Homeward Bound!

Here I sit, waiting for the time to tick by before I head to the airport. My flight doesn´t leave till almost 2am, and then I get to sit in an airport for about 15 hours before the long flight home. You can imagine how I´m excited about 15 hours in an airport. Hopefully I can find a comfy seat to sleep.

Mandy´s in Quito now, and I´ve had the day to myself. The guys here at this hostel have been fantastic, as they have let me hang out. Peruvians have a fantastic sense of humour, and these gusy seem to like being able to pick on the Aussies. They also think it´s very funny that we are vegetarian as apparently (they keep telling me that I need some meat, it´s good for me).

Anyway, not sure if I´ll get internet access between now and when I get home.

So.....
Mandy - thanks for sharing the past 3 and a half months adventures with me. The words "is impossible" and "is possible" have a completely different meaning to me than when I first started, as do hazard lights and boompahs! Enjoy your next two months.
Jim & John - Thanks for organising BA & Rio. It was great, and I look forward to our next catchup.
Simon - Thanks for paying all the bills, for looking after the puppies and for everything else that you´ve done for me while I´ve been away.
And Everyoneelse - hope you´ve enjoyed the read and I look forward to boring you with the many (and I mean MANY) photos.

The Past Few Days.

Machu Piccu was fantastic. We left Cusco at 7am on Thursday morning on the train for Agua Caliente. The train ride took almost 4 hours and wasn´t very exciting - other than the food we purchased on the train was better than the food we were provided by on our LAN Chile flights.

When we arrived at Agua Caliente, we went in search of our hostel. Which isn´t hard, as there´s one main street in town, and everything is off that street. The place town and the hostel were lovely. Mind you everything is up-hill.

We had lunch in the local Hari Krishna restaurant and the food was great and cheap. As were were eating it, we realised that some of the best food that we had had on this trip had been in the wierdest places - Krakow, Agua Caliente and Edinburgh.

We then wandered around the town for a bit (didn´t take long as it´s not that big) and then headed to the towns market. The market seemed to be almost as big as the town. Of course we managed to spend heaps as it´s all pretty cool stuff - but oh so very touristy (strange that!).

So after a very tiring day we headed to our room for a quick "nanna nap", which basically lasted until Friday morning. We had to be up by stupid o´clock to catch the 5.30am bus to Macchu Piccu. We managed to get on the bus ontime, and the adventure began.

The road leading up the Macchu Piccu was .... interesting. It had been raining heavily overnight so the roads were very muddy and slippery and very narrow road that is zig-zag up the mountain. The edge of the road is very close, particularly when a bus is coming from the other direction. By the time we got to the entrace our heart rates were very high! Mind you , what were we worried about - we arrived safely.

Weather wise we were very lucky. The weather reports showed that it was going to rain for the 4 days we were in Cusco/Machu Piccu. It rained pretty much all day Wednesday and Thursday, and Friday morning looked very bleak and we were sure we were going to be rained on. But as we got closer to the Macchu Piccu the sun started shining on the mountain tops and we had fantastic weather while we were there. Sunny, and warm - it was beautiful.

Macchu Piccu is spectaculor. The altitude wasn´t fun. Being scared of hights - again not fun. But the views were well worth it. The first part of the tour took us up and up and up. Nah, it wasn´t really that bad, but the altitude just made it hard to breath. But the view - spectacular. I would upload some photos, but this computer doesn´t have a USB port (well not that I can see anyway).

The tour took about two and a half hours, and was very informative. It was well worth it, and there are some amazing stories that go with the place. I can certainly see why it´s one of the seven wonders of the world.

By about 10.30am, we were starving, and decided that we had seen as much as we wanted to see. So we headed back down the hill. Again the bus drive made our hearts race, but at least the road had dried out.

We got back into town, and had an early lunch (Hari Krishna food again). Then headed to the hot springs. They were fabulous. Any tension that our muscles were feeling melted away in the mineral spring pools. Mandy and I ended up having a water fight with this cute little kid who spoke no english but he kept spalshing us telling us that the water was ¨caliente¨. Clearly his parents had told him he wasn´t allowed to splash frio water. We had everyone laughing at us as we were splashing and squeeling. Then the rain set in. It´s a very weird sensation being in hot springs, getting rained on by very cold rain.

After the hot springs, we then decided that we needed a drink. Something local of course! So we had a Pisco Sour (very nice) and a Caipirinha (this is what we were drinking on Copacabana beach). Both were very nice, and went down a little too easy. As did the pizza and beer afterwards.

The train left Agua Caliente at 5pm and took almost 4 hours to get back to Cusco. The ride back was fun though, as we ended up sitting with two gay guys from New York who were a hoot. They really enjoyed having 2 Aussies to stir, and I think we almost convinced them to come to Australia for Mardi Gras.

We got back to the guest house, and pretty much hit the pillow. We were exhausted. We awoke this morning not feeling so great. We of course blamed the altitude! Couldn´t have anything to do with the alcohol (which you´re told not to have at altitude).

We didn´t get to see anymore of Cusco as we left this morning, but it´s a lovely place, and our experience there was was very positive. I´ve read a lot of comments about Cusco, and a fair percentage of them made it sound like a terrible place - and this was certainly not what we experienced. Everyone we met and dealt with was lovely and everything "is possible!"

In the guesthouse that we stayed in, the people were lovely. They organsied our Macchu Piccu tour, accommodation in Agua Caliente and transfers to and from the train station. They couldn´t do enough to help us. They were fantastic. The guy running the place was very concerned about us going to Lima, and checked where we were staying to ensure it was safe. He gave us a couple of tips on how to survive in Lima. He said that he wanted us to stay safe as we were nice people. Sweet!

His Mum also helps out in the guesthouse, and she´s a true ¨Mum¨. She takes care of everyone and makes sure that you´re ok. On our first day in Cusco, one of the lady´s staying in the guesthouse suffered quite badly from the altitude and Mumma took care of her. She fussed over her, and gave her something and within about 20 minutes she was feeling better. Honestly - if you´re thinking of going to Cusco I recommend you stay at that guesthouse.

We´re now in Lima, staying in one of the safest suburbs of the city (so we keep getting told). We´re staying in Miraflora - it´s on the coast and it´s lovely, but very touristy. We walked along the coast for a while this afternoon and it was lovely. Mind you we ended up walking considerably further than we planned.

We made the owner of our hostel laugh, as we bought some black corn to try and as we were trying to eat it and cracked up, as they don´t eat it. Apparently they use it to make Chicha, which we need to try. He said it´s made from the water that the corn is boiled in, pineapple and cinnamon. So Mandy and I are going to give it a go.

Tomorrow Peru is having a census, and all Peruvians have to stay at home from 8am to 6pm so there will be nothing open, no shop, markets, buses, taxis or anything. So we´re being forced to have a very slack day and do nothing. Jealous??

Getting High In Cusco

We flew into Cusco yesterday afternoon. Had a cup of Coco leave tea and were promptly told to go and lay down and not to walk around for 2 hours. The lady incharge of the Hostel was absolutely lovely, but as we don´t speak Spanish and she doesn´t speak English it was a lot of laughs working that out. We thought we were fine, until we got up from our ¨rest¨ and our heads spun. But were not doing too badly. We´re relieved that we decided sometime ago not to do the trek, although it would have been fantastic, but it´s so hard to breath even when you´re just lying down.

But as we´re feeling slightly better today, we´re going to take ourselves off into town and check out the local markets - should be fun. Hopefully the rain will hold out, but I´somehow doubt it.

Cusco Here We Come

Today we spent the day being very slack - which was great. We slept in, then as we left the hostel we heard drums, which were calling us so we folloewd them. And found ourselves amist a miriad of protesters, with drums and trumpets. It was pretty amazing and there was an amazing feel.

We then wandered around town abit and determined that it must be a public holiday as the majority of the shops were shut, as was a couple of the places we wanted to visit. So we spent the afternoon sitting in the local park enjoying the sunlight which was lovely - and we finally got warm.

Tomorrow we head off to Cusco.

It´s Chilly in Chile!

Yesterday was freezing. Today was slightly warmer, but we decided that we couldn´t stand it any more so we went and bought ourselves some handmade socks from the local market. While we were there, we also bought a majorily dorky socks, and a funky handmade jumper - all of which needs to be seen to be believed.

We walked around a heap today, and saw a number of different local markets. Some more to our liking than others. The dead stuff hanging from varoius angles wasn´t really our thing. Food and alcohol are very cheap here, and South America has been great in that the Aussie dollar is finally worth somthing.

Tomorrow we´re off to have some Taco Bell for lunch, and to see if we can find a power adapoter, or there´ll be no photos of Machuc Piccu which would be very sad.

Hope all is well with everyone.

Farewell Rio - Hola Santiago

One week in Rio is never enough. Copacabana and Ipanema beachs are glorious, and I'm not even a real beach lover. It's truely an amazing experience sitting on the beach and being able to do all your tourist shopping without moving. Fantastic!

Cristo Redentor was pretty amazing too, with spectacular views.

Just for you Simon - The football stadium.

Mandy, John and Jim

The pavement at Ipanema.

Thanks Jim & John for joining us in South America and for sorting out the accommodation. Lets not leave it another 15 or so years till we catch-up again.

After the exhaustion of the past few days, I slept like a log last night. I was the best nights sleep that I've had since Barcelona. I know I was going on about going home again, but as I've already made that decision and I'm staying, I gave myself a good talking to and if I'm staying, then I need to start enjoying myself. So today, we became typical tourists in Rio and headed to the beach. What a very different experience that was. I'm used to clean beaches, with generally speaking not too many people around, and the major sound of the beach is the waves crashing. In Rio, it's oh so very different. The Beaches are pretty busy, and for the record budgy smugglers don't look good on anyone, not matter the age or the size! And ladies, let's just say that some sizes shouldn't wear a g-string bikini. Just as you lay down and get comfortable, the sales people arrive selling sunglasses, water, beer, food, sarongs, bikinis, hennah tattoos, jewellery, sunscreen. You name it and it would appear that you could buy it while at the beach. Don't get me wrong, it wasn't bad, and they took no for an answer quite well, it was just very different than I'm used too. Oh and the water was freezing!! The rest of the day was pretty much being slack.

Tomorrow we head off for some markets and we'll see how heaving are backpacks will be by the time we lealve the markets :-)

The Happy and the Sad

The past few days have had some amazing highs and lows.

Tuesday we spent the day being tourists, we walked around the cemetary where Evitas body is buried. It's an amazing cemetary which mosques and tombs that really just need to be seen to be believed. Very late that night I received an email telling me that my nanna passed away. This sent me into a weird spin. Should I stay or should I go was the only thoughts that I could consider. After much thought, little sleep and a great deal of tears, I decided to stay.

So over the past few days trying to enjoy this trip has become a real battle. I'm still enjoying the sites and sounds, but my hearts just not in it. We arrived in Rio this afternoon, and we're staying a very short walk from Copocabana Beach, and all I can think about is wanting to be at home. I'm hoping that if I get a good nights sleep tonight that this will all improve.

While flying today I became quite nostalgic about Nanna, and remembered some of the good times before she become frail. One of the things that sticks in my mind is how she once said that "this getting old stuff has knobbs on it" Oh how true those words were. I remember her telling me how she used to ride horse and buggy around the streets of Redcliffe. How she used to swim across the river from Maylands to Redcliffe to see aunty Mavis, how she hated it when the multinovas were introduced as she kept getting caught speeding - with her excuse being it was because she couldn't talk her way out of it. How she always made jelly for summer dessert, but she always mushed it up with a fork to make it look prettier. How Lockie would be sitting on her lap whenever her and Pop came to visit. I could go on. It was really comforting to remember her how she used to be, full of life. Her funeral will be on Thursday, and I wish I could be there.

Tomorrow is Simons Birthday - happy birthday!! Hope you have a great birthday and enjoyed your breakfast with Jo & Nita.

Yay - we're in BA!!

Yay, we've finally made it out of Madrid and into Buenos Aires. We're starting to get a comple now, as it's beenraining since we got here (apparently the day before was beautiful), that means we've been rained on in every country that we've been to. Yippee!! Just as well I kept my rain jacket!

The other exciting thing is that John has bought along his laptop, since Mandy and I are suffering computer withdrawal we're really appreciated to being able to just hopp on the computer when we want to "google" something. And you'ld be surprised how often that is. The other good thing is that we don't have to pay for the internet connection either, so we can juststay on for as long as we like, no rushing - very nice. Thanks John for brining the laptop with, we really do appreciate it.

So, Since I've got a bit of time, and it's stupid o'clock here and everyone else is asleep, I may as well try and find some photos for you'll

Connemarra Ponies - Ireland

Kylemore Abbey - Ireland

Wee Flossies - Ireland

Giants Causeway

Dorky tourist shot, somewhere on the Irish coast looking towards Mull of Kintyre.

Mandy with Oscar Wildes knee Galway

Loch Ness Monster - Scotland

Hadrians Walls - England

Well I've managed to flattten the battery on my camera while checking out my photos, so you'll all have to wait for the next installment for more photos.

Don´t Ever FLy Iberia Airlines!!

OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! We´re still in Madrid. Yes, I know we were supposed to be either in BA or on our way by now, but thewy over booked the flight and well we´ll just have to wait!!! After much frustration and spending many hours in a line at Madrid airport (which is quite a nice looking airport) we managed to get onto a flight at leaves at stupid o´clock tonight and arrives early tomorrow morning. Gee´s - how hard can it be. Clearly ¨the computer¨needs to be sorted out so that they get their s**t together and not stuff people around. Mind you we´ve actually ended up better off in someways, as we´ve been put up in a nice hotel for the day, food, internet and wine has been paid for. We´ve been financially compensated for our delay which was a nice surprise. But I tell you NEVER AGAIN WILL I FLY IBERIA!!