. We had a take away pizza and a good catch up with Bryn before bed.

The next morning, which was a cold one, was spend meandering around shops, namely The Burton store!!! Awww Yeeeee… The afternoon consisted of food, and making arrangements with Bryn and Stuart (of Lara and Stuart fame) for that evening. Stout NYC was the location, with a slight mix up on times..

We arrived at 5, not 6, due to a poor mobile phone connection!!! We wandered around the vast bar in search of a familiar face, and we found one ( well, 4 ) Someone who looked remarkably like Mr Trevor Ellis!! Sitting next to 3 other people who looked identical to Sarah Ellis – Jones, Tim Kopotsha and Zoe Johnson. So identical did they look that it turned out it actually WAS them. WHAT A SHOCK!!!!!…. The most wonderful surprise. It later turned out that we were just a good excuse to shop;) Which boy did they do….

We hooked up with a few travel buddies, Bill who we met At Iguazu falls, who is now working as a lawyer in Manhattan. Also Rob and Emma who we met in Chile and Bolivia, it was really nice to see them..

The next 4 days were spent shopping socialising, eating far too much food at some great places, a bit more shopping mixed with a little bit of sightseeing, followed by a few beers here and there, and a bit more shopping. This was all coupled with perfect New York weather, crystal clear and cold for two days, then SNOW!!! Amazing!!.. We couldn’t have wished for more.

One night of our time there was spent with Lyns and Andy in their new pad in Port Chester, just north of Manhattan, beautiful Town house with a big fire!!J Both are well and ready for parenthood. Good luck guys!!

Great City + Great Friends + Great weather = a truly memorable ending……Thanks!!

……..But not the end of our blog!!!! Carry on watching for more jude and Jimmy frivolitites.

We hope you have enjoyed – and will continue to enjoy – it as much as we have..
VIVIR EL SUENO……

2 weeks of sun in Puerto

Tasty sunsets!!
Puerto Escondido
Comp winner in red
Bum!!!!

Well, as our travels draw to a close, we sit here in an internet café in Mexico city, bronzed and contented after 2 week of sun, sea, sand, surfing, good times, great people and a few too many mojitos!! And prepare for a final fling in NYC!

The two weeks of many s´ was in Puerto Escondido! A chilled beach “resort” - in a hostally chilled still Mexican influenced sense of the word. The place was perfect, we wanted somewhere, cheap, sunny, hot with a bit of a vibe and some good food, and after a little scratching beneath the surface all was satisfied. We stayed in a hostel recommended by a Belgian couple who were painting it as their friends ran it, and it was great, basic cheap and chilled. We spent our day’s sun bathing reading and surfing, which we are converts for, it’s such good fun!! Getting a good dumping by a wave is hilarious. Puerto is known as the MEXPIPE as it gets huge swells resulting in some of the best “off beach” surf in the world. Whilst we were there they held the PMX surf comp, which was great! Real good buzz.

We found a beach called La Punta, about 30 mins walk south where they have smaller perfect learner waves. It was also really quiet there. In between surfing we sat and watched Stingrays jumping (I also stepped on one!) pods of dolphins rounding up fish just off the shore, and a few ozzie guys saw humpbacks jumping!! Amazing!! And this combined with some spectacular sunsets equaled all in all a perfect end to our time in Central America, which like south has opened our eyes to so many wonderful cultures.


See you all soooo soon!!

Guatemala and Tikal.......now MEHICO!!!!!

Loving the Spider monkeys!

Jude and a temple

Temples of Tikal peeping through the jungle

Sunrise over Tikal

Hola Chicos,

We are in Mehico!!!!

Our journey from San Ignacio in Belize to Flores in Guatemala went without a hitch. Flores is an island on Lake Peten Itza, lovely little town with lots of narrow cobbled streets. Our reasons for going to Flores were to use it as a base to visit Tikal and then as a starting point to hop over to Mexico. Stayed in a huge rambling hostel called Los Amigos, great and definitely the place to be in Flores!!!!

So, we got up at 3am in order to be at the top of Temple IV to watch the sunrise over the temples at Tikal!!!!!! The early rise was worth it, we had to hike through the jungle for over ½ hr in the pitch black listening to the growls of howler monkeys! Tikal is the most important Mayan ruin site, hidden in the rainforest, it consists of towering temples, pyramids and loads of other smaller buildings that made up the royal palace. Many of the ruins have yet to be excavated. Pretty impressive and very mysterious. Saw lots of spider monkeys while looking around the ruins too! They're so cool!

The following day we were up early again, this time to catch a 5am bus that would take us to the Mexican border, from there we got on a tiny boat that took us down the river to Frontera Corozal in Chiapas region of Mexico. Once back on land we caught a minibus (the driver wins points for squashing 20 people into a 12 seater bus!) to Palenque. We stayed in a lodge in the jungle in El Panchan, just outside of Palenque, for one night and then the next day made our way to San Cristobal stopping at 2 waterfalls, Agua Azul and Misoha, and a river, Agua Clara, with a very dodgy wooden bridge, on the way.

San Cristobal is such a pretty city, full of brightly coloured biuldings. It's located in the highlands of Mexico, so in the night-time it was freeeeeeeeezing, first time we have been properly cold for ages! Fortunately during the day it was bright blue skies and sunshine. Spent a couple of days there sightseeing, great city to just amble around, and then it was time to find a beach so we can catch some rays before heading back to Winter.........................................

Honduras to Belize...

The elusive water taxi!!
Our Cabaña at Ruthies.
Our own private island.
Snorkling off our porch at Tobacco caye.

Well after a few hectic days of travel through Honduras, spending a night at San Pedro Sula, which has little to report back apart from the football fanatical taxi driver who bought us some nuts and gave us a mini tour, and then a second night at a place called Puerto Cortes, which is the main port in the whole of central america, again not much going on there! Our reason for visiting was to catch an elusive taxiboat to Belize. The boat was rumoured to leave once or twice a week, and basically if we missed it, we would have ended up with an extra few days of chicken buses!! No thanks!! Luckily, after a night in a semi seedy US style motel room, we managed to find the boat which took us to Dangriga in Belize, not our original choice but our only option!!.... Just before reaching Dangriga we were stopped by the Belize coast guard, and behold....THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE, yeap, they speak English in Belize!!!!!!

Dangriga is the home town to the indigenous people of Belize, the Garifuna. We stayed with Ruthie and her husband, both pure Garifuna descendants, in one of her cabañas on the beach, and had home cooked breakfast and dinner!! Magic!!

After 2 nights there we took a 5 mile boat ride out to Tobacco caye. A sand island on the barrier reef!! It was so nice here we stayed 5 instead of 2 nights. We went there just at the right time as the holiday season starts in about 2 weeks, so it was like having our own private island!! We spent our days reading, sunbathing, and as the island is on the reef you can snorkle with eagle rays, spanish rays and yellow rays right off the beach plus beautiful coral and masses of reef fish!! The boat ride back was fun.........3 meter swells in a small flat bottom fiberglass boat with an outboard motor!! Wet, wild and never again!!

After the caye we headed towards the Guatemalan border. We spent our last night in Belize in San Ignacio, a little town near the border, staying in a guest house run by the Central American version of Mr Miyagi (remember him, the teacher from Karate kid!). The next morning we visisted Cahal Pech, the oldest known mayan ruins and our first taste, they didn´t disappoint. A little more magical than Inca ruins due to the fact they are hidden in the jungle, but not as complex and majestic. After this we headed for Guatemala...........................

Hope all is well.

xxx

Welcome to Nicaragua......

Granada and Lake Nicaragua

James......

Jude........

Janet........

James emerging from the mist!

a baby boa!

We made it to Nicaragua! Quite an eventful journey yesterday which involved queuing at the Costa Rican border control for ages whilst being hastled my money changers, being charged a lot more than the local people on the bus to enter Nicaragua (hmmmmmmm, think we funded the bus drivers next couple of meals!), having our passports put in a plastic carrier bag and taken somewhere, having to pile off the bus and grab our luggage while Nicaraguan customs officers chucked it off the bus, drag our bags to a random table in the baking sunshine and queue up some more while they randomly checked bags (although I don´t think they actually checked any!!), retrieve our passports from a fierce looking border guard, get back on the bus which by this time was an oven, find out our bus didn´t go to where we thought it was going, get dropped off on the outskirts of a random town, hunt for a very elusive bus station which turned out to be through a cavernous market, and finally get on an old yellow American school bus with bullet holes in the windscreen for a bumpy 1 1/2 hr journey to Granada. Phew. Anyway it was worth it, Granada is a lovely colonial city near Lake Nicaragua with a great chilled-out atmosphere. You can see an active volcano from here too! But tomorrow we are off again, hot footing it through Nicaragua into Honduras, San Pedro Sula to be precise. From there we go to Puerto Cortes to catch a boat to Belize on Monday.....hopefully!!!!!!

The rest of our time in Costa Rica was brill. The canopy tour was great fun, swinging through cloud rainforest and very high-up! A total of 3 km of cables, the longest wire was over 1/2 mile and the highest 130 m above the ground. Also in Monteverde, Janet, James and myself got to hold a one-year old boa constrictor at the serpentarium, those of you who know about my phobia will understand what a big deal this was for me!!!!!! And on our last day in Costa Rica James celebrated his 30th birthday in San Jose :)

xJ&Jx

Costa Rica.....Pura Vida.......

Humming away

Sinister looking caiman

Cute little bird

White faced monkey

Awesome butterfly!

Hola Chicos and Chicas!

We are having a great time in Costa Rica with Mummy G (that’s James’ mum for those of you who don’t know!), despite it being the rainy season and seeing an awful lot of torrential rain in the afternoons (it is still really warm though and it’s sunny in the mornings and fine in the evenings) !! Stunning country, the people here are so friendly and the variety of wildlife, flora and fauna is amazing……….

At the moment we are in a place called Monteverde, arrived here after a very bumpy ride in a jeep followed by a boat trip over a lake and then an even more bumpy ride on another jeep (parts of the roads have been washed away by rain so buses can't negotiate them at the moment). Monteverde is in the north of Costa Rica towards the West. The village was created by some American Quakers, it's very beautiful, surrounded by lush farmland and thick cloud rainforest. Tomorrow morning we are off on a canopy tour through the cloud rainforest which involves swinging from sky lines (kind of like flying foxes and tarzan swings!!!) and walking over bridges that are very high-up, can't wait!!!!

We came here from La Fortuna (also in the North of Costa Rica), famous for its active volcano, Volcan Arenal, one of the ten most active in the world. We were there for 2 nights, stayed in an eco lodge which had hummingbirds in the garden. Not bad! Walked to a fab waterfall yesterday morning and then had a walk through rainforest late yesterday afternoon. Saw a spider monkey and heard the growl of howler monkeys! After that, when it was dark, we went to watch lava erupting from the volcano and flowing down the side of the volcano (all from a very safe distance!). Incredible to see. And we were surrounded by fireflies flickering away. After such a hard day, we needed to go and have a soak in some hot springs, complete with 25 pools of varying temperatures and 3 wet bars!!!

Before La Fortuna, we did a 3 day trip to Tortuguero National Park, which is on the Caribbean Coast. It didn't rain so much there as it is not the rainy season in that part of the country. In fact in was really hot and sunny most of the time, the sea was so warm, like a bath, but it is not safe to swim in because of dangerous currents. However, we stayed in a fabulous lodge with a swimming pool! Tortuguero National Park consists of jungle surrounded by waterways and a beach (with black sand). The beach is where the endangered green sea turtles lay their eggs. Luckily we caught the end of the nesting season and were able to go on a night tour to the beach to see the turtles laying their eggs. The adult turtles weigh 200 pounds, so it really is something to see them haul themselves up the beach, dig a nest and lay eggs, and then haul themselves back to sea. We also got up really early one morning to see baby turtles hatching from these nests (James also saved a freshly hatched baby turtle from burning hot sand during the day and put it safely out to sea!!!) Seeing the turtles is one of the highlights of our trip so far, very moving. Lots of wildlife in the jungle too, we went on two wildlife spotting boat trips along the waterways, one early in the morning and one in the afternoon, and did a trek through the jungle. Saw soooooo much, three types of monkey (spider, howler and white faced monkeys), sloths, caimans, crocodiles, lizards, frogs and tons of different birds. All-in-all, it really was an amazing trip.

Previous to that trip, we spent a couple of days in Alajuela at a B&B on a small farm with lots of orange trees, 3 big dogs and some pigs, which was owned and run by a nice nutter! Took a trip to a great butterfly farm, there are so many beautiful brightly coloured butterflies over here. And then we spent a day in San Jose, the capital city, before our Torteguerro trip.

We leave Monteverde the day after tomorrow. Spend a day in San Jose (when it is James 30th Birthday!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!), and the day after that, Mummy G flies home and we are getting the bus to Nicaragua.......

loadsa love
J&Jxxxx

Arequipa to Lima. Adios South America!

Volcano backdrop to Arequipa

White stone buildings

Chillin' by the pool!

Well, Arequipa was everything we had hoped for. Beautiful architecture, relaxed, lower altitude and warm! We stayed in a great hostel with a pool, awesome buffet breakfast and a great little restaurant.

The city itself is set against 3 Volcanoes, one of which is active. The buildings are made from white volcanic stone, which looks and fells very similar to pumice. We did the usual wander around town and visited a museum containing the mummified body of Juanita, an Inca girl sacrificed to the volcano (volcanos were believed to be Gods) some 500 years ago and perfectly preserved in the permafrost until volcanic ash melted it in the 1990s, really interesting insight in to the ritualistic aspect of the Incas lives.

This was the extent of our culture in Arequipa as we wanted to make the most of the relaxed atmos before heading to Lima, which we knew was going to be quite the opposite!
It was! After a 15hr delayed bus journey thanks to hydraulics, we made it to Lima. Busy, bustling, slightly chaotic slum surrounded city, with contrasting flash hotels and shopping malls in the centre, set on high cliffs above the sea with a permanent fog!! Doesn’t it sound nice!!! Mmmmmm. We stayed in the Mirraflores area, which, to be fair was OK. Our main reason for visiting was our flight left from there to Costa Rica! We had a wander round, ate dinner then prepared for our flight the next day!

I (Jimmyg) was quite please to have avoided any illness in South America, but it got me! On the day of the flight I woke feeling sick, and then proceeded to try and find Huey down the plane toilet for the majority of the flight! Possibly the worst day of my life, made worse by a last minute aborted landing due to bad weather resulting in and extra 40 mins in the air! We did however make it safely, met MummyG and have proceeded to have an amazing time in Cost Rica.

South America is incredible. Our travels were hard work at times, but soooooo rewarding. It was above and beyond our expectations. Out of this world scenery and proud and friendly people. Possibly the highlight personally has been learning the Language, we can converse, understand and even chat a little which has multiplied the experience. Spanish lessons for sure when we return!!!

Well, love to all and time is ticking away!!!

Xxj&jxx

Copa to Cuzco..The mighty Machu!!

Machu Picchu
Ollantaytambo. Sacred valley.
Pisaq. Sacred Valley.

Quick fire posts here, but we had to keep them seperate due to the enormity of the places vivited in terms of Travel destinations!!.. Namely Machu Picchu!!!!!!!

Soooo from copa we hopped on another bus! in the direction of Cuzco, Peru, and the worst bus journey so far!!! cramped, packed and 11.5 hours long, 2 hours longer than expexted, but hey ho it was worth it for the resulting city at the end. Cuzco!! Beatifull, clean, relaxed - larger that expected - town with truely amazing Inca inspired architecture, great musems -modern Art, Pre-Colombian and numerous others- combined with great restaurants and the odd Enlish pub selling Speckled Hen!! which is nice!! Of course our main reason for heading here was Machu Picchu!
We didn´t book the Inca trail as this books up 3 months in advance and we didn´t want to tie ourseves to a date. So we shopped around on arrival and found a 3 day bargain tour including the sacred valley, entrance to Machu, two nights accomodation in Aguas Callientes including breakfast and train journeys, for a bargain $130 each!! We were quite plaesed about this and the fact that the trip worked out perfectly! The Sacred alley trip was incredible, the valley is surrounded by towering Andesite mountains, and was sacred to the incas due to the pleasant climate and incredibly fertile soil, which it clearly is. We visited the Ince runs of Pisaq, and Ollantaytambo, the latter being the most accesible and spectacular, we spent hours wandering around here. After that we go the train to Aguas Callienntes ( meaning "Hot Water", due to the thermal spring) which is the base town for Machu.
We got the bus the next morning at 5.30am to catch the sun rise over Machu Picchu, which never really happen due to mist, but it was a great experince non the less. Nothing can prepare you for the sheer spectacle of the site, perched right in the top of a huge mountain with incredible drops off either side!! But if this wasn´t spectacle enough, we decided to walk to wayna Picchu, approx 200meters above Machu, up quite a trecherous climb, but so worth it. It looks down on Machu providing the most incredible views and steep drops, my fear of hights kicked in and I spent most of my time clinging on to rocks and wires. The Inca ruins at the top are thought to have been a possile retreat. The fact they built on such incredible terrain is bewildering. We decided to blame it on the perpetual chewing of the coca leaf, which seem to be linked to many feats of human endurance in the north of this continent!! NUTTERS!!....
In the afternoon we visited the inca bridge, which spans a cliff face which allowed them to traverse a ridge, hopefull we will be up to date on the Photo front today, so check them out, there are quite a few!!!

We are now killing time before our bus to Arequipa this evening (the town my grandad Galloway grew up in!!) It´s the second biggest city in Peru and famed for it´s white building an surrounding Volcans! we arrive there on the 8th, and spend 2 nght before Lima and our flight to Costa Rica to see Mummy G!!!!!!

The count down beigins now, just over 8 weeks untill we return!! Doesn´t time fly!!

Check below for the other post if you haven´t already read it....

love to all.
xxj&jxx

La Paz to Copacabana

La Paz houses
Locals at the bus station
Copa centre. The blessing of the cars!!

Hey all... It´s been a while thanks to a busy 10 days.

La Paz turned out to be a lot more intersting than we expected and also not as unsafe as we had heard. We stayed in a great Hostal called the Adventure Brew, which included free all you can eat pancake breakfast! and one free beer - brewed on the premises - every night! which was just as well because thanks to the altitude smog, general filthy air and possibly a little bit of dodgy food Jude was ill for 3 days! So it was a blessing that we were in a nice hostal.
We had 2 days of sight seeng before Jude was struck down, and in that time we managed a few museums (one about the history of the Coca plant), a photo expo and the witches and local markets, so not a complete loss, and got a good feel for the city, which is completely MANIC!!

After 4 night we were ready to move on so we got the bus to Copacabana on the shore of lake Titicaca. The journey there was amazing, at one point we got on a little boat to cross the lake whilst the bus was put on a rickety wooden barge and floated across!! Absolutly hilarious, huge bussess bobbing around all over the place...Once in Copa we had a slpurge for $3 each per night in a great Hostal with an equally great Restaurant next to it with SALAD!!! which is rare, and if you do find it it is normally rinsed in dodgy water! The resaturants was sterile!!! awww yeah!!
Copa is a real hippy town and a bit touristy but nice and chilled and right on the lake, a blessed relief from La Paz.

From Copa we did a day trip to the Isla del Sol, a 2 hours boat ride on titicac. It´s the island the Incas believe the Sun was born from, and was our firs taste of Inca ruins. the boat drops you at the north where you visit a small museum and some ruins before a 3 hour walk to the south where the boat collects you and takes you back, and this was where the fun began!! The outboard motor was being a little tempramental, after a lot of stopping and staring and bobbing about, it finally packed up about 20 mins in to the journey back!! We spent about an hour bobbing around whilst the driver stripped the motor, which thankfully worked and we made it back safely one and a half hours late!! Comedy!!

Bolivia is renowned for it´s tempramental transport and infastructure and it was great to experience some of the problems, the journeys we took all be it by train bus or boat have been the most memorable of our travels so far, and that combined with the truely stunning out-of-this-world scenery has made it our top country so far. It´s been hard work, but ultimately rewarding!

Another post to follow this as we have been busy bees so eyes up!
xxj&jxx

p.s. lake Titicaca is soooo massive it´s like being by the sea!! without waves!

Salt and High Altitude!

Hola!

Well we are now in La Paz, got here at 5.30am this morning (2 hours early!!), after a bumpy overnight bus journey from Potosi.

So last time we posted we were awaiting our train to Uyuni from Villazon. What an AWESOME journey, 9 hours of stunning scenery through tiny villages, farmland, huge red cliffs and canyons and desert. Uyuni is a cold desert town, bit scruffy, but interesting, most travellers are just passing through on their way to or from seeing the salt plains. We took a one day tour of the salt plains, which turned out to be a very surreal day of sightseeing. Our guide spoke no English, but he was great at speaking Spanish veeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeery slowly so we got the jist of most of what he was saying! First stop was a train cemetery on the outskirts of Uyuni, full of old British built steam trains. We then drove across the salt plain, the Salar de Uyuni, so white and huge, 12,000km square, thats a lot of salt! There is no perspective so you can get some crazy pictues. Saw the locals mining the salt and a hotel made out of salt. We had lunch in the shadows of a dormant volcano, whilst watching flamingos and llamas (our driver cooked us steak over a gas BBQ!). Then we drove across more salt and visited fish island. Crazy island in the middle of the salt plain which has giant cactuses and rabbit like creatures with long tails! And James got some quality sunburn, resulting in very immpresive sunglasses marks on his face!

From Uyuni we caught a bus to Potosi, the highest city in the world, 4070m above sea level. The bus journey there was interesting......no bitumen at all (only 10%of roads in Bolivia have bitumen) and winding through mountains, with some very steep drops off the edge!!!!! Think of the bumpyest road you´ve been on and times it by 10!!!!! The bus also got a puncture at one point on two tyres!!!!! So we all had to get off the bus in the middle of nowhere while they fixed it, the tyres that they replaced the punctured ones with weren´t much better, they had no tred at all and bits of rubber missing! LLamas kept being getting on the road infront of the bus too, so the driver was constantly beeping his horn (something they are very fond of doing in Bolivia). But we made it. However the scenery on the drive was stunning, lots of huge red and green cliffs.

Potosi turned out to be quite a cool city, with a huge mountain called the Cerra Rico overlooking it and some great colonial buildings. The mountain used to be massive silver mine, and now looks as if it belongs on Mars after 100´s of years of mining. It is still a mine today but on a much smaller scale. Its very dangerous too, the life expectancy of people who work in there is 10 years after they have started mining because of the bad ventilation. Over 8 million people died in the mine over 300 years in its heyday,which was from1500-1800´s!!!!! Despite the altitude it wasn´t too cold, very sunny during the day. And we´ve both got used to the altitude now so no sickness :) While we were there we met up with a English couple, Emma and Rob, who we met in Chile, which was great fun. Just stayed there for one night, then lastnight caught the bus to La Paz. That bus journey wasn´t as bad, still quite bumpy though and we did have two comedy old Bolivian ladies in traditional dress sleeping in the aisle. We are staying here for 3 days, and then moving on to Copacabana............

Very behind on the piccies am afraid, hopefully we´ll find a reasonably fast interent place soon so I can upload them...........

Lots of love to everyone
J&J xxxxx

BOLIVIA!!!!!

Hi all..

Just a quickie here to let you know we are alive and well, and a little short of breath in a town called Villazon (3440m above sea level) on the Bolivia side of the border from Argentina. We are awaiting a train to take us to Uyuni to see the salt plains.

We are a little behind on photos as interweb connection struggle to download Flickr applications here, Jude is trying as we speak.

Well after Uraguay we headed back to Buenos aires to catch a bus to Puerto Iguazu! Special note at this stage goes to my super-on-the-ball-lady who - whilst we were waiting for the bus at the notorious Retiro station - foiled an attempted theft of my bag !! 10 out of 10 and a lot of hassle saved!

After a 19 hour bus ride we arrived in Puerto Iguazu, to an amazing hostel with a massive pool, they were also the first hostel who actually got our booking correct!! a good start, and things just got better, the food there was amazing! our room was clean and in the quiet area and of course the falls were incredible! photos can't do the scale or the force justice! we did both the Argentinian and Brazilian side which was cool, both completely different. On the Argentinian side we took a speed boat ride which ploughs in to some of the falls which was fun, and damp!!

We then set off Bolivia bound by yes you guessed it BUS!! 27 and a half hours to a town called Salta for 24 hours rest before the big push to Bolivia, and here we are!!

Well signing out, as altitude is making this hard work. apologies for the poor reading will improve once we have acclimatised.

xxj&jxx

Uruguay - winners of the first ever football world cup!!!

Wall in San Telmo, Buenos Aires

Doorway in La Boca, Buenos Aires

Hola once again!
After a surprisingly pleasant 19 hour bus journey from Bariloche (English movies, proper meals, armchair seats, wine and a bed-time whiskey!) we arrived in BUENOS AIRES. muy bien! (the spanish is getting slightly better and they speak more slowly in Argentinia so we have been able to understand people, or at least some of what they say!!!)

Buenos Aires rocked, had sooooooo much fun, saw and did loads. A city bus tour (´cos we can´t get enough of buses!!!!) showed us the main sights, including the famous Boca Junior Football stadium and the most polluted river in the World (smelt VERY bad!). We had a traditional Argentinian BBQ (Asado) —lots of charred salty meat and copious amounts of red wine, resulting in muchos headaches. We wandered the cobbled streets of the San Telmo area on Sunday (which was really near where we stayed), loads of markets, street stalls, tango, street dining and tons of people!!!! Great atmosphere. We also went to a Tango show one evening, which was one of the highlights. Professional dancers and singers (and boy could they dance and sing!) With champagne and a three course meal thrown in. One final mention for the Recoleta cemetery – home to the grave of Evita. A truely extravagant graveyard with huge ornate mausoleums crammed next to each other, with coffins on display and loads of cats wandering around!! Nuts!!!

From Buenos Aires we had the crazy idea to hop on a boat to Uruguay for a few days. We’ve visited Colonia del Sacramento – an old town built by the Portuguese as a smuggling route to Buenos Aires - beautiful architecture and generally really cute. And Montevideo, where we are now. It´s rained and thundered most of the afternoon, but we had a good stroll round this morning. Lots of huge old buildings, some of which are a bit run down, but cool atmosphere and friendly people. When we arrived in Montevideo we saw a bus for Fray Bentos, much amusement, we thought about going to get a pie, but unfortunately the factory has closed there now!

Back to Buenos Aires tomorrow, so bus, boat, then 19 hour bus journey again to Puerto Iguazu to see the mighty Iguazu falls (all 270+ of them). Quite excited about this, apparently the ions from the spray make you happy!!

Love to all.

Xxj&jxx

Don´t cry for me Argentina...............

Volcano Villarica, Pucon, Chile

A fat sea lion in Valdivia, Chile

Bariloche, Argentina

Hey there everyone!

Well, we are in the Argentinean Lake District in a ski resort town called Bariloche by the side of Lake Nahuel Huapi. Really pretty place, very alpine. Arrived here on Wednesday after a scenic and interesting 8 hour drive over the Andes from Puerto Varas in Chile. Snow was piled higher than the bus by the side of the road, we got stuck for a bit while a wagon pulled other wagons up a hill, and we had to pass through two border crossings. The ski field near Bariloche is the biggest in South America but we decided not to board while here, partly because the conditions aren´t that great at the moment, but more importantly the hire gear is mostly multi-coloured all in ones!!!!!!!!!!!!! NICE.

Our 5-day trip from Santiago down to the Lake District region of Chile was great. We spent the first night in the beach town resort of Pichelimu, has the best surf in the whole of Chile and amazing black sand beaches. Bit cold when we were there though to appreciate the beach. Second stop was Pucon (via an awesome museum in Santa Cruz containing a huge and very eclectic collection of all kinds of stuff belonging to a very rich Chilean arms dealer!). Pucon lies in the shadows of Volcano Villarica, which is active! It puffs smoke by day and glows by night, cooooooooool. We did a 40km bike ride in the countryside around it one afternoon, beautiful, and we saw some baby lambs J Then it was further South to Valdivia, where we saw the fattest and laziest sea lions ever, they just gorge on fish from the fish market! Finally arriving in Peurto Varas after a stop-off to eat salmon and peruse the local markets in Peurto Montt. Made some new friends on the trip too, we had a cool guide called Nicos and a great driver called Sergio, both from Santiago and both spoke really good English, thanks guys! And there were only four other peeps on the trip, including an English couple from Twickenham, all great fun.

So this afternoon we are catching the bus to Buenos Aires, woooooooooohooooooooooooo, bring on the steaks and the tango. A 19 hour journey arriving around midday. Can´t wait!

Lotsa love,
J&J xxxx