Around the world in 80 weeks

And back where we began...

2009-10-03T23:03:00.002+10:00

After Chaing Mai we spent our last days of the trip in Hoi An, Vietnam resting and having a holiday before coming home. We luxuriated in the joy of knowing I would soon have an income so we spent money in reckless ways (having mango shakes for $1, rather than water for 30c) and other similar extravagances. We also went shopping for the first time in 18 months getting clothes made and buying a bag to put our new wardrobe in. Other couples in Hoi An on two week trips were mailing their clothes home as they had 40kg of luggage for two weeks – it was fun seeing their faces when we explained we had only had 15kg of luggage (between us) for 18 months so could happily shop away without excess baggage worries.

We are now, however, back in Sydney and nearly home… it won’t quite be home until Lily is able to jump up on me and lick my face when I get back from work. We are living in a youth hostel for the first month as my job started before the tenants lease on our flat ended. We’re catching up with family and friends and being asked awkward questions. The worst of which is “What was your favourite country/best experience?” There is no answer to that as how can you compare the Tower of London to trekking Gorillas in Rwanda… for that matter can you rate learning about the genocide in Rwanda as a good experience? Yet, it is something that touched us and learning about the world (the good and the bad) is part of what this trip was all about.

But here is an attempt at answering that question, or a variety of it.

The best places to relax:

Zanzibar – amazing beach, beautiful snorkelling and we went there at a time we needed it more than anything.
Myoka Village – this is the place we stayed on Lake Malawi. Crystal clear water, with a pontoon floating in the middle of the lake for sunbathing, friendly social place, great food.
Croatia – The coastline was amazing, the water beautiful and people friendly. Our favourites were Hostel Adria near Split and Mijet Island.

Best animal encounters:

African safaris – We loved every one we did. Self driving in Kruger was amazing, but not something I would recommend if you haven’t done a safari before. The northern Tanzania circuit was great, but we also loved South Luagwa…. As I said we loved them all!
Galapagos – If you want to go, you will love it. If you can’t see the appeal, you really won’t.
Elephant owner in Thailand – just for one day I became a mahout to Nui and washed, rode, swam with and had my pocket ransacked by an elephant.
Simien Mountains – Ethiopia. Standing surrounded by a troop of Gegelda baboons is intimidating, thrilling and amazing all at once.
Walking with lions – and more importantly having adult lions play fighting around you whilst you’re on foot.

Best adrenalin hits:

White water rafting the Nile in Uganda – of course they’re planning on flooding the area so get in quick before the opportunity is gone.
Ziplining in the Amazon jungle, through the canopy at monkey height!
Microflight over Victoria falls
African buses – an adrenalin rush and cheap too, plus you can do all your shopping on board!

Best places to know you’re not at home anymore

Kasawa Village – living like the locals in Zambia do.
Ethiopia – trust me, just go there. Fly don’t take buses (unless you’re a cheap backpacker, but do go there).
Croatia – getting out to a small village and drinking the home brewed wine whilst we all talked in our own languages.

For the history buffs

Macchu Picchu – and the surrounding area too
Krakow and really most of Europe
Castles of gondor, Ethiopia
Rwanda – not a pleasant history but what I saw there still brings tears to my eyes.

Nature and getting away from it all

Night sky in South America was unsurpassed. Whether from a boat in the Galapagos or a bus in Bolivia we’ve never seen stars like it.
Geyser fields near San Pedro de Atacama
The African bush, particularly the Okovango Delta

There’s so many more amazing things we’ve seen and done but you can’t write them all down. The other awkward question we’ve been asked is “How have you changed?” Well, we’ve learnt to find joy in a hot shower, in a toilet that flushes, in a toilet that has a seat, in a bus that has working brakes and doesn’t proclaim “Speeding our way to heaven” proudly on the front.

But, seriously, yes we have changed. I can see how Jason has changed and he can see how I’ve changed but maybe we’ll just let you figure out if you can see how we’ve both changed.

29 countries, 6 continents, 75 weeks (I know, we didn’t make 80 weeks… but it still has a better ring to it), 2 hospital visits, 7 pairs of glasses and 15,000 photos. So who wants to come to the slideshow?

Now if only we could take them home with us!

2009-09-05T23:34:00.002+10:00

After a few days rest and relaxation in Chaing Mai swimming, being massaged and enjoying a few days in luxury we signed up for a day at Patara Elephant Farm. Here you get to own an elephant for a day. Not quite sure what to expect we were greeted by Ben who proceeded to inform us that unlike a lot of the elephant experiences in Chaing Mai we were not there to be made happy by the elephants, but were there to make the elephants happy! The elephants were rescued from unsuitable working conditions and they are now trying to breed them. After some history about elephants in Asia and instructions on how to interact with the elephants we picked up our basket of bananas and went to find out what mood the elephants were in. The general principal was to hold up a couple of bananas and call out the elephants name, if they called back to you flapping ears and tail all was good and it was time to bond.... if on the other hand they stared back at you in stoney silence, well they let a maximum of 8 tourists come each day and they have 17 elephants - hopefully one of them will want to play.

My elephant was 10 years old, called Nui and was a trouble maker. She spent the day splashing me with water and mud at every opportunity and was never more than a few seconds without something to eat in her mouth. Jason's on the other hand was a 34 year old matriarch called Kapor who was going to do things her way no matter what Jason or her mahout said. After devouring the basket of fruit we offered as bribery to make them like us it was time to check on their health. First - wagging ears and tail means a happy elephant, perfectly stationery probably means a sick elephant. Secondly - we had to check for dirt patches on both sides of the elephant to make sure they were turning during the night. Thirdly - we checked that the sweat glands were working properly, you find those just above the toenail. Lastly - we checked the quantity and quality of the dung. Reassured our elephants were healthy it was time to give them a clean. We assaulted them with bunches of leaves to get rid of the loose dirt before heading down to the river (you lead an elephant by pulling on its ear and saying 'ma' for come - or in Jason's case the elephant leads you as you dangle from its ear) for a proper wash. This was when Nui's personality came out as she liked to splash her trunk around, or just suck water and mud in and spray it at me. The mahout would notice her starting and try to stop her, but sometimes he missed the signs.

At the end of their bath things dissolved into (admittedly staged) waterfight. We threw water at the elephants, then turned around to pose for photos whilst they showered us with water in revenge. The elephants won.

After a short break for the elephants to eat some more it was time to learn how to get on. Option 1 - You ask your elephant nicely to bend it's leg, then you step on the back of the ankle, then the knee and somehow jump from there to its back. Option 2 - You ask your elephant nicely to bend it's trunk, stand on it and get lifted to the top of the head where you have to turn around. Option 3 - Ask your elephant to lie down and just walk up to the neck. No one in our group went for option 3. I choose to be lifted, whilst Jason clambored up. The videos are very entertaining with different degrees of grace.

From there we walked a short way up the road before heading into the jungle and walking along an incredibly narrow path made our way up and down hills on the way to the waterfall. Nui in particular did not like getting muddy, so rather than following Jason and Kapor we tended to go the route that the mahouts were walking which I'm sure were narrower than her feet and occasionally involved jumping over a gap! We made it to the waterfalls were our elephants were swimming, with us still on their backs. It was kind of disconcerting to be sitting on an elephant which was no longer visible and then a trunk would grab your foot and you wouldn't know whose trunk it was. Wet and happy we ate a little lunch, but fed the majority of our food to our very hungry elephants. We took the easy route back to camp before walking along a river to the end point of the day.

So today we are sore (arms from cleaning the elephants) (legs from the riding position) (shins bruised from the strength of the elephants ears) but happy.

Getting onto Nui

2009-09-05T23:32:00.001+10:00

From male bonding to girl chat

2009-08-30T19:13:00.000+10:00

From Prague and a week with Stephen we headed to Berlin to spend a week with Clare. We spent the week answering long unanswered questions. We met Guntram, Rebecca and got to hear Clare speak German. We spent a brief period attempting to be traditional tourists in the old centre of town but took more enjoyment seeing the other side of Berlin. We crashed parties, went to the beach (still in Berlin, yes) and explored an old train yard that has been converted into a beautiful park. The other main activity was eating. Jason and I monopolised the kitchen enjoying the opportunity to cook with more than three ingredients. The biggest hit was definitely the spinach salad. Of course everyone helped with the desserts - mmm, chocolate and marshmallow fondue!

2009-08-23T18:27:00.000+10:00

Leaving Poland early in the morning we arrived in Prague to find noone at our hostel. But there was a note on the door saying the receptionist was out and would be back at 3pm so we settled into wait for her. Around 3:30 we finally got into the hostel but Stephen who was supposed to have landed around 2pm was still not around. At 6pm he finally turned up and after a quick catch up on the last 3 years we headed out for a late dinner (It was now 9pm or so).

We explored Prague on foot and then in the afternoon by Segway. A segway is a two wheeled vehicle that it is reportedly impossible to fall off of as it balances your weight. You lean forward, you move forward – you lean backward, you reverse. You lean too far forward trying to go faster it pushes back at you. Jason however discovered how to trick it into letting you fall off.. you go over a jump it turns off and you find yourself eating pavement. Our guide was interesting and towards the end he took off the turtle restriction on the segway allowing us to really get up some speed! Now, I wonder how much it would cost to buy one in Sydney?

Not wanting to spend all our time in Prague we hired a car and headed out into the countryside. Our first stop was Kutna Hora to see the famous ‘bone church’. Basically the church was built on top of an old cemetery and some monk decided to get artistic creating a fascinatingly beautiful church. It is estimated that around 40000 skeletons were used to create the decorations.

After further exploration of the town we headed towards Cesky Budejovice with a random detour via a black dot on the map. As we got close to said black dot we started to see tourist signs. Woohoo! Good sign. It turned out to be a pink castle built in the middle of a lake. We had a pleasant walk around the grounds but declined to do a tour of the castle which was only offered in Czech. We arrived in Cesky Budejovice and found a guesthouse owned by a son but his mother lived in the other half of the house and seemed quite distraught at all the guests. We were a bit too much the party animals up talking at 9:30pm.

From there we did a trip out to Cesky Krumlov which is a beautiful old town nestled in the curve of a river. We watched the kayakers heading down the rapids in various states of sobriety (It’s towards the end of a popular 5-6day kayaking trip and there was a constant stream going past). We meandered down country lanes and visited a couple more castles in the surrounding area before heading back to Prague.

Time to start moving again

2009-08-16T18:25:00.000+10:00

Following the interview we set off for Plitvice National Park which is the only place we have regretted not booking accommodation in advance. Our research had led us to believe there was a village or two you could wander around looking for rooms… but it was not obvious which way to walk when we got off the bus. So, we went and asked information and rather than telling us where to walk they offered to call someone for us. The problem was it was too far away to walk to the park and we would have to rely on them for lifts. We looked at the pouring rain outside and agreed to take it.

It was like staying with relatives who don’t really want you there. We were obviously in a kids room. Two small twin beds, bright coloured mobiles and stuffed toys. We were also not welcome in the family area so felt confined to our room. On the plus side the park was amazing!!

From there we headed to Bled in Slovenia for more walking, a fairytale castle and stunning scenery. After that it was time for some cities so we explored Vienna learning what a good museum really is (we’ve seen a lot of museums in the past year and a bit, but nothing like the ones in Vienna). Currently we’re in Poland crossing two more of the original 12 UNESCO world heritage sights off our list (half way there now). Krakow old town is made more charming by the constant stream of horses and carriages (but the lack of poop thanks to the poop buckets) and the carvings in the salt mines were impressive to say the least.

Reality intervenes

2009-08-04T18:23:00.000+10:00

Unfortunately we had to cut short our island hopping adventure to get back to Hostel Adria for my job interview. Not with Hostel Adria, but for a job back home. It was a rather weird experience sitting on the balcony of the hostel owners flat (I had to use their home phone for the call) looking out at the Adriatic and trying to talk like an intelligent neuropsychologist. The good news is I got the job and will be coming home!! The bad news is I’ve agreed to start 3 weeks before our tenant will vacate our flat. So if anyone has space for a couple of travelers in Sydney in October, let me know!

Islands in the sun

2009-08-03T18:44:00.000+10:00

Leaving our life of laziness in hostel Adria we jumped on a bus to Dubrovnik. Exploring the most fortified "old town" that we have yet encountered, its collection of red roofed buildings both in and out of the walls. And of course the walls themselves that took a few hours to walk along gazing at the castle or fort situated on a nearby out cropping and the bright kayaks in the crystal clear waters around the city.

Having a fill of a city we went for more of the traditional Mediterranean pastime - the ocean.

Between our luxury apartment overlooking the harbour and the two gloriously beautiful lakes that make up the islands national park, Mljet was our favorite of the islands. This was also helped by the fact that you can swim in the lakes as you walk around the lakes, so our day consisted of walking 200m and then diving in the waters, relaxing and talking, before diving back in to be cool for our next 200m walk!

We also visited the islands of Korcula and Hvar, Korcula had a fabulous little old city which had a quirky assortment of souvenirs based around the fact that Marco Polo was born there and so ship borne sun dials, sextants and spy glasses competed with the spices and soaps. Hvar however was much larger and more touristed.

You pay more for the adventure

2009-07-27T05:48:00.000+10:00

We finally found summer in Croatia! We spent the first few days relaxing by the ocean in a small town called Bajnice, marveling at being hot again (it was about 36C) and jumping into the spectacularly clear water at the front of our hostel to cool off. We also ventured into Split for a day of sightseeing, but were soon keen to be back in the water. Then we were given an offer we couldn’t refuse. The hostel is new and the owner Nikola is FULL of ideas. One of them is to set up a trip to his father’s old house in the middle of the countryside, quite near to the border of Bosnia and Herzegovina. He’d run it once before a year ago and this was his second attempt. We left a few hours later than planned as we first had to disassemble 6 of the hostel beds and pack them into the trailer along with the dishwasher, our lunch and a wine bottle big enough for me to get in! There were 6 of us going, which meant 2 cars. Nikola with his and Sonja (his niece) driving us, but for some reason not in her car. She was having difficulty with the car from the getgo and before we had got 5km the car gave up completely and we had our first adventure – pushing the car to the nearest turn off! Some theatrics later (not quite sure how jumping on the car bonnet was supposed to help) we were off this time in her car. The drive along the Croatian coast was spectacular to say the least, looking like all the tourist brochures you’ve ever seen. Lush green hills rolling down to crystal clear turquoise ocean with the occasional town with white walls and red roods completing the colour palette. Then Nikola spotted some backpackers who were trying to hitch to Mostar (in Bosnia and Herzegovina). He offered to let them join us going to the National Park and getting to the border sometime that night, but they did not have enough time so we drove them only 2km to a better hitching spot.

Our first official stop was a National Park. This was a beautiful spot and the views from the top of the mountain were amazing. But, we were starting to get hungry. We made it to the top about 6pm, and hadn’t eaten since 10am. The sandwiches, you may remember, were put in the trailer which we’d left at the bottom of the road. It was a very narrow winding road and trying to pass was at times exciting. One spot in particular where there was no barrier we had to drive right to the edge of the cliff to let the other car pass. From Sonja’s car we had watched Nikola drive right up to the edge without a millimeter to spare. But we had to get there too. All four of us jumped out of the car not wanting to risk that Nikola would not be able to pull it off twice in a row (Sonja was not even going to try) and proceeded to take pictures of what was happening instead!

We made it to the old stone house about 8pm. It was a charming house and the whole community came to be part of dinner. Not many people live there now as they had moved down the valley to the village. But we were joined by the ‘old lady’ (a next door neighbour who was 99 years old), the ‘cowboy’ (Nikola’s brother, Anti) and the ‘indian’ (another neighbour). There was also Sonja’s sister and her boyfriend who had come up from Split. The old lady and the cowboy were in charge of cooking dinner, all with food from Anti’s ranch. First up was the bread. A fire was built on the stones and once it had burned itself out to coals and heated the stones it was moved aside, fig leaves were put down and the bread placed on top of them. A lid was put over it and hot coals placed on top of it. The result was some of the best bread I’ve ever tasted, particularly dipped in the home made olive oil and garlic. Yum!! We were all consuming copious amounts of Anti’s home made wine which came in three bottles. The largest was good, the middle size was better and the smallest (the bottle was a pumpkin!) was ‘very special’ and much higher in alcohol content. And we can’t forget the homemade spirit of somekind which was incredibly potent, plus the shots of raki that we’d been given by an old man in the National Park that we bought some honey off. It was a great night with conversations in Croatian, German and English all happening simultaneously.

The next day when we finally stirred we explored a bit more before we headed off to Bosnia and Herzegovina for a beer. It was the most laid back border crossing ever as Nikola explained what we were doing and so our passports were not even looked at in either direction on the Croatian side and only a quick glance as we entered Bosnia and Herzegovina. Afterwards we swam in the blue lake before heading back to Split for a well deserved sleep.

Speeding trains, friends relatives, and sightseeing

2009-07-24T06:50:00.004+10:00

London was one of the most jam-packed weeks we have managed on the trip! We landed in Heathrow at a reasonable time of day (we will just ignore the 30 hours spent in airports and on planes prior) where we made our way to see some friends in London. Revelling in the long daylight hours (9:30pm? of course it's still light) and the fact that our jetlag made staying up late easy we chatted until past 1am. Getting up the next morning however was excruciating!! We made it to Cambridge where after nearly a year we finally managed to meet Claudine. The one activity we were eager to do in Cambridge was punting. So we made a plan - bad idea. At the appointed hour to meet beside the punts the heavens opened, in a way that shouldn't happen in England, being more reminiscent of a tropical storm. Within seconds we were soaked through and the streets were flooded. So Andrew, Jason and I ducked into the pub where Claudine was sensibly waiting and all took off our shoes and poured out the water to create our own paddling pool under the table. Of course the weather wasn't finished yet and within an hour the rain was replaced with hail! After a lovely couple of days catching up we jumped on the train to Exeter to see some of the Northcott side of the family and to show Jason where I lived for the first few years before we very sensibly moved to Australia. We toured the sights, strangely my cousin who lives there hadn't been to many of the places we saw either, before heading back to Louise's house for a nice dinner and more chat. The next morning we were off to Salisbury to be proper tourists! We jumped on a tour bus to Stonehenge and Old Sarum quite enjoying the spiel about the area. The next morning we were off to Banbury to see my brother and after a night sharing a couch.. slightly smaller than a single bed... we were back on the train to London. In London we headed out to the Body Worlds exhibition, which was fascinating, before catching an evening performance of Les Mis!! "Do you hear the people sing?" The next day we met up with my great Aunt for lunch, spent a couple of hours in the Tower of London where we were thoroughly entertained by our Yeoman guide, before heading out to Gatwick. Phew! I'm tired just writing it. So to summarise, we spent one night in London, two in Cambridge, one in Exeter, one in Salisbury, one in Banbury, one in London before heading to the airport!! Now it's time for some rest and relaxation -to Croatia we go!

Conclusions from South America

2009-07-14T05:44:00.000+10:00

The best from South America:

The night sky – whether gazing at it from the bus window, the catamaran in the Galapagos or some town in the middle of nowhere it was spectacular.
Activities – this is a continent where there is always something to do in every town and travelers are kept busy and on the move.
The Andes – absolutely spectacular scenery from geysers to lakes to snow capped peaks or jaw dropping canyons.
Buses – particularly in Argentina where luxury buses are an experience in themselves.
Spanish – we’ve loved challenging ourselves to learn a new language and been pleased at being able to get by.

The worst from South America:

Activities – this is a continent where there is always something to do in every town often with ridiculously high prices and travelers are kept busy and on the move with very few places that are good for a few down days.
Toilets – specifically having to put toilet paper in the bin, not the toilet.
Opportunistic theft – if you leave something anywhere (like a hostel) it will be gone within five minutes even something like prescription glasses.
Buses – it’s a big continent and distances are long we found ourselves thinking that 24hours is doable 7 hours is a short jaunt.
Spanish – getting frustrated at not being fluent and when locals do the talk louder thing in the hope you’ll suddenly get it.
Cold – oh why oh why did we not bring the ski jackets from Canada?

Tired, sick and ready to move on

2009-07-13T08:29:00.003+10:00

We haven't written a blog for awhile as there's not been much to say. After Uyuni we took a bumpy bus ride to Tupiza where we had ideas about horse riding through canyons, but Jason's stomach had other ideas and he spent a night sleeping on the bathroom floor and still only just making it to the toilet in time. After a couple of days of recovery we decided to leave Bolivia and go to Argentina where hopefully the hygiene would be a bit better and our stomachs would thank us. Three more hours on a bumpy, dusty bus got us to the border where we were incredibly grateful to board an Argentinian bus. Only semi-cama, but in Argentina that still means a very comfortable trip and the road was sealed - a great improvement from Bolivia where we went off road as often as on!! Arriving in Salta we discovered Jason hadn't had food poisoning as we'd assumed, but a bug and it was now my turn to get comfortable in the bathroom. After a full week in one spot we splurged on the fanciest bus imaginable with a flat bed, hot meals and champagne on tap. After a surprisingly good nights sleep we arrived in Buenos Aires where we're currently relaxing before flying to England!

Up, up and frozen

2009-06-27T02:52:00.000+10:00

Bolivia used to be known as ‘High Peru’ and seeing as how Peru is not exactly without it’s mountains that should tell you something. We also added a few records to our tally. We spent time in the highest capital city in the world – La Paz, avoided the highest city in the world and achieved a personal best for high altitude sleeping at 4378m.

La Paz is in a spectacular setting for a city, sprawling down a valley with views of snow capped mountains that top 6000m in the background. The city itself was apparently one giant market. There are the specific markets like the black market, or the witches market but every road is filled with stalls and sellers. The witches market was a little creepy as the shops were adorned with dried llama fetuses, and some that looked like dried llamas as they were a lot bigger and covered with fur. We enjoyed stolling through the shoe market, the clothes market, the sewing market and of course the tourist market. Knowing we were heading up from there we invested in some alpaca beanies and jumpers. They weren’t enough however. From La Paz we jumped on an overnight bus to Uyuni and even though we were supplied blankets and wearing every item of clothing possible we still froze. It’s the one time we’ve arrived at a destination and no one has got off the bus. It was still dark at 6:30am when we arrived and you knew as cold as you were it would be colder off the bus and without the provided blanket. Around 7:00am as the street was starting to get light we decided to brave it. Our only impression of Uyuni was that it was cold and after speaking to several travel agents about doing a tour through the Salt flats to Tupiza we decided it just wasn’t worth paying double the price to get there. So frustrated and cold we found a tour leaving that day willing to take us and were on our way.

Our tour to the salt flats was in a jeep which normally would seat five, but they stuck an extra row of seats in the back and we set off with 3 Brits, 1 American, us, the driver, the cook and the goat. Initially we were a little perplexed at why there was a goat. Our consternation grew when we couldn’t see the goat following the first lunch of some unspecified fried meat. A couple of hours of worry were relieved by a cute little ‘baa’ and a brown, black and white head popping into view. He was only 2 weeks old and gave us much amusement on the long drives between sites. It’s also been quite amusing talking to people who were on different tours who tell us about this other tour who had a goat – we smile and say yes that was us. As for the actual tour we were, in all honesty, slightly disappointed. This tour is the icon of Bolivia the must do, can’t be missed. The scenery was spectacular but the amount of driving between the sights and the freezing cold temperatures (make that -20C) with basic accommodation – dorm rooms, no heating, no showers, not even toilet paper provided – were not necessarily worth it in our opinion. If you were traveling between San Pedro (Chile) and Uyuni it would be fabulous and must do, but as a round trip from Uyuni I think the one day trip to the salt flats would be a better option. We were quite disappointed by how little time we got on the actual salt flats. The first stop was the salt hotel and the surrounding area was flattened and slightly grey by all the cars and tourists, we drove through pristine white salt with a curious geometric pattern on the way to the lunch stop. An island with cactuses. And that was it. Not one stop in the middle of all that pristine salt as far as the eye could see. Now I don’t want you to think it wasn’t spectacular because it was, but if you go do the one day tour and ask for a stop in the middle where it is truly mind boggling.

The lake on top of the world

2009-06-20T02:49:00.000+10:00

Lake Titicaca may not be the highest navigable lake in the world but there are not any bigger and higher! Leaving from Puno we spent a day on the Peruvian side of the lake visiting the famous floating islands of the Uros. The Islands were a sight to see, even with the shifting of the culture from isolationistic:- the original inhabitants moved to the islands to avoid imperialistic neighbors around 800 years ago and remained there though the rise and fall of the Incas, to the modern more tourist driven lifestyle. The islands are made from large sections of reed roots 2m deep covered with many layers of reeds that need continual replenishment. The chunks of roots are tied together and also anchored to poles imbedded in the lake bottom. Not only are the islands they live on made of reeds but so are their houses, their boats, and their souvenirs.

One aspect of their life which I found quite appealing was when a couple planned on marrying they were instructed by a special member of their tribe on contraceptives both natural traditional methods and modern condoms and the pill, after which they would live together for two years to ensure compatibility before permission would be given for marriage and children. If they were not compatible they would go their separate ways with no ill regard from the community as they were never married.

We also visited Taquile island one of the four major islands in the lake, the community was very strictly run with codes of dress for the inhabitants ensuring that marriage status could be seen and if the individual was a leader of the community. They are reputed to have the finest weavings in the Andes, but the work on display didn’t appeal to us the way the bright cheap works on the mainland did. I will however give credit for their hats being woven close enough to carry water, though why not use a bucket I’m not so sure.

Crossing to the Bolivian side we looked out over the fleet of paddle boats and kayaks while relaxing in hammocks up on the hill. If we were not at 4000m the temperature may have risen enough to venture in the water but instead we just soaked up the view.

Collapsed bridges, protests and swerving around rocks

2009-06-18T10:10:00.000+10:00

We had delayed our departure from Cusco by a couple of days hoping that the protests we had been hearing about between Cusco and Puno would cease. But, they didn’t. From our research it appeared we had two options when it came to bus travel. A day time bus that was taking an alternative route and thus avoiding the protests or a night time bus that took the main route, but assured us buses were being allowed through at night. Eventually we bit the bullet, flipped a coin and purchased two tickets on the day time bus. Our bus was due to leave at 8am so we dutifully turned up at 7:45am only to be told that no, the bus was not leaving. We were informed that not only had the protests not resolved as we hoped but that they were ‘muy fuerte’ much stronger and the protestors had damaged the bridge that the alternative route buses were taking.

We ummed and ahhed and approached every bus company, only one was still running. Not sure whether ‘Tour Peru’ was telling us the truth or just collecting money with no intention of running a bus we decided to risk the ‘Libertadad’ bus instead. It was due to leave at 9:30am so not too long to wait. We started talking to our fellow passengers, most of whom were gringos – was it a bad sign that the locals weren’t taking the route at all? Ok, there were about 5 locals on the bus, but normally the ratio would be reversed. Whilst we waited we held the annual Cusco balance bar championships of which Lee was the undisputed winner. At 10am, half an hour after we were due to depart we finally spotted our bus easily identifiable by the graffiti plastered over the sides indicating it had made it through the road block at least once. The bus promptly pulled up onto the curb 100m away and we watched as animated discussions between various staff members were held around the bus. We can only assume they were debating whether to actually go or not… or how much extra ‘danger money’ the bus driver wanted to go.

Eventually all demands were met and the bus actually pulled up ready for us to board and after only 3 hours or so of waiting we actually started moving. 2 minutes later we promptly stopped again and a rumour was passed around the Spanish speaking passengers that we actually weren’t going at all and were now heading back to the terminal. 5 minutes later the rumour had changed to we all had to pay a 1 sole bribe to get through the roadblock. Neither of these were accurate and after filling up with diesel we actually got on the road. Just as I was comfortably dosing off cries went up along the bus – are we falling off a cliff? Are we being attacked by the protestors? In reality the luggage was trying to make a break for it. One of the doors had popped open as we turned the corner and our luggage was strewn for 100m down the main highway. Luckily we picked it all up again and set off again, now not only worrying about the roadblock but about whether our luggage would still be there at the other end.

Around 1 and a half hours outside of Cusco we hit the first rocks and continued to swerve from one side of the road to the other avoiding the boulders for about another half an hour when the bus stopped and the engine was turned off. Then the rumour mill started up again. We could walk for four hours to the next town where there may be a bus we could possibly catch. Our bus was going to wait until nightfall and hope to get through the roadblock then. We were all going back to Cusco to get our money back. Most of the bus were voting for the 3^rd option, whilst the driver seemed keenest on option 2. A few energetic types wanted to walk it, but when you’re only 2 hours into a 12 hour drive and don’t know how far it will be until you find another bus walking was not the top option for most people. After a couple of hours though there was excitement, movement and we were all told to grab our bags and start walking.

This is the moment when we found out Tour Peru had told us the truth – the bridge was damaged. Although that seems a little like understatement to me. The bridge in question was just before the main roadblock and it was obvious the protestors were not letting anyone through. To prevent the use of the alternative route they had taken the simple measure of ripping up the wooden planks that made up the bridge. The metal struts underneath were still there so that’s what we walked across with all our baggage in tow. Feeling like laden donkeys we tight-roped across. It turned out our bus driver had made a deal with another bus driver from Copacabana to swap passengers and pay some compensation. So after only about 1km of walking we were able to jump on another bus and wait to see how far it would get us.

After 5 minutes we passed a bus that had not made it, turning one of the tight corners the undercarriage had separated from the rest of the bus and as we listened to the rattles and remembered that the front of our bus was missing we were not filled with confidence. The alternative route was not able to be used by the bigger buses and we soon found out why. The conductor was in and out of the bus helping the driver do three point turns around corners, dodge rocks, dodge the edge of the cliff and avoid driving into the 2m holes that the protestors had dug in the road. By 5pm we were stopped again. We thought just to pick up passengers, until we saw quite how many engine parts were being removed by the local mechanic. We spent a couple of hours watching the drunks in the pub, buying some extra food supplies and trying to find a bathroom to use. We watched as tour buses went past on their way to Cusco, with particular trepidation for the ‘Time Seniors Tour’ – picturing old ladies with walking sticks trying to maneuver across the metal struts of the bridge in the dark.

It was also starting to get cold and we appreciated the bag with all our clothes we had put on the bus. By the time we arrived in Puno we were wearing 4 jumpers each, a beanie, gloves and using our sarongs for blankets – we were still cold!! It felt like being back in Banff but without appropriate clothing. So after a delayed start, roadblocks, escaping luggage, a broken down bus and 9 hours of driving along bumby, windy dirt roads occasionally going over some of the rocks or into a ditch left by the protestors we arrived in Puno at 4am. So what should have been a 6 hour journey under normal circumstances took a chilly 20 hours. Now, we know we’re in South America.

Qosqo

2009-06-17T00:30:00.003+10:00

You might know it better as Cuzco but Qosqo is the Quechua spelling and finding your way around is made all the more complicated by the spellings varying between differing brochures, guidebooks, names on buildings and street signs. Cusco is a very nice city at least the old town or tourist district, enough so that we kept coming back between trips to Manu and Machu Pichu. We got to experience some different moods of the city, once we got used to the fire works that are used for any large gathering or just to startle the pigeons we relaxed a lot more in our rooms particularly when trying to go to sleep, or when woken up by a particularly loud firecracker.

Cusco we saw as a sleepy town on a Sunday where many of the shops were closed and there wasn’t much movement around. We saw the city bustling about it’s normal business of trying to sell the tourists, tours, massages, a quick shoe shine and enough paintings to fill the art galleries of Europe.

But two events stick in our minds most, the first being a protest on the first day we were in the city, there were no taxis, but the police were present with large numbers from the traffic, the municipal police, the tourist police, and even the riot squad, all dressed very formally but with their gun holsters empty (Batons were still equipped however) The rioters were seemingly without end as they stretched down the main road, businesses that were open firmly shut their doors before the mob reached them, the one store that failed to do so in time had fists of dirt and small stones thrown at them and protesters forcing their way in until the police stopped them. But once the protest was over all the extra security disappeared quickly, except for the riot squad who had engine trouble, so after posing for a few photos while the engine was tinkered with ended up pushing their vehicle.

The other event was the celebration of Cusco, of which we saw the first two days, the elderly dancers, and the under fives. It appears that the majority of the inhabitants are required to learn their traditional dances as children many of which show themes that we guessed the meanings of, some we suspected demonstrated how they saw the Spanish when they arrived, others the relationship between men and women –men thinking they have control then ending up on their backside.

Discovering the lost city of the Incas

2009-06-11T23:59:00.001+10:00

Of course, Machu Picchu can hardly be considered lost anymore, rather the expensive city of the Incas. There is no direct road between Cusco and Aguas Calientes (the town closest to Machu Picchu) which means getting there is either difficult or expensive or both. You can pay $500 to walk there, $60 to catch a train or we met a few real budget travelers who were taking multiple buses probably over a few days then walking a few hours to get there. After paying $60 for the 1 and a half hour train journey we arrived in Aguas Calientes which is described as a horrible overpriced small town by the guidebooks. Surprisingly we liked it and didn't actually find it that overpriced (double room with private bathroom for $13). It is in a valley surrounded by mountains with a beautiful river filled with huge boulders. We then paid an extortionate amount for our entrance tickets ($40 each) and a totally ridiculous amount for the 20 minute bus ride up to the actual site ($14 each).

The actual day didn't get off to the best start. We woke up at 4:45am to make it to the bus stop by 5am where we got in line behind the 100 or so people who had been lining up since 4am to get on the first bus at 5:30am. At the top we joined the line to get into Machu Picchu which opens at 6am. There are a whole host of rules for entering Machu Picchu - the problem is some of them are so ridiculous you know they can't be enforced and it's impossible to know where the line will be drawn. You are not allowed: water bottles, walking sticks, food, backpacks over 20 litres and the list goes on. Jason went to the bag storage section to store our food and checked that our bag would be allowed in, he was told it would be fine. But the guy on the gate was not having a good day. Not only did our backpack get rejected but so did bags clearly labelled 18 litres, 14 litres and some that could not have been over 10 litres. Whilst Jason tried to argue his bag through and then went to join the growing line of those checking their bags in I did not see him let a single backpack into the ruins. People argued, cried, cajolled, attempted bribes but nothing worked, he was in a shitty mood and determined to spread his mood around the visitors. Part of the reason that this was all quite so distressing is that most people arrive that early to obtain one of the 400 tickets to climb Waynapicchu. After finally getting into the ruins with a water bottle, wishing we had grabbed the food bag (most people carried in a plastic bag with food) we sprinted to the other side of the ruins to get in line for Waynapicchu. We were about 230th in the line, but luckily 150 people wanted to climb at 10am so we were able to climb at 7am.

On the hike up Waynapicchu we bonded with the other climbers as we struggled directly up hill, on steps with a cliff face plunging to the valley below. The views were absolutely spectacular though and we marvelled at the workers that had originally trekked up the hill carrying the stones to build the grain storage at the top of the hill. After drinking in the view of Machu Picchu and the surrounding mountains we returned to the bottom for a closer look at the ruins. We didn't have our own guide but with the multitude of tour groups wandering around the ruins we would have been hard pressed to avoid hearing bits and pieces from various different tour groups. The site is quite spectacular, both for the actual ruins but more for the location.

Down into the Amazon basin

2009-06-09T00:17:00.003+10:00

From Cusco we decided to do a week long journey into the jungle. Manu national park is supposed to be one of the best places in South America to go to the jungle if you want to see wildlife. This is mainly because it is primary rainforest (not stuffed up by man). We were also traveling with the cheapest tour we could find so the accommodation was definitely rustic - lots of cold showers and surprisingly it was cold in the jungle, particularly after dark.

It is however a bit of a trek to get there. The journey was broken up visiting pre-Incan tombs, spotting the 'cock of the rock' and seeing our first monkeys. After the first 7 hours on the bus we reached the edge of Manu National Park, but it would be nearly 2 more days (mostly by boat) before we entered the reserved zone (which is pristine rainforest, whereas the buffer zone is an inhabited area). That's not to say we didn't have a lot of fun on the way. As well as spotting some birds, monkeys, frogs and bugs we went white water rafting and canopy zip lining. In fact the zip line was so fun we went again the next day!! There were four zip lines in total getting progressively faster as you went. The second time we went I was feeling a bit more confident and even went upside down!

During the week in the jungle we saw 77 species of birds, 9 species of monkey, giant otters, black and white caimans, 3 snakes, frogs, toads, beautiful butterflies, a rhinocerous beetle, spiders galore and of course thousands of mosquitos and sandflies. Unfortunately we weren't able to get photos of everything we saw as the animals were generally a fair distance away (the canopy was at least 40m up in the air) and under the canopy it was very dark and difficult to get enough light for photos. There were also interesting plants to be seen, such as the walking palm (that can walk up to 10cm a year), the penis tree (yes, we have a photo of that one, so you know where it got it's name), the garlic tree which grows totally hollow and amazing fig trees that create labyrinths of roots. Then there were the ants, like the bullet ant which is an inch long and can paralyse a limb if it bites you or the army ants which native people use instead of stitches - getting the ant to bite them and then ripping the body off leaving the head and pincers to hold the wound close, or the leaf cutter ants which use the leaves to farm the fungus that they eat.

Zoos and the animals that are too lazy to escape

2009-05-22T01:24:00.000+10:00

We walked a short way out of town to check out the zoo as it was recommended in the guide books, as a very pleasant surprise it’s conditions were better than many first world zoos that we have seen, most of the enclosures were ample in size. It was definitely worth a trip as we now know what animals we won’t be seeing when we visit the Amazon. The enclosures were however, not particularly well sealed. However the animals seemed to be able to escape the enclosures as we saw spider monkeys playing in the trees by the path, a Condor was perched on top of the enclosure whether attracted by the calls of those in the cage or an actual escapee was open to interpretation. Finally the most obvious was the capybara wandering along the walk way that scampered away when it spotted us.

Standing on an erupting volcano

2009-05-20T01:21:00.000+10:00

Our journey brought us to Banos – literally meaning baths in Spanish due to the large number of thermal springs in the area. A beautiful area which is dominated by a volcano that has been continually erupting since 1999. So we decided to take a horse ride up to the volcano. Not right up to the rim – that’s considered suicidal since the last major eruption in July 2006 – just through some of the villages which were destroyed by said eruption. It was unfortunately a very cloudy rainy day, so we were only granted occasional glimpses of the spectacular view down the valley and were completely unable to see the volcano above us (although we could hear and feel the eruptions). Our guide was unworried by these though, telling us “solo pocino”. The actual horse riding was lots of fun, with the best horses either of us have ever had for a day trip before. Normally you seem to get old nags that are reluctant to go above a walk and the guides aren’t that keen for you to go fast either. Not on this trip. Within 30 seconds of being on the horses we were encouraged to speed up to a canter and throughout the morning we repeatedly galloped along roads and across lava fields. The horses also actually responded when you used the reins and only a slight squeeze of the legs was needed to get them to go faster.

The following day from our ride all we could feel where aching bones and bruised backsides so we headed to the thermal baths for the always recommended soothing waters. The water however does not do much for horse riding inflicted aches and pains and so we remained sore. The baths were nice despite waters so murky that you couldn’t see a hand span deep. One of the pools was a warm bath while the other hot bath felt like it was suitable for cooking dinner. Then if you were feeling truly masochistic you could jump under the icy waterfall – we refrained.

Playing with sea lions

2009-05-18T10:07:00.004+10:00

Now, we could probably write about 10 posts about the past week that we spent at the Galapagos, but we will try to refrain and stick to the highlights. It was one of the most amazing experiences ever.

We had obviously heard a lot about the Galapagos and were looking forward to being so close to wild animals, but we had not heard about the snorkeling. We swam with penguins, sharks, turtles (both green sea turtles and a hawksbill turtle), but the highlight was the sea lions. We got to swim with them and play with them and be tickled by their whiskers. The first time they appeared in the water I got such a fright as they are so fast and come so close to check you out - they appear out of nowhere half the time. At one point I had four sea lions surrounding me and playing with me, whilst Jason had another one chasing the bubbles of his snorkel and mouthing the end of it. We would try and show off our underwater acrobatic skills whilst they watched and they would respond with a dazzling display and then stop and look at us as if to say 'well, beat that then'.

On land we saw magnificent frigate birds with their red balloons all puffed up, marine iguanas in all sorts of different sizes and colours, bright yellow land iguanas, blue footed boobies dancing as they courted each other, nazca boobies, beautiful waved albatrosses nursing their eggs and landing with difficulty, penguins sheltering under cactus trees on the equator and lots more. Then there was the scenery - volcanoes everywhere you looked. The galapagos was formed by a hot spot and as the nazca plate that it sits on moves towards the mainland the islands shift over and get lower and newer islands are created. Shortly before we arrived Fernandina which is directly over the hotspot had erupted (unfortunately we were not able to get over there to see it). The land is almost all hard lava which plants have managed to find a foothold on. There are the 'aa' lava flows and the other smooth lava flows with craters in every direction.

There was the giant tortoise breeding centre with 'lonesome George' who is the last of his species in the world, but does have two girlfriends of a similar species so he's not so lonesome anymore. The post barrel that was started a couple of hundred years ago where sailors used to leave post and take that labeled wherever they were heading. Tourists now leave postcards and take others with the idea being that you should hand deliver them. We have one for someone in Croydon so it will be a very slow postal service that they receive.

We had decided to splurge on one of the nicer boats as it was having an excellent deal so we spent a week on the very comfortable Nemo II. On arrival we were greeted with banana milkshakes and garlic bread whilst we got to know the other passengers. This was to set the tone for the entire week. Food, food and more food. Three buffet meals a day with snacks for morning and afternoon tea. So we had an amazing experience in unparalleled luxury and now have to return to being backpackers worrying about bedbugs and whether this cheap dodgy meal with give us a bout of food poisoning or not.

I should also quickly mention the people that we shared the trip with. They were all wonderful (and yes, I gave out the address for the blog)... but really, wonderful people. They ranged from other backpackers to a couple in their 70s (he had his 79th birthday on the trip) who ran marathons and competed in triathlons. The crew were also marvellous and made the trip memorable. Joining in as we followed huge pods of melon-headed whales, pilot whales and dolphins.

Architecture and the middle of the world

2009-05-09T03:53:00.001+10:00

Having made our way to Quito Ecuador we found ourselves with 3 days to amuse ourselves before the Galapagos. Given our impatience to be on the islands we carefully ensured that we had activities for each day, the first of them being the old town center.

Quito unlike most of the cities we have traveled has the tourist district in the New town, so we traveled on one of the better public transport systems to the old town and spend the day wandering around the various churches and monasteries of Quito, with a trip to the top of the nearby hill for panoramic views of the city. For us the highlight was “La Basillica” a beautiful gothic church complete with gargoyles, delicate arches and enormous stained glass windows. We also visited the san Franciscan monastery which was still in use and was more evidence that the San Franciscans endeavored to use more gold and glitz than any other order.

The following day we traveled a longer distance to the “Mitad del Mundo” or the middle of the world, while no Jules Verne trip was to be seen, there was a large monument indicating where the French had calculated the equator to be over two hundred years ago. At the site we found a number of buildings split between the northern and southern hemispheres, the south consisted of buildings with educational displays of insects, how the equator and the diameter of the earth was calculated and scale models of a number of cities both in Ecuador and the rest of the world. The northern buildings were all tourist shops, with souvenirs, touts, and food. So naturally once we explored the south we moved on! Just next door was the Inti nan museum which is located on the true (according to US military GPS) equator and they had more interesting exhibits on the cultures of the tribes of Ecuador. Exhibits included a shrunken head, various snakes and animals, and traditional buildings. In addition they demonstrated the properties of the equator – such as water swirling in opposite directions 3m apart and the inability to hold muscles strong standing on the equator - with just a little trickery.

Lima

2009-05-04T06:35:00.001+10:00

By far and away the most interesting site we saw in Lima was the monastery. I never knew that they could be so interesting! Much to our dismay no photos were allowed anywhere within the monastery... this physically hurt when we were in the library. But let me start at the beginning. You are given a 'free' tour of the monastery (probably to make sure you stay where you are supposed to and don't take any photos), on our tour were us and a New Zealand guy who had been travelling around South America for 7 months. The library houses around 24000 books, dating back to the 1100s and it is like every ancient library you have imagined. In fact we suspect it has been used in a few movies. The ancient texts, the spiral staircases leading up to the higher shelves, shafts of light coming in through the skylights with dust spiralling and the whole library built out of carved cedar polished till it shone. Ah.... beautiful. From there we headed through the elaborately carved chorister section, past paintings, through courtyards until eventually we reached the catacombs, where bones are piled in 4 meter deep pits. What seemed very odd to us was that the bones were in coffins until the 1950s when they were taken out, according to our guide, to make it into a tourist attraction. Weird.

Colca Canyon Condors

2009-04-28T08:31:00.000+10:00

We left Ariquipa for a couple of days to do a quick trip to the Colca Canyon. Which ever company we went with would likely prove irrelevant as here as elsewhere in South America there are far more tour booking offices then actual tour companies (despite claims by every agent that the bus is theirs!)

The tour involved a long bus trip to Chivay with a couple of stops to medicate ourselves with Coca (yes that’s coca not cocoa) in the form of sweets, tea or just chewing the leaves. This is meant to help alleviate the symptoms of altitude sickness (and if you believe the hype stop you needing to eat, sleep, drink, keep you alert and any number of other side effects.. of course that sounds more like the effects from the processed form to me). As we approached the high point on the road, marked by the thousands of small cairns of rock, each of which represents a wish made, we discovered one of the members of our party wasn’t handling the altitude very well. We reached 4900m the highest point we have ever attempted to walk and we were both out of breath after just a few steps. We were a bit worried for the woman as she was planning to continue upward after the tour to do the Inca trail. We were grateful that we had spent the last 3 days at 2600m in Areiquipa so we had acclimatised a little. (We suspect we went higher on the bus trip between Salta and San Pedro de Attacama but we sat the whole way for that.)

From there we made our way down into the township of Chivay a spectacularly green valley after the barrenness of the road that we had journeyed along. We were fortunate enough to see some of the local dancing in the town centre that we suspect was put on for one of the more expensive tours, (our organised dancing for dinner was somewhat less inspired).

Waking up for the second time the next day (our five o’clock wake up call was actually delivered at 1am!!!) we bundled into the bus to the Colca canyons. We played the part of tourists on the way even paying to hold a hawk and take some photos. Arriving a little early we walked up the path to the Condor view point that most tours take on the way out, having it to ourselves was beautiful and relaxing. Reaching the view point we were given two hours for the main event. We hadn’t expected much as the photos in all the tour agents led us to suspect the condors wouldn’t come within 30 meters of us, We were incredibly surprised as the morning went on different groups of condors would rise up on thermals out of the canyon some of which came well within 2 meters of us. We spent a very happy two hours snapping pictures and enjoying the flight of the condors and other birds, the only disappointment was the “Traditional music” that a group of locals would play for the tourists disrupting the tranquillity of the place far more than the quantity of watchers would have.

Nuns... with servants

2009-04-26T06:59:00.002+10:00

The highlight of Arequipa is the Monasteria de Santa Catelina. The convent was founded in 1579, 40 years after the arrival of the Spanish to Arequipa. Initially most of the nuns came from rich families and so the convent is a little more elaborate than you might expect as the nuns weren’t quite willing to give up their previous life. There was however a pronouncement by the bishop sometime in the 1600s limiting each nun to only one servant. The convent is absolutely beautifully and a warren of small streets and smaller rooms, with kitchens littered around everywhere. Different sections of the convent show different periods of architecture as the convent has been built in sections, and occasionally destroyed by an earthquake. There are currently 30 nuns still living their and the section they are in was built in the 1960s and is completely different to the sections that are open to tourists. The nuns agreed with us in terms of where to eat, as on our last night eating at our favourite restaurant in Arequipa, there was a group of 6 nuns eating at the next table!

Explosions and Buses

2009-04-24T06:56:00.000+10:00

We have now journeyed from Iquique Chile to Arequipa Peru, deciding that doing the trip in stages would preserve our sanity a little better we paused a night in Tacna. We departed Iquique early on a bus of the standard we had become accustomed to, but this would only get us to Arica. At the bus terminal we were deluged with offers from taxi drivers to go to Tacna and beyond. The trust between Chile and Peru could be seen by looking around the town with its large military bases.

We braved finding a colectivo (a shared Taxi) and made our way to Tacna, a contrast in technique occurred, the Chile officials had bare offices with a computer that they scanned the passports while Peru had a huge shiny building but the passports were entered manually and we suspect the metal detectors and xray machines were just for show (ellen walking though the metal detector with her backpack on containing scissors, cables, laptop - didn’t trigger a beep – although she was asked to put the bag through the xray machine, nor was our organic food noted on the xray machine.)

We spent the night in Tacna where we were awoken by something that sounded distinctly like a bomb going off. A short while later the sirens that you associate with air raids started. Followed by the sound of army marching songs. “Has there been an invasion… Should we hide in the hotel?” but no much later in the day we found our that a gas plant exploded. The departures terminal of Tacna we discovered where the people hoping to become auctioneers go. The rapid loud, and astonishingly clear call of “Arequipa” by those trying to attract customers was incessant. After a very uneventful (but much getting out of passports) bus trip we have arrived in Arequipa.

Here we did a most unusual thing for us. Not feeling like traipsing around the second biggest city in Peru at 8pm with all our gear we went to the tourist information bureau and picked one of the three hotels they had on offer and got them to organise a taxi for us (the taxi paid on commission rather than by us). This turned out to be an excellent move. The hostel was one of the nicest hostels we’ve stayed in. It was an old colonial house and our room had 14 foot ceilings covered in incredibly ornate moulding. There were even some very nice touches, like the speakers for an MP3 player with the sign “Because music is important in life please attach your MP3 player or iPod.” The only downside was that they had no free matrimonial rooms so we didn’t really want to stay there for more than one night. So this morning we went for a walk and found another place to stay, not quite so nice but still a big step up from our Chilean accommodation, or that in Tacna.

Finally, a beach!

2009-04-22T07:37:00.000+10:00

We have been longing to get to a beach nearly since Christmas, so Iquique seemed like the perfect place to hang out, relax and spend some time listening to the waves crash on the sand. The hostel here is very different to others we’ve stayed at in South America. For one thing it’s full of Aussies!! This is a place for surf, so no real surprise there. It’s a social place and the tiny kitchen is almost always full as people cook most meals. Everyone hangs out at the hostel in the evenings, reading, watching TV and chatting. One such evening on our second night we suddenly felt something… Jason thought a train was speeding by, I thought the wind was picking up… and then half a second after that we realised that no, this is an earthquake. So we sat there whilst for 30 seconds the entire building shook, afterwhich everyone started making those inane comments when you’ve just experiencing something new and slightly scary. “Did you feel that?” “Was that an earthquake” “Cool!”.

One of the other big things to do here is to paraglide. The guidebook mentions 3 day courses from $140, which sounds like a lot of fun. However, when we started trying to find one of these courses we turned up nothing. That is, nothing that short. The shortest course we found was for 10 days, which is a bit long as we have a deadline for getting to Lima, not to mention an awful lot more expensive. So instead of learning how to jump by ourselves, we will be strapped to the front of someone else as we take to the skies this afternoon.

Soaring with the eagles – or should that be not eagles

2009-04-21T06:51:00.002+10:00

We were picked up from our hostel ½ hour early much to our shock, as we were still eating lunch counting on the normal, tardy practices that much of our trip has demonstrated. As our vehicle wound it’s way up the hairpins along the hill facing the upper suburbs. (Iquique ran out of space along the coast and so has many of it’s suburbs separated by a 500m high escarpment – according to my pilot anyway. Ellen’s pilot said it was a separate town). We got to have a much better view of the city in the daylight, bands of houses/apartments were painted one bright colour or another, one swathe green another blue, but for some reason all the roofs were the same desert brown iron roof. Reaching the top of the escarpment we bundled out and were assigned our pilots, while they readied the chutes we had a bit more of a look at the lower part of Iquique. Strapped into our seats and attached to our pilots we were ready. Ellen took off first, no running required just up up and away, while my pilot fiddled a bit longer and when it came for take off we went up, but only just my feet barely brushed the ground even on tip toes but I was being instructed to run. “HOW?” with what little grip I managed to get us moving forward enough to launch into the air.

This experience of paragliding was very different to our previous one, where before we raced down to the bottom as quick as possible (so the next person could hand over money) we instead spent time competing with the birds for the thermals. There were two species of eagle sharing the thermals but they were heavily out numbered by another species that our guides informed us where “not eagles” but as neither Ellen or I can find an image of the birds they shall have to remain anonymous. We followed the escarpment along finding different patches that allowed our pilots to spin and gain us the altitude to glide over the city to the beach.

As my pilot and I crossed the beach to start our decent I was lucky enough to spot some seals playing in the ocean. Landing was a breeze but one of the pilot’s dogs was there to greet us noisily and there was a moment where it looked like we would be landing on the dog’s back! It was a wonderful experience but we decided that it wasn’t as exciting as we may have hoped so it is now off our list of skills to acquire.

Don’t fall in, the nearest hospital is 137km away

2009-04-13T23:05:00.000+10:00

Today we went to El Tatio Geisers about 100km from San Pedro. All I can say is WOW!! Just an amazing day. All the tour companies in San Pedro obviously got together at some point and decide to get some of their own back at the stupid tourists by deciding that you just have to be at the Geysers at sunrise. This means getting picked up at 4am and waking up at 3:45am (that seems more like a time I should be going to bed on holiday, not waking up!!). Every single tour company only runs it at that time. Definitely a conspiracy. So the night before we dutifully tried to go to bed early, meaning we weren’t tired enough to sleep and we were both so worried we would miss Jason’s rather subtle watch alarm that we kept waking up all night. When it finally did go off we stumbled out of bed into some clothes and onto the street to wait. The other person from our hostel who was waiting and wearing a lot more clothes then informed us she had been told it’s around -10 at the geysers. WHAT?! We had been told to dress warmly, but it’s rather chilly at 4am in San Pedro and no further explanation had been given. Jason quickly rushed back in and put on trainers rather than sandals, and grabbed a thermal top which I put on underneath the two jumpers I was already wearing. We were as ready as we were going to be and on our way.

Nearly 3 hours of very bumpy twisty mountain roads later we reached the geysers just as the sun was beginning to light the sky. It was indeed around -10, if not colder. We fought over who should take photos as neither of us wanted to risk frostbite from holding the camera too long. “No, you take it… you’ll do a much better job.” Our very thin travel pants didn’t give much warmth to the legs either and we began to wonder how susceptible legs were to frostbite. But enough about the temperature… onto the geysers. The whole area looked like something from another planet. We were at 4320m but it looked like we were in a depression as the area was surrounded with volcanoes and snow covered mountains that top 6000m. The ground was issuing steam all around and as you got closer you could hear the boiling water under the ground that would suddenly burst forth and threaten to scald those standing too close. The minerals from the water had left interesting shaped and coloured deposits which further led to the alien feel. Words can’t really do it justice but hopefully our photos do a better job.

Following an hour or so wandering around the geysers we went for a quick dip in a hot spring. Only 15 minutes was allowed though as otherwise the minerals start to do nasty things to your skin. After this we thought the tour was over, but the drive down was just amazing. Looking out from either side of the bus you could be mistaken for thinking it was two entirely different places. One side would be covered in snow rising up to volcanoes or mountains whilst the other would be a typically desert scene with sand dunes and cacti dotting the landscape and bizarrely no snow in sight. We were constantly snapping pictures out the window and almost as frequently stopping the bus to have a proper look. The scenery was kind of expected, but we weren’t expecting a wildlife tour as well! We saw herds of guanacos, vicuna and llamas (all closely related), multiple bird species and some very weird looking rabbit type animals that I’m pretty sure are called vizcacha.

Further evidence that we can always get bad weather when it matters.

2009-04-12T23:01:00.000+10:00

The Lonely Planet describes the Atacama desert as the driest in the world. Days were reaching well into the 30s so we booked what sounded like a nice relaxing tour. A trip into the desert and to a couple of desert lakes. The first is a salt lake in which you can float in much the same way as at the Dead Sea, the second was a fresh water lake to help you wash off all that salt. Finally the tour ended at the Salar de Atacama (salt plain) where sipping on a pisco sour you would watch the sun set behind the mountains. Sounds like bliss. Around 1pm that afternoon we started to notice some clouds. That’s strange we thought, having not seen any clouds previously here. We were however unperturbed as it’s a very dry desert and it never rains here. By 2:30pm (with the tour leaving at 3) we felt the first drops of rain. We headed to the tour office where the travel agent denied that it could be raining here, as it just doesn’t. Then she came outside… but she assured us we were going out into the middle of the desert so it should be fine. The storm clouds continued to build however and the temperature drop and the rain followed us to the first lake. We debated getting in anyway but the water was cold and we were already feeling chilled despite wearing jumpers!! We watched those crazy enough to risk pneumonia float sitting up and watched the storm get closer. We ended the tour at the salt plains (basically a huge area with 15cm deep of salt) and took a few photos before the rain caught up. We then huddled beside the van drinking our pisco sours and mango sours pretending we could see the sun setting behind the clouds. Although we had a few drops of rain the heavens didn’t actually open until they hit the mountains where the lightening lit up the sky far and wide. But we still feel that our reputation for being able to bring the rain when you want it least is safe for now.

How many stars do you thing you see at night?

2009-04-10T22:59:00.000+10:00

One of the things we were really looking forward to doing was going out into the middle of the desert with a professional astronomer and gaze at millions of stars whilst having some of his knowledge passed to us. When we got there we were told ‘millions of stars is what we say in the brochure. You’ve paid now. You can only ever see about 3,000 stars with the naked eye and tonight with the full moon it’s less than 1,000.’ Both he and his wife were incredibly interesting however and pointed out various constellations, the closest stars, the zodiac part of the sky – which is also the elliptical plane the only part of the sky where you will ever see planets. He had an assortment of huge telescopes through which we were shown the moon, Saturn, nebulae, a globular cluster, the jewellery box (3 stars close together which are yellow, blue and red respectively) and a binary star. Definitely something I would recommend!

Where shall we sleep?

2009-04-08T22:54:00.000+10:00

San Pedro was not quite what we expected. We knew it was a desert oasis town, but we also knew it was a major tourist centre, so the dusty mud brick homes that make up the entire town were a bit of a shock coming from very European Argentina. We were a little concerned on the way about finding a room for the time we would be here. Arriving at 6pm the day before Easter long weekend in a major tourist centre, that is also a very small town seemed to be a bad combination. After wandering around San Pedro for an hour or more it seemed to be a complete disaster. So we asked the hostel we had just found where else we could look, he called a friend and we were on our way to a room with a bed. Woohoo!! Our host is Nadia and we spent the walk to her house in very enjoyable conversation, her teaching us Spanish and us teaching her English. She wants to set up her house as a hostel and as such currently only has one room available but I’m sure she plans more in the future.

How high can you go?

2009-04-08T22:50:00.001+10:00

The trip from Salta to San Pedro de Atacama was a jaw dropping, finger tingling, headache inducing experience. Of course the later two were from altitude sickness, whilst the former was from the absolutely spectacular views. The scenery didn’t really start to be anything special until we had made it past the blockade. We aren’t quite sure what they were protesting about, but they were obviously camped out there and had blocked the roads with logs, branches, rocks and anything else they could find. There were also a fair few armourned trucks with police or army men which I assume is why we did get through it eventually (2 hours later). From there the road began to climb into the Andes, past mountains, canyons and salt plains. At various points the effects of altitude became obvious, there was that moment when I tried to sit up and my vision went blurry and I thought I would pass out – we were eye level with snow at that point though. Around 4pm we arrived at the border crossing… or at least the Argentinian side of it. We were all stamped through fairly quickly but then had to wait forever for the paperwork on the bus to be completed. Whilst we were waiting Jason made the suggestion that we really should all just walk across no-mans land and wait for the bus on the Chilean side of the border. (Something we had done frequently in Africa). Shortly thereafter we were all piled back on to the bus and given our lunch (yes, it was a very late lunch). We weren’t sure at this point if we still had a really long wait before the bus was going to be able to move, or the lunch wasn’t allowed across the border and they had just forgotten to feed it to us earlier. The bus did start moving though and we proceeded to go through the longest border crossing so far. It was 2 hours driving later that we finally reached the Chilean immigration – actually in San Pedro de Atacama!

Child mummies

2009-04-05T22:50:00.000+10:00

Salta is one of the last cities before the Andes and as such is the base for archeological expeditions into the mountains. One of the biggest finds was in 1999 when 3 children were excavated in nearly perfect condition from the Llullaillaco volcano. One of the children had been struck by lightening sometime in the last 500 years, but the other two are scarily well preserved. They don’t look alive, but very much in the way taxidermied animals don’t look alive. Their skin, clothes and teeth are all in excellent condition (none of them had any cavities and the oldest was 15 years old). Even scans of the internal organs showed them to be perfectly preserved down to what was in their stomachs on the day they died. The volcano where they were found is over 6739m and it is thought that the cold combined with lack of oxygen, low atmospheric pressure and low humidity all contributed to their amazing preservation. This is now being maintained in the museum, and the children are kept at -20C permanently. The children were all sacrifices, but it was never stated how they died (at least in English), it seems they were just left there and expected to stay until they died. The only abnormal finding on tests was lung shrinkage possibly from dehydration. Our only gripe with the museum was that as it was charging 3 times the price for foreigners as locals the text (of which there was a lot) could have been translated into English. My Spanish regarding sacrifices and religious practices of the Incas is just not good enough!!

More bus journeys

2009-04-04T22:46:00.000+11:00

We weren’t planning on writing about every bus journey, but each one is its own unique form of torture. By starting in Buenos Aires we have started with the best and will slowly be making our way down (we hope not to get to buses as those found in Ethiopia, but you never know). The first bus we basically had beds, were served a hot dinner complete with wine and snuggled under the provided blankets resting our weary heads on the pillow. That is coche cama/total cama or a myriad of other names. Next we took a cama class bus to Resistencia. Gone was our ability to recline fully, but it still came close and the seats were again wide and comfortable. We didn’t receive blankets or pillows but there again it was during the day not at night. Meals were no longer hot, but still existed. It was a fascinating journey though as the bus also acted as a local normal bus picking up passengers every few minutes. In this way we got to see our first ‘gauchos’ cowboys – the clothes were amazing! If the situation had been different you would have assumed they were dressed up for tourists to take photos of them. Hat, boots, belts, silver chains the whole full bit. Anyway. The next bus was semi cama class and we’re now back to something closer to a greyhound bus in Australia or Canada… ok, not quite that bad, but close! Mostly upright seats, food that the airlines rejected 10 years ago, but worst of all no blankets. We had stupidly assumed these would be provided and spent the entire night shivering away (occasionally sharing one seat for warmth, but that wasn’t exactly comfortable) whilst every joint in the bus seemed to blow in cold air. Of course we are also reminded of how quickly your expectations can change. In Africa if a bus came even close to the level of Greyhound we were ecstatic... more often it was a school bus with 6 people squished in each row.

Of course it’s not just the buses that have gone down in quality, we also seem to be staying in grottier and grottier accommodation. This is the first place we’ve stayed in South America with a share bathroom (yes, I know we’ve been living the high life up until now). That is fine with me. The problem is that we have two choices for showers. Option 1 is a full bathroom (shower, toilet, locked door) but only cold water. Option 2 is a hot shower but only a curtain between you and the corridor. And it’s cold enough that we are going for option 2!

We are now in Salta, but I suppose I should quickly mention Resistencia. It was Sunday, so everything was shut which was stupid planning on our part. We planned to spend the day sitting in the park, but then I got stung by a bee (it got inside my shoe somehow and then stung me when it couldn’t get out) so we spent the day avoiding bees, looking at statues and drinking gallons of liquid.

Vote for us!!

2009-04-04T08:33:00.000+11:00

It seems whenever you go to a great natural wonder of the world these days you are asked to go online and vote for it to become one of the seven natural wonders of the world. So, why are we restricted to seven… there are lots of natural wonders to see! Iguassu falls was something special though. It was everything you would expect – flowing rivers, deafening waterfalls, drenching spray – but also something we did not – a butterfly sanctuary. Everywhere you went you were surrounded by butterflies, frequently landing on you to drink your sweat (I did mention it was hot, didn’t I?). And everywhere you looked you saw tourists taking photos of butterflies. And along many of the paths if you sat at the benches lizards, small ones and ones the size of your arm would often appear at a discreate distance (although their thunderous approach was anything but subtle) to see if you would leave any morsels of food.

The wheels on the bus go round and round

2009-04-04T08:30:00.001+11:00

I thought that our first bus trip in South America deserved a quick mention. These will quickly become routine I’m sure but it was the first time we’ve ever sat on a bus for 16 hours straight, with no stops at all. It was however, amazingly comfortable!! There were only three seats across and only 7 rows on the top floor (only about 4 rows underneath) with each seat being able to go totally flat. Ah bliss, particularly when compared to the 6 people across and about 40 rows that was squeezed onto Ethiopian buses. They also showed a couple of movies on the bus, we only watched one and it seemed an odd choice for a bus trip being an anti-travel movie. Two girls head to France and share a taxi with a guy who proceeds to kidnap them. Ex-government agent paranoid father who had never wanted his daughter to leave safe America for dangerous France immediately sets off to rescue them. It was an entertaining movie and once it was over gave us plenty of fodder for further conversations regarding the many and numerous holes in the plotline.

The belief that wherever you don’t live has to be dangerous was reinforced by a very nice guy we met who was having dinner with his mother. On hearing that we had travelled to Africa he started saying how much he would like to go there but that his mother was too frightened and wouldn’t let him go (he was our age, so not a child). He had spent 2 years in Brisbane studying and was currently travelling a bit before going back home to Columbia. His mother who was kept trying to shush us as we were telling him how safe Africa was and how much we loved it.

Hablas Espanol?

2009-04-04T08:26:00.000+11:00

One of our goals is to learn enough Spanish to at least get by comfortably. So we planned to do a weeks worth of lessons in Buenos Aires to get us started on our way. Luckily we didn’t pay for the whole lot up front. We did a two hour private lesson just to test it out and see how it went. It was useless!! Even for private lessons they seemed to categorise you into beginner/internediate/advanced. So despite the fact that we already knew a few basics the teacher started right from ‘Hola’. Fair enough, I could cope with that. But the teaching style seemed to be give us a script to read. Read it. Explain what all the words mean. Alright, next script. Reading is definitely a good skill to have, but not the way to teach a one week crash course in a language. In two hours the only thing we learnt was that ll is pronounced more like ‘sh’ in Argentina, whereas we were saying it as a ‘y’ sound which is correct for other parts of South America. Even worse rather than being a good way to boost our confidence and help us have the courage to speak to people in Spanish she made us feel like complete idiots who knew nothing. Needless to say we decided not to continue with the lessons.

Will you tango?

2009-04-02T08:26:00.002+11:00

We had four more days in Buenos Aires during which time we tangoed, demonstrated and ate meat. The tango show was in the basement of a lovely old café called “Café Tortoni”. We were led through the actual dining room which was all high ceilings, crown moulding and crystal chandeliers down a narrow winding staircase to a small room in the basment with exposed brick and about 20 tables set facing the stage. The show was nothing like what we had expected, being much more of a show rather than just a tango dance. I’m sure we would have got a lot more out of it if we could actually speak Spanish, but not much of what they said had to do with ordering dinner or booking hotel rooms. The lighting, however, seemed to have been purposefully designed to make taking a decent photo impossible as it changed about twice every second.

The demonstrations were daily, but that is just part of life in Buenos Aires and we learnt to pay them no mind. Although it was interesting to see how quickly the police could block off a street.

The meat in question, was a traditional pasillo or grill… basically all the meat you can imagine and that’s basically your dinner. We managed to identify beef, chicken, pork, kidney, spicy sausage, blood sausage and there were a couple of other things that defied identification. It was an incredibly nice dinner though and more than even Jason could eat!! (At least here in Argentina. But he is eating about a third of what he was eating in Canada. When we first arrived in Canada we were eating similarly to what we would eat in Australia, always a little hungry but not that worried about it until we realised that Jason was down to skin and bone weighing less than he ever had as an adult. So, we started eating more. We were mildly worried we had just become gluttonous pigs, but on arrival in South America we reverted to more normal eating habits – or eating even less as the heat seems to suppress the appetite, so the conclusion is that being cold burns calories like there is no tomorrow, “The new fad – the freezer diet!”)

We also explored the Sunday San Telmo market which went and went and went, it was about 10 blocks in length and a three wide in places. There were street performers and tango music giving a wonderful atmosphere. The other thing of note was the Evita museum which gave us the incredibly saintly history of Eva Peron. Finding the other side of the story... now, that's not in any museum.

We also had our first pick pocketing incident in South America, and only the second for the whole trip. We had gone to buy our bus tickets and while ducking into the train station which was quieter to consult the map Jason felt someone brush against him but thought nothing of it. It wasn’t until I went to get out a bottle of water that we realised two of the pockets on the daypack were open. The first has the USB drive in it, which luckily she didn’t find. The second had the ipod in it, which luckily she didn’t find. What she did take was our medication pouch, so she made off with a couple of immodium and a packet of zyrtec. Whilst we learnt to lock the pockets on the daypack, because even apparently blind pickpockets can take worthless items and it's a pain.

Ah, so that's what it was all about.

2009-03-26T12:33:00.002+11:00

Today we decided to take the free walking tour offered by our hostel and learn a bit about the city. In the process we found out what the demonstration was about yesterday. Yesterday was memorial day (March 24th, it was declared such only in 2006). This is the date that the "Dirty War" started back in 1976. The government that reigned from 1976-83 was the last military government of Argentina and reportedly quite keen on disappearing any opposition or supposed opposition - about 30,000 people. But of course we also learnt about the Perons and how big the Peronistic movement was and the equal divide between love and hate for them. More recently we learnt about the 2001 revolution and heard one perspective from a local, as well as being shown the newspaper articles about the presidents that followed. 5 in one month, and then a photo of an empty chair as they looked for anyone who was willing to take on the job.

As you can tell there's certainly been a lot of upheaval here in the past and there continues to be plenty of protests and demonstrations in the present. In fact demonstrations are a daily part of life and all around the city there are barricades that can be quickly drawn across the roads to block demonstrators from particular areas. Many buildings, such as the town hall, have an obvious paintline as demonstrators throw paint at the buildings daily and every now and then it is painted over. One particularly demonstration has been happening every Thursday since 1977. The mothers and grandmothers of children taken during the "Dirty War" march in a circle around the Plaza de Mayo. At first it was to find out where their children were, now it is to get justice for their deaths. On Tuesdays another group marches who disagree with the mothers message. Every week this goes on and each group paints messages on the ground for the other group to paint over.

Tomorrow we will go and march on a Spanish school and demand some lessons.

Hello, Buenos Aires

2009-03-25T07:36:00.003+11:00

Singing “Hello Buenos Aires”, not that I’ve done any singing yet. The journey over here was the worst and longest plane trip I have ever taken. The longest having a lot to do with it being categorised as the worst. The first leg of the trip was the shuttle to Calgary airport. Unfortunately there was about 3 hours between the two appropriate shuttles and as the second would have cut it fine we were advised to take the 1:30, particularly as snow was predicted for that day. The snow came. The previous day had been 12 degrees and sunny, but that morning there was a foot of new snow in the driveway and it just kept falling. It was quite a send off we received. After 1 and three quarter hours on the shuttle we were just coming into Calgary when we saw a pack of wolves!!! Wow! Unfortunately there were a few people on the shuttle who were cutting it fine timewise so no chance for even a quick photo.

We then waited around at Calgary airport for 4 hours. Followed by an 8 hour flight to Heathrow on Air Canada. Surely the most cramped economy class seats in existence, not to mention the worst in flight entertainment. We arrived at Heathrow without any sleep, tired and cranky. 11 hours later we were finally on our Tam Airlines flight to Buenos Aires. This flight was pretty empty... but we were still cramped thanks to the person who completed our three being the only person in existence who didn't see the value in moving to have 2 seats to himself and leaving Jason and I with 3 between us. Surprisingly the food was really quite good and the in-flight entertainment beat Air Canada hands down.

This flight took us as far as Sao Paulo, Brazil in a tedious 12 and a half hours. Where we were supposed to have a fairly quick 2 and a half hours to wait around before the final leg to Buenos Aires. Of course we weren't counting on the fog. All in all we made it to our hostel at 2:30pm Tuesday 24th March, having left Banff at 1:30pm Sunday 22nd March. The time difference of 3 hours leaves us with a total travel time of 46 hours. Phew! I'm exhausted just thinking about it.

But I really should mention What we've been doing for the 2 hours we've been in this part of the world. Why, marching in a typical Argentine protest of course. We tried not to. But everytime we turned a corner the protest was continuing. It seemed to go in every direction. At one point we gave up trying to get away from it and just went with the flow, the sound of the drum forcing your heart to beat, the chanting and crying. It just felt like what you hope Buenos Aires might feel like. Alive. Then there was that one point where we reached another section of the protest where all the participants had their faces covered and were walking with baseball bats, needless to say we were out of that area pretty fast. Tomorrow I will have to find a street to dance down singing "Hello, Buenos Aires" and if you don't get the reference go watch Evita.

Canada Summary

2009-03-21T13:13:00.002+11:00

Farewell, oh canada. On our way to the airport today we had one final treat... a sighting of a wolf pack right outside Calgary. Cool!! Unfortunately being an airport bus there was no chance of stopping to take a closer look or even a photo. But a very nice way to end our stay.

What to say about our time in Canada? It certainly wasn't what we expected. We planned to spend a few months of our lives concentrating on skiing and in the process becoming fit and proficient in at least one sport. An early injury laid that idea to rest. Instead it became a time of reflection and of really deciding what we want out of life. Where we want to live and how we want to do it.
So what have we learnt:
1) Winter is fun, for a week or two. But neither of us ever want to live anywhere that has winter like they have here in Banff. Constantly putting coats and boots and gloves and beanies on and off, on and off... it's enough to drive you mad. When you have to put on more layers than you have limbs, it's just too many.
2) Thin rugs on top of carpet are just dementing, particularly when they are in every room!! They constantly get wrinkled and when you're cleaning, you have to vacuum the floors twice.
3) A small house is all we really need. Mega-mansions don't appeal at all.
4) For the first time on the trip we really started to miss working. When traveling we were always busy enough that we didn't feel the need to work. Here we have had a lot more time and found ourselves searching for neuropsych and engineering jobs back in Sydney.
5) We would ideally love to live near a beach. Warmth, sun and sand. Ah, heaven. This may be emphasised by the current, cold, snow and mountains surrounding.

I don't want to make it sound all bad though. So here are the things we will miss:
1) Snuggling together under a blanket watching the snow fall outside.
2) Checking each morning to see whether any deer or elk are outside or if they came during the night.
3) Trying to convince a squirrel to pose just so for a photo.
4) Having a really great kitchen to cook in.
5) Walking in the nearby forest by only the light of the moon.

Why you should always have travel insurance

2009-03-14T03:19:00.003+11:00

Monday morning dawned cold, cold and snowy. Despite it now being theoretically spring it was around -25C and snowing, so neither Mum nor I were keen to go skiing. Dad and Jason waited until it had warmed up a bit (-18C) and went up together for the afternoon. Then at 4:30pm or so Dad called to let Mum know that he had had a 'bit of an accident' and was on the way to the hospital with Jason driving and could she call the insurance company and the hospital. Now for those of you who know how much Jason loves driving, particularly in a huge tank of a 4WD on snow and ice covered roads on the wrong side of the road, you would understand that this fact alone let us know how much Dad must be hurt.

It turns out he was skiing down a black mogul run and got the turn wrong going over and landing on his shoulder. He dislocated his shoulder and broke the arm in the process into multiple pieces. He also tore the ligament in his thumb (on the other hand) completely off the bone. From Banff he was transferred the 200km to Calgary for surgery to repair his arm and shoulder. He now has a plate in his shoulder and 7 screws keeping it together. When I left the hospital he had moved from being miserable and in pain the day before to being bored at having nothing to do.

There are a few raves that came out of this. The first was for Avis. The car was supposed to be returned to Calgary but none of the three of us wanted to drive it. So someone from Banff Avis drove up to our house to pick up the car (he was the only one on duty so had to leave his car here) and said there would be no charge for it. My parents were insured through the flight centre insurance "Covermore" and I can not recommend them highly enough. Everytime we called they had all the details of the case on hand, purely based on our surname. They were incredibly proactive calling the hospital, the surgeon, organising new flights with a business class upgrade for both Mum and Dad. Our rough calculation is that they have paid out around $50,000 and almost all of this they have paid directly. They weren't able to pay the Banff hospital directly as Banff refuses to deal with insurance companies but everything else they have taken care of.

Ice, snow and mountains

2009-03-04T03:08:00.000+11:00

One of the highlights of our trip to Canada so far has been a drive up the icefields parkway from Banff to Jasper. We had planned the day carefully picking the day with good weather forecasted and a night with a good chance of seeing the northern lights forecast. (How do you get a northern lights forecast, you ask - go to www.gedds.alaska.edu/AuroraForecast) When we woke up in the morning, however, we couldn't see the mountains surrounding Banff at all and the snow was coming down. Our expectations for stunning views thus lowered we set off anyway. Luckily by the time we got to Lake Louise we had left the snow behind us and the views were looking good. It ended up being great weather for the trip. There were occasional snow showers but at all the major lookout points we had great views. One place on the drive is called the weeping wall which in winter is one massive sheet of icicles. We were happily gawking at this wall and taking photos when suddenly I realised there were 4 ice climbers on the wall. The fact that we didn't notice them gives you an idea of how big this wall is. Sure enough a quick look back at the photos showed that they had been there the whole time.

The hotel in Jasper was absolutely lovely and we went out for a nice dinner to celebrate Jason's birthday whilst we were there. Then at 11 pm we wondered out onto the street to see the northern lights... which weren't there. Hmpf. We have looked out most nights in Banff as well, but it seems that the combination of not being far enough north, being in the mountains and it frequently being cloudy mean we aren't going to get to see them on this trip.

The invasion

2009-02-28T05:10:00.000+11:00

Our house has been invaded. There are tell tale signs everywhere. The fridge is overflowing with food, the house is warmer, there is snow piling up outside (although I'm not sure how closely this is related to the invasion) and most telling my parents are sleeping in the spare room. It's lovely to see them and we are taking the opportunity to be proper tourists, plus they've hired a car so we can explore the area in a way that is impossible without one. The day they arrived so did the snow, which is great for skiing but I'm not sure my mother was that impressed with two days of driving snow and -20C temperatures. The snow stopped and we were treated to a couple of beautiful sunny days with fresh snow perfect for skiing. During the blizzard we explored some of the local indoor sites as well. The very interesting Whyte Museum, which gave some history of the area, as well as a photography exhibition which we loved! We also visited the Cave and Basin which was very hot and very smelly... mmmm, sulphur.

Cameras, snowflakes and water

2009-02-02T05:03:00.000+11:00

Well, we haven't written anything new on our blog for a very long time. Partly because being in one place nothing much changes. Skiing has not been our main focus and instead we started becoming more interested in photography. To the point that we decided to buy ourselves a new camera (as a combined birthdays and christmas present). We try and take at least one interesting photo a day. One aim has been to get a good photo of a snowflake - the main problem with this is how rarely it snows. The second problem is that when it does, being REALLY cold the snowflakes are generally 1mm across... quite hard to get a decent photo of that. Occasionally you get lucky and one will be 2mm across, so those are the ones we have attempted to photograph. The third problem with this is that after 10min your fingers start to go numb and develop frostbite. So as an alternative indoor activity we tried to photograph a single water droplet. Lots more fun and without the problems mentioned above. To further waste money on photography as a hobby we set up a website with some photos at www.80weeks.smugmug.com

Feel free to post photographic missions for us, and we will have fun attempting them!

Happy Holidays

2009-01-03T05:53:00.002+11:00

Christmas was nicely quiet. The day was filled with phone calls to family (mostly free thanks to the joy of internet based calls) and playing in the snow. We did attempt to make a snowman for the holidays but the snow is so dry here that it just doesn't stick together very well. You need that good Australian wet snow for really good snowmen, or snowball fights for that matter. It was Jason's first white Christmas and even he agreed that it just feels more like Christmas when all that Christmas imagery is all around you. We also kept to the Christmas tradition of eating too much. Mmmm fudge. New Years Eve we headed into town to join the rest of the locals on the bridge for the best view of the fireworks. Unlike Sydney you only need to arrive 1 minute early to get the best position, not 12 hours early. The fireworks were amazingly good and it was fun standing in the snow cuddling up against the cold. On the way down we had spotted two deer (with antlers) digging up snow to get to some yummy grass... we assumed they would be gone by the time we walked back scared away by the fireworks, but surprisingly they were in exactly the same position and didn't seem at all concerned. Very different to normal but lots of fun!

The fall

2008-12-11T05:37:00.001+11:00

It was the fifth day of skiing, we were just getting into it and excited about improving. We only had a short day of skiing as Kristina and Vicky needed to get into town in time to buy their greyhound tickets to Lake Louise. There was a jump just to the right of one of the easiest runs that we'd seen both skiers and boarders getting some nice air. We'd already attempted this jump a few times, but approaching from the green run and thinking about it too late so not so much as 1cm of air had been achieved. We had time for one more run and decided to give this jump a proper go... so we prepared ourselves at the top of the blue run that approaches the jump. Jason went first and appeared to have a fair bit of speed so I was really surprised when his skis still didn't leave the ground. I was determined to get at least 10cm of air so I went from a little higher and a little faster than Jason had gone... over the jump and what the hell!! I had 2 meters of air!!!! (I later found out Jason had chickened and slowed down at the last moment) I nearly landed the jump getting both skis under me, but was leaning too far forward and did a spectacular roll. In the middle I felt my ski dig into the snow and my knee twist and force it out, the bindings didn't give. OW! A visit to the doctor later revealed torn ligaments (to both the MCL and ACL)... so no skiing for awhile, or walking, or twisting, or sleeping. All I'm really hoping is that this is not going to be a lifetime injury.... only time will tell.

4 countries in 18 hours

2008-11-17T09:02:00.000+11:00

Admittedly it was a long 18 hours, but we took off from Sydney just before 7pm Sunday and landed in Vancouver just after 11am Monday. We had booked the cheapest ticket we could find that didn’t involves going through America (due to their annoying visa requirements), so we flew to Singapore (8 hours) where we spent the night (10 hours), then flew to South Korea (7 hours) where after queuing in line to get a transit card, get our bags scanned and get back on the plane (40 minutes) we flew to Vancouver (10 hours). As I said it was a long 18 hours. Strangely enough it wasn’t that bad. We discovered the oasis lounge in Singapore (free!) where they have $8000 massage chairs for you to use (free!). After three massages and a few hours of sleep we felt quite refreshed, we also explored the butterfly garden which was lots of fun. The second good part of the flight was that the Korea-Canada leg was basically empty and nearly everyone had an entire row to themselves!! So we were able to lie down and sleep nearly the whole flight, blissful.

Quick update

2008-11-15T09:00:00.000+11:00

It’s been quite awhile since we’ve written anything for the blog, so this is just a quick post to catch up on what’s happened in the meantime. After the Mekong Delta we spent a relaxed week in Kuala Lumpur catching up on sleep and exploring the city and the surroundings. Then we flew home for my parents 60^th birthday party, and what an even it was!! There were 80 guests, a band, presents for everyone and fun had by all. Conveniently the trip home also meant we were able to go to Jason’s family reunion and my ten year school reunion (now I feel old). It was great to have a chance to catch up with everyone and remind ourselves why Sydney is really where we want to live.

Crocodile fishing 5000dong

2008-10-08T16:36:00.002+11:00

With just a couple of days left we decided to head out into the Mekong Delta. Primarily to visit the floating markets. Meandering through the waterways was enjoyable, but stopping for lunch on an island led to unexpected events. Walking around we saw a sign "crocodile fishing 5000Dong" beside an enclosure of crocodiles. So, naturally we said let's go! Grabbing a bamboo pole with a bit of meat tied to the end with string we started teasing crocodiles. This was a good lesson in why not to swim with crocodiles. Some of the others who were there held their meat low over the water and when it was grabbed they often managed to keep some of it back. I was trying to make the crocodiles jump, and boy can they jump high! The one that finally got the meat had it's entire body out of the water to it's back legs (and Jason snapped the photo to prove it!).

So, there was a bit more than clothes

2008-10-06T16:28:00.000+11:00

I just thought that I should write something about Hoi An other than the shopping. It's a lovely old historic town that miracuously managed to avoid being bombed into oblivion. To enable you to explore properly you buy one ticket that takes you to old houses, temples, chinese assembly halls and traditional music concerts. It was really quite beautiful. Also, the traditional dish of cau lao was incredibly good and made a cheap tasty lunch nearly everyday we were there.

From Hoi An we took our first ever night bus to Nha Trang. This was certainly an experience. The seats were cleverly designed, at least if you are Vietnamese. Unfortunately for those over 5'3" you're left wondering where your lower legs are supposed to go. They nearly go flat, with you feet underneath the persons back in front of you. For those with size 11 feet the hole for them was not big enough at all. Despite this we actually slept pretty well and were ready to enjoy the beach in Nha Trang. We spent a couple of days there planning to go and see some of the sights in the area, but the beach was so beautiful, with clear water, islands abounding, mountains behind we just never found the motivation to move from it!

From there it was off to Saigon with a quick stop in Mui Ne on the way. Oh, how glad I will be to go back home where crossing the road does not feel like a life threatening activity.

Clothes, clothes and more clothes

2008-09-28T17:36:00.003+10:00

Now, for anyone who knows me you know I hate clothes shopping. So heading to a town which is known for being home to over 500 tailors I wasn't expecting to go crazy with excitement. However, with so many tailors you have to try it out and Mum and Dad's upcoming party for which we are heading all the way home seemed the perfect excuse. Not managing to find a style I liked in any of the hundreds of catalogues that were presented I ended up describing what I wanted and picking out a couple of fabrics. The next day I had a brand new one of a kind dress that fits perfectly for less than $30. Jason on the other hand had a nice dress shirt in his own choice of fabric, despite repeatedly being redirected to the shirt fabrics (all business shirt type fabrics) he stuck to his guns choosing from the dress fabrics. After a week here not only have we succumbed to buying 2 pairs of jeans, a dress, a skirt, and a shirt.... but we are also compiling the long list of clothes we will get made before coming home at the end of this trip. That's right, we will be back and we will be shopping!! We're up to 31 items so far, but that could get longer as we've still got at least a year before we'll be back.

Zipping through villages and going underground

2008-09-20T22:39:00.000+10:00

Well, we finally felt we had mastered the crossing the street problem. It involves walking very very slowly and constantly. We generally try to pick a time with no cars, trucks, buses but trying to wait for a time with no motorbikes would mean never actually crossing the road. So when you're ready you step out and start walking and miraculously all the motorbikes predict where you will be and swerve to pass either in front or behind. Always a heart pounding experience, but as I said we felt we had it mastered. So, we decided to hire a motorbike for the day! Luckily Jason is actually capable of driving such things as my attempts (once we were in the countryside) were, to be honest, embarrassing. We negotiated the traffic of Hue, thankfully not as busy as Hanoi, and set off to explore the royal tombs which are dotted around the countryside.

The tombs were interesting certainly, although the architecture was very similar to other historic places we have been, the area was beautifully landscaped and serene. The real fun was riding a motorbike, particularly when we got lost! The guidebook mentioned that there was a dirt track between two of the tombs, what they didn't mention is that there are two dirt tracks one goes somewhere completely different. So, we rode through a couple of little villages, beside rice paddies and chose directions at random. Much more fun than the tour option!

The next day we headed up to the former DMZ (de-militarised zone) primarily to explore the Vinh Moc tunnels. These tunnels were dug by civilians who decided to stay in the area. The tunnel system has three levels 12m, 15m and 23m. There are a number of bomb shelters in the tunnel at 23m (to avoid drilling bombs that reach 15m underground). Although not lived in permanently (people would come and go depending on how much bombing was going on - 5 days and nights was the maximum) these tunnels were occupied for a 6 year period. The family rooms that housed 2 adults and 2 children were about three quarters of the size of a normal single bed, the maternity ward about the size of a single bed.

Another highlight of the DMZ was the museum with a very different slant on the war than we normally receive. The photos of American troops invariably had captions along the lines of "American troops turning tail and running from the might of the liberation army". Whilst the photos of the north Vietnamese army showed smiling happy people carrying supplies.

How to get through a police barrier.

2008-09-20T20:32:00.004+10:00

Arriving in Hanoi was a pleasant experience, the touts for transport weren't pushy and we were directed to where we wished to go (a nice change!) without attempts to change our minds, the only mishap was my misplacing of the passport holders with the yellow fever certificates but as we still had the passports it wasn't urgent and we hoped that they were just deep in the day pack.

Traveling the 40km to the city it self, allowed you to start to appreciate some of the differences of Vietnam, the high quality highway which we traveled along had signs indicating cars and motorcycles were to share the main part while horse drawn carts and bicycles used the side lane. The closer we got to Hanoi the more frenetic the traffic became until it reached a point exceeding the worse in Cambodia, still we were assured that it was much better than in Ho Chi Minh (Saigon), oh what we have to look forward to. The traffic had 8-12 bikes running level when no cars were sharing, and would manage to cross at cross roads with none of the lanes appearing to even slow. Looking out at the movement from a restaurant window you became hypnotised watching every more crazy happenings none of which seemed to cause an accident (occasionally all traffic at the junction would pause for one or two seconds as they worked out who needed to move first) My personal favorite was a person wheeling a large sign (about 4 car lengths long) across the diagonal of the road with balloon vendors with their carts and the rest of the normal traffic not missing a beat.

The First Full day we organised to see the water puppets in the evening, only one screening that day. But not much else was done as I made a trip out to the airport to collect those yellow fever certificates from lost and found, an experience just seeing how much stuff sits and waits for collection/identification. The Water Puppets were worth seeing, unfortunately from our position taking photos was pointless and my knees were as squished as on an Ethiopian bus, but the show was very interesting with 14 or so very short little skits performed to traditional music. While basic, controlling the movements of the puppets definitely required a lot of skill. Features of the puppets included fire breathing and water spitting dragons, Acrobatic children that stood on each others shoulders and many more.

We had booked a two day trip into Ha Long Bay where we soon discovered that the voting for the "7 Natural Wonders of the World" was currently taking place, Ha Long bay was in the 21 finalists for a position and every one of the people involved in the trip found a moment to encourage us to vote. The bay was very Stunning with small islands all over (approximately 1969 islands in total we were informed) many of which had been given names by the locals such as cocks fighting, turtle sleeping, the whole bay according to legend formed by dragons who assisted the Vietnamese in a war and decided to hang around rather than return to heaven. We had a wonderful time on the boat with very nice food, the best traditional food to that point.

But it wasn't just sailing, the boat went to "The Cave of Marvels" which is a very spacious series of chambers which are stunning lit up (rather tacky really but still pretty), many of the formations had been named some appropriately, it was a bit hard to argue with "penis rock" or some of the lovers, though most in the group thought that the "dog" was rather more like a pig and a conclusion that some people have very active imaginations. Returning to the boat we headed off to our mooring for the night, once there we started our afternoon activity of leaping from the second story of the boat into the water. This really was a great way of spending the afternoon on board, unfortunately the jellyfish put a slight damper to that activity.

It really was a very nice way of spending a couple of days everything ran smoothly, we will just ignore the sleepless night due to the rats :(, and would like to see what the bay looks like with clear days so you can see many more of the islands at once. Our final activity on the bay was a kayaking trip through a nearby arch into a isolated lake inside an island, quite nice but more arm work than I think either of us wanted.

After a day of recovering we decided to at least look at one of the temples in Hanoi, looking in the guide we decided upon the temple of literature. This temple was built by early rulers partially as a university and a place to study Confucianism, it had a number of ponds (representing elements) together with the traditional buildings containing Steele (stone tablets) which contained details of all the students who graduated from the temple. The item that caught our eye first though was the ceremonial drum which can be seen from outside, this drum would be at least 3m in diameter and 5m in length. The temple was a very nice place to escape the rush of Hanoi, and even to take some wedding photos as we observed.

Having booked our tickets to Hue after visiting the temple, our last day was to consist of relaxing in the hotel and visiting one or more of the museums. The morning however started with me deciding to do a kind deed and collecting some chocolate croissants for breakfast in bed. Departing the hotel it looked like a parade was being orgainsed with so many people in uniform around, my return was rather more interesting as in the intervening 10 minutes barricades were erected either end of the street where our hotel was located and people were not being allowed back in to the area with out ID or proof of need. Having just left to get breakfast I had no guidebook, couldn't remember the name of the hotel, had no mobile to call with and was being obstructed by police telling me to go round (both sides told me this repeatedly.) Eventually I narrowed the requirements to getting through this barrier to having a business card of the hotel, calling them and getting them to accompany me through the barrier, or convince them of which hotel I was staying in. As the last seemed the only option, I grabbed the first tourist I saw with a lonely planet and got the address and phone number for the hotel and decided to make another attempt before finding a phone to call from. This did in fact work with only a little extra persuasion. It was a slightly eerie experience being inside a police blockade where the normal hustle and bustle of Vietnamese streets had dropped to a whisper (well if you ignore the few hundred protestors 3 doors down anyway). We found out that the blockade was due to protests by the catholic priests regarding land in the street, it even made the world news a few days later. ( http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7632095.stm )

Just a little Island time

2008-09-14T20:03:00.001+10:00

Before we had even spent a night in Chau Doc, we ran into some people we had met in the visa office back in Phnom Penh, they had managed to take a slightly different slow boat to Chau Doc and told us about their plans to get to Phu Quoc. Using someone elses motivation to find the cheapest price seemed advantagous to us, so we followed him on a tour of the ticket sellers of the town settling on a combination minibus/ferry ticket (with transport between at own cost) for the next day.

Getting up bright an early, to get on our little minibus, we decided that the few dollars saved were due to the fact our minibus was definately not express and even backtracked at one point to ensure that it was always full to 120% capacity. Fortunately Ellen and I had ended up it the danger seat- the seat beside the driver which meant we didn't have to endure the tidal flow of extra passengers squeezing on and off, as the driver refused to let go of the horn it was noisy but relatively safe.

Arrival at the bus terminal we endured the rush of motos trying to obtain our patrinage putting them off till after we had eaten. Facing them once again we negotiated as best we could before climbing onto a bike each, at least Vietnam is one of the countries with compulsory helmets. Traveling to the Dock via the ticket office, we recieved our boarding pass for the ferry- always a releif when things happen the way you are told we made it through the hours of waiting for departure, and the crazy martial art gambling movies that played during the trip. With only the final stint to long beach and the resorts we agreed to take a minibus that promised if we didn't like their resort they would take us to the other resorts we wanted free of charge... we should have known better. We ended up staying one night there due to exaustion, the rain now falling and the fact it was the cheapest resort in the strip, but the following morning we moved on principle as we don't like being mislead!

Moving to the some what more extravigant Tropicana Resort ($20 rather than $10) we gained A/C a much nicer bungalo looking onto the gardens and best of all a swiming pool. As the beach wasn't the most beautiful beach we had ever seen and the weather was churning up the water so much we ended up spending a lot of time in the pool and enjoying the beach for the sound and view. Three days here was great for just managing to relax and get ready to explore Vietnam which was expected to be a bit more challenging than Cambodia.

Deciding that the last time we debated between saving not all that much money and taking a 2 day journey turned out not so well, after quite some debate we elected to be sensible an splurge on an air ticket to Hanoi (Really not that much more that the ferry/train coast anyway). So with a free transfer that actually was free we left early in the morning for the airport to see the sights of the capital.

Boating through the Mekong Delta

2008-09-09T22:35:00.001+10:00

After eating our fill of Khmer curries it was time to head to Vietnam. This involved a bus to Phnom Penh (we took the boat up to Siem Reap, so thought we'd try the road) a day there getting our visa, again as we hadn't spent anytime dealing with bureaucracy we went for the personal approach, and went in person (every hotel and every second shop advertises they will do it for you for little extra cost) and discovered that when they said come back and collect the passports at 5pm we thought that they would be ready by two and turning up at 4:15 would be fine (the office hours were listed as closing at 4:30 so we wanted to make sure we got in) but no when they say 5 it means they will start putting the visa stickers in the passports at 5.

Visa in hand the first visas that we had before turning up at a border we chose to go on the "Slow" boat thinking more opportunity for taking photos! as well as being a quarter of the price but after a two hour minibus trip to the ferry we realised there was more to it than the speed of the boat. After a cruise in the rustic boat (all the luggage and 7 of the 9 people on board where on the port side to keep the boat more level.) We arrived at the boarder post where we all had to get out of the boat to sign out of Cambodia, then back to the boat for a 500m trip to the Vietnam post. We then discovered our boat didn't continue with us and we were introduced to our guide for the remainder of our trip, she explained what each of the stages we had to go through to complete the formalities including the 4000 dong health check which only seemed to involve paying money? but there where very clear official signs indicating that this was a requirement (with differencing amounts if you hadn't been vaccinated against various illnesses- though this wasn't checked).

Boarding a slightly less battered boat we continued our journey to Chau Doc receiving a bit of information from our guide as to what we were seeing. We were slightly shocked to see that the stereotypical images of the farmers with their buffalo in rice paddies with conical hats really appeared to be true. Settling into our hotel we prepared to work out how to find our way to the Island of Phu Quoc but more of that next time.

Cooking up a storm

2008-09-04T22:34:00.000+10:00

One of the biggest surprises for us in Cambodia was the food, just delicious! To be honest, before I arrived I had no idea what Cambodian food was being more familiar with neighbouring Thailand and Vietnam. For 10 days I virtually lived on Khmer curry, so good! In fact it was so good that we decided to do a cooking class. Unfortunately the herbs used were generally unknown and unrecognisable... so I don't know how we'll go replicating it back home, but we'll try!

Our cooking class started with a trip to the market to buy some last minute ingrediants before we whipped up a Khmer curry, fresh spring rolls, mango salad, and Amok. I would like to say that we were the stars of the class, but we got admonished for not chopping fine enough, making our carrots pretty enough and not rolling our spring rolls tight enough. The food still tasted good though!

Marvelling at ancient temples

2008-09-03T23:39:00.003+10:00

It is all too easy to wax lyrical about the temples of Angkor, where we spent three days exploring temples devoured by jungle, examining carvings of dancers and gods and admiring statues of Buddha.

The most famous temple, for it's sheer size, is Angkor Wat. This wasn't however the first temple we visited, or by any means our favourite. We started off in Bayon which is within a larger complex Angkor Thom. This was amazing there were two levels that were accessible and within these you could wander around, over and through. Every surface seemed to be carved and we felt much more like we were exploring the site than we had expected. Some temples were under restoration and lots have scaffolding holding them up, but others like Bayon are in amazing condition. One, Ta Prohm (made famous by Lara Croft), has not been restored allowing you to see the state they were found in. Enormous trees have caught root in the temples forcing the stones apart. There are many areas of Ta Prohm that were in serious danger of falling down and wooden walkways take you around these, but once you are inside you are able to climb over crumbling pillars, squeeze through doorways and appear in a surprisingly intact room with carvings hundreds of years old (and usually no other tourists).

From bicycles to motorcycles

2008-08-30T17:10:00.000+10:00

From the land of whole families being driven around on bicycles to one where they've added a motor. We started off with a few days in Kuala Lumpur revelling in being somewhere that felt like home (albeit a little bit more modern in parts). It helped that we were staying in Chinatown which probably feels the same everywhere... plus large numbers of tourists and a public transport system that works. Ok, that's not like Sydney but maybe one day. We spent one day to go up the twin towers and take in the view from the skybridge. We had expected this to be a 2 hour affair at most... but after queueing foran hour and a half we secured tickets for the 12:45pm visit. The skybridge is free as they bombard you with advertising for Petronas. We spent the time we had to wait exploring a shopping mall... with shops we recognised!!! Oh, the things we find exciting now, it's quite sad. The view from the bridge was spectacular and I spent a long time watching the fountain display from on high. We also indulged in our first cinema viewing experience in months!!

From there a quick flight to Cambodia brought us to the hottest place we have ever been!! Walking for 2 minutes leaves you dripping with sweat from places you didn't know sweated, and few places have air con so there's not much relief. We did decide to splurge on a room with a/c for that reason (a whole $13 for a double). Although we are now somewhere where they drive on the right again, it's not so noticeable here as you have to look every whichway when crossing the street including on the pavement.

Africa - conclusions

2008-08-25T21:23:00.000+10:00

I hope to do this for every continent, but we'll see. Africa has been a fascinating place to travel. We have met travellers who have come here 10 times, without wanting to go to Asia or South America or Australia, we have met people who have been here 10 months when they planned on 2... we on the other hand did not fall in love with this continent in that way. In fact it took us quite awhile to get into Africa. After being here 2 weeks, we thought the planned 4 months would be way too long. By the time we had been here a month we thought it would be about right but that we wouldn't return. By the end, we were sad to leave and have planned at least the next 2 trips to Africa.... but I doubt they'll happen for five years or so.

Now, for some facts:

Surprises: Mobile phones are more common than electricity or running water (hence a roaring trade in mobile phone charging shops).
Things seen on a bicycle: A family of six, a man holding trays with over one hundred eggs in one hand whilst steering with the other. 100s of kg of rice/coal etc. Trees stacked vertically about 4m tall.
Items lost: 4
Items returned: 3 ( money belt fell off on a bus in Botswana was returned by locals; daypack with all valuables was left in a restaurant in Dar Es Salaam and returned intact when we went back 2 hours later; contact lenses left in Stonetown were returned one week later - luckily one of the few times we backtracked). One t-shirt never got returned.
Sunglasses broken: 3 (generally from getting sat on during safaris)
Illnesses: 2 (food poisoning twice in Ethiopia - both Ellen)
Number of breakdowns/flat tyres: 6
Marriage proposals: 4 (all to Ellen)
Declarations of love: 32 (all to Ellen)

So now we're off to South East Asia for 6 weeks.... should be fun!

The underbelly of an elephant

2008-08-24T11:53:00.000+10:00

After farewelling Andrew we flew back to J'berg (with a slight detour via Uganda). We only had one week before our flight to Malaysia, so decided to do one last safari in Kruger. The thing we really wanted to do was attempt a self drive safari. So we hired a little Honda Jazz (brand new.... great for going around a national park) and headed off for 5 last days in the African bush. Natually without a guide and not really knowing where to drive we weren't expecting too much in the way of wildlife sightings, so we were pretty impressed when after the first 33minutes we had seen 4 of the big 5. (It took until the next day to see a leopard).

We loved it!! If we come back to Africa we would definitely choose to do a self-drive safari over a tour. There is something extraordinary about viewing the underbelly of an elephant. One day as we were driving along one of the narrower roads in Kruger with dense bush on either side we saw a huge bull elephant walking along the road towards us. The last turn off was 10km behind us, so we decided to pull as far to the side as possible and wait with the car in reverse ready to run at the first sign of trouble. As he got closer our heart rates increased and we really wished we knew exactly how you tell if an elephant is about to charge. About 2m from us he flapped his ears and gave us a look and as he came in line with the car he gave his head a little shake and gave just a little trumpet. Our hearts were in our throats, but he just continued past the car as we looked out our window directly in line with the underside of his belly.... just amazing!!! Another highlight was the leopard that we and only we saw.

This is the only safari that we have kept a list of the animals we saw so in 5 days we saw: lions, leopards, cheetahs, rhino, nile crocodiles, zebra, giraffe, spotted hyena, chacma baboons, vervet monkeys, buffalo, warthog, elephant, hippos, common duiker, sable, bushbuck, klipspringer, mountain reedbuck, common reedbuck, impala, grey rhebok, Sharpe's grysbok, waterbuck, blue wilderbeest, steenbok, nyala, kudu, tree squirrel, orbi, dwarf mongoose, slender mongoose, honey badger, white-headed vulture, secretary bird, martial eagle, wahlberg's eagle, african fish-eagle,barn owl and a 38 further species of birds.

We hadn't however realised quite how lucky we had been until we returned to the hostel and spoke to other people who had also done 5 day safaris (the same days of us). One group saw no big cats at all, and the other person who was on an organised tour saw leopard eyes a long way away at night and two lions about 200m away in the day and that was it. So, I'm not sure whether our love of Kruger is biased by how much we saw.

Genocide

2008-08-14T22:36:00.004+10:00

As our trip to Rwanda started with a visit to the genocide memorial of Kigali, so our last day in Rwanda included visits to two of the outlying genocide memorials. Both memorials were catholic churches prior to the genocide. As is generally the case churches were viewed as places of safety and thousands of people sought sanctuary at the various churches around Rwanda. For the perpetrators of the genocide this was seen only as a convenient way of getting people together so they could be killed. Each of the churches we went to had seen the massacre of over 5,000people and the mass graves out the back were the resting place for over 41,000. The exact number was not known as bodies are still being found as the trials continue. It is impossible to describe the emotion of being there and all three of us found our cheeks damp with tears. The saddest part is that the murderers and the victims were often neighbours and friends. The scale of the massare is difficult to fathom and the numbers are truly disturbing, but it is the individual stories that really tell the story. What follows is the story of our guide, Paul, I hope that I have done it justice.

Paul was 14 years old during the genocide. He had been brought up in a very religious household and was taught that he was a child of God and not a Hutu or a Tutsi. Indeed when he was taking his end of primary school exam and had to fill in on the form whether he was Hutu or Tutsi he didn't know so copied off his friend. Of course his friend was Hutu, whilst he was Tutsi so his page was ripped up and he had to fill it in again. Children that pass this exam were sent to government high schools, considered very good schools and paid for by the government. Despite being near the top of his class in primary school he was not accepted into the government run schools. One way of limiting the educational opportunities for Tutsi children. Luckily for him his uncle was headmaster at a Catholic school so he was able to continue to high school. In the years prior to the genocide there were killings going on and he recalled going out to the funerals of relatives but not really understanding what was happening.

Paul recalled on April 6th 1994 listening to the radio with his family when the announcement came that the presidents plane had been shot down and he was dead. He had a typical teenagers reaction of thinking it was good news as the school holidays were nearly ended and it would undoubtedly mean an extra week off school. His parents however did not share his excitement, knowing that this would not be good news, but obviously not aware of exactly what would happen. The next day a group came to their house on the pretext of looking for guns and lined the family up outside. A very close friend and neighbour (a Hutu) heard what was happening and came round to talk to the leader of the group. After the talks Pauls father was instructed to give them money, which luckily they had... so on day 1 money saved their lives. There was a meeting that night in which the list of people to be killed was read through. The neighbour came back and told them they had to leave. 5 of the children went with their mother to seek sanctuary in the church, his mother and 2 of the children were killed there. Paul went with his father and 2 other siblings into the forest to try and get out of Kigali that way. They hadn't understood that the genocide was country wide thinking it was confined to the cities. All the roads were blocked and identity cards (which identified ethnicity) were checked before you were allowed to pass. They were lucky though and managed to survive in the forest for 5 days, before being found by the RPF. It was four years later in 1998 that they were finally able to bury his mother and the two children who were killed. He is considered one of the lucky ones, he still has a father and brothers and sisters, many people don't.

News from home

2008-08-09T21:17:00.003+10:00

We've been having a lovely time relaxing at Lake Kivu in Rwanda, seeing the hot springs, swimming (avoiding the patches of lake which can asphixiate you) and peering over the border into the DRC. However, last night our sleep was interrupted by a phone call at 12:30am from my brother to announce the arrival of his daughter Elizabeth Honour Northcott (Beth). We are now auntie Ellen and uncle Jason!! Full of excitement I didn't get back to sleep until 4am... I can't wait to get home for a cuddle.... of course that has to wait a few more months. So, many congratulations to Geoff and Rachel and we want lots of photos!!

Trekking through mud

2008-08-08T05:06:00.001+10:00

We had one more day in Kigali exploring the different areas of town and visiting a natural history museum which is housed in Richard Kant's house, before heading to the Volcanoes National Park. One thing that was very striking is how clean Rwanda is. The other pleasant surprise is that the police do not carry around guns (of any size) compared with the machine guns seen in many other countries we've been to. We spent three days at the Volcanoes National Park with treks planned each day, so we expected to get very tired.

The first day was a trek to see the Golden Monkeys, supposed to be quite an easy walk. After our guide (Patience) informed us that the monkeys had moved and it would be a four hour hike there, we reached the monkeys before even entering the park proper observing them from the fields just outside. (Supposedly Patience was testing us to mae sure we really wanted to go). The monkeys were quite entertaining to watch jumping around in the bamboo... and at one point jumping on each other (although the female didn't seem to notice as she just kept eating before, during and after).

Day two was the much anticipated gorilla trek for Jason and I. There are only 750 mountain gorillas left in the world and we were very excited to have the opportunity of seeing them in the wild. In the morning of the trek you are assigned to groups based upon the difficulty of the trek the guides think you can manage. Jason and I were assigned to one of the intermediate groups (Umubano) that is supposed to be about a 1 and a half to 2 hour hike in the park. After walking through the fields towards the boundary of the park for about 20 minutes we met the trackers for the group. All the rain had encouraged the group down the mountain meaning we had a 10 minute hike through the forest before being able to spend 1 hour with the gorillas. Before you go you are informed that you should stay at least 7m from the gorillas at all times (although the gorillas are not aware of this rule)... in reality it was nearly impossible to get that far away from the gorillas. Generally we were about 2-3m away and at times closer. One of the babies seemed to think making the tourists move was great fun. The 8 of us were all standing in a group when the baby starting walking directly towards us, so the guides quickly moved us out of the way... and the baby changed direction heading towards the group, we moved, he followed. He didn't seem to want to touch us, just make us scramble out of the way. Once he tired of this game he started climbing on a tree, hanging upside down and fighting with his brother. We were also able to get incredibly close to the silverback. He hadn't moved from his nest that he slept in and went back to sleep whilst we were there after greeting the guides with some grunts. It was an incredible experience and we could happily have spent many more hours with the family getting to know them, but alas that's not allowed and so we headed back down the mountain.

On day three we were excited to finally get into the park!! We were pretty sure that Dian Fossey's grave would not have moved down the mountain. Initially we expected a 15minute walk to the park, then 2 hours in the park to the grave... however, because it had rained so much the guide decided to take us a different route walking for nearly an hour before making it to the park. We then scrambled over the wall and started up the volcano. Luckily for us it was only the three of us in the group, so we could go at our own pace without upsetting anyone. There was another group heading to the crater lakes, but 3 of those turned back before making it to the park and another 2 turned back shortly after overtaking us. There is really only one work to adequately describe this hike - mudddy!!! The 2 hour hike took us about 4 hours as even on flat sections we were incredibly slow trying to avoid sinking into the mud - we failed. By the end we were all caked in mud up to our knees and the inside of our shoes had filled with it. The walk was great fun and the gorilla graveyard although sad was interesting to see. By the end though we were all tired and hungry (having forgotten to take any snacks with us) and were looking forward to a few days of r and r on Lake Kivu.

Meeting with Andrew

2008-08-03T16:49:00.000+10:00

After settling into the luxury of the hotel, we then attempted to meet up with Andrew. We couldn't remember exactly what time his flight got in so we called down to reception a few times to see if he had arrived. At 8:30pm we finally found out he was there and tried to call his room from reception. Whilst we were waiting for him to pick up he arrived at reception in person. It turned out he hadn't looked for us as the tour company he had booked the trip with thought we were arriving at the airport and had driven there to pick us up. They even had an arrival time for us of 9:30pm which is quite impressive as we were coming overland.

After a sumptuous dinner, we headed off for bed (which had been turned down for us!).The next day we visited the genocide memorial, which was incredibly moving and deeply disturbing. There were very moving stories, skulls, bones, pictures and videos. They also had a very good exhibit detailing a few of the other genocides that have occured to drive home the point that this is not a one of occurance in one country but something human beings repeatedly do to each other and we need to learn how to prevent. The genocide has definitely not been forgotten here with motorcycle taxi drivers jackets bearing messages regarding it, and frequent messages seen along roadsides and in country towns. There is a definite feeling of Rwanda defined before the genocide and post the genocide.

The journey towards luxury

2008-08-02T04:42:00.000+10:00

Unfortunately the journey wasn't particularly luxurious at all. In anticipation of meeting up with my uncle Andrew and travelling with him in Rwanda for two weeks staying in his choice of hotel rather than our normal what's the cheapest we can find approach, we had camped basically every night in Uganda. Unlike in southern Africa where camping was usually accompanied by excellent toilets and showers in Uganda they were generally smelly pit toilets and cold showers. To put it bluntly we smelt... and were covered with dust as well. It probably didn't help that the minibus from the border to Kigali was an over crowded minibus with a whole bunch of other smelly people, requiring open windows ensuring a final layer of dust over everything. Our bags were strapped to the top of the bus and so had both achieved a brown coating by the time we disembarked. Not wanting to be total slobs we did opt for a taxi from the bus station to the hotel, rather than the cheaper boda-boda (motorbike taxi). Still, when we got out at the Kigali Serena where we were staying with Andrew noone rushed to help us with our bags, instead we got some rather strange looks.

The reception was however able to be convinced that we were actually staying there and replacing our backpacks we headed up to see our room..... and WOW!!!! Amazing. We weren't even willing to touch anything in our state of disrepair. After showers... with a shower door!! and a bathmat!! we dressed in the fluffy bathrobes whilst we set about doing a load of washing in the bath.... just to give us something clean to change into. After that we had another shower. In fact from being in a state of 'No, can't face a cold shower today'.... we are having 3 showers and a bath a day. Never has it felt so good to be clean.

Lake Bunyoni

2008-08-01T04:25:00.000+10:00

From Kampala we decided to head for Lake Bunyoni, which is quite near the border of Rwanda. Perhaps stupidly we went to the bus station the day before to find out what time we needed to arrive the next day. For about 1km around the bus station the streets were packed and chaotic to say the least and the bus station appeared to be something made out of nightmares. We did find someone who was wearing a jacket proclaiming him to be a guide for the bus station who told us we needed to be there at 6am the next day. Little did we realise that in Uganda buses don't have a departure time, they just leave when full... so the 6am was just a suggestion not a compulsory time to come. So we organised at large expense a taxi to pick us up at 5:30am and set our alarm for 4:15am to give us time to pack up the tent and all our belongings in the dark. (We have discovered that by using all our clothing we can make quite a nice pillow - but packing up does take a bit longer).

We arrived at the bus station tired and mildly disorientated to find the entire area empty and really quite peaceful at that time of day. Our taxi driver handed us over to another person wearing one of those guide jackets and we were led to a bus (accompanied by a couple of other people)paid our money and were given tickets that read Kampala to Kabale. There was only one other person on the bus which wasn't promising, so we settled in for a long wait. After about 20 minutes I decided to go stand outside the bus and stretch my legs. As per normal I was immediately approached by about 5 guys who started talking to me and asking where I was going. When I told them Kabale I was promptly informed that we were on the wrong bus. After much talking to everyone I could find and just a hint of tears as I explained we had paid all our money for the bus fair and now wouldn't be able to afford the bus ticket for the right bus I was taken to the bus station bouncer. This was a big African dressed all in black who was slouched by the entrance to the bus station. The situation was explained by my 10 supporters to him, I handed over my tickets and the group of us went to find the ticket seller for the bus we were on. Whilst the 10 guys who were helping me yelled, abused and shouted at this guy the bouncer just held out our tickets and kept getting into his personal space. Within another couple of minutes we had our money and were seated on what everyone in the bus stop assured us was the bus to Kabale. (During all this palava Jason had remained hidden on the bus, figuring as a lone girl I would get more help than if he was with me... undoubtedly an accurate assessment).

The bus journey was long, but otherwise uneventful. At the other end we joined up with the other two tourists on the bus to get a taxi to the Lake. There we met up with 5 more and the 9 of us headed off in a motorboat to the island. This led to a very enjoyable few days camping by the lake, eating too much food and reading. There was also the memorable vodka and amarula night when we played 'This is how I bang my stick'.... but I guess the details of that aren't really necessary.

A minor rerouting

2008-07-26T23:38:00.000+10:00

We arrived in Kampala with an urgent need... to sort out air tickets. We had just recieved an email informing us that our flight from Kigali would now be leaving from Entebbe instead. With such scant information we urgently wished to get to South African Airways to find out how they could just decide that we would leave from a different country to what we had originally booked.
Arriving in Kampala at Red Chilli Backpackers, on the free rafting bus, we set up our tent for the first time in darkness, this turned out to be easier than finding a clear space between the tents already set up at the backpackers. The guard dogs kindly guarded our tent for the small fee of a chew of our thongs.
The next morning we made a bee line straight for the SAA office, where we were informed that SAA no longer flew from Rwanda, hence the change, however a flight and accomadation with food, would be provided but it would have to be issued by the SAA office in Kigali, Rwanda. Feeling a bit more releaved (a warning not to leave the Rwandan office till it is all sorted out preventing a total relaxation), we wondered why our travel agent couldn't have provided a few more details.
With that out of the way we had the opertunity to explore Kampala some more, we found the Garden City a wonderful mall obviously aimed at the Expats and tourists, the food including meat looked and smelt safe and wonderful, there was even a variety of cheese in the deli.
We had our first steak in 3 months at a butchery that also functioned as a restraunt, steak was never more appreachiated.

Dirt, rain and white water

2008-07-25T17:38:00.003+10:00

Arriving in Bujagali Falls we signed up for an evening of quad biking along the banks of the river nile, ending with dinner in a local village. This was a heap of very muddy fun... although it was a little disconcerting stopping at each of the rapids on the way to be shown where the white water rafting is done. The dinner consisted of 6 different types of carbohydrate, beans and cabbage... but was surprisingly nice. It was also fun sitting in a locals house with her five kids eating by lantern light due to the lack of electricity, with a TV for decoration. The kids were sweet and as with all Africa kids treated us to some songs.

The next day we went back out into a different village to watch a movie. There's a charity organisation here called 'Soft Power' which sets up schools and medical centres and one of their fund raising activities is to have a weekly movie. They have a generator to power the laptop and projector, as again there's no electricity in the villages. This week it was Blood Diamond and it was a really moving experience watching it in Africa and we're both sure that our response to the movie was very different than it would have been back home. There were only four mzungus there the rest of the audience being local(primarily young children) and we were really disturbed by the laughter that was their reaction to all the violence and women and children getting shot.

The highlight though and the main reason that people generally come to Bujagali falls is for the white water rafting on the Nile. This was terrifying at least in the lead up. We had watched the DVD from the trip that ran the day before, and even Jason started to wonder if this was a sane thing to do. The day started with breakfast whilst we listened to the guides be briefed on all the important things (like, please put on your shorts before you leave so that we don't have to wait around for you?!) It was a bit like listening to a school teacher berate naughty children and did little for our confidence. We then piled into two buses and a couple of trucks and headed for the Nile.

After a few practice paddles, turning left and right we started to approach the first rapid and were promptly told to jump out to swim through it. The 7 of us in the boat looked at each other wondering if he was joking (Our guide was called Alex, but quickly got nicknamed Jaffar as his evil laugh distinctly reminded us of the evil villain in Aladdin). It turns out he wasn't joking and so we all swam through the first rapid. After clambering (or being yanked into the boat for those of us with no arm muscles... all but 2) back into the boat he promptly flipped it, so we'd know what that felt like too. At this point he was not our favourite person!!! Eventually we reached the first 'real' rapid of the day, meaning a grade 5 - the hardest grade that is allowed to be commercially rafted. The rapids here are totally different to those that we rafted in New Zealand. There it was about the height of the fall, here it is the volume of water and the waves!! You head down the rapid to be met at the bottom by a wall of water which the boat then attempts to go over or through... consequently it is quite common to get flipped out. In the course of the day we were only flipped once which felt like quite an achievement! The best rapid was Silverback which consists of four seperate waves. The first is actually two diagonal waves which meet in a point, we hit this dead on and the boat went completely verticle, we all thought that we were going over and to avert this Jason who was sitting in the front lent forward over the top of the boat to try and bring the bow back down (it worked). There is this amazing shot on the DVD of the bottom of the boat and Jason (from about the waist up) coming out over the top. Of course today he is complaining about the massive bruise on his chest from when we came back down and he slammed into the boat.

The Migration

2008-07-20T16:17:00.000+10:00

Well, after much debate we decided to head into the Masai Mara for two nights, primarily in the hope of seeing the migration. THere were huge differences in how the safari was organised compared to in Tanzania. The company (Best Camping Safaris) has it's own camp site just outside the park and it felt a bit like being on school camp, particularly at meal times. We didn't have our own driver for the whole trip either, swapping between groups (probably as we had booked such a short safari). IT was however a lot of fun, and we did manage to see the migration. Imagine plain after plain after plain of zebra and wilderbeest, with a few other animals thrown in. Amazing! We also realised that in all the game drives we've done in Zambia, Tanzania and Kenya we've only had one where we didn't see lions!! We've seen male lions and prides of lions with cubs of all ages. We've even seen a male and female happily snuggled up by a lake following more strenuous activities.

This is our last tour type safari although we are looking forward to doing a self-drive safari in Kruger before heading home.

I suppose I should also quickly mention Nairobbery... I mean, Nairobi. This is definitely the most modern city we've been in in Africa (apart form Pretoria/J'berg) but it is also the first place since Pretoria/J'berg that we have felt unsafe and been warned about carrying anything even in daylight. Due to this we rushed through with only one night before the safari and one after. Because we were rushing we were unable to get on the royal coach (think business class seats, movies, drinks) and had to settle for executive class (think overcrowded, broken windows, rattling unidentified bits), but it was worth it to get to Uganda and a slower pace of life in Jinja (think country NSW).

The big five and more...

2008-07-15T18:16:00.004+10:00

Although we had done a few game drives previously, this really felt like our first 'real' safari. We had booked a 5 day/4 night trip to Lake Manyara, Serengeti and Ngorongoro Crater. There were 5 of us on the trip, an Italian (Paulo) who was traveling for one week whilst his wife and child stayed at home and an engaged couple from the Netherlands who were here on a three week holiday (spending as much in 3 weeks, as we have in 3 months).

The food on the trip was amazing! We had our own cook, Isaac, who kept even Jason full (although it only took the group one day to start teasing Jason about how much he eats!!) We ate better on this trip, than we have at any other point in Africa.

The parks were all very different. The scenery in Lake Manyara was beautiful and we saw large numbers of animals all together. Beautiful and green, lush forests with lots of little creeks running through it. Serengeti was amazingly empty, which surprised us. The sheer expanse of grassy plains as far as the eye can see, broken by the occasional acacia tree. The highlight of the serengeti was definitely the leopard that walked so close to the car that we could touch it (don't worry, we didn't). It was amazingly graceful and beautiful... the photos just don't do it justice. We also saw a three cheetahs, the first we saw was a mother with 4 cubs, who were playing, jumping and leaping. At one point they decided to have a little run, and boy do they turn into blurs!! Lastly we went to Ngorongoro crater, where we completed the big 5 by seeing a rhino. We also came across a pride of lions (2 females and 5 cubs) sitting in the middle of the road. Unfortunately the driver was not happy to sit and wait with them (which we wanted to do), as when we came back 30 minutes later they had killed a warthog and were happily munching away. Well, the cubs were eating anyway, with much snarling and growling as they fought over the best bits.

We enjoyed the safari so much, we are now debating whether to go to the Masai Mara as well in the hope of seeing the migration. Ah, decisions, decisions.

To the land of touts

2008-07-08T17:48:00.000+10:00

We had had many warnings about Arusha and the persistent touts trying to sell you safaris. We were thus prepared with our response of "Already booked and paid with Shidolya Tours". As we disembarked the bus we were immediately approached with offers of tours and accommodation, so we quickly adjusted our response to include already booked and paid for accommodation too. Walking quickly we found our hotel and decided to give it a go for the night. It was however rather overpriced at 20,000tsh for a dodgy foam mattress, shared squat toilet that was rather smelly by the next morning and a shared shower, so we decided to check out a few others and moved two doors down to a room with proper mattress, private western bathroom and tv for 25,000tsh.... the main difference being the first place was in the guidebook, the second place isn't, so prices are more reasonable.

Surprisingly on our day looking for safaris in Arusha we were not approached by a single tout. Very strange!! Maybe word had got around that we were taken. Booking was very easy, as we had been recommended a tour company by a couple of other travellers and knew the right price and what that included. So we were all organised by 10am and proceeded to head to the Rwanda tribunal.

We were both very interested to go to the tribunal as we will be heading to Rwanda in a few weeks. This is the United Nations tribunal for the 1994 Rwandan genocide which was established in 1995 and you are able to go and watch proceedings. Witnesses are naturally protected, so you can't see them but it was still interesting to see how the hearing works. Very slowly is one way to put it (not surprising as it's been going for 13 years!! There was 15 minutes discussion on when to take a 15 minute break at one point. It took awhile for us to figure out what was going on - we were listening to the defense interrogate a witness. We hope to go back once we've done our safari and hear some more.

Getting back on the horse again.

2008-07-07T17:36:00.000+10:00

Or in reality, the bus. After our hellish experience in Ethiopia we were both dreading the bus trip from Dar Es Salaam to Arusha... so much so we did actually vaguely consider flying. But, at some point we would have to return to buses so we thought sooner was better than later. So, we both drugged up on travel sickness tablets and prepared for another 9 hours of hell....

Fortunately, Tanzanian buses are a world away from Ethiopian buses. There were only four seats across.. .and they were actual seats rather than a bench. Plus, there was enough leg room that our knees were still attached at the end of the journey. Then the road, ah the marvelous tarmac road!!! So, we enjoyed the view, actually ate something at the lunch stop (we never managed to eat on Ethiopian buses), and used the toilets at all the stops without gagging. In Ethiopia there was one stop a day and the toilets were vastly inferior to squatting in the bush as people tended to use the floor whilst they were waiting and none of them flushed. In contrast we had 3 stops on the 9 hour journey and all toilets worked, had toilet paper and soap to wash your hands!!!! We were also incredibly lucky to have a perfectly clear view of Mt Kilimanjaro on the way past (usually being so high it is obscured by clouds), which was quite stunning and reinforced the fact that we have no desire to climb it.

Paradise in Africa

2008-07-04T21:10:00.000+10:00

We had an absolutely amazing relaxing time on Zanzibar, and ended up spending nearly twice as long as planned. We spent a week at the beach where the most strenuous thing we did was an all day snorkeling trip. The snorkeling was fabulous, with some very interesting fish. Then we sailed back on the dhow to our beach resort, ah...heaven.

After a week we decided to head back to Stonetown to explore a little bit. The main thing here was a spice tour. The spice farms were not at all what we expected, seeming more like how you would grow plants in your backyard. The vanilla (which is a vine)was grown using acacia trees, or whatever else was around. Cardamon grew in the shade of clove trees. We tried all sorts of fresh herbs: ginger, clove, pepper, cinnamon, cardamon etc. Also fruits, where my favourite was undeniably the cocoa!!! The flesh is white and surrounds the beans, you don't chew only suck (this was said very firmly) and the taste was very like mangosteens. We now have lots of photos of us eating cocoa fruit.

On a more serious note we were taken to the slave cave where hundreds and thousands of slaves were held after slavery became illegal. They were dumped down into the cave to await a boat, when it arrived they were taken through a tunnel to the beach for boarding to be shipped around the world.

The great escape

2008-06-29T01:36:00.002+10:00

Now, let me say first off that I loved Ethiopia. It is the most fascinating country I have been to, with an incredibly distinct culture and history. But it was a tiring country. After surviving the 2 day bus journey I came down with a second lot of travellers diarrhea and this one continued for days. So rather than going to the south of the country as planned, we decided we had to get out. Jason spent a couple of days doing the walk to the Hilton (for the airline office) whilst I lay around feeling sorry for myself. Meanwhile we also visited the hospital in an attempt to find out what was wrong, and get some antibiotics.... this proved a useless exercise with the high point being when the doctor asked in stilted English "Do you have a fever?" - I don't know! Maybe you could check???! With only two more days to wait until the flight, we decided I would live and hopefully Tanzanian medical care would be more helpful. So on Monday 23rd we set off from 18 degree weather in Addis in the middle of summer, landing in 30degree weather in winter in Tanzania. Ah, how good it was!

Feeling bouyed by escaping Ethiopia we quickly purchased a ticket to Zanzibar and were soon on a tropical island paradise! We heard lots of warnings about the touts in Zanzibar from other travellers, but after Ethiopia where spending 60seconds without being hassled was cause for celebration we hardly noticed there were any here. Also, antibiotics are available over the counter. Luckily my ill stomach seems to have remained in Ethiopia and we are now firmly ensconced on a beautiful white sandy beach beside azure waters, with nothing more to do than complain about the hideous prices. (Bit of a shock from eating for $2 a meal, going to $10 each!!) I think we'll be here awhile...

Two days of self imposed torture

2008-06-18T01:29:00.000+10:00

Now, if you are ever considering should you spend $10 for 2 days on the bus from Lalibela to Addis Ababa or should you spend the $120 for the flight, I'll make it simple for you - fly!!! Why are you even considering two days on the bus. Unfortunately for us, no one shared this wisdom and after much debate we decided to do the bus trip. Why???? Why????? Why????? It was two days of pure hell. The road was as windy as a pile of cooked spaghetti and a bumpy dirt track to boot. What made this worse was that Ethiopians have weak stomachs and every other person on the bus was throwing up. The plastic bags were going up and down the aisle at lightening speed. This is before you consider that being Ethiopia there is about 5cm of leg room so your knees are decapitated and they fit 5 people across each row (with people in the aisle as well, despite the fact this is illegal).

Day one of this was hellish, but it's even worse when after a nights sleep in a flea infested hotel (for $4) you have to force yourself to get up at 4am, queue with two hundred people for the gates to the bus station to open, push past women and children to avoid being trampled in the rush to your bus only to do it all again. I never thought I would be so grateful to see an African city in my life, but Addis looked beautiful!!

Gondar gut... and those castles as well.

2008-06-09T20:31:00.001+10:00

It's been awhile since we've updated the blog, partly because ehtiopian internet doesn't like blogspot. We've now remembered that we can email blogs in... but we can't edit the times and dates, so these will be appearing out of order, my apologies. Hopefully we can fix it up in Tanzania.

We have now been in Africa for 2 months and I suppose it's only fair that one of us got food poisoning in that length of time, but it doesn't feel fair at all. We have been eating a lot more local food in Ethiopia and due to not being able to either speak or read Amharic a lot of time we convey 'no fish' and leave the rest up to chance. In this way we ate a quite nice local dinner our first night in Gondar, it was injera (big sour pancake thing that all food is served on and eaten with) with some meat thing (don't ask what type of meat I don't know). It was very tasty and enjoyable but I spent the next two days with liquid gushing out of both ends, which we've named the Gondor gut (this beat out Ethiopian evacuation as the name).

So despite this being our fourth day in Gondor it is the first day that we have really explored. This is a really lovely town, built around the old crumpling walls of 17th century palaces and churches which are still in use from the same era. In the 250 years that Gondar was the capital of Ethiopia there were 7 castles built within an area the size of a couple of city blocks. It was a very different experience to see these castles in the middle of Africa, as goats graze within the compound walls, people mow the lawns with sickles, and the streets around the outside teem with people, taxis, minibuses, donkeys and horse drawn carts. Not to mention the touts (everyone one of whom has two people wanting to go to the simien mountains tomorrow!).

The other very noteworthy thing about Ethiopia is that it is the birthplace of coffee, and so the cafe culture is king. There are hundreds of little cafes serving excellent coffee and cakes and nothing else (this has led to some slight embarrassment as tables have been vacated for us in what we assumed was a packed restaurant at dinner time, to discover they don't serve food). It has however been fun eating cake again!!

Get the name you always wanted with the new y7mail email address.

Oh my gosh it's a mattress!!!

2008-06-08T21:10:00.000+10:00

Ok, so maybe this wasn't the most interesting thing about Bahir Dar, but when you've been sleeping on foam for two months (3cm when camping, and about 10cm in hotels) a real mattress is an absolute treat, and led to some excellent nights sleep.

The real draw card of Bahir Dar though is the various monastries which are found on islands on Lake Tana. Everyone in Bahir Dar either seems to have a boat or a minibus and depending which either wants to take you onto the lake or to Gondar. We decided to just go through our hotel and organised a half day on the lake with three girls we had met from Israel. This however doesn't include the entry fee for each monastry and aftre the first couple we began to feel they were a bit similar. You would never guess from the outside that these round mud brick buildings are churches built in the 14th century (although the roof had to be replaced with tin as water was leaking through destroying the paintings). Inside our beautiful paintings depicting various biblical scenes, some of which are definitely unique to Ethiopia. The one where some saint is using a snake to climb a building was certainly interesting.

As after a couple o fthese churches all five of us felt they were remarkably similar we decided to us e the boat to trip to see the start of the nile (the blue nile, the white nile starts in Uganda), which was a very pretty area.

The other nice thing about Bahir Dar was being adventurous with the food, and trying some interesting dishes. Possibly I'm biased because of what came later, but I'm just not that much of a fan of Ethiopian food.

Is that a goat?... no, it's a whole herd of goats

2008-06-02T20:51:00.000+10:00

We arrived in Addis Ababa on May 31st. We were a little worried about getting the visa as everything we'd read said you can only get a 30 day visa and stupidly our flight out was 32 days away. But we decided to give it a go and ask at the visa office... we're not sure she understood exactly what we wanted, but we were given 3 month visas for the same cost as the 1 month without any fuss whatsoever.

Addis Ababa can be summed up quite well by the sight of a herd of goats crossing a ten lane highway in the middle of a city of 3 million people.Where they were going I'm not sure. Despite the size of the road there were not that many cars, and a lot of transport was done using packmules, ox/cow/donkey/horse drawn carts.

Addis is probably one of the safer African cities, and despite needing to be aware of petty theft violent crime is pretty much unheard of. Instead the city is full to bursting with beggars, which was a little overwhelming. However, these do not necessarily target foreigners, rather everyone gives what they can. It is an amazingly religious country and priests (or something similar) abound blessing people as they are touched on the forehead by an ornate wooden cross which they then kiss).

We are beginning to feel a little homesick, or at least missing the peace and quiet of a park or just anywhere you can be alone and not hassled, approached, talked to etc. We hadn't realised how much until we went to the Sheraton to use the ATM and ended up spending an hour sitting in the peaceful garden without being approached once!!

From there we attempted the journey to Bahir Dar. We were assured this would be an 11 hour bus journey (the worry being Ethiopian buses are not allowed to travel after dark so if it took too long we could get stranded somewere for the night). Up at 4:30am we were on the bus soon after 5am and on our way shortly after sunrise or 6am, or 12 o'clock local time... but lets not go there.(Ok, just briefly time here is such that sunrise is 12 o'clock, and sunset or 6pm is also 12 o'clock. This I could possibly cope with but locals know what farangi time is so you never know which time is being quoted at you). We were stopped just outside Addis for a check point. We think they were checking for bombs or something (due to the fact they spent quite awhile under the bus and went through everyone's bags). Jason was on the top of the bus opening his bag for the police, when searching a different bag they found 'something' and Jason was nearly thrown from the roof. It was not promising when the bus reversed up a side street and a few policeman with rather large guns (rifles I assume) boarded and made sure everyone stayed sitting and quiet. (This was a painful prospect due to the fact the gap between the seats was 5cm too short for my legs, and about 15cm too short for Jason... kneecaps being slowly amputated by the seat in front is not particularly fun). There were however moments of hilarity as one of the policeman fancied himself as a comedien and frequently had the bus in stitches, before becoming serious and scaring them into submission. No one felt a need to translate any of this for us though. The only English translation we got was "No problem", to which we asked then why have we been sitting here for 3 hours!!! The police did occassionally target individuals and take them off for questionning, they also checked everyone's ID (Except ours). Evetually they picked on one person to stand up and then started beating him off the bus, onto the ground where they kicked him about a bit more. Obviously convinced he was the owner of the mystery bag.It turned out that there was a gun in his bag.We were then on our way to Bahir Dar.

We saw many interesting sights, amazing views, armoured tanks and local villages. Surprisingly we made it to Bahir Dar that day although about 1 hour after sunset and as the lights of the town became visible a spontaneous standing ovation was given by the bus passengers, making us think we weren't the only ones worried about a night in the middle of nowhere

Why Camping is fun in Africa (Or why a tent is very reassuring)

2008-05-30T23:47:00.003+10:00

Having done quite a bit of camping now in africa, I feel that we are starting to really see the benifits of that extra volume and mass in the bags. Not only is camping usually cheaper it has some very special benifits (Photos will follow at a later stage)

Turning up to accomadation without booking. Having done this at Myoka Village in Malwi, having the tent when you are told there are no rooms left and dark is falling is very reassuring
Great Views. Some of the places we have camped can only be experienced, already we have been on the shores of lake Malwim with lapping water a gorgeous sunset and just a nice place to sleep, up a tree by South Lawanga National Park waiting for animals to pass underneith, or on the ground with hippos munching beside the tent. And it still could get better as the trip goes on.
Facilities. This may seem odd, but places that you camp often have much nicer showers, more likely to be hot and toilets more likely to be clean, than in some of the cheap hotels or hostels we've seen or heard of, sometimes you even get a view from your shower.
Emergency Bedding. While we haven't yet resorted to setting up our tent in a room we have booked, we have considered it upon seeing the rooms, the sleep mats and insect proof fly look mighty reasuring and may well be used yet!

So taking our tent has been most comforting.

The top of the world... or at least Malawi

2008-05-27T22:08:00.000+10:00

Following a very relaxing week in Nhkata Bay we decided to head to Livingstonia. This is an area with a rich colonial history and being on the top of a mountain, fabulous views. It is however a little off the tourist circuit so can be difficult to get to. However, we were incredibly lucky and getting off the minibus at the turn off there was a truck waiting (to try and get some paying passengers) to go up the hill. It's about 15km which would be a very long walk up hill with packs on. The view from the top was jaw dropping, with mountains heading down to the lake. After winding our way up 20 hairpin bends we reached Mushroom Farm. Our room was a simple A-frame which was totally open on the side facing the view, absolutely stunning!!

The next day we walked the 8km into town where exploring all the sites and doing some shopping took about 1 hour (although it was interesting all the same) and it was quite strange seeing all these colonial buildings in Africa. We also walked to the waterfall, and found the cave where locals hid from slave traders (this is behind the falls, so a bit wet and muddy). It was a beatiful area and very different from anywhere else we've travelled in Africa.

Getting down again was a bit trickier and we ended up walking the whole way. In 3 and a half hours on the road we saw one car going downhill and it was full. By the end we were exhausted and collapsed at the bottom, without even enough energy to find ourselves a drink. Also, the passing minibuses were full so we ended up hitching - which was the best trip yet. We went with a local man in a very plush rental car, which even had seatbelts!!! We each had are own seat and only one bag around our feet, what luxury. He was incredibly nice and drove us all the way to our hotel (despite the fact this was one town further on than he was going) and refused to accept any money. Blissful.

Sun, swimming... but no salt

2008-05-23T19:38:00.002+10:00

This is just a quick update to let you know about the last week we've spent in Malawi. We are in a beautiful place called Nhkata Bay on Lake Malawi. We weren't sure when we left home if we would swim in the lake due to bilharizia but supposedly none as ever been found in this area so we are making full use of the lake. We are staying in our own chalet which is right on the water so we are lulled to sleep by the sound of waves lapping against the rocks each night. In the morning we sit on our balcony eating breakfast and enjoying the view. There is good snorkelling just by the room and we really feel like we're on holiday here... and are dreading the next bus trip so we keep extending our stay. It's also the first country that feels cheap!! So in a week we have only spent $150 for the two of us and we are in the nicest room yet, and have been partaking of the massive buffet dinners each night. About 100m in front of Mayoka (where we are staying) there is a raft, so everyone just swims our there lies in the sun to dry off and swims back to shore. What a life!

The best laid plans

2008-05-16T00:24:00.003+10:00

We had planned this morning to catch the minibus to Chipata spend a night and head to Malawi tomorrow using two taxis and a minibus... but that's not quite what happened. To catch the minibus you have to leave at 4:45am, which meant waking up at 4am to pack up the tent. This went well, and we avoided the hippos who were still munching. But, before we made it into town where the minibus leaves from we ran into a ute (lorry - sized) going to Chipata leaving immediately - so the 6 of us who were heading that way jumped into the back and were on our way. The ute makes money by giving lifts to people so we soon had around 15 people in the back and were partially deafened from the horn which he used to announce his presence. We were however in Chipata before 9am much earlier than expected, so decided to press on for Malawi (It would have been even earlier but we got stopped by the police, so it took some time to come to a suitable bribe to get the car keys back).

We took a share taxi to the border with 4 people on the back seat, 2 on the passengers seat and 2 in the drivers! After an easy border crossing we decided to ask the tourists who were ahead of us in the queue for a lift. So rather than another taxi and minibus we were driven in what felt like absolute luxury!! I also began to learn Afrikaans from the 4 year old boy I was sitting beside who couldn't understand why I couldn't talk properly.

Next stop Nhakata Bay... we think! (Gosh, up to date... been awhile since that's been the case)

Hippos, hippos everywhere

2008-05-16T00:06:00.003+10:00

Flatdogs camp where we spent much of the past week is right outside the national park gates of South Luangwa National Park. As such any animals seen in the park can be seen at the campsite. Hippos are particularly prominent with around 200 visible at any point from the campsite. My new theory is that the reason hippos kill more people in Africa than any other animal is not due to their ferocity but just sheer numbers of them and the fact that the campsites are set up in the middle of their feeding ground. After dark you are supposed to have a night watchman with you to help you avoid the hippos, elephant or whatever else is around... but frequently it was just you and your little headtorch hoping not to get trodden on. The last two nights we camped on the ground very close to the river and the sound of a hippo eating next to your head is a little disturbing - and then I turned on the torch to have a look at it seeing as how I wasn't sleeping anyway only to startle it and see a stampeding hippo. Elephants were also fairly common in the campsite and surprisingly quiet (unlike those hippos who never shut up and can be heard 3km away). So quiet in fact that the first time we saw them in camp they were about 3m behind Jason and he didn't hear them. As I was walking towards him and called out elephants he started coming towards me to find them not realising all he had to do was turn around. The other highlight was the tower of 17 giraffes (tower is the name for a group of giraffes) that came into camp one day. We missed the day the four lions came into camp and as we were leaving this morning we found out that leopards come in most mornings to chase the baboons outside the chalets!!!! And the watchman didn't think to mention this until this morning! ARGH! Oh well, we are yet to see a leopard, but here's hoping.

We went on three game drives at South Luangwa and all were amazing in their own way. Just being in Africa and watching impala, puku, zebra, giraffe etc from metres away is incredibly special. But some of the main highlights were:
- watching two 3 month old lion cubs playing whilst the rest of the pride slept on unawares.
- hearing the angry trumpet call of an elephant. The guide stopping turning off the engine and the angry elephant appearing through the trees 5m from the car (it was a mother protecting her baby). She didn't look very happy and took a few menacing steps towards us, whilst the 6 of us encouraged our guide to turn the engine back on and be ready to go - he ignored us. Then another trumpet call and she charged... stopping a little bit short. The guide remained relaxed whilst the rest of us were convinced we were about to die. She charged one more time before withdrawing and only once she was out of sight did the guide start the engine again.
- hearing a male lion roaring into the night and then finding him,
- all the baby animals - hippos, elephants, zebra, giraffe etc.
- coming across a buffalo on foot (the only animal the ranger had ever had to shoot) and having him stand up and watch us whilst the guide and ranger tried to stop us taking photographs to get to safety.
- seeing a dazzle of zebra, tower of giraffes, raft of hippos, parade of elephants, obstinance of buffalo (ok, we didn't actually see the last, but I want to remember the terms).

We saw nearly everything South Luangwa has to offer, except the leopard so here's hoping we'll manage later.

Kasawa Village

2008-05-14T00:52:00.002+10:00

Flatdogs is a beautiful campsite and we pitched our tent up in the trees (they have wooden platforms) and spent our days doing laundry, sitting by the pool watching hippos in the river and doing game drives. But I'll write more about that later as we have another game drive tomorrow.

After much deliberation we decided to spend a night in a traditional village. We were a bit worried that this would be incredibly touristy, but wanted to see more of Africa than just animals. It was about a 40 minute drive away mostly over a dirt track that passed by numerous villages and crossed a couple of rivers (we saw a tractor get stuck at one of these crossings). Eventually we reached the village of Kasawa where we were greeted by the head teacher at the school.

The school has 804 students who come from approximately 250 villages in the area. The children attend school in batches as there are not enough teachers for all the children at once, so the children will attend school in the morning and then in the afternoon do sport or clean up the town or learn how to work in the fields. This is despite the fact that the school is better off than most due to the tourism project they run. The government only pays for 14 teachers, and the income from tourism pays for another 9. They also use the money to buy books, equipment and generally improve facilities. For this reason we were told everyone in the area is always very happy to see 'mzungus' as by visiting we are helping all 250 villages.

As soon as we were taken on a walk through some of the villages we realised how true this was. People were calling out to say hello and asking our guide 'Raphael' if they could meet us. We also had a line of children walking behind us who loved having their photos taken. The villages have no electricity or running water or much in the way of possessions but we were both struck by how genuinely happy everyone was. The children spent hours playing with old bike wheels, balls made out of plastic bags or just dancing away.

One of the highlights was meeting a traditional healer. She was very sick when she was a child and was told that this was because she was possessed and wanted to be a healer. After this she got better. She goes into a trance whilst reading the bible and is possessed by a spirit out of Eden, who is able to tell the person standing before her what is wrong. After this she is able to prescribe medication based on information given to her by the spirit in her dreams. It was fascinating to hear her talk, although as she had a toothache we were not able to stand before her. She did give Jason something that from the description is African viagra, whilst I was given the female version. She then proceeded to tell us that we must stay together till we die before sending us on our way.

In the evening we were treated to traditional dancing and singing. This was beautiful to watch and we were thoroughly entertained as within minutes of the drums starting a crowd had started to form. People from all the surrounding villages came running and children wore strips of chitembe fabric tied in the same manner of the dances and as the evening wore on they would emulate the dancers and join in the middle of the stage. Both Jason and I were invited to dance during the dance to celebrate a girl becoming a women (Jason wishing he could have done a different dance), but I think the children outshone us all. It was loud, bright and colourful and impossible to put into words but we couldn't keep the smiles off our faces.

Whilst we were there we attempted a few words in the local language, although every attempt was met with laughter. I attempted to cook Nshima (the local staple) although it was like trying to stir concrete after it's set. We also spoke to Orbi's mother who is blind but still cultivates her field and looks after her house. (Orbi was one of the guys who set up the project originally).

All in all this was an absolute highlight of the trip so far.

3 days of buses

2008-05-07T00:44:00.000+10:00

Well, we've come a long way in four days, from one side of Zambia to the other. On the 4th May we did the 8 hour bus journey to Lusaka. After spending a day looking around and buying a mobile phone (we were assured by other travellers it was a good idea... and it has since proved useful) we were on another bus (this time for 9 hours) to Chipata. We spent a night in a very dodgy hotel with no water (we hadn't realised this when we agreed on the room)... a drop toilet I can handle, a normal flushing toilet which isn't flushing due to the aforementioned no water issue is absolutely repulsive and disgusting. Luckily there were public toilets across the road so we paid to use those instead. On the plus side it was the cheapest night so far, being cheaper than any of the campsites we've used. The next day we were on the minibus bright and early (7am) but didn't leave until 11am, making it to Flatdogs camp at 3:30pm. There was seating for about 15 people on the minibus, but 30 people plus accompanying luggage (50kg bags of meal, clothes etc) all crammed together. The lady I was squished against spent the entire trip eating, although she did share some of the fruit with me (I'm not sure what it was, but it was very nice).

It's alright, we survived

2008-05-02T23:17:00.003+10:00

Now, before we get into what we did today let me just assure Mum and Dad (both lots) that we did check out the situation first. We talked to people who had been there and done that, we looked it over from the microlight and we stuck our heads over the border when we were at Vic Falls the other day... and just to make sure we had asked Penny (who is staying at the same place as us) to call the embassy if we didn't come back... but on to what we did.

Waking up at 5:30am (it was still dark!) we got in a taxi heading to the Zambian/Zimbabwean border post. When we got there, it hadn't opened yet so we spent 15 minutes watching the baboons attempt to break into the various trucks that were waiting to cross the border. At 6:30am we were stamped out of Zambia and crossed the border to a waiting minibus that took us the couple of kms to the Zimbabwean customs. We paid the $30 for the Zimbabwean visa and proceeded to drive through Victoria Falls town. The town is beautiful, and much better laid out than Livingstone. Despite the troubles it still seems cleaner with more structured manicured gardens. The shops were however decidedly empty and there was a horde of people waiting outside the bank even at that time of the morning.

But, we weren't actually here just so we could say we'd been to Zimbabwe, the real reason was so we could take some Lions for a walk. There were two lions Echo and Etosha and they were 12 month old brothers. We were each given a stick and informed that if they look like the want to play with you (by chewing on your leg or arm or some such) then you should try and get them interested in the stick instead. Other than that just stay out of their way and avoid being near the head area. At first they seemed a bit reluctant to go for a walk choosing to rub up against us and collapse on our legs whenever possible. Until one of the guides (George) decided to tease and get them to chase him. This was the best game ever and by the time we made it to the river the two lions were having a fabulous time running around, chasing buffalo dung balls and pouncing on each other (and George). It was definitely a unique experience, getting to touch and feel the muscles moving in a lion as it walks along. Lots of fun and we made it safely out of Zimbabwe without difficulty.

Labor Day

2008-05-01T11:09:00.000+10:00

Today was a quiet day for us, but big for the locals. We walked out our front door and within two minutes spotted this huge procession marching towards us. Uh oh, what was that our parents warned us not to do... that's right get caught up in marches or demonstrations. Turns out it was labor day and the march was for improved working conditions and social justice. Every business seemed to be represented and it went on for as far as the eye could see in both directions. We spent the rest of the morning at the Livingstone museum which was quite interesting, going through the history of man, Zambia, slavery and more. It also gave a rather strong view on the movement of people from the villages to the urban centres, with a couple of rooms dedicated to "our village" and "their town".

And then Vic Falls from the ground

2008-04-29T21:43:00.000+10:00

After the microlight we headed to the falls on foot. From Zambia you can only see a small portion of the falls and at the moment most of what you see is spray!! Although we were pre-warned it still is astounding to stand in what amounts to a torrential downpour on a beautiful cloudless day. The spray falls like rain, not coming horizontally as you might think, and it is heavier by far than most thunderstorms you encounter. You can see the edge of the rain and move in a couple of steps from nearly dry to absolutely soaking wet. To fully explore you are forced to go over a small bridge which is positioned such that you will be absolutely soaked!! (see photo) We did catch beautiful glimpses of the falls occasionally and there are rainbows in every direction due to the amount of water in the air.

Victoria Falls from the air

2008-04-29T10:00:00.000+10:00

Victoria Falls from the air
Originally uploaded by 80weeks

We spent the first day or so relaxing in Livingstone, doing the washing (ah, the joy of clean clothes!!) and doing some shopping (food is much more expensive here than Botswana so we decided to self-cater as much as possible). Our first dinner was 70,000K just ridiculous! Of course we did get 2 million out of the ATM, so it's probably not that bad, but still double what we were paying in Botswana... but the accommodation is cheaper, so we don't need to camp as much.

Our first splurge for Africa was on a microlight flight over the falls. We were up at 6:30am and after a couple of minutes were at the runway. It was absolutely amazing! We got dressed up in flight suits, which were a one size fits all (or none depending on how you look at it). Then after being strapped in we were up and away. As soon as we were in the air we could see the spray from the falls, which goes at least 250m up into the air. It is currently absolutely peak flow for Victoria Falls which means that the view isn't as good (the spray stops you being able to see the falls), but you really get the feel for the sheer quantity of water going over the falls.

The current falls are actually the 8th, and you can see the beginning of the 9th. As well as the beautiful gorges which are the remains of where the falls used to be. The slight gash which is the start of the 9th falls has taken 5,000 years and depending on which pilot you believe(mine or Jason's) in another 40,000 to 20,000 years the falls will be completely in the new location. The view was completely stunning from the microlight and I highly recommend it to anyone coming to the falls.

Another day, another African border crossing

2008-04-27T21:25:00.000+10:00

We had an early start this morning, primarily due to the three overland trucks that left by 6am with much calling out to each other, loud farewells etc. Unfortunately the kitchen didn't open until 7:30am and as we are supposed to eat something before taking the anti-malarials we hung around until then. But, it didn't open. So rather than waiting around for who knows how long until the kitchen opened and then the further 30 minutes it takes for them to make toast we decided to just start heading for the border and hope. A few minutes after we started walking a nice South African stopped and gave us a lift all the way to the ferry, driving past the 1km of waiting trucks right to the front. Bananas made for a quick breakfast and then we jumped on the ferry with about 10 other passengers (plus 1 truck and 1 ute - which explains why it takes a week to make the crossing).

The difference once we hit Zambia was obvious. We were instantly designated as money trees and approached from all sides by people wanting to show us their wares, sell us money or find us a taxi (even coming into the customs booth to ask what we needed). We forked out a ridiculous amount for the visa ($80 each!) and tried to find the official exchange bureau... but, it was Sunday and it was closed. So we ended up changing with one of the guys who was hanging around and quickly jumped in a taxi for Livingstone.

Arriving at Fawlty Towers was blissful, and the staff are the most competent yet.. nothing like the TV show. There is a beautiful garden with a nice pool, hot showers with good pressure and best of all, free pancakes everyday!! (The free internet helps too) So we decided to stay... and keep extending how long we are going to stay here.

Is that a scorpion?

2008-04-27T04:18:00.000+10:00

After a very bumpy truck ride we were happy to relax for a day in Kasane. We spent a couple of nights camping in what was obviously a popular overlander route - with at least 8 different trucks in the two nights we were there. Including one of absolutely insane people who were travelling for 9 months!!! They were generally older and had been doing a lot of bush camping as they went. The other trucks were younger and only the few older people on them were willing to talk to us. It was nice to talk to some other travellers about where we were going and what we should do there. We are getting used to camping, although the scorpion crawling over the tent (inside the fly, but outside the mesh) was a little disconcerting.

The highlight of our time in Kasane was a wildlife cruise into Choebe national park. We saw hundreds of elephants and a few other animals. The sunset was beautiful and it was a very relaxing way to spend an afternoon.

Kasane was also noteworthy for it's relatively cheap food... albeit slow. For breakfast one the first morning we asked for some toast (for about $1) and wondered how an earth it took 30 minutes to cook a piece of bread, especially as we were the only people eating! The next day we decided to forgo the breakfast as we were eager to get to Zambia... but that's another entry.

Why we should have got up an hour earlier.

2008-04-25T20:06:00.000+10:00

After our trip into the Okavango Delta we spent another night camping in Maun and enjoying a proper meal (the tinned peas and corn we had taken for dinner on the mokoro trip were less than inspiring) before attempting to get an early start for the long trip to Kasane. Unfortunately we didn't make it to the bus station until 8am (we were aiming for 7:30am) so we were on the 8:30 bus to Nata. We arrived in Nata at around midday and were pointed to the petrol station where the buses to Kasane leave from. Asking around we were quickly told that we had missed the Kasane bus, but we could ask around for a lift. Although hitch hiking in Botswana is supposed to be safe we stood around debating whether to just find somewhere to pitch the tent for the night and take the bus the next day. As Jason was trying to find someone to ask what time the bus to Kasane comes so we knew when to get there the next day he was approached by one of the locals who had heard that we needed to get to Kasane, and offered us a lift on the back of his truck for the same price as the bus tickets.

The back of the truck was filled with furniture and spare tyres and we were told to sit on a metal cupboard for the trip. We had been warned previously by a group of overlanders in Maun that the road between Kasane and Nata was pot hole filled and probably the back of a truck was not the most comfortable way to go! We did see a large herd of elephants beside the road and at one point had to wait while a big bull elephant got off the road. Altogether the trip was long (4 hours!), bumpy and very windy... but fun all the same. We were dropped at Thebe camp site where we decided to spend a couple of nights to recover from the journey. Never has a sleeping mat felt so good on our very sore backs.

Will it float?

2008-04-24T23:45:00.000+10:00

Our trip into the Okavango Delta was of the budget variety. This meant going into the Eastern Delta close to the buffalo fence (which separates wild animals from cattle to prevent the spread of foot and mouth disease), so we were warned by everyone involved that we were not likely to see many animals, but that it would be a chance to see the delta and the bird life. The other aspect of a budget trip is that it is self-catering. This means taking not only all your food, but also your tent, sleeping bag and anything else you want... they provide the transport and a guide.

So, the morning of the tour we got into the open safari vehicle to be transferred to the mokoro station. There were 8 of us going in, but only Jason and I were staying overnight. It took about 2 hours to get to the buffalo fence and soon after passing through we spotted the first wildlife. Zebra!! Then some giraffe. These were quite a way off but still exciting. We were also eagerly following elephant tracks down the sandy road, but by the time we reached the village to pick up a guide we still hadn't caught up to the elephants. At the village there was much discussion and talk between the locals to decide who would be poling (there are 2 people to a mokoro so we needed 4 guides/polers). Once they were sorted we continued down to the mokoro station... although maybe that's an overstatement. There was a bit of shore with what looked like a few logs in it... our mokoros. A mokoro is a dug out log, which is filled with straw to help keep you dry (help, not succeed). Each mokoro was a different shape and about half were already filled with water. Undeterred our guide loaded all our camping gear, food, his camping gear and three of us into this mokoro.

We were sitting below the water level, with only about 5cm of mokoro above the water level. The guide (Olly) stood at the back and pushed off with the pole. We wove our way down narrow channels, choosing one over the other apparently at random. Although on one particularly narrow channel where he had to get out and push the mokoro when we got stuck we were informed that there were hippos in the main channel, and being that low in the water we were just as eager as him to avoid any hippos. Never has there been a more menacing sound than that of a hippo's laugh. By about 20 minutes in the mokoro was soaked with water and a puddle began to form in the bottom. It took about 2 hours of slowly making our way through the channels surrounded by grass the height of a man, water lilies and lots of different birds to make it to the campsite.

Here we set up camp and rested before heading off for a bush walk (not a game walk we were assured) with Olly and his trusty stick. Olly was a great guide giving us lots of information about different plants and there uses, including the sausage tree which can be used to, um, increase a mans size - but you must be careful not to go too big we were warned! Olly also showed us some red berries which he named lucky berries. A few minutes later we stumbled onto a blue wildebeest and cautiously approached hiding behind a termite mound. We were stared at as we stared back and it was wonderful to be so close. Later in the walk we also saw giraffe - approaching to within 20meters, and a big bull elephant - which we were about 10meters away from. Olly did seem rather worried about the elephant and kept checking the wind direction to make sure we were down wind. It was absolutely amazing!!

The night passed uneventfully although the hippos sure were noisy! The next day we did a further bush walk with more elephant, hippos, giraffe, zebra, warthog, impala and baboons galore. For a trip where we weren't expecting to see animals it was amazing, and so much more fun on foot. We relaxed in the mokoro on the way back enjoying the peace and quiet (and now sitting on plastic bags enjoyed being dry!).

All in all a fabulous safari to start off with.

Chicken? Live or cooked?

2008-04-22T17:47:00.003+10:00

One thing that I would highly recommend to anyone coming to Africa is catching alocal bus. You arrive at the bus station which is the size of a few football fields with hundreds of combis,thousands of people and dozens of large buses. There are rickety stalls everywhere, and people walking around selling anything you could want. You wind your way through the maze that all the locals seem to understand the order of and point you to the bus that is going your way. On our first bus trip we had arrived in a taxi and when our driver identified the correct bus someone came out grabbed Jason's bag and loaded it on for him. I was trying to keep track of the bag, the bus and Jason (who was waiting for change from the driver). We were soon seated on the bus as dozens of people squeezed up and down the aisle selling food,drinks,sim cards, bags,wallets, DVDs,belts, lollies etc. Not sure if we were supposed to buy a ticket before we left I asked one of these sellers...however he misheard me thinking I wanted to buy a chicken! That was fine with him, did I want a live one or cooked with chips??

We both enjoy the bus stops where food and drink appear at your window. And watching a family of four squeeze into two seats together. We have made it as far as Maun in Botswana, and tomorrow we will be doing a mokoro trip into the Okavango Delta. We spent a lovely couple of nights camping in Francistown, and are now staying in a beautiful campsite beside the river. There is a pool which we plan to enjoy this afternoon, and the showers are the best we've had yet in Africa (open air showers and all).

We have also now experienced our first African border crossing, which went quickly and easily. We asked one of the locals on the bus if there was somewhere to change money at the border,and he then took us under his wing showing us where to go and what to do. Everyone piled off the bus and into South African customs who stamped us out. We then walked about 200 metres to no mans land where there is a currency exchange booth. We took the last of their Pula before heading anouth 300 metres to Botswanan customs. And that was that. Easy and simple.... here's hoping they're all that easy. Of course yesterday the bus got stopped at a checkpoint where they were very interested in what our anti-malarials were...and they only found one box,not the other 8! Luckily once they saw our Australian passports they stopped searching and waved us on. The tourist buses we saw were just waved through the checkpoint.

That's all for now, sorry still no photos...maybe in a few more weeks.

Touch down

2008-04-17T23:46:00.003+10:00

Well, we've been in Africa less than 36 hours and Jason has already managed to get bitten by a lion. But, I'm getting ahead of myself so let me start at the beginning. The flight over was long, long, very long (26hours door to door) but like all good flights it was boring and uneventful. We arrived in J'berg at 5:20am and found a nice taxi driver to take us to our hostel. Unfortunately he spent the hour long trip telling us horror stories about muggings and car-jackings. He had been car-jacked 3 times. The first time they took the car, the second time he killed two of them (seeing our faces he hastened to add that he is now Christian and no longer carries a gun), the third time they took his meter, wing mirror and smashed a window.

Arriving in Pretoria with these stories in our heads we were confronted with 8 foot walls topped with razor wire or electric fences. The taxi driver gave a final warning not to walk around by ourselves as the gate to our hostel was opened by some mysterious hidden person.

We are staying at 1322 backpackers and everyone has been very nice and helpful. They've booked tours, organised lifts and explained where we can and can't walk. The first day we were just exhausted. We managed a walk to the nearby shops and a very pretty park. We sat in the park for a couple of hours enjoying the rose bushes and watching people (I'm pretty sure there was a quick nap in there too!) and gradually began to relax. Today we went to the nearby lion park, where after driving past wilderbeest, impala, zebra, giraffe and a few other animals we entered the lion camps. The lions lay in big piles beneath the trees, moving from sun to shade to control their temperature. The highlight though was 'cubworld' where you can go into the enclosure with the cubs and give them a stroke. Numerous times we were carefully posed for photos with one cub when another lion would approach from behind to get some attention too. Then one decided to get a little too friendly with Jason grabbing onto his pants and rolling onto his back and trying to bring him with it. When this failed he started on the shoelaces, but Jason retreated.

So we are now relaxing this afternoon before catching a bus to Botswana tomorrow morning.

Being walked on by lions

2008-04-17T19:33:00.000+10:00

Being walked on by lions
Originally uploaded by 80weeks

A photo of the lion cubs at the Lion Park.

The Joy of Outrage

2008-04-14T16:43:00.003+10:00

Today has been a busy day, as it was our last day in Sydney. We cleaned the flat, got out some US dollars and went to the doctor for some malaria tablets. We had been assured by our good friend who happens to be a pharmacist that getting the 5 months supply we needed on a private script wouldn't be a problem and the cost would only be about $22 a month, so not too excessive. So like the trusting individuals we are we toddled off to the doctor and asked for a private script. We ducked in next door to the pharmacist and spent 30 minutes watching him enter things into the computer and label the 40 boxes of doxy! He then rang it up and asked us for $480......

our jaws dropped and the power of speech deserted us temporarily. As we stuttered our disbelief, we reached for our wallets (obviously we'd rather pay the money than risk malaria). The pharmacist obviously sensing our discomfort at parting with all this money voided the transaction and went back for another go. He came back with an offer of $240, and what might have started out sounding expensive all of a sudden sounded like a bargain. So we are now armed with 40 boxes of doxy and have two hours tomorrow morning to work out how it fits into the pack!!

Work is over the pack begins.

2008-04-04T18:48:00.004+11:00

Having finally finished work, Giving in those four weeks notice was rather difficult, the real task of packing the household up and selling off the majority of our possessions entered full swing. Really the selling of furniture has been going for a while with the last of the "main" furniture auctions ending the day after completing work. Both my and Ellen's workplaces where wonderful in support and encouragement for our trip, with promises of places when we return (how that could be arranged is a problem for another day).

We now have obtained a much smaller backpack for Ellen to carry, a mere 40L, unfortunately the first pack we did afterwards showed that there is no chance of me carrying Ellen's old backpack, and even with my 70L backpack we will be taking the zip on bag so we can carry some consumables such as food as we travel.

With the pack up in full swing and our furniture disappearing out the door, panic and excitement compete continuously as dominant emotions. Checking, rewriting and rethinking packing lists is one pastime that is becoming more frequent as we try to trim down the amounts of gear we try taking, but the lists end up longer each time rather than shorter. The Internet is getting a workout as we look at what others have done before, but our real gain in bulk is due to our plans to camp in Africa, and possibly continue camping at times till we reach Asia on the second part of our trip. The tent, and the sleeping bag account for nearly a third of the storage space of my larger bag, with the majority of the remainder taken up by shoes. Fortunately two pairs of those shoes will be on our feet at all times.

As we deplete the fridge, and our home, I think our nerves will continue to increase, but I can't wait to start the trip in earnest.