I feel it coming. That familiar feeling. That swelling in my chest that makes me excited and feeling like I'm about to explode. Yep. It's here. My disease has caught up with me again. I have to do something about it. I have to indulge in it once again. I have to scratch the itch. Yes, this disease manifests itself with an indescribable, and unbearable itch.
What disease is this you ask?
Itchy feet.
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Saturday, September 26, 2009
Surfer's paradise
There's a city in Australia, just a bit north of Sydney, called Surfer's Paradise. I'm pretty sure the people who named that place hadn't been to Florianopolis, otherwise they would've thought this was a surfer's paradise...
After spending 5hrs in a bus from Pantanal to Campo Grande, and another 27hrs on another bus from Campo Grande to Floripa, we were exhausted, smelly and hungry. Shower was top priority, and since it was already past midnight, we decided to forget about food and crash instead...
After spending 5hrs in a bus from Pantanal to Campo Grande, and another 27hrs on another bus from Campo Grande to Floripa, we were exhausted, smelly and hungry. Shower was top priority, and since it was already past midnight, we decided to forget about food and crash instead...
Next morning, I wake up and realize I've just landed in paradise...
Perfect day, not a cloud in the sky, warm, beautiful! Breakfast is included, so we head up immediately and eat to our heart's content...
Delicious strong Brazilian coffee that I know and love! :)
Then, after checking the surf conditions which were apparently very good, my surfer friend starts to itch and we take off immediately to head to the beach, where I have a beautiful afternoon in the sun, playing with an awesome camera, taking loads of pictures and eating Acai... (his camera, so pictures will come a little later...)
Brave New World
Swamp. Mud. Alligators. Piranhas. Beautiful rare birds, like Tucans and Macaws. Monkeys. Iguanas. Giant rodents. Jaguars. Fishing. Sleeping in hammocks. All of this and much more you will find in Pantanal.
Dorm... doesn't get much better than that, if you ask me!
This little guy would come everyday at breakfast and eat off our hands... he even drank my coffee!
I have been here before, six years ago, and unfortunately the government has implemented some regulations since then, which were put in place to protect the environment, but also interfere with the possibilities for wild-life viewing and some amazing experiences… However: a trip to Pantanal is always an incredible thing, and I’m very glad I had the chance of going a second time… :)
*Side-note* à The world really is a tiny ball (un pañuelo, as we’d say in Spanish). Six years ago I had eaten a baked pumpkin filled with a delicious home-made tomato sauce, the whole over rice. I have even made it since, because it was such an amazing and simple dish… Well, this time around, the guy who was the cook for the place I went to the first time, happened to be my guide!!! I didn’t remember him, but while talking to his wife about the first time I came to Pantanal, she mentioned that he used to be the cook, and that’s where she had met him… later on I asked him directly if he had been the one to make the stuffed pumpkin, and sure enough, it was him! How cool is that?
Beautiful, isn't it?
--Day 1--
We arrived, and did a bit of exploring on our own, watched alligators down by the river, hang out on hammocks and watched the stars…
A bit too close for comfort? nah... they're pretty laid back... I think...
--Day 2--
We went horseback riding, then fished piranhas side by side with the alligators, ate the piranhas for dinner (ironic, no?) and laughed our heads off with our new friends.
Yes, yes, the helmet is silly, but unfortunately mandatory...
At one point this alligator started coming towards me and I thought it'd be better to move out of his way...
I was waaaay too excited after catching that Piranha! :)
--Day 3--
We went on a walk through the jungle to spot some wild life, had lunch, then went on a boat “safari” down the river to see some more animals.
Somebody got to his dinner before he did!
--Day 4--
Woke up at 4am (yep!!) to go on yet another “safari,” this time by truck up to a point, and then on foot. We stopped somewhere in the middle to have breakfast and then headed back to the camp, to relax for a bit, have lunch and prepare to leave in the afternoon…
Friday, September 25, 2009
The Flood
Amazing. Breathtaking. Not that in the Brazilian side it’s any less breathtaking… but when we were there, it was so misty (because the falls are so full because of the recent rains) that we could barely see anything but a white wall of mist. In the Argentine side, because we were above the falls (instead of in front of them) we could see better, and it looked like a big hole sucking the water in. It was awesome!
The problem is, unfortunately, we didn’t have much time, as we had to come back and catch our bus to Campo Grande at 6pm. We were heading into the Pantanal, and even though I’ve been there before, I was pretty excited about it… but this is what happened: we missed the little train by 5 minutes, and it comes every half hour, so we had to wait for 25 minutes. The train takes 15 minutes to arrive at the main entrance. We missed the bus that goes into town by 10 minutes, and it also comes every half hour, so we had to wait 20 minutes. By this time it was 4:50pm and there was no way we were going to make it back in time to catch our bus. We even tried… from the bus station in Puerto Iguazu we took a taxi to take us all the way home, wait while we threw our stuff together and head back to the bus station. We almost made it… we actually saw the bus pass us by when we were just 2 minutes from the bus station, but of course, he was going in the opposite direction! Luckily they changed the date without charging us for another ticket, and that was really nice of them…
So we decided we’d just skip Bonito (a city with lots of eco-tourism adventures) and go straight to the Pantanal, leaving on Saturday night and arriving in Campo Grande on Sunday morning. And since we had an extra day, we’d go back to the falls on the Argentine side and walk around some more, take another million photos, do the little hike through the woods, etc. We stayed up talking until late, so I was having a hard time waking up this morning… until I regained enough consciousness to realize that the beautiful sound that was lulling me to sleep was rain. And I don’t mean just a little trickle drip-drip-drip rain. I mean a full on storm! This realization came somewhere around 7am. It is now almost 11am and the rain hasn’t stopped or diminished its volume. It’s incredible! Thunder, lightening, rain, rain, rain! Of course, at 7am when I realized it was rain, I also knew there was no way we were going back to the falls today, and therefore there was no real reason to get up, so I stayed in bed, and fell asleep again, to the same tune Noah must’ve heard for 40 days in that arc… FLOOD!
Wednesday, September 16, 2009
Spontaneous Brazilian trip
I guess it's starting to be a trend, eh? People are traveling around, they start talking to me about it, and next thing I know, I'm on the trip with them! :) Yes, I have a very difficult life... for sure!
This one at least gave me a little more advance notice (not the <12hrs of last time!) It happened like this: my friend Guy sent me an email saying he was in Europe, and planning on going to either Africa or Brazil in a week, and was asking my opinion of what he should do. I obviously told him he should come to Brazil, and I would meet him there! So after a couple of days of emails and skype chats, he decided to come, and bought his ticket for a week later. We started to plan the trip, although very loosely (which was a good thing since we already changed a good part of it, and we're only on day 3!), where we should go and where we would meet.
He flew to Foz do Iguazu, and I took a bus up from Buenos Aires, and arrived at the airport to pick him up just minutes before his flight came in... perfect timing! So that's where we are at the moment, yesterday we went to the Brazilian side of the falls, got soaken wet from the spray and marvelled at the beauty of the falls, then dried up in the sun, had a humangous dinner in town and eventually dropped dead from exhaustion... it was a long day... but FUN! :)
This one at least gave me a little more advance notice (not the <12hrs of last time!) It happened like this: my friend Guy sent me an email saying he was in Europe, and planning on going to either Africa or Brazil in a week, and was asking my opinion of what he should do. I obviously told him he should come to Brazil, and I would meet him there! So after a couple of days of emails and skype chats, he decided to come, and bought his ticket for a week later. We started to plan the trip, although very loosely (which was a good thing since we already changed a good part of it, and we're only on day 3!), where we should go and where we would meet.
He flew to Foz do Iguazu, and I took a bus up from Buenos Aires, and arrived at the airport to pick him up just minutes before his flight came in... perfect timing! So that's where we are at the moment, yesterday we went to the Brazilian side of the falls, got soaken wet from the spray and marvelled at the beauty of the falls, then dried up in the sun, had a humangous dinner in town and eventually dropped dead from exhaustion... it was a long day... but FUN! :)
That was at the restaurant for lunch... we had a blast!!!
At the falls...
Soaken wet!
Apologies...
Hi everyone...
So I start by apologizing because I haven't finished the blogs of the last trip, (because I'm lazy and terrible!) and now I have to start blogging this trip because otherwise I'll have a hard time catching up, and the same thing will happen again... Hopefully I'll be able to finish the other blog at a later time, but for now, just forgive me and come with me as I cruise around Brazil! :)
So I start by apologizing because I haven't finished the blogs of the last trip, (because I'm lazy and terrible!) and now I have to start blogging this trip because otherwise I'll have a hard time catching up, and the same thing will happen again... Hopefully I'll be able to finish the other blog at a later time, but for now, just forgive me and come with me as I cruise around Brazil! :)
Tuesday, August 4, 2009
Cuzco-Lima-Cajamarca
Cajamarca is a little (actually not that little) city in the north of Peru, almost in the border with Colombia, but inland, in the mountains, with very difficult access. It is the center for gold mining in the region, and apparently one of the largest deposits of Gold in South America. This place is not very touristy AT ALL. There were some interesting things to see, but it's just so hard to get there, that most people don't really bother.
Cajamarca marked "the first" for many things for me: first time CouchSurfing, first time eating Ceviche (which entails raw seafood! yuck!), first time in a bus accident (although that wasn't really in Cajamarca, it was on the way there...)
The bus accident wasn't really bad, we just had to wait a couple of hours for the replacement... oh well... at least no one was hurt!
After many hours in the two buses (one from Cuzco to Lima, the next from Lima to Cajamarca), our CS host, Giancarlo came to pick us up at the bus station and take us home. Him and his cousin Sergio treated us like kings, took us out for drinks, for lunch, introduced us to their friends, showed us around some ruins, and generally showed us a great time! I could not have asked for a better first experience CouchSurfing... It was pretty amazing!!!
Our hosts and friends
We were only there for like 36hrs though, it was a necessary pit-stop for the keeping of a promise.
Next stop==> Colombia!!!
Cajamarca marked "the first" for many things for me: first time CouchSurfing, first time eating Ceviche (which entails raw seafood! yuck!), first time in a bus accident (although that wasn't really in Cajamarca, it was on the way there...)
The bus accident wasn't really bad, we just had to wait a couple of hours for the replacement... oh well... at least no one was hurt!After many hours in the two buses (one from Cuzco to Lima, the next from Lima to Cajamarca), our CS host, Giancarlo came to pick us up at the bus station and take us home. Him and his cousin Sergio treated us like kings, took us out for drinks, for lunch, introduced us to their friends, showed us around some ruins, and generally showed us a great time! I could not have asked for a better first experience CouchSurfing... It was pretty amazing!!!
Our hosts and friends
We were only there for like 36hrs though, it was a necessary pit-stop for the keeping of a promise.
Next stop==> Colombia!!!
Cuzco--round II
Next day we get up somewhat early, to take the train back to Ollantaytambo, take the bus back to Cuzco, and hopefully take a bus from Cuzco that same night heading towards Lima and eventually to Cajamarca.
BUT! One of my friends from Buenos Aires, Johan, was supposed to be arriving in Cuzco that day, and we were going to try and meet, even if for just a couple of hours...
So we got to Cuzco, took a taxi from the bus station towards the hotel (where we had left our stuff before). I'm sitting in the front, all of a sudden I hear "Isn't that Johan??" I look back and start to tell the taxi driver to stop! Stop! STOP!! tell Mene to pay, open the car door and RUN!
Couldn't see Johan anymore, where is he, oh there he is, he crossed the street... cars... cars... there, cross, run, jump on Johan in the middle of the street! He had a friend with him, who looked at me as if I were some insane person recently escaped from the nut house. Johan himself started laughing, it was just too great a coincidence that we met on the street like that. :)
So we walked around the city for a little bit, talked for a while, and then unfortunately I had to head back to the hotel, to grab the backpack and go to the bus station for the next leg of the journey...
BUT! One of my friends from Buenos Aires, Johan, was supposed to be arriving in Cuzco that day, and we were going to try and meet, even if for just a couple of hours...
So we got to Cuzco, took a taxi from the bus station towards the hotel (where we had left our stuff before). I'm sitting in the front, all of a sudden I hear "Isn't that Johan??" I look back and start to tell the taxi driver to stop! Stop! STOP!! tell Mene to pay, open the car door and RUN!
Couldn't see Johan anymore, where is he, oh there he is, he crossed the street... cars... cars... there, cross, run, jump on Johan in the middle of the street! He had a friend with him, who looked at me as if I were some insane person recently escaped from the nut house. Johan himself started laughing, it was just too great a coincidence that we met on the street like that. :)
So we walked around the city for a little bit, talked for a while, and then unfortunately I had to head back to the hotel, to grab the backpack and go to the bus station for the next leg of the journey...
How to almost die in Peru
With a title like that, you’d think food poisoning, mugged and left for dead in a dark alley, being attacked by Indians in the forest, or having a traffic accident. However, the tail of this post has nothing to do with that. The food may have gotten to us a little bit, but nothing that bad (neither of us got to the point of throwing up, it was just belly ache), we were never mugged or felt the least bit unsafe, the Indians are actually quite friendly, and we haven't had any traffic accidents yet.
But we did almost die in Machu Picchu.
Keep in mind that I hadn’t slept much the night before, and we had to get up at 4:30am to be in the line for the buses (another US$7 dollars!) at 5am, because the buses started running at 5:30am and we HAD to be at the top by 6am when they opened, otherwise we would not get our ticket to Huayna Picchu. Tip 1- buy your ticket to Machu Picchu in Aguas Calientes the night before, as they do NOT sell them at the entrance. Tip 2- if you have a student card, it’s half the price! Tip 3- they only allow 400 people per day into Huayna Picchu. You don't have to pay extra, but if you don't make it there by 6am and RUN to the entrance of Huayna Picchu to get your ticket you won't be part of the 400. We got there early and ran, and I got number 296... 15 minutes later and we wouldn't have gone in...
So after getting our tickets, we had until 10am to explore Machu Picchu before we could go into Huayna Picchu. This was actually perfect, because we could have a little breakfast and walk round the ruins, take loads of pictures, and enjoy the place without that many tourists around, since the majority of the people would come around 10-11am.
Machu Picchu is absolutely incredible. How they managed to build an entire city of stone like that, in the top of mountains is completely beyond me. It may be expensive to get here, and the Peruvian government may be making millions from the tourists, but it’s totally worth it!
At 10am we made our way to the line for the entrance of Huayna Picchu, which is the tall, round looking mountain you see at the back of the pictures. Yep, we were going all the way to the top...
Of course, I already almost died on the way up, but fair enough, I could see what I was getting myself into from the beginning, and the views from the top were definitely worth it... It's incredible that the Incas managed to build stone steps around the entire mountain to get to the top of Huayna Picchu, which was a guard post since from there they could see all around and send messages to the main city if they saw any danger.
So we walked around, relaxed in the sunshine, discovered Granadina (close cousin of Maracuya, just a little sweeter) and took lots of pictures. Somewhere around 12:30pm, we were ready to move on, which to me meant going back down to Machu Picchu and from there walking down to Aguas Calientes. Except that we saw a little sign that said "Machu Picchu" with an arrow to the left, and "Gran Caverna" with an arrow to the right. Curiosity spiked, we decided to check what this Gran Caverna was all about... and took that path instead. It's downhill. Very much downhill. Stone step after stone step downhill... with steel cables to hold on to because the steps are almost vertically downhill... At some points, 20m ladders going straight down...
Notice how far away the river looks on this picture...
By this point I'm starting to get worried, because if we have to go all the way back UP to make our way back to Machu Picchu, I'm either going to die or kill someone. But we passed a couple who was going up and they told us there was another way around to get to Machu Picchu, so we didn't have to backtrack. Ok. Good. So we keep going down, so much so that I can see and hear the river, which from the top of Huayna Picchu looked like a little silver snake...
And now notice how close the river looks on this one!!
We make it to the Gran Caverna... and go "So this was it???" alright, back then.
And the way back, happens to be UP. Not the same way we came, but UP nonetheless... We had brought a 2,5l bottle of water for the two of us, but by this point we would've gladly drank the entire bottle each... which of course was not possible. So up and up and UP we go. And round and round and round we go. We had no idea where the heck we were, and we didn't know how long it would be until we got to the entrance of Huayna Picchu, and then back to Machu Picchu.
Remember that we entered the Huayna Picchu complex at 10am... you are only allowed to be there until 4pm... this is 3pm and we're starting to get worried... are we going to make it out in time?? Finally at 3:40pm we see the light, and get to sign our little names out. As a matter of curiosity, after being completely exhausted and feeling our legs were made of silly putty, we asked the guards at the entrance if anyone had ever been crazy enough to count how many steps it was to go all the way around... and the guard tells us: 13,000 steps!!!
Our jaws dropped. Yep, we went up and down 13,000 stone steps in one day, and there was no way we were going to keep going and walk down to Aguas Calientes... so $7 dollars later, we were in the comfy air conditioned bus, back to Aguas Calientes where a good hot shower and a nice bed was waiting for us to collapse.
By 6pm we were asleep. Dead. Or almost...
But we did almost die in Machu Picchu.
Keep in mind that I hadn’t slept much the night before, and we had to get up at 4:30am to be in the line for the buses (another US$7 dollars!) at 5am, because the buses started running at 5:30am and we HAD to be at the top by 6am when they opened, otherwise we would not get our ticket to Huayna Picchu. Tip 1- buy your ticket to Machu Picchu in Aguas Calientes the night before, as they do NOT sell them at the entrance. Tip 2- if you have a student card, it’s half the price! Tip 3- they only allow 400 people per day into Huayna Picchu. You don't have to pay extra, but if you don't make it there by 6am and RUN to the entrance of Huayna Picchu to get your ticket you won't be part of the 400. We got there early and ran, and I got number 296... 15 minutes later and we wouldn't have gone in...
So after getting our tickets, we had until 10am to explore Machu Picchu before we could go into Huayna Picchu. This was actually perfect, because we could have a little breakfast and walk round the ruins, take loads of pictures, and enjoy the place without that many tourists around, since the majority of the people would come around 10-11am.
Machu Picchu is absolutely incredible. How they managed to build an entire city of stone like that, in the top of mountains is completely beyond me. It may be expensive to get here, and the Peruvian government may be making millions from the tourists, but it’s totally worth it!
At 10am we made our way to the line for the entrance of Huayna Picchu, which is the tall, round looking mountain you see at the back of the pictures. Yep, we were going all the way to the top...
Of course, I already almost died on the way up, but fair enough, I could see what I was getting myself into from the beginning, and the views from the top were definitely worth it... It's incredible that the Incas managed to build stone steps around the entire mountain to get to the top of Huayna Picchu, which was a guard post since from there they could see all around and send messages to the main city if they saw any danger.
So we walked around, relaxed in the sunshine, discovered Granadina (close cousin of Maracuya, just a little sweeter) and took lots of pictures. Somewhere around 12:30pm, we were ready to move on, which to me meant going back down to Machu Picchu and from there walking down to Aguas Calientes. Except that we saw a little sign that said "Machu Picchu" with an arrow to the left, and "Gran Caverna" with an arrow to the right. Curiosity spiked, we decided to check what this Gran Caverna was all about... and took that path instead. It's downhill. Very much downhill. Stone step after stone step downhill... with steel cables to hold on to because the steps are almost vertically downhill... At some points, 20m ladders going straight down...
Notice how far away the river looks on this picture...
By this point I'm starting to get worried, because if we have to go all the way back UP to make our way back to Machu Picchu, I'm either going to die or kill someone. But we passed a couple who was going up and they told us there was another way around to get to Machu Picchu, so we didn't have to backtrack. Ok. Good. So we keep going down, so much so that I can see and hear the river, which from the top of Huayna Picchu looked like a little silver snake...
And now notice how close the river looks on this one!!
We make it to the Gran Caverna... and go "So this was it???" alright, back then.
And the way back, happens to be UP. Not the same way we came, but UP nonetheless... We had brought a 2,5l bottle of water for the two of us, but by this point we would've gladly drank the entire bottle each... which of course was not possible. So up and up and UP we go. And round and round and round we go. We had no idea where the heck we were, and we didn't know how long it would be until we got to the entrance of Huayna Picchu, and then back to Machu Picchu.
Remember that we entered the Huayna Picchu complex at 10am... you are only allowed to be there until 4pm... this is 3pm and we're starting to get worried... are we going to make it out in time?? Finally at 3:40pm we see the light, and get to sign our little names out. As a matter of curiosity, after being completely exhausted and feeling our legs were made of silly putty, we asked the guards at the entrance if anyone had ever been crazy enough to count how many steps it was to go all the way around... and the guard tells us: 13,000 steps!!!
Our jaws dropped. Yep, we went up and down 13,000 stone steps in one day, and there was no way we were going to keep going and walk down to Aguas Calientes... so $7 dollars later, we were in the comfy air conditioned bus, back to Aguas Calientes where a good hot shower and a nice bed was waiting for us to collapse.
By 6pm we were asleep. Dead. Or almost...
Ollantaytambo-Aguas Calientes
We got on the mini-van that would take us from Cuzco to Ollantaytambo (try saying Ollantaytambo 3 times fast! haha! took us a while to be able to say it correctly...) and made our way down the Sacred Valley, following the river, in the midst of the mountains. Beautiful scenery. Warm weather (for the first time in a while!!) But since we had been a little late in getting our bus in the morning, we didn’t have that much time to go exploring the ruins. We did however, find this amazing café owned by a British woman who used it as a charity place, where all the profits went to benefit the undernourished children of the mountain villages around. Great food, and quite strange to find a full English Breakfast in a tiny little town in the middle of nowhere, Peru.
The best thing though, is that they were having a festival, so we saw lots of people dressed up in interesting/funny/scary costumes dancing and walking around the city... that was fun and unexpected!
Apparently we were having too much fun, because when we got up and started to walk towards the train station, we had to run the last 500m or so because the train was about to leave!!! Can you imagine? US$31 dollars for the train and watch it go without us... NO WAY! So we got on the train and the views were simply amazing!!
Arriving in Aguas Calientes, the initial idea was to camp, so we had left our stuff at the hotel in Cuzco, and brought just the tent and a small backpack, because we had heard lodging in Aguas Calientes was pretty expensive. Except we had fallen asleep on the train (it's amazing, we could sleep through anything... any type of transport, if it starts to move, it would rock me to sleep and I had to make an effort to stay awake if I wanted to look at the views!) and so we were pretty tired and wanted a proper bed. This girl immediately approached us and offered us a room for the same amount we had been paying in Cuzco. Well, jackpot. Ok, so the room was a little dodgy, and had a humangous window facing the hallway (with curtains that didn't quite cover the whole thing!) but at least there was a bed and hot shower... eventually we'd realize that was the best thing we could've done...
So we walked around for a while, bought some food to make sandwiches for the next day (yes, you are allowed to take food, just pack it all out when you leave the Machu Picchu complex!) and went to sleep early because we were supposed to get up at 4:30am!
The only problem is that this time it was MY stomach that wasn't feeling so well, and I spent half the night sitting up in bed trying to feel better... :(
The best thing though, is that they were having a festival, so we saw lots of people dressed up in interesting/funny/scary costumes dancing and walking around the city... that was fun and unexpected!
Apparently we were having too much fun, because when we got up and started to walk towards the train station, we had to run the last 500m or so because the train was about to leave!!! Can you imagine? US$31 dollars for the train and watch it go without us... NO WAY! So we got on the train and the views were simply amazing!!
Arriving in Aguas Calientes, the initial idea was to camp, so we had left our stuff at the hotel in Cuzco, and brought just the tent and a small backpack, because we had heard lodging in Aguas Calientes was pretty expensive. Except we had fallen asleep on the train (it's amazing, we could sleep through anything... any type of transport, if it starts to move, it would rock me to sleep and I had to make an effort to stay awake if I wanted to look at the views!) and so we were pretty tired and wanted a proper bed. This girl immediately approached us and offered us a room for the same amount we had been paying in Cuzco. Well, jackpot. Ok, so the room was a little dodgy, and had a humangous window facing the hallway (with curtains that didn't quite cover the whole thing!) but at least there was a bed and hot shower... eventually we'd realize that was the best thing we could've done...
So we walked around for a while, bought some food to make sandwiches for the next day (yes, you are allowed to take food, just pack it all out when you leave the Machu Picchu complex!) and went to sleep early because we were supposed to get up at 4:30am!
The only problem is that this time it was MY stomach that wasn't feeling so well, and I spent half the night sitting up in bed trying to feel better... :(
Puno-Cuzco
Finally, we're on our way to Cuzco. We took our bus at 10am to arrive around 5pm, and try to figure out everything about the Machu Picchu thing before the next day, because we really wanted to go soon. By this point I was seriously considering going to Machu Picchu and then heading back south to Buenos Aires, but was eventually convinced otherwise...
Cuzco is an impressive city. The buildings, the lights, the architecture. Admittedly, I didn't see that much of it, but it was beautiful... and it's pretty big too...
So we get to Plaza de Armas and start asking everyone around for the street where the hotel we were supposed to go to was. Nobody seemed to have ever heard of it. Not even the tourist police. Yep, they have so many tourists, that apparently they thought it necessary to have a tourist police force. Since we couldn't find the place we wanted, we ended up going to this place close by that was recommended by some people on the square, it was cheap and clean, so we said ok, good enough!
We dropped our stuff and started going around asking for prices of train tickets to Aguas Calientes and such. We managed to get train tickets from Ollantaytambo to Aguas Calientes for 3pm the next day, and that was really great since one of my friends had had to wait 5 days before getting a spot on the train. The idea was to leave early the next morning, take the bus to Ollantaytambo (1 1/2hrs) and walk around there for a while, before taking the train to Aguas Calientes. Since we had bought our tickets at Plaza de Armas, the lady was supposed to come in the morning, and we told her 8am sharp! with our tickets, so we could go. Well, 8:30am and nothing. The cell phone she had given us, no answer. I start to get worried... we gave her US$75 each, and that's one heck of a lot of money!!!
Eventually she showed up, and we were on our way to get the bus to Ollantaytambo, from where we'd take the train to Machu Picchu!! YEY!!
(TIP: We didn't take the train directly, because from Cuzco to Aguas Calientes, round-trip would be almost US$100, against the US$75 from Ollantaytambo. The bus to Ollantaytambo cost us 10 Soles, or around US$3, so we saved a bit, and got to see Ollantaytambo which is a nice little place and also has ruins!)
Cuzco is an impressive city. The buildings, the lights, the architecture. Admittedly, I didn't see that much of it, but it was beautiful... and it's pretty big too...
So we get to Plaza de Armas and start asking everyone around for the street where the hotel we were supposed to go to was. Nobody seemed to have ever heard of it. Not even the tourist police. Yep, they have so many tourists, that apparently they thought it necessary to have a tourist police force. Since we couldn't find the place we wanted, we ended up going to this place close by that was recommended by some people on the square, it was cheap and clean, so we said ok, good enough!
We dropped our stuff and started going around asking for prices of train tickets to Aguas Calientes and such. We managed to get train tickets from Ollantaytambo to Aguas Calientes for 3pm the next day, and that was really great since one of my friends had had to wait 5 days before getting a spot on the train. The idea was to leave early the next morning, take the bus to Ollantaytambo (1 1/2hrs) and walk around there for a while, before taking the train to Aguas Calientes. Since we had bought our tickets at Plaza de Armas, the lady was supposed to come in the morning, and we told her 8am sharp! with our tickets, so we could go. Well, 8:30am and nothing. The cell phone she had given us, no answer. I start to get worried... we gave her US$75 each, and that's one heck of a lot of money!!!
Eventually she showed up, and we were on our way to get the bus to Ollantaytambo, from where we'd take the train to Machu Picchu!! YEY!!
(TIP: We didn't take the train directly, because from Cuzco to Aguas Calientes, round-trip would be almost US$100, against the US$75 from Ollantaytambo. The bus to Ollantaytambo cost us 10 Soles, or around US$3, so we saved a bit, and got to see Ollantaytambo which is a nice little place and also has ruins!)
Back in Puno... for longer than expected!
It has obviously been a while since I wrote here, but I didn't want to leave it that way and I want to finish the part about this particular trip before I start writing about the next adventures... so here we go! :)
We went back to Puno, and were supposed to leave the next morning to go to Cuzco, and from there on to Machu Picchu, but something got in the way... you guys remember in the last post I mentioned the food and something called Oca? Well, apparently that did not sit well in Mene's stomach, and even after a visit to Colors (where we knew we could get good and healthy food), he still didn't feel 100% well. So we decided to stay in Puno one extra day, and go to Cuzco the morning after that. I ran to the bus station and managed to change our tickets, and we spent the day chilling, writing and hanging out... :)
We went back to Puno, and were supposed to leave the next morning to go to Cuzco, and from there on to Machu Picchu, but something got in the way... you guys remember in the last post I mentioned the food and something called Oca? Well, apparently that did not sit well in Mene's stomach, and even after a visit to Colors (where we knew we could get good and healthy food), he still didn't feel 100% well. So we decided to stay in Puno one extra day, and go to Cuzco the morning after that. I ran to the bus station and managed to change our tickets, and we spent the day chilling, writing and hanging out... :)
Thursday, June 18, 2009
Lake Titicaca II-- Island tour
We got up early for our tour of the islands (and after having slept for like 12hrs!) and we were pretty excited about the boat ride on the lake, and the islands, staying with a family, etc...
I think on this one the pictures speak for themselves, so I'll shut up and post pictures... :)
The boat ride was pretty nice, and we meet a quite french family with 2 kids, and became good friends... :)
Uros is the first island, which is actually an artificial floating island, built with roots and reeds that they cut and cover the blocks of roots to make a "floor." Out of the same reeds, they build their houses, boats, and they even eat them! The entire island must be around 300sq. meters, and these people live here, year round...
After Uros, we went to Amantani, one of the biggest islands on the lake, and where we would be hosted by a local family and spend the night.
That's our home in Amantani, with our host Carmen...
That afternoon we hiked to the top of the mountain, to the Pacha Mama temple (or ruins actually) and watched the sunset... beautiful!
And that's our dinner... it wasn't the culinary experience of my life, but it was Ok... A soup made with quinoa and other vegetables, which included Oca, a potato-looking thing that will be mentioned later... :)
That evening after dinner, they had prepared a party for us, with folkloric dances, and they actually dressed us up with their colorful traditional outfits... we danced like crazy, and went home exhausted, only to get up early the next morning and head to Taquile.
Taquile was pretty, but kind of a disappointment actually. It was a tourist trap, with everything geared towards the tourists, and the prices reflecting that (5 soles, or almost 2 dollars for a bar of chocolate, which should cost 1 sol at the most!!) But since it was our last stop, after lunch we headed back to Puno, and couldn't wait to make our way to Colors, for desert and coffee again... :)
Next stop: Cuzco and Macchu Picchu!!
I think on this one the pictures speak for themselves, so I'll shut up and post pictures... :)
The boat ride was pretty nice, and we meet a quite french family with 2 kids, and became good friends... :)
Uros is the first island, which is actually an artificial floating island, built with roots and reeds that they cut and cover the blocks of roots to make a "floor." Out of the same reeds, they build their houses, boats, and they even eat them! The entire island must be around 300sq. meters, and these people live here, year round...
After Uros, we went to Amantani, one of the biggest islands on the lake, and where we would be hosted by a local family and spend the night.
That's our home in Amantani, with our host Carmen...
That afternoon we hiked to the top of the mountain, to the Pacha Mama temple (or ruins actually) and watched the sunset... beautiful!
And that's our dinner... it wasn't the culinary experience of my life, but it was Ok... A soup made with quinoa and other vegetables, which included Oca, a potato-looking thing that will be mentioned later... :)
That evening after dinner, they had prepared a party for us, with folkloric dances, and they actually dressed us up with their colorful traditional outfits... we danced like crazy, and went home exhausted, only to get up early the next morning and head to Taquile.
Taquile was pretty, but kind of a disappointment actually. It was a tourist trap, with everything geared towards the tourists, and the prices reflecting that (5 soles, or almost 2 dollars for a bar of chocolate, which should cost 1 sol at the most!!) But since it was our last stop, after lunch we headed back to Puno, and couldn't wait to make our way to Colors, for desert and coffee again... :)
Next stop: Cuzco and Macchu Picchu!!
Puno, Peru
Puno is an interesting town; 90% of it is not touristic at all, and the result is you only see Peruvians going to and fro with their normal activities.
And then there's the 10%, which mainly consist of Parque Pinos and the adjoining pedestrian street, Calle Lima (or Jiron Lima, since that's the word they use for street instead of Calle, and had us quite confused at first), which is saturated with tourists...
We arrived around 11am, found a reasonably priced hotel (which wasn't easy!) and went out for internet, food, and to try and book our tour of the lake's islands, hopefully for the next day.
In the afternoon, after having lunch at this local restaurant (Sayani) and eating Alpaca and drinking purple corn juice (Chicha Morada), we also found a magical, wonderful Oasis in the middle of Puno... scratch that! In the middle of Peru! We found this cafe/restaurant/lounge bar place called Colors, with incredible desserts and coffee and food! What's more: the chef was Greek! No joke!
And here's the dessert:
The plan was to come back to Colors for dinner, but we ended up crashing, and they were coming to pick us up early the next morning for our 2-day tour of the islands, so that was that...
And then there's the 10%, which mainly consist of Parque Pinos and the adjoining pedestrian street, Calle Lima (or Jiron Lima, since that's the word they use for street instead of Calle, and had us quite confused at first), which is saturated with tourists...
We arrived around 11am, found a reasonably priced hotel (which wasn't easy!) and went out for internet, food, and to try and book our tour of the lake's islands, hopefully for the next day.
In the afternoon, after having lunch at this local restaurant (Sayani) and eating Alpaca and drinking purple corn juice (Chicha Morada), we also found a magical, wonderful Oasis in the middle of Puno... scratch that! In the middle of Peru! We found this cafe/restaurant/lounge bar place called Colors, with incredible desserts and coffee and food! What's more: the chef was Greek! No joke!
And here's the dessert:
The plan was to come back to Colors for dinner, but we ended up crashing, and they were coming to pick us up early the next morning for our 2-day tour of the islands, so that was that...
Lake Titicaca
Continuing from last entry...
So we arrived in La Paz at 7am. It seemed like a pretty incredible city, built like a spiral bowl, with the bottom around 600m lower than the top, and the mountains all around it, really making it look like a bowl.
However, we only stayed for a couple of hours, in the bus terminal, waiting for the next bus that would take us to Copacabana (nope, not the beach in Rio), a city on the shores of lake Titicaca.
Apparently I must've been really tired (after the journey from hell!) because I fell asleep almost immediately, and when I woke up, we were already in the highlands surrounding the lake.
It's quite a sight to wake up and see the beautiful blue skies and the beautiful dark blue waters and mountains and rolling hills all around...
(view from the window of the bus when I woke up... and the broken window with the cumpliments of Mene, who broke it trying to open... oops! )
Funny thing is though, there's a part of the lake where there's no road around, so our bus actually got on a boat, and we had to get on a different boat and chase after it! :) It was kinda funny because nobody explained anything to us, they just told us to get off the bus, and we watched and marvelled as the bus started to cross the lake without us...
Once on the other side, our journey continued for another hour or so, until we arrived in the beautiful Copacabana. We were tired, hungry and very dirty, so all we wanted was a room, a shower, and some good food...
We found a place called Residencial Sucre, with a nice room and hot shower for a reasonable price, and took it immediately. After the necessary showers, we went to find money exchange, food and laundry (which was also incredibly necessary!).
That's my happy face after a nice, HUGE and delicious Rainbow Trout, fished directly from the lake, and so fresh, it must've been fished a couple of hours before I ate it... :)
After food, a nap... that ended up lasting until the next morning, when unfortunately we had the bus to go to Puno, already in Peru. I say unfortunately because Copacabana is really beautiful, and I would've liked to stay a little longer, but Peru awaits!! :)
So we arrived in La Paz at 7am. It seemed like a pretty incredible city, built like a spiral bowl, with the bottom around 600m lower than the top, and the mountains all around it, really making it look like a bowl.
However, we only stayed for a couple of hours, in the bus terminal, waiting for the next bus that would take us to Copacabana (nope, not the beach in Rio), a city on the shores of lake Titicaca.
Apparently I must've been really tired (after the journey from hell!) because I fell asleep almost immediately, and when I woke up, we were already in the highlands surrounding the lake.
It's quite a sight to wake up and see the beautiful blue skies and the beautiful dark blue waters and mountains and rolling hills all around...
(view from the window of the bus when I woke up... and the broken window with the cumpliments of Mene, who broke it trying to open... oops! )
Funny thing is though, there's a part of the lake where there's no road around, so our bus actually got on a boat, and we had to get on a different boat and chase after it! :) It was kinda funny because nobody explained anything to us, they just told us to get off the bus, and we watched and marvelled as the bus started to cross the lake without us...
Once on the other side, our journey continued for another hour or so, until we arrived in the beautiful Copacabana. We were tired, hungry and very dirty, so all we wanted was a room, a shower, and some good food...
We found a place called Residencial Sucre, with a nice room and hot shower for a reasonable price, and took it immediately. After the necessary showers, we went to find money exchange, food and laundry (which was also incredibly necessary!).
That's my happy face after a nice, HUGE and delicious Rainbow Trout, fished directly from the lake, and so fresh, it must've been fished a couple of hours before I ate it... :)
After food, a nap... that ended up lasting until the next morning, when unfortunately we had the bus to go to Puno, already in Peru. I say unfortunately because Copacabana is really beautiful, and I would've liked to stay a little longer, but Peru awaits!! :)
Wednesday, June 10, 2009
The Journey to La Paz
I realize I haven't updated this in a little while, and I should try to keep up to date more, and have to upload a million pictures, but I only have a little bit of time and I think the journey from Uyuni to La Paz deserves an entry all of itself... (even though there are other memorable bus rides that will be mentioned later...)
So like I mentioned in the end of the last entry, we arrived at Uyuni and had to wait until 8pm for the bus. Like idiots, we didn't wait until all the agencies were opened (it was like 12:30 when we arrived, and the majority would reopen at 2pm), we just bought our tickets in the first one we found, for 80 bolivianos, which seemed like a reasonable price, even though it meant we'd have to change buses in Oruro, at the ungodly hour of 3am... but alright, we really just wanted to get the hell out of there.
Time comes for the bus, and our Canadian friends from the Salar tour were actually coming part of the journey with us, only until Oruro, where they would take another bus to Cochabamba. They only paid 40 bolivianos (which is important info, will tell you why in a sec.)
The journey begins, and we immediately feel like we've been trapped inside an earthquake simulator, or something of the sort. No joke. The road was the worse thing I've seen so far, and the entire bus (which wasn't that new) was rattling and shaking like a blender... To make matters worse, there wasn't just the number of people that could fill the seats... there was much more! You know those buses you see in movies, with the chickens and the children and everything else mixed in?? Well, there were no chickens (or at least that I saw... but I made sure to close my eyes very quickly and ignore everything...) but it was kinda like that... people sitting on the floor, trying to sleep on the floor, filling the isles and every possible space...
Luckly, both Mene and I can sleep through anything, so that's what we did... turn towards the window, away from the crowd, and sleep....
Eventually, we made a stop, somewhere around midnight I think, and woke up, looked behind at our Canadian friends to see how they were doing, and the poor girl, Angie, she had been throwing up out the window nonstop for the last 4hrs or so... and Matt, her husband, could barely keep it down. They couldn't believe we had slept through the whole thing...
After that, we had a paved road, so it was better... until we stopped at 3am in Oruro.
In Oruro, we expect to change buses directly and leave to La Paz, but that's where we discover that we don't actually have tickets to La Paz, that the bus company we came with doesn't go all the way there, and the bus driver was walking around with us behind him, trying to find us tickets. Detail: there were people yelling around the platforms "La Paz, 15 bolivianos to La Paz..."
That's where we realized we'd just been screwed and the bus driver used our 40 bolivianos to buy tickets for 15 bolivianos and give them to us, and put us on the bus. Oh well... it happens...
At least we made it to La Paz, the second bus was on paved road and not overcrowded, and incredibly, it was on time. We arrived at La Paz at 7am on the dot, where we stayed at the bus terminal for only a couple of hours, while waiting for our next bus, which would take us to Copacabana, on Lake Titicaca...
And that's on another entry... :)
So like I mentioned in the end of the last entry, we arrived at Uyuni and had to wait until 8pm for the bus. Like idiots, we didn't wait until all the agencies were opened (it was like 12:30 when we arrived, and the majority would reopen at 2pm), we just bought our tickets in the first one we found, for 80 bolivianos, which seemed like a reasonable price, even though it meant we'd have to change buses in Oruro, at the ungodly hour of 3am... but alright, we really just wanted to get the hell out of there.
Time comes for the bus, and our Canadian friends from the Salar tour were actually coming part of the journey with us, only until Oruro, where they would take another bus to Cochabamba. They only paid 40 bolivianos (which is important info, will tell you why in a sec.)
The journey begins, and we immediately feel like we've been trapped inside an earthquake simulator, or something of the sort. No joke. The road was the worse thing I've seen so far, and the entire bus (which wasn't that new) was rattling and shaking like a blender... To make matters worse, there wasn't just the number of people that could fill the seats... there was much more! You know those buses you see in movies, with the chickens and the children and everything else mixed in?? Well, there were no chickens (or at least that I saw... but I made sure to close my eyes very quickly and ignore everything...) but it was kinda like that... people sitting on the floor, trying to sleep on the floor, filling the isles and every possible space...
Luckly, both Mene and I can sleep through anything, so that's what we did... turn towards the window, away from the crowd, and sleep....
Eventually, we made a stop, somewhere around midnight I think, and woke up, looked behind at our Canadian friends to see how they were doing, and the poor girl, Angie, she had been throwing up out the window nonstop for the last 4hrs or so... and Matt, her husband, could barely keep it down. They couldn't believe we had slept through the whole thing...
After that, we had a paved road, so it was better... until we stopped at 3am in Oruro.
In Oruro, we expect to change buses directly and leave to La Paz, but that's where we discover that we don't actually have tickets to La Paz, that the bus company we came with doesn't go all the way there, and the bus driver was walking around with us behind him, trying to find us tickets. Detail: there were people yelling around the platforms "La Paz, 15 bolivianos to La Paz..."
That's where we realized we'd just been screwed and the bus driver used our 40 bolivianos to buy tickets for 15 bolivianos and give them to us, and put us on the bus. Oh well... it happens...
At least we made it to La Paz, the second bus was on paved road and not overcrowded, and incredibly, it was on time. We arrived at La Paz at 7am on the dot, where we stayed at the bus terminal for only a couple of hours, while waiting for our next bus, which would take us to Copacabana, on Lake Titicaca...
And that's on another entry... :)
Friday, May 29, 2009
Salar de Uyuni--tour
Alright peoples, so here it comes... this will be long, so brace yourselves... I'll try to summarize as much as I can...
Day 1- Tupiza to San Antonio de Lipez
We got up early and had a pretty decent breakfast, bought a couple of last minute things, and met our travel companions, Angie and Matt, a really nice Canadian couple.
Our jeep driver, Rafael and our cook (yep, our own cook!) Margarita seemed also very nice... so we were happy and excited to start the tour.
Tupiza is at an altitude of 2950m above sea level, which is really not bad... but then we started to go uphill... and uphill... and uphill...
I forgot the name of most of the places we passed through that first day, we crossed deserts, a couple of little villages, a gold mine (serious, apparently in the rainy season it's possible to find Gold along the streams!!!) and lots and lots of llamas... (which eventually would become dinner!)
Finally, we arrived at San Antonio de Lipez, the little village at 4200m, where we were going to spend the night. Margarita, who had done miracles at lunch, again surprised us with a little coffee break before dinner, and gave us this tea of some local herb called Pupuna, which is supposed to help with the altitude. We'll see...
We tried to go for a walk and take a few pictures before the sun went down, but at that altitude, we couldn't really walk very fast! It really was an effort to catch your breath, and the worse part is that some kids around were playing basketball!!!
The temperature went down with the sun, and if it weren't for the nice hot soup that Margarita had for our dinner, we would've died! But the stars though.... and the milky way.... just breath taking!
Then it's bed-time, and we piled lots of blankets on top of ourselves to try and keep warm. That was a terrible night though. We weren't cold, but none of us could sleep... It was really an effort to breathe, and the lack of oxygen to our brains resulted in a pretty bad headache (which prevented us from sleeping and probably caused some brain damage as well... hehe... there, now I have an excuse!)
1250m of difference from Tupiza at 2950m to San Antonio de Lipez at 4200m is a heck of a lot! But we survived... barely...
Day 2-- San Antonio de Lipez to Laguna Colorada
We got up really early, at 5:30am because we were supposed to leave at 6am to see the sunset at this little village...
BUT--- the jeep was not cooperating. It just wouldn't start. Damn cold! So Rafael starts taking things apart and doing what he could while we crawled back under the covers to try and keep warm. We hadn't turned off the ligths, so the two boys started a competition trying to throw shoes at the light-switch to turn it off... unsuccessfully however... so the light stayed on.
At around 8am, Rafael produced a miracle and the jeep started. We jumped from our beds and in minutes, we were on our way, trying to make up for the lost time.
In about 45 minutes, we reached at this Ghost Town, or Mundo Nuevo, an old Spanish settlement from the 16th century, when the Spaniards reached that part of Bolivia. I kept wondering how the heck they made it here, since today, 5 centuries later, it was still pretty damn hard to get there! But anyway, the Spaniards managed to get there and bring the plague with them, which eventually killed everybody, natives and spaniards alike. They left behind the Ghost Town, where, rumor has it, there are treasures buried, because the families never made it out. Today, the tow belongs to the "biscachas," these funny rabbit-looking creatures, with small ears and a tail.
Well, on we go, for there are many things yet to see. We spent the day crossing deserts and finding colorful lagoons, mountains, hot springs, geysers, etc.
At lunch, we stopped at the hot springs, and that was incredible! The plae was a little sheltered from the wind, and the water was deliciously hot, so we juped straight in and felt warm for the first time since the beginning of the trip. We couldn't stay long however, because according to Rafael, the hot springs dehydrate us, and that would make the altitude headaches worse. We really didn't want that.....
So we got out of the pool and air dried, the sun was really hitting hard and it was great! Lunch, once again was delicious.... Margarita was wonderful, and always made food for an army!
From there we kept going to the different lagoons, Laguna Blanca, Laguna Verde, Laguna Colorada... My favorite was Laguna Verde... it was gorgeous! Too bad it was really windy and terribly cold. Funny thing though= the lagoon is green because it has a high concentration of Arsenic! So we didn't get very close...
We crossed the Dali Desert, which gained its name due to the crazy rock formations which resemble a Dali painting. By this point, we were going along the Chile/Bolivia border.
Eventually, we got up to 5,000m above sea level, to see "El Sol de Manana" which I really have no idea why it has that name. Those were the geysers, bubbling greyish color water and steam coming up from the earth, smelling of sulfur. This whole area has a bit of volcanic activity, and most of the mountains/rock formations are of volcanic origin.
Finally, we arrived at Laguna Colorada, home of 25,000 flamingos, but there were only a few left, because they're already migrating north, running away from the cold. The lagoon is red because of the microplancton in it, which also explains the presence of the Flamingos and their red color. The lagoon is at 4270m, but sheltered from the wind by the mountain on top of which is our hotel for the night.
Yep, you got that right... The view was great, but the wind and cold at 4300+ meters was unbearable!
We slept with all our clothes on and 7 blankets (count them, 7!) on top of ourselves. The night was a little better than the night before though... They say it takes a couple of days to get used to the altitude, and I think the Pupuna tea was also helping a little...
Day 3-- Laguna Colorada to Salar de Uyuni
When we got up in the morning, the sun was barely rising. It was so freaking cold, we really didn't want to get out of bed...
Eventually we understood why we were so cold though.... apparently, during the night, temperatures had gone as low as -25 degrees Celsius (that's about -30 Farenheit!!!) Seriously!!! So at least we knew we weren't being wusses, and it really was that cold!
But the jeep cooperated this time, and with the sun coming through the windwos, it was almost warm.
Detail= a water bottle we had left in the back seat was frozen solid...
The first stop of the day was El Arbol de Piedra, a funny-looking rock formation that looks like a tree. Interesting though, this is the middle of nowhere, with miles of empty dust and desert as far as the eye can see, and someone managed to put a big Parking sign there... just to show us where to park... seriously??? Seriously!
From there we continued on, desert, lagoon, desert, mountain... it's hard to describe it, and the pictures wouldn't make it justice, but we're talking about spectacular landscapes and beautiful empty spaces... things that you'd never really get to see, and here I am, in the middle of nowhere, in this 4x4 jeep, crossing the deserts of Bolivia... feasting my eyes with the beauty of this place. In one word: Amazing.
We stopped for lunch at these volcanic rock formations from where we could see Volcano Ollague, at 5865m. It's actually considered an active volcano because it's constantly sputting up smoke. It's also a natural border between Chile and Bolivia.
After lunch, we crossed a small Salar called Chiguana, and made our way to our accomodation for the night... We had to get there early because this place was very popular, for a couple of reasons: 1st, it had a SHOWER with HOT WATER! That might not be all that exciting to you, but it certainly was for us, after 3 days of eating and breathing dust!
The second reason is more interesting though: the place was entirely made out of SALT! Bricks of salt made walls, floor, steps, tables, seats, beds, everything! Even the decorations were made of salt, with "salticles" (think of icycles) hanging from the ceiling. It was pretty cool! The only downside is that everything you touch turns white...
Oh, and since it was a little high up, we had some awesome views of the Salar de Uyuni, the star of the tour, which we would see upclose the next morning...
Day 4-- Salar de Uyuni
We got up at 6am, and by 6:15 we're already on the road. Breakfast will be at the Island of Fish, in the middle of the Salar. We're leaving early because we want to see the sunrise on the Salar...
At the middle of the salar, the sun starts to rise, and we stop the jeep and start taking pictures like mad people. Luckly, Matt and Angie are just as fanatics as we are, so out we go with our tripods and cameras, in the freezing cold but very incredible and beautiful Salar de Uyuni, which has a total surface of 12,000 square kilometers, and at some points, as deep as 50m! That's a whole lot of salt!!!
Rafael told us that the bricks of salt used in constructions are basically carved out manually with axes and such. That's just insane!!! They also exploit the salt commercially, and remove about 20,000 tons of salt per year!
After the sun was up and our fingers and toes were just about to fall off, we got back on the jeep and made our way to Isla del Pescado.
From there we can go up, and up, and up... (this is a like half the Saleve, but at a slightly higher altitude, which means I made it to the top almost puking my lungs out!!!) but the view from the top is well worth it. This is an island, but instead of being surrounded by water, it's surrounded by salt. And completely covered by cactii. They say cactus grows at a rate of 1cm per year, and the oldest cactus on the island died last year, at 12m, which would make it 1,200 years old!
We went down and Margarita again surpassed herself with an amazing breakfast of cereal, yogurt, cake, dulce de leche and coffee. We really ate very, very well on this trip, and it seemed every 5 minutes she had something else for us to eat... incredible! :)
After another picture session, where the Choo-Choo Shoe was re-created (if you don't know it, go find out!) we got on our way again, and crossed the 40km of Salar, to this little village called Puerto Chuvica, where we walked around, bought a couple of handicrafts (I got alpaca gloves and socks...!) and Margarita served us our last meal of the tour, a delicious lunch!
Then we made our way to the town of Uyuni proper, where we finished our tour, and where we would stay until 8pm to wait for our bus to La Paz...
So that's it, that was the 4-days/3 nights tour of the Salar de Uyuni. Sorry it's long, but I could've said SOOO much more about it! Despite the cold and dust, this was an amazing trip, and I really recommend it to anyone who wants an adventure! :)
Day 1- Tupiza to San Antonio de Lipez
We got up early and had a pretty decent breakfast, bought a couple of last minute things, and met our travel companions, Angie and Matt, a really nice Canadian couple.
Our jeep driver, Rafael and our cook (yep, our own cook!) Margarita seemed also very nice... so we were happy and excited to start the tour.
Tupiza is at an altitude of 2950m above sea level, which is really not bad... but then we started to go uphill... and uphill... and uphill...
I forgot the name of most of the places we passed through that first day, we crossed deserts, a couple of little villages, a gold mine (serious, apparently in the rainy season it's possible to find Gold along the streams!!!) and lots and lots of llamas... (which eventually would become dinner!)
Finally, we arrived at San Antonio de Lipez, the little village at 4200m, where we were going to spend the night. Margarita, who had done miracles at lunch, again surprised us with a little coffee break before dinner, and gave us this tea of some local herb called Pupuna, which is supposed to help with the altitude. We'll see...
We tried to go for a walk and take a few pictures before the sun went down, but at that altitude, we couldn't really walk very fast! It really was an effort to catch your breath, and the worse part is that some kids around were playing basketball!!!
The temperature went down with the sun, and if it weren't for the nice hot soup that Margarita had for our dinner, we would've died! But the stars though.... and the milky way.... just breath taking!
Then it's bed-time, and we piled lots of blankets on top of ourselves to try and keep warm. That was a terrible night though. We weren't cold, but none of us could sleep... It was really an effort to breathe, and the lack of oxygen to our brains resulted in a pretty bad headache (which prevented us from sleeping and probably caused some brain damage as well... hehe... there, now I have an excuse!)
1250m of difference from Tupiza at 2950m to San Antonio de Lipez at 4200m is a heck of a lot! But we survived... barely...
Day 2-- San Antonio de Lipez to Laguna Colorada
We got up really early, at 5:30am because we were supposed to leave at 6am to see the sunset at this little village...
BUT--- the jeep was not cooperating. It just wouldn't start. Damn cold! So Rafael starts taking things apart and doing what he could while we crawled back under the covers to try and keep warm. We hadn't turned off the ligths, so the two boys started a competition trying to throw shoes at the light-switch to turn it off... unsuccessfully however... so the light stayed on.
At around 8am, Rafael produced a miracle and the jeep started. We jumped from our beds and in minutes, we were on our way, trying to make up for the lost time.
In about 45 minutes, we reached at this Ghost Town, or Mundo Nuevo, an old Spanish settlement from the 16th century, when the Spaniards reached that part of Bolivia. I kept wondering how the heck they made it here, since today, 5 centuries later, it was still pretty damn hard to get there! But anyway, the Spaniards managed to get there and bring the plague with them, which eventually killed everybody, natives and spaniards alike. They left behind the Ghost Town, where, rumor has it, there are treasures buried, because the families never made it out. Today, the tow belongs to the "biscachas," these funny rabbit-looking creatures, with small ears and a tail.
Well, on we go, for there are many things yet to see. We spent the day crossing deserts and finding colorful lagoons, mountains, hot springs, geysers, etc.
At lunch, we stopped at the hot springs, and that was incredible! The plae was a little sheltered from the wind, and the water was deliciously hot, so we juped straight in and felt warm for the first time since the beginning of the trip. We couldn't stay long however, because according to Rafael, the hot springs dehydrate us, and that would make the altitude headaches worse. We really didn't want that.....
So we got out of the pool and air dried, the sun was really hitting hard and it was great! Lunch, once again was delicious.... Margarita was wonderful, and always made food for an army!
From there we kept going to the different lagoons, Laguna Blanca, Laguna Verde, Laguna Colorada... My favorite was Laguna Verde... it was gorgeous! Too bad it was really windy and terribly cold. Funny thing though= the lagoon is green because it has a high concentration of Arsenic! So we didn't get very close...
We crossed the Dali Desert, which gained its name due to the crazy rock formations which resemble a Dali painting. By this point, we were going along the Chile/Bolivia border.
Eventually, we got up to 5,000m above sea level, to see "El Sol de Manana" which I really have no idea why it has that name. Those were the geysers, bubbling greyish color water and steam coming up from the earth, smelling of sulfur. This whole area has a bit of volcanic activity, and most of the mountains/rock formations are of volcanic origin.
Finally, we arrived at Laguna Colorada, home of 25,000 flamingos, but there were only a few left, because they're already migrating north, running away from the cold. The lagoon is red because of the microplancton in it, which also explains the presence of the Flamingos and their red color. The lagoon is at 4270m, but sheltered from the wind by the mountain on top of which is our hotel for the night.
Yep, you got that right... The view was great, but the wind and cold at 4300+ meters was unbearable!
We slept with all our clothes on and 7 blankets (count them, 7!) on top of ourselves. The night was a little better than the night before though... They say it takes a couple of days to get used to the altitude, and I think the Pupuna tea was also helping a little...
Day 3-- Laguna Colorada to Salar de Uyuni
When we got up in the morning, the sun was barely rising. It was so freaking cold, we really didn't want to get out of bed...
Eventually we understood why we were so cold though.... apparently, during the night, temperatures had gone as low as -25 degrees Celsius (that's about -30 Farenheit!!!) Seriously!!! So at least we knew we weren't being wusses, and it really was that cold!
But the jeep cooperated this time, and with the sun coming through the windwos, it was almost warm.
Detail= a water bottle we had left in the back seat was frozen solid...
The first stop of the day was El Arbol de Piedra, a funny-looking rock formation that looks like a tree. Interesting though, this is the middle of nowhere, with miles of empty dust and desert as far as the eye can see, and someone managed to put a big Parking sign there... just to show us where to park... seriously??? Seriously!
From there we continued on, desert, lagoon, desert, mountain... it's hard to describe it, and the pictures wouldn't make it justice, but we're talking about spectacular landscapes and beautiful empty spaces... things that you'd never really get to see, and here I am, in the middle of nowhere, in this 4x4 jeep, crossing the deserts of Bolivia... feasting my eyes with the beauty of this place. In one word: Amazing.
We stopped for lunch at these volcanic rock formations from where we could see Volcano Ollague, at 5865m. It's actually considered an active volcano because it's constantly sputting up smoke. It's also a natural border between Chile and Bolivia.
After lunch, we crossed a small Salar called Chiguana, and made our way to our accomodation for the night... We had to get there early because this place was very popular, for a couple of reasons: 1st, it had a SHOWER with HOT WATER! That might not be all that exciting to you, but it certainly was for us, after 3 days of eating and breathing dust!
The second reason is more interesting though: the place was entirely made out of SALT! Bricks of salt made walls, floor, steps, tables, seats, beds, everything! Even the decorations were made of salt, with "salticles" (think of icycles) hanging from the ceiling. It was pretty cool! The only downside is that everything you touch turns white...
Oh, and since it was a little high up, we had some awesome views of the Salar de Uyuni, the star of the tour, which we would see upclose the next morning...
Day 4-- Salar de Uyuni
We got up at 6am, and by 6:15 we're already on the road. Breakfast will be at the Island of Fish, in the middle of the Salar. We're leaving early because we want to see the sunrise on the Salar...
At the middle of the salar, the sun starts to rise, and we stop the jeep and start taking pictures like mad people. Luckly, Matt and Angie are just as fanatics as we are, so out we go with our tripods and cameras, in the freezing cold but very incredible and beautiful Salar de Uyuni, which has a total surface of 12,000 square kilometers, and at some points, as deep as 50m! That's a whole lot of salt!!!
Rafael told us that the bricks of salt used in constructions are basically carved out manually with axes and such. That's just insane!!! They also exploit the salt commercially, and remove about 20,000 tons of salt per year!
After the sun was up and our fingers and toes were just about to fall off, we got back on the jeep and made our way to Isla del Pescado.
From there we can go up, and up, and up... (this is a like half the Saleve, but at a slightly higher altitude, which means I made it to the top almost puking my lungs out!!!) but the view from the top is well worth it. This is an island, but instead of being surrounded by water, it's surrounded by salt. And completely covered by cactii. They say cactus grows at a rate of 1cm per year, and the oldest cactus on the island died last year, at 12m, which would make it 1,200 years old!
We went down and Margarita again surpassed herself with an amazing breakfast of cereal, yogurt, cake, dulce de leche and coffee. We really ate very, very well on this trip, and it seemed every 5 minutes she had something else for us to eat... incredible! :)
After another picture session, where the Choo-Choo Shoe was re-created (if you don't know it, go find out!) we got on our way again, and crossed the 40km of Salar, to this little village called Puerto Chuvica, where we walked around, bought a couple of handicrafts (I got alpaca gloves and socks...!) and Margarita served us our last meal of the tour, a delicious lunch!
Then we made our way to the town of Uyuni proper, where we finished our tour, and where we would stay until 8pm to wait for our bus to La Paz...
So that's it, that was the 4-days/3 nights tour of the Salar de Uyuni. Sorry it's long, but I could've said SOOO much more about it! Despite the cold and dust, this was an amazing trip, and I really recommend it to anyone who wants an adventure! :)
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
Pictures...
Hey peoples...
I have to do the whole post on the Salar tour, and that's going to take a while... so I thought I'd just post a couple of pictures to give you an idea...
Right now I'm in Peru, just crossed the border this morning, after spending a comatose day/night in Copacabana... I slept close to 12hrs... serious!! It was nice to have a big comfortable bed, and not have to have 7 blankets to keep warm... :)
Alright, pictures!
Crossing the border into Bolivia... if you look carefully, there's a Bolivian flag on the background... but we were running so as to catch the train, and the guidebook had said several times "no pictures allowed at border control areas" so we thought it safer to avoid them...
That's Laguna Verde, in the middle of the desert, almost on the border with Chile... altitude? Somewhere around 4100m I think... cold and hard to breathe, but beautiful nonetheless...
Sunrise on the Salt Flats.... it was freaking cold (yep, it was cold during the whole tour!!) but it was really beautiful!!! :)
Alright, that's all for the moment.... I'll get my act together and write about the whole tour day-by-day before I have too much more to write and it gets hard to catch up... Tomorrow we're already going on another 2-day tour, to some islands on Lake Titicaca... :)
I have to do the whole post on the Salar tour, and that's going to take a while... so I thought I'd just post a couple of pictures to give you an idea...
Right now I'm in Peru, just crossed the border this morning, after spending a comatose day/night in Copacabana... I slept close to 12hrs... serious!! It was nice to have a big comfortable bed, and not have to have 7 blankets to keep warm... :)
Alright, pictures!
Crossing the border into Bolivia... if you look carefully, there's a Bolivian flag on the background... but we were running so as to catch the train, and the guidebook had said several times "no pictures allowed at border control areas" so we thought it safer to avoid them...
That's Laguna Verde, in the middle of the desert, almost on the border with Chile... altitude? Somewhere around 4100m I think... cold and hard to breathe, but beautiful nonetheless...
Sunrise on the Salt Flats.... it was freaking cold (yep, it was cold during the whole tour!!) but it was really beautiful!!! :)
Alright, that's all for the moment.... I'll get my act together and write about the whole tour day-by-day before I have too much more to write and it gets hard to catch up... Tomorrow we're already going on another 2-day tour, to some islands on Lake Titicaca... :)
Sunday, May 24, 2009
Spur-of-the moment...
So I don't need to remind you people that I'm crazy, but I thought I'd start with that anyway... :)
I have a friend from Greece who had been living in Buenos Aires for like a year and a half, but recently went back to Greece for a month and was passing through Buenos Aires again just to catch a bus because he's going to travel through South America and stay in Colombia for a couple of months...
Well, he was only going to be in town for a day, so we met Monday night just to catch up a bit, before he left at 10am Tuesday morning. We started to talk, and eventually, without me knowing exactly how it happened, I was on board to go on the trip with him, at least until I ran out of money... Keep in mind that this is Monday at like 11pm, and the bus leaves at 10am the next day. So I go home, start calling people, start packing, write a letter to my roommates and leave rent for the next month, and try to sleep (although that didn't work very well).
Next morning, 8am I'm out the door, because I still have to try to change money and buy a ticket... to the bus that will take me from Buenos Aires to the town of La Quiaca, on the border with Bolivia, some 29hrs later. No joke.
When I actually get in the bus, his jaw dropped... he just couldn't believe that I was really there. I was. I'm just that crazy... :) and translation is great because it's an online based job, you can do it from anywhere... so it´s all good.
Here I am, 6 days later, after just finishing a tour of the Salar de Uyuni. I'll have to write about that on the next blog, especially because I just realized that I forgot my little journal thing at the last hotel... a salt hotel... meaning, a building completely made of salt bricks... unbelievable!! Pictures later...
Anyway, we're here in Uyuni until tonight, where we take an overnight bus to La Paz, and from there try to get on another bus to Copacabana... nope, not the beach in Rio... it's actually a little town on the shores of Lake Titicaca... and after that, it's all up in the air.
So to sum it all up, I'm crazy, but it's always been a bit embarassing that I've travelled all over and haven't seen much of my own back yard (meaning South America). This was a crazy decision, one that I didn't really think over, even because I didn't have much time, but sometimes opportunities knock and you just have to grab them! That's what I did, and so far, it couldn't have been any better... :)
Yes, I'm crazy... but you already knew that...
So stay tuned for the next episodes of crazy South American trip!
I have a friend from Greece who had been living in Buenos Aires for like a year and a half, but recently went back to Greece for a month and was passing through Buenos Aires again just to catch a bus because he's going to travel through South America and stay in Colombia for a couple of months...
Well, he was only going to be in town for a day, so we met Monday night just to catch up a bit, before he left at 10am Tuesday morning. We started to talk, and eventually, without me knowing exactly how it happened, I was on board to go on the trip with him, at least until I ran out of money... Keep in mind that this is Monday at like 11pm, and the bus leaves at 10am the next day. So I go home, start calling people, start packing, write a letter to my roommates and leave rent for the next month, and try to sleep (although that didn't work very well).
Next morning, 8am I'm out the door, because I still have to try to change money and buy a ticket... to the bus that will take me from Buenos Aires to the town of La Quiaca, on the border with Bolivia, some 29hrs later. No joke.
When I actually get in the bus, his jaw dropped... he just couldn't believe that I was really there. I was. I'm just that crazy... :) and translation is great because it's an online based job, you can do it from anywhere... so it´s all good.
Here I am, 6 days later, after just finishing a tour of the Salar de Uyuni. I'll have to write about that on the next blog, especially because I just realized that I forgot my little journal thing at the last hotel... a salt hotel... meaning, a building completely made of salt bricks... unbelievable!! Pictures later...
Anyway, we're here in Uyuni until tonight, where we take an overnight bus to La Paz, and from there try to get on another bus to Copacabana... nope, not the beach in Rio... it's actually a little town on the shores of Lake Titicaca... and after that, it's all up in the air.
So to sum it all up, I'm crazy, but it's always been a bit embarassing that I've travelled all over and haven't seen much of my own back yard (meaning South America). This was a crazy decision, one that I didn't really think over, even because I didn't have much time, but sometimes opportunities knock and you just have to grab them! That's what I did, and so far, it couldn't have been any better... :)
Yes, I'm crazy... but you already knew that...
So stay tuned for the next episodes of crazy South American trip!
Wednesday, April 22, 2009
Chance encounters and interesting finds...
Like I said below, Buenos Aires is an amazing city, full of surprises. So much happened yesterday that I would need 3 or 4 blogs to tell it all, but I’m going to try and squeeze it into one, otherwise I might bore you all with details relevant only to myself.
I’ve been serenaded a few times in my life, and "La vie en rose" will always bring a specific memory about a rainy night in France to my mind, but yesterday was completely unexpected.
I was walking around as usual, going to the Japanese Gardens to meet some friends, it was a lovely day, and I stopped at a bench to appreciate the day (and write an sms!) when this old man stopped and started to talk to me. Porteno born and bread, he must’ve been at least 70, and he told me that people should do what they like best: “if they like to write, they should write. If they like to dance, they should dance. If they like to paint, they should paint. I like to sing…" and he left the phrase for me to complete, which I obediently did. "...then you should sing." So he said if I'd let him, he'd sing me a song, to which I gladly acquiesced. So right there and then he broke into song, with a full voice, singing a bolero dedicated to me on the spot. He wasn’t a dirty old man at all, he just wanted to share his gift of song, and he said he couldn't stop himself for singing to a "beautiful young lady like you." (His words, not mine...)
Before we parted, he sang me another one, this time by an Uruguayan composer, and had I not been going to meet my friends, I’m sure he would have sang me many more. He walked away happy for having someone to sing to. I walked away happy for having been sang to. It may be that we never meet again, but it was worth it and will be a moment I will always remember.
The day continued with a couple of other chance encounters that put even more smiles upon my face, but I will spare you those and fast forward to the evening…
I went to my friend’s place because we were going to walk to this live tango music place… and a block away from her house, somebody had put a really good (almost new!) bamboo framed couch on the street. There were 3 of us, all girls, all nicely dressed (one even in heels!) and we were 14 blocks away from my house. But we all looked at each other and just knew what we had to do. So I spent the next half hour carrying a couch through the streets of Buenos Aires, having people (even a policeman!) smile and offer to help. I now have a comfy couch in my living room (I’m debating taking it up to my room… we’ll see…)
I’ve been serenaded a few times in my life, and "La vie en rose" will always bring a specific memory about a rainy night in France to my mind, but yesterday was completely unexpected.
I was walking around as usual, going to the Japanese Gardens to meet some friends, it was a lovely day, and I stopped at a bench to appreciate the day (and write an sms!) when this old man stopped and started to talk to me. Porteno born and bread, he must’ve been at least 70, and he told me that people should do what they like best: “if they like to write, they should write. If they like to dance, they should dance. If they like to paint, they should paint. I like to sing…" and he left the phrase for me to complete, which I obediently did. "...then you should sing." So he said if I'd let him, he'd sing me a song, to which I gladly acquiesced. So right there and then he broke into song, with a full voice, singing a bolero dedicated to me on the spot. He wasn’t a dirty old man at all, he just wanted to share his gift of song, and he said he couldn't stop himself for singing to a "beautiful young lady like you." (His words, not mine...)
Before we parted, he sang me another one, this time by an Uruguayan composer, and had I not been going to meet my friends, I’m sure he would have sang me many more. He walked away happy for having someone to sing to. I walked away happy for having been sang to. It may be that we never meet again, but it was worth it and will be a moment I will always remember.
The day continued with a couple of other chance encounters that put even more smiles upon my face, but I will spare you those and fast forward to the evening…
I went to my friend’s place because we were going to walk to this live tango music place… and a block away from her house, somebody had put a really good (almost new!) bamboo framed couch on the street. There were 3 of us, all girls, all nicely dressed (one even in heels!) and we were 14 blocks away from my house. But we all looked at each other and just knew what we had to do. So I spent the next half hour carrying a couch through the streets of Buenos Aires, having people (even a policeman!) smile and offer to help. I now have a comfy couch in my living room (I’m debating taking it up to my room… we’ll see…)
Monday, April 6, 2009
It's been a while...
...since I wrote here. And as it usually happens in my life, it has turned upside down and inside out in a matter of days. And once again, new beginnings, new terms, new life!
I must admit I was a bit scared about this one. It happened so unexpectedly! But somehow it ended up happening naturally, can't even explain how.
The point is, the last 3 months have been amazing, challenging, hard, wonderful, exciting, and a whole lot of other things. In a sense, I have been pushed to the max, and I'm proud to say I didn't break. I picked myself up, shook the dust, stood on my own two feet and managed to build a pretty good life!
So now that a new adventure has started, and I'm back under the southern skies, with the beautiful south cross to lead the way, I feel like I should start writing here again. :)
For those of you who don't know this yet, I am living in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
This city is so amazing, it's almost impossible to describe how I feel about it. There is SO much to discover, so many things that bring a feeling of awe and excitement, so much life, so much... joy. Yes, I think that's the word. We don't use that word nearly enough, but joy is a wonderful feeling that just invades you and brings a smile to your lips that you just can't control. I have discovered myself smiling happily on the streets while just walking, for no other reason than the fact I'm walking down a street in Buenos Aires, or that I see a building that makes me think of Paris, or that I'm going to my favorite coffee place, or that I'm meeting a friend... And invariably, I take different routes to go places, and discover a new little gem of a place, a little hidden piece of heaven with a delicious ginger lemonade, or a mouth-watering factura de dulce de leche (hmmm... hard to explain... something sweet and delicious!)
I don't know how long I will be here for. I'm planning on staying until December, but the wind might pick up again and take me on a different adventure before then... or I might fall in love even more with this city and decide I can't leave just yet.
To all my dear and old friends... I miss you as always. To all my new friends, I'm thankful you're in my life. You have truly made a difference in these last 3 months, and I can't imagine life here without you. So thank you.
I must admit I was a bit scared about this one. It happened so unexpectedly! But somehow it ended up happening naturally, can't even explain how.
The point is, the last 3 months have been amazing, challenging, hard, wonderful, exciting, and a whole lot of other things. In a sense, I have been pushed to the max, and I'm proud to say I didn't break. I picked myself up, shook the dust, stood on my own two feet and managed to build a pretty good life!
So now that a new adventure has started, and I'm back under the southern skies, with the beautiful south cross to lead the way, I feel like I should start writing here again. :)
For those of you who don't know this yet, I am living in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
This city is so amazing, it's almost impossible to describe how I feel about it. There is SO much to discover, so many things that bring a feeling of awe and excitement, so much life, so much... joy. Yes, I think that's the word. We don't use that word nearly enough, but joy is a wonderful feeling that just invades you and brings a smile to your lips that you just can't control. I have discovered myself smiling happily on the streets while just walking, for no other reason than the fact I'm walking down a street in Buenos Aires, or that I see a building that makes me think of Paris, or that I'm going to my favorite coffee place, or that I'm meeting a friend... And invariably, I take different routes to go places, and discover a new little gem of a place, a little hidden piece of heaven with a delicious ginger lemonade, or a mouth-watering factura de dulce de leche (hmmm... hard to explain... something sweet and delicious!)
I don't know how long I will be here for. I'm planning on staying until December, but the wind might pick up again and take me on a different adventure before then... or I might fall in love even more with this city and decide I can't leave just yet.
To all my dear and old friends... I miss you as always. To all my new friends, I'm thankful you're in my life. You have truly made a difference in these last 3 months, and I can't imagine life here without you. So thank you.
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