Rucksac monologues

exambox.co.uk

2010-03-01T11:08:00.003Z

www.exambox.co.uk

The website has recently launched and will soon contain practice exam papers for the UK GCSE maths syllabus, available for students, parents and teachers to buy and download online. Each practice paper comes complete with full worked solutions, allowing those who download them to mark their papers in detail and determine those areas in which they're doing well, and those in which they need to concentrate their work and revision. Two sets of six papers and solutions for foundation and higher tiers will be available in time for this year's summer exam season.

In the future the hope is that the website will be expanded to include other subjects and qualification levels. To see a specimen couple of pages from a foundation tier (non-calculator paper) click the link below.

http://www.exambox.co.uk/files/Exambox_Solutions_Specimen_Page.pdf

Back home

2007-09-18T10:19:00.000Z

You're a very loyal reader to have got to this point, and I thank you for that. I had planned to do a signing-off post soon after I got back, and I've finally got round to doing that now.

Well, I was away for 303 nights, 35 of which were spent in a tent, 15 in mountain huts and 14 on buses, trains and planes. I read 36 and a half books and took 17 hitch-hike rides. I saw some astounding places and met some extraordinary people. I well and truly have the travel bug.

As I landed in to Heathrow just over a month ago, the weather was dreary and overcast and I was glad about this; it wouldn't have felt right to land back in to a UK blessed with good weather. I was pleased to be home, and this was exactly what home was supposed to feel like.

Since I've been back I've been trying to sort myself out. I have a job for the time being at the shop in which I used to work in St Albans, while I look for a more permanent job. In addition, I've worked on my CV, I've relearnt Java, I'm improving my Spanish, I'm doing some freelance web work and I'm applying for jobs. I'm hoping to find some charity work to do while I'm still here in St Albans without a full time job.

I'm having to make some serious decisions about my life now. Emma and I have both voiced thoughts about going and living abroad for a while, to learn a new language and do something worthwhile with our lives. We hope that over the coming months we'll consolidate these thoughts into a rational plan, but for the time being we will both be seeking jobs here in the UK. Emma arrives back here just before Christmas.

Some final news: though it's a bit late I've eventually got round to creating a custom domain for this blog. As you may have noticed in your browser address bars, the blog is now permanently situated at

www.rucksacmonologues.com

I hope to use this blog for any future travel escapades (there will be some) so stay tuned, and thanks for reading!

A tale of two Khaos

2007-08-13T08:08:00.000Z

After Railay and Koh Phi Phi it was time for me to say goodbye to the beach and head inland towards the jungle. My destination was Khao Sok, one of Thailand's many national parks and an area of pristine rainforest that has been thankfully largely untouched by humans. In the darkest depths of the forest lurk tigers, along with an immense variety of other animals and tropical plants.

I had only a couple of days in Khao Sok so I didn't have the time to go on a tour to the more remote regions. Instead I decided to do a couple of day-walks from Khao Sok village to some of the nearby waterfalls and natural cavernous swimming pools.

Being in the midst of the forest, surrounded by the din of the insects and birds, confronted by innumerable shades of green, and assaulted by the mingled aromas of life in the jungle, I was reminded heavily of my time in Los Cedros in Ecuador, and I smiled to think of how similar some parts of the world are, even when they are about as far away from each other as it's possible to be. My walks took me to various waterfalls, and at each available point I jumped in to the water (clothes and all) to cool off from the oppressive humidity of the forest.

After my first day-walk I treated myself to a traditional Thai massage. It was surprisingly brutal but also relaxing and invigorating, and at the end of it my limbs felt lighter and less strained, despite the lengthy walk I'd done earlier in the day.

After the second day of walking it was time to leave Khao Sok for Bangkok on a night bus. We were taken by minibus to the nearest large town, Surat Thani, from where everyone except me was told to get off and wait at a travel agent for the coach which would take them overnight to Bangkok. I was told that I needed to be taken to a different travel agent as I had booked my ticket through a different company. At first I was quite annoyed by this and I thought I was getting messed around. I'm very glad that I was moved, however, because I later bumped into an Austrian couple on the other bus who had had things stolen from their bags while they were asleep on the bus. My coach also had the advantage of having hardly anyone on it, and I successfully claimed all five back seats to lie down on for the trip.

Here in Bangkok I'm staying on the legendary Khao San road in the backpacker's mecca of Banglamphu. Khao San road is a heady mix of bars, street food vendors, internet shops, guest houses and the all-important counterfeit CDs, DVDs and t-shirts stalls. The atmosphere is unique here and I feel it's a great place for me to end my trip.

Today I walked into the historic royal quarter of Ratanakosin, a very different destination in Bangkok but one that's no less dizzying, decked out as it is with splendid royal palaces and ornate Buddhist temples. I visited Wat Phra Kaew, the incredibly ornate complex within the Grand Palace which houses the temple of the Emerald Buddha. I also visited Wat Pho, the home of the deservedly famous Temple of the Reclining Buddha. Here there is basically a very large (30m long more or less) gold statue of the Buddha reaching Nirvana. It's an impressive sight.

Today is my last full day in Bangkok, but before my flight tomorrow I'm going to brave the public transport system of Bangkok (which, incidentally, includes the world's largest bus network) to explore some more of the city. I'm also going to buy as many dodgy CDs as my overflowing rucksac will allow.

Kayaking & finding 'The Beach'

2007-08-08T13:27:00.000Z

After the climbing I described in my last blog, I spent a few days chilling out on Railay, which included another half day of climbing. When I came back to the leading I felt much more confident and was able to lead some tougher routes, and I even managed to on-sight about half of an F7a on a top rope, which I was very pleased about. The day after that bit of climbing I took the boat back to Krabi town, where I spent the night before embarking on a day of sea kayaking around the nearby coast. We explored the mangroves that line this part of the shoreline, and ventured between towering karsts of rock.

We also ventured in to part of a cave, only accessible during certain periods of the day at low tide. We spotted an otter who came to play with us, splashing around the kayaks and swimming under us; whether he was really playing or telling us to get off his territory I'm not sure, but it was great to interact so intimately with the wildlife. As well as the otter we also sighted some monkeys, a long lizard, lots of salamanders and many brightly coloured crabs.

The following day I took a ferry to Koh Phi Phi, one of the most famous islands off the Andaman Coast. Many people here will tell you that Koh Phi Phi is one of the most beautiful islands in the world. They're probably right. In fact, Koh Phi Phi is actually comprised of two main islands, one of which, Koh Phi Phi Leh, is basically uninhabited. Today I took a snorkelling tour out to this island and explored the underwater realm of the coral reefs. The coral and the fish it played host to were very similar to what we saw in Lombok, but the surrounding landscape was very different. This is a truly beautiful place, where towering limestone plunges into turquoise water and sweeping stretches of pure sand lie beneath lush green palms. The beaches of Thailand are the most beautiful I've seen in the world.

Koh Phi Phi Leh was the choice of location for the famous film The Beach. The effect of this film on tourism to Koh Phi Phi was huge, and The Beach is treated with a similar reverence here to that of the Lord of the Rings films in New Zealand. After disembarking the boat at a rocky outcrop with the aid of ropes and lifejackets, we walked across the narrow island to come out on Maya Bay, the precise location for the film.

Another event that had substantial, but in this case negative, effects on southern Thailand was the December 2004 tsunami. Before I came to South East Asia I hadn't quite grasped the effect of this natural event on the people and communities of this region. Many of the buildings on Koh Phi Phi were destroyed, and many people lost their lives. In fact, speaking to a local man the other day, I found out that many people were too scared for months afterwards to go near the water. These people, many of whom rely on the seas for their jobs, completely lost their livelihoods. Many people have members of their family or friends who were never seen again. In a cruel twist of fate, I learnt that in the minutes before the tsunami struck, it caused a period of extreme-low tide which drew many puzzled people out on to the beach, wondering what was happening. These people would have been the first to perish.

Tomorrow I'm heading back to the mainland, where I'm going to spend a couple of nights with the gibbons in Khao Sok National Park. Then I'll head to Bangkok, where I'll do a crash course of the city in a couple of days before flying home.

Climbers' playground

2007-08-02T10:47:00.000Z

After a quick couple of days in Singapore I arrived in to resort-strewn Phuket, Thailand. I wanted to make the most of my two and a half weeks here so I didn't hang around in Phuket long. I arrived in Krabi on Monday morning and from there caught a boat to the inaccessible and beautiful Laem Phra Nang headland. Laem Phra Nang, or Railay, is on the mainland, but the topography of the area permits no roads to approach it, so the only way to reach it is by boat. Approaching Railay by boat was a beautiful way to do it; gliding over the turquoise water, past the mangroves and towards the clean beach made the whole area feel beautiful and invigorating.

The main reason I came to this part of Thailand's coast is the climbing opportunities it offers. Limestone karst cliffs dominate the scene and local climbers have bolted up sport-climbing routes ranging from grade (French) 4 to 8c. I couldn't wait to give it a go, so I booked myself on to a one-day intermediate's climbing course for the day after I arrived. In the morning we got in to the swing of things with a bit of top roping, and I remembered how out of shape I am by not even managing a 6a+. We also climbed up the inside of a cave on pre-placed ladders and emerged on to a ledge from where we had a great view of the surrounding beaches, before abseiling down in to the forest.

In the afternoon I learnt how to lead climb, something I've been meaning to do for donkeys' years but have never got round to. I really enjoyed it, and as soon as I get home and have enough money (ie around about December 2047) I'm going to get myself a rope and some quickdraws.

I'm going to hang around here long enough to do a bit more climbing (hopefully), and perhaps some kayaking, on top of reading as many Nick Hornby books I can find and trying to get a tan (nice try Mike you pasty bastard). I may end up staying here until I have to go to Bangkok, around the 11th.

This is probably going to be one of my last posts. How weird does that feel?

The Lion City

2007-07-27T13:13:00.000Z

Legend has it that a Sumatran prince once visited one of the islands at the southern tip of present day peninsular Malaysia and sighted a lion there. He named the island Singapura, meaning city of lions, and it's to Singapore that my travels have most recently taken me.

Another airport, another time to have to say goodbye to Emma for a while. This was the third hard airport situation we've had since October (Heathrow and La Paz were the other two) and the knowledge that this would be the last stretch of time we would be apart did little to help things along. Emma's now remaining in Bali until after Matt arrives next Thursday.

Singapore is quite a culture shock after having got used to Bali and Lombok for the last month. Streamlined skyscrapers dominate the CBD, sleek shopping malls provide most of the entertainment (according to my guide, shopping is the national sport of Singapore) and an ultramodern subway system glides people around underneath the metropolis with the utmost efficiency.

Singapore acts as the principle business hub of South East Asia and in some ways Singapore is like a microcosm of Asia itself. It is home to a Chinatown, a Little India and an islamic quarter, Kampung Glam. The main language is English, but Mandarin, Malay and Tamil are quite close behind. It has an extraordinary mix of Asian cultures like no other city I've been to. I was at first surprised when the book put so much emphasis on staying and eating in Little India and Chinatown, since I thought that by doing this you would miss out on the 'native' Singaporean experience. But that is exactly what Singapore is: a heady mix of all things Asian.

As far as I'm concerned, one of the major plus points of having a diverse mixture of Asian cultures here is the wide range of culinary delights that are available. Singapore has a good attitude towards public eating; the majority of food sellers are located in 'hawker sites', arcades where cheap eats are available in a variety of different food styles. I pointedly decided to stay in Little India for this exact reason: I love Indian food.

Today, as well as going to see not one but two films at the cinema (Die Hard and HP, I have to catch up with everyone back home!), I visited the Asian Civilizations museum in the Colonial District. This was one of the best museums I've visited while I've been away, and I managed to take in a fair amount of information about the cultures of Asia. I got museum overload after about an hour so I took a stroll around the city. Tomorrow I'm flying to Phuket, but I'm considering a third film before I go. Come on, it's The Simpsons!

Authentic Bali: volcanoes, lush landscapes and laid back villages

2007-07-23T12:25:00.000Z

I've been loving Indonesia for the last week. We've discovered the laid back, cultural and beautiful sides of Bali that were evading us before, and our experience here is all the better for it.

I mentioned in my last post that we were heading to the Lombok countryside to trek to the top of Gunung Rinjani, the island's highest peak. I should learn not to so specifically postulate what we are planning, since when I do that the plan tends to end up on the floor, in tatters, shat on and run over by the caterpillar tracks of a large combat-ready tank. For various reasons our plans didn't work out, so we decided to go back to Bali. That was probably the best course we could have taken, as we've really enjoyed our time back here.

We aimed for the village of Tirta Gangga, a sleepy place surrounded by padi fields and rainforested hillsides; a place not yet 'discovered' en masse by the tourists who visit Bali. We arrived at a hotel and asked for one night's stay, which in the course of things became four nights. We spent our time reading, walking to nearby rural villages across the fields and visiting the water palace for which the village is famous.

We also hatched a plan to trek to the top of Gunung Agung, the 3142m sacred volcano of Bali. Indonesia is a place where you can make seemingly anything happen, if you have enough money. Any jock on the street will, within 30 seconds, be able to find you transport to anywhere on the island. Extrapolating this idea further, given a bit of time and a smile you can get other things organised. So thinking, we asked our hotel man whether anyone would be able to drive us to and from and guide us up Gunung Agung, and a little while later we had it all nailed down and sorted. At 12:15am the next day, we met up with our guide and driver and headed up to Pasar Agung, the temple at the bottom of the mountain.

We donned saris to enter the temple and gave our guide a moment to pray and ask the gods for our safety on the mountain. He had also previously left an offering to the gods in our hotel, presumably to protect us both on our drive to the mountain and on our ascent of it. The way Indonesians drive, however, he probably should have done several offerings. As it turned out our trip was entirely accident-free. We trekked through the night in order to make it to the summit for sunrise, and this midnight start made it all the more worthwhile. We had been worried that the foreboding rain earlier in the evening would prevent the top from being clear. It turned out that at sunrise Bali was all covered in cloud, but our mountain poked out of the top of it. We had views across to Rinjani on Lombok, and all over the south and east of Bali itself.

We returned to Pasar Agung with our mentalist guide Bob, so named because he's obsessed with Bob Marley and Bob Dylan. He was great fun; he spoke little English so we mainly got by on common Bob Marley songs. In true entrepreneurial Indonesian style he sorted us our transport to Ubud today too.

We're now back in Ubud, which we visited near the start of our trip here, and we are looking forward to having a couple of nights in a slightly posher hotel before I leave. I'm not at all looking forward to leaving Emma for another four and three quarter months. On a lighter side, however, Harry Potter 7 is out and I've got a copy. Fans of HP unite: this is an exciting time!

Upping the chill factor

2007-07-13T07:21:00.000Z

Some of you may have been disappointed at the amount of beach-time I have logged on this trip. I'm sure that many people would utilize the privilege of a trip like this to maximize their tans and try to spend as much time as possible soaking up the beach vibes. Most of you, however, know me well enough to know that I don't really do beaches, and that I prefer mountains. Over the last few days, however, Emma and I have been in an island paradise that was worth doing absolutely nothing in. Barring the fact that we both became rather ill, I quite enjoyed it.

I shalln't (is that the correct spelling? I can't ever remember writing that before) be giving you a blow-by-blow account of our illnesses. It suffices to say that we both expelled nutrient-rich organic material out of both ends, almost at the same time. You need know no more about that.

In the times when we weren't toiling on or over the toilet, we were mostly reading, chilling or snorkelling. The main drawcard of South East Asia is its beautiful aquatic environment. All around Indonesia, Malaysia, The Phillipines and Thailand are coral reefs swarming with tropical fish, turtles and small sharks. The Gili islands, where we have spent the last few days, were no exception, and we enjoyed leisurely exploring some of the aquatic world with the aid of a mask and snorkel.

Life on Gili Air is very laid back, and most of the time you are no more than 100 metres from someone lazily strumming a guitar or sipping a Bintang (the local beer). The three Gili islands lie just offshore of Lombok, and the main economic drive here is tourism. Spending some time on the islands gave me time to think a bit more about Indonesia and reflect on my negative experiences which I spoke about in my last blog. I understand more now that many of the people so annoying me previously are poor and at their wits end. I guess I just wasn't expecting it, which is why it caught me off guard.

Here are some pictures with captions if you hover.

We're now back on the mainland in Sengiggi and are planning to trek up Gunung Rinjani, Lombok's highest volcano and the second highest peak in Indonesia. That means we'll be in the mountains, and I'm getting pretty excited. The idea of going to look for Komodo dragons has been shelved for the moment. We got our priorities sorted! I'll leave you with this sunset picture I took, which I'm quite proud of.

Ripped off when someone sees ya, that's life in Indonesia

2007-07-08T06:10:00.000Z

It's been a week now since we arrived in Bali and we are now sitting in Lombok, another small island just east of Bali. We got here yesterday after 6 days of venturing to see the best bits of Bali whilst trying not to get too ripped off by the all-to-expert hawkers, touts and bus drivers that service the island.

Bali seems like paradise to most westerners who come to visit; its endless warm beaches with jewel-coloured water, blanket of tropical forest and fertile padi fields and its towering conical volcanoes all seem exotic and fresh to its visitors from foreign lands. However as I sit here I am being stared through the window by an old man who seems to think that by continually gesturing through the glass to me that he is in possession of a sizeable number of rather rancid looking bananas he will successfully entice me into buying his produce. A polite shake of the head or 'no thank you' just does not cut it here: these people are persistent. It can get extremely annoying and I have not experienced this incessant badgering anywhere else in the world. I've heard that India and Marrakech are the worst places for this; I dread to think what they're like. You learn in Indonesia not to sit in restaurants which have alleyways along their flanks; you will be badgered as you try to eat your meal. I know that I am from a different culture and I should accept these things, but given that these people are selling to westerners you would surely think that they would learn that by hawking us in such a way they are doing their business no good. It suffices to say that this, together with a bus driver who overcharged us by a factor of 10 and a 'guardian of the temple' who originally insisted his guiding was a free service, and later asked that we pay him an extortionate sum (we didn't), has partially spoilt my experience here.

Anyway, that's enough ranting. Here are some photos with captions of what we have seen so far in Bali:

In other news, Emma and I are becoming pretty good at learning Bahasa, the main language in Indonesia. We can now count arbitrarily high and we get smiles from locals when we try to use their lingo. Hopefully this will endear us more to these people and will mean we're less likely to get ripped off. There's my English sense of optimism coming through again; I mustn't let that get out of control!

I promise my next post will not be so grumpy! We're off to the Gili islands for lots of snorkelling and relaxing on the beach, before trying to find a way to get to Komodo islands to see their infamous namesake dragons!

Wine, crocodiles and rock art

2007-07-01T03:52:00.000Z

It's been another quite busy couple of weeks which is why I've been a bit slack on the blogging. There's now too much to talk about in detail so I'll mention some of the highlights from the last little while here in Australia.

After returning to Perth from our trip up the coast to Coral Bay, we hooked up with my cousin Emma who very kindly allowed us to stay in a holiday home that she was given a free weekend in, south of Perth in the Margaret River region of WA.

Margaret River sits in a section of land that juts out west from the rest of the state and has a climate particularly suited to growing grapes for wine. After our quick few days in Adelaide which didn't permit us a stay in the famous Barossa Valley of South Australia (wine buffs will know it), we were looking forward to spending some time in the Margaret River region, a lesser known but no less enticing wine-producing region. Whilst the hot climate of the Barossa Valley produces predominantly Shiraz labelled wines such as those by Wolf Blass and Jacob's Creek, Margaret River's climate is more suited to, amongst others, Cabernet and Merlot grapes.

The three of us spent a really enjoyable weekend chatting, cooking, drinking wine and beer, admiring the rocky coastline and tasting wine, chocolate and cheese. It was the first time that I had experienced wine tasting and it was the first time I can honestly say I tasted big difference between different wines. It was educational, but great fun too. Emma has one or two photos of us wine tasting on her blog. We'll definitely be looking out for MR wines when we get back to the UK. You may have heard of Leeuwin Estate wines, and a large number of other wineries export their liquid back to the UK, so look out for it.

After catching a lift back to Perth with cousin Emma, girlfriend Emma and I flew to Darwin, where over the last few days we've been exploring nearby Kakadu National Park. Kakadu is Australia's largest National Park (which is saying something), and it is also a World Heritage Site, which gives you an idea that it a Pretty Cool Place, with capital Ps and a C.

Kakadu is an area that the Aborigines have been living in for thousands of years. Literally thousands - at least 20,000. I think that is astonishing. That is long before any of the history you learn about at school - several times as long ago as the Ancient Greeks and Egyptians. We learnt a lot about Aboriginal culture and tried to imagine what it must have been like for the indigenous people when the White Man came and overran their land. The most poignant reminder of the clash between Aboriginal and Western cultures is right in front of you every time you walk down the main street in Darwin. The indigenous people have never properly fit in with the new society and are reduced to begging on the pavements. It's sad evidence of how mistreated they have been, not only during the initial wave of European settlement in Australia, but as recently as the 1970s, at which time they still did not have the same rights as the whites.

The Aboriginal culture in Kakadu manifests itself in the rock art that is visible at many sites around the park. These are thousands of years old and it is like stepping back into a completely different era when you are faced with examples of these drawings. In the example below, the skeletal figure in the top right is lightning man, one of the protagonists in the Aboriginal Creation Period. He now resides at one of the many 'Dreaming Places' in the rock nearby. These sites are sacred to Aboriginals and it is important that they are not disturbed by outsiders.

Kakadu is also home to amazing natural beauty, and one of the habitats, the wetlands, are home to crocodiles! We observed one crocodile basking under a tree trunk, but all other efforts at croc spotting turned out to be fruitless. Instead, we saw many species of birds.

After hitch hiking around Kakadu for a few days we returned to Darwin yesterday, and now we are biding time before going to the airport this evening for our flight to Indonesia. I'd better start learning some Indonesian phrases then!

There's sweet FA in WA

2007-06-20T02:21:00.000Z

And that's what's so great about it!

Western Australia or WA is Australia's largest state, and that pretty much puts it at about the same size of half of mainland Europe. Over the last week Emma and I have been exploring it, or a very small part of it, namely a 1500km long stretch of coastline that unravels north of Perth, in an attempt to get in touch with the 'real' Australia. We realised that the most economical way to travel through this part of the country would be to hire a car, camp in the bush and on the beaches along the way, and cook our own food.

Our route took us along parts of the coast but also over vast tracts of inland wilderness; the famous Australian outback. It is a unique experience to drive through such an environment. Seemingly endless sections of straight road are surrounded by a consistent mess of bush, tracks that venture off the road look promising but soon peter out into impassable quagmires of sand, and the occasional fuel-selling roadhouse provides the only major evidence of human influence in an environment that is simultaneously beautiful and inviting but deceptive and deadly. I suddenly attained a great respect for the explorers who first came to this continent and had the nerve to attempt to stray into the unknown red centre of the country in order to try to cross it from the south to the north. The first explorers to survive the crossing died on the return journey.

On top of experiencing the outback we found numerous deserted beaches and visited several national parks and marine reserves. Emma's writing more about one of the highlights of the journey, Ningaloo reef, in her blog, which you can reach via my sidebar.

I'm going to write a little about the intriguing stromatolites of Hamelin Pool, Shark Bay which we found on our second day, 800km north of Perth. Bill Bryson mentions these interesting biological phenomena in his hilarious book Down Under, and after having read the book in Peru I was keen to visit them if ever I had the opportunity to.

Stromatolites are deceptive. They look like rocks, and they more or less are rocks, but with an extra twist. They're alive. These intriguing creatures once dominated life on earth for 2 billion years. They consist of a primitive form of bacteria known as cyanobacteria, which collectively join together and trap sediment. Over time, this materializes into a tangible structure which, on a long enough timescale, grows and spreads. When geologists first visited Shark Bay they were amazed to find evidence of stromatolites living today, as it was previously believed that there were no modern day examples of an organism which once dominated the earth and eventually evolved in to all other living things. The stromatolites of Shark Bay exist because the hypersaline waters of Hamelin Pool prohibit any of their natural predators, which include sea snails, from grazing on them and destroying them. A different species of stromatolite exists somewhere in the Bahamas, and there exist freshwater versions in Mexico, but otherwise the stromatolites of Shark Bay are unique. It was amazing to gaze in to the water below the boardwalk and see evidence of one of the first forms of life that miraculously spawned out of the primordial soup.

Here are some more pictures from our trip.

We're now back in Perth and are looking forward to spending a couple of days south of Perth (in one of the wine regions, not coincidentally) with my cousin Emma. Then we'll be off to Darwin to spend a few days in Kakadu National Park (think Crocodile Dundee) before changing countries again. Indonesia beckons!

City, flight, city, ocean, city, long bus ride, city, cancelled train, city...

2007-06-11T03:41:00.000Z

If the last week is anything to go by, Australia must be composed of a number of huge gridded cities, linked by extremely long roads.

I think that that is probably generally true, but not the whole truth. It's like saying that love is a chemical reaction between two people that invokes an emotional response in both. It is true but completely misses the point.

You see, the only Australia I've seen so far is the quite boring part of Australia, namely its cities. After experiencing Sydney I flew to Melbourne to meet up with Emma and Matt, and I was left a little disappointed. I'd heard people say that Melbourne was a world class city. It's world class in the sense that it's big and has lots of trendy wine bars. But it don't got soul. The highlight of our time in and around Melbourne was, to be honest, the latter; the around. The three of us hired a car to explore the Great Ocean Road. It is all three of these things, so top marks to the Victoria Parks Authority for naming it. Lower marks go to its park wardens, who evidently don't approve of people like me pulling handbrake turns in its car parks.

You see, the only reason I was pulling a handbrake turn was to achieve an optimal position in the parking spot. The fact that it was a disabled person's parking spot certainly did me no favours when I looked up to find the park warden looking up at me with an expression that included contempt, extreme disapproval and just a hint of admiration at the fact that I had the audacity to pull it off in front of him. He gave me a slap on the wrist and sent us on our way. I'm running out of time on this machine so I shall be quick - here are some pictures:

I'm really running out of time now so the story of our missed train journey will have to wait. Suffice to say I'm currently in Perth and Emma and I are heading on a 7 day adventure up the west coast. Bring on the real Australia!

A hop over the Tasman to the West Island

2007-06-03T07:56:00.000Z

Or the name that the residents of this large, dry and deadly country like to call it: Australia.

After a couple of days in Auckland I stepped on a plane bound for Sydney, a city that until I was a teenager I always thought was the capital of Australia, before I found out the administrative centre of this former British penal colony outpost of a country is instead located in Canberra, which according to Bill Bryson is an infinitely more boring and frustratingly homogeneous city someway inland of where I am now. I'll take his word for it.

Sydney AIN'T boring. It's fragging cool, to use a pseudo-swearword-cum-adverb that I am known only to use when I'm praising something in the superlative. (The English experts amongst you would be correct but pinickity to remind me that the superlative of fragging would in fact be fraggingest; please don't waste your time emailing me). Anyway, to get back to the subject. I was quite taken aback when I had my first nighttime view down William Street towards Sydney's main CBD (it has two) on my arrival in the Kings Cross district. All the skyscrapers were lit up and shone high above the busy streets below. It really is a beautiful city at night.

Unfortunately the flash on my camera doesn't work. In fact, the camera makes crunchy noises when the lens comes out and as such, I don't have any good nighttime shots of this city, so you'll have to imagine it. I strolled down in to the city and explored some of the many parks before reaching the harbour. My stomach leapt when I had my first view of the Opera House. It looked great in the photos but it's something else to see in the flesh, glistening and crouching over the edge of the water. On the other side of the harbour is the rest of Sydney, and the Harbour Bridge hangs between the two like a coathanger destined for greater things.

For all of Sydney's charm I am, after all, on a tight budget, and when you are on a tight budget in a city where you could happily spend away the entire inheritance of an heir to the throne of a minor Emirate country in just one evening, you get bored quite quickly. Therefore, I'm quite looking forward to getting to Melbourne tomorrow. I've heard it's an equally fragging cool city. Possibly the fraggingest coolest nizzelest city in Australia.

Mount Doom

2007-05-29T11:14:00.000Z

After a few days in Wellington chilling out and meeting up with my friend Jen, we quickly travelled to National Park Village (what an imaginative name), from which we embarked on the Tongariro Crossing on Sunday. The TC is New Zealand's most famous and popular day walk, taking in as it does views of spectacular volcanic landscape of Tongariro National Park and close encounters with hot springs and emerald coloured lakes. We realised that one of the volcanoes on the route, Mount Ngauruhoe, was the mountain used as Mount Doom in the LOTR films, so we decided to throw in the ascent of it as a side trip. The volcano is estimated to be under 2500 years old, and because of its young age it has a very symmetrical shape. The climb up was arduous and long, made harder by the loose scree. The scree run/slide down was much more fun! Hover over images for some descriptions if you're using Internet Explorer.

Once we'd descended the volcano we carried on with the rest of the walk, which was nice and easy in comparison. The terrain reminded Emma & I of Bolivia, with dark brown and subtly coloured red rocks punctured occasionally by turquoise lakes and the pungent smell of sulphur-infected springs.

This was, and will be for us, the highlight of our trip around the North Island. We are now in Auckland and will be leaving for Australia in the next few days. We haven't had long in the North Island but we're not disappointed because we spent so much quality time in the South Island. Auckland seems like a cool place from first impressions. It's the first proper sized city I've been to for three months since Santiago! It has massive buildings and everythunk!

Dunedin: The Edinburgh of the South

2007-05-22T07:52:00.000Z

After completing the Kepler track last Tuesday, Emma and Matt ventured back to Queenstown and then up the South Island's west coast, while I did a bit more tramping. I have been to the west coast twice so I felt like doing something different. When I finished my two day tramp I hitch hiked back to Queenstown, where I stayed for a couple of days in an attempt to sell my bike. Queenstown was getting pretty boring by the time I left - it feels like a soulless tourist honeypot after a few days so I was quite keen to get on to Dunedin on the east coast. I finally sold my bike on Saturday, so Sunday saw me with my thumb out on the road out of Queenstown in the hope of a lift to Dunedin.

3 lifts did it. One to Frankton, about 7km out of Queenstown, the next to Cromwell, a further 55km, and the third all the way to Dunedin, nearly 300km away from Queenstown. Dunedin is sometimes referred to as 'The Edinburgh of the South'. It's a nice city - the most pleasant I've been to so far in New Zealand. It's the South Island's second biggest city (which isn't saying much), but it's smallish size does give it a personal and homely feel. In the sense that it has old buildings, a few big churches, an old university, a river and a Scottish name, it's exactly like Edinburgh (what could be more similar?).

There is something that distinguishes Dunedin from Edinburgh, however. Dunedin is in possession of the world's steepest street (according to the Guinness Book of Records). This is one steep mother of a street. You can forget San Francisco - this street has a maximum gradient of 1 in 2.86. That's like nearly this steep:

Now I'm back in Christchurch, and tomorrow I'm getting a flight to Wellington, where I'm reuniting with E & M. I'm also looking forward to meeting up with my uni mate Jen and my school mate Amy in the next few days. See - all the clever people are over here in New Zealand!

Our tramping adventure

2007-05-11T02:59:00.000Z

Since my last post we've done some tramping. We headed up to remote Kinloch, just across Lake Wakatipu from Glenorchy and a great place to do some serious relaxing. We had just a day before our trek over the mountains on the quite famous Caples Track. This was a nice track; not ultra-scenic but fun, what with us meeting some drunk and incompetent deer hunters along the way. (That's taking it a bit far, but I'll call it poetic licence).

We then hitched down to Milford Sound, through Homer Tunnel, which is a great big tunnel going through an even greater bigger mountain.

Emma and Matt took a boat tour of the sound (I've already done one), and then we relaxed in the pub for the night. Matt and I got a beer tower, much to the envy of everyone else in the pub. The next day we hitched back to the tramping track, and took the Routeburn track back to Kinloch. The Routeburn is a very famous NZ walk, rightly so because it contains gorgeous scenery.

Once back in Kinloch we had a rest day and prepared ourselves mentally for our next prepared tramp: the Rees-Dart. This was quite hard to do, being as it was raining incessantly outside, and when the weather does that it feels quite hard to get motivated to go on a long walk, with the prospect of deep river crossings and snow covered passes upon us. In the end, we decided against doing this tramp on the advice of the owner at Kinloch, who said the rivers would probably have become impassable having had the huge influx of rain over the previous two days.

Instead of tramping, we hitched a lift back to Queenstown where we are now. We're planning to do the Kepler Track out of Te Anau, starting tomorrow. In other news, I've got someone to look at buying my bike in about an hour so wish me luck with getting rid of it!

Back down south

2007-05-01T00:36:00.000Z

The three of us jumped on a coach from Christchurch to Mount Cook village last Thursday, blagging ourselves on to a luxury coach for a bargain fare. We didn't realise that we would hence join the Elderly Japanese Tourist Tour Coach Club, but our driver Brian's constant and informed commentary made it quite good fun. Along the way, we stopped at such exciting attractions as a 'sheepdog monument', which was just about as exciting as it sounds.

Anyway, we arrived in Mount Cook and the following day, after some deliberation, headed off on a daywalk up to Mueller Hut. The hut is 1000m or so above the village and offers great views of Mount Cook and the surrounding mountains. We were chuffed to be climbing above the cloud that was occupying the valley, to be treated to some amazing views.

We relaxed the next day, and the day after we took a bus down to Queenstown, after going on a short stroll up the valley. Mount Cook village is situated close to several glaciers and some of the highest mountains in the southern alps.

We're now in Queenstown and have planned to do three separate tramps in the next couple of weeks. Tomorrow we embark on our trip which will involve tramping the Caples, Greenstone and Rees-Dart tracks, and throwing in a trip to Milford Sound somewhere in the middle. It's adventure time!

Bowlestering the ranks

2007-04-25T05:39:00.000Z

Last night I was finally joined on my travelling adventure by Emma and Matt. I'd been waiting for this moment ever since I set out on 16th October and it's really great to have them here. We're all really looking forward to exploring New Zealand together. At the moment we're sorting things out in Christchurch and getting reunited, and we'll be heading down to Mount Cook tomorrow to do a walk up to the famous Mueller Hut, from where you get great views of the spectacular mountain. Then we'll work our way round the South Island for three or four weeks before getting up north.

Those of you who know her will be interested to know I just completely randomly bumped in to Emily Enright! I knew she was on a round the world trip, but had no idea she was in Australasia, let alone Christchurch! It's great to bump into people when you're not expecting it.

Last week I spent several days mountain biking near Nelson, in the north of the South Island. I stayed at an excellent backpackers called The Bug (strongly recommended), who offered me great advice on where to go on my bike. I spent most of the week exploring the trails on Dun Mountain, including a 2 day trip where I stayed overnight in a hut. Here are some photos.

I'm carrying my bike round with me at the moment, looking forward to exploring some more biking options down near Queenstown.

I've fixed the pictures from my last post, so use the sidebar to navigate to that if you want to see pics of The Dutchy.

Sventastic

2007-04-20T11:30:00.000Z

I'm not talking about the ageing womanizing ex-England manager with aspirations to become a sauna repairman (Jonathan McGowan fans will remember), but rather a permagrinning dutchman (hereafter called The Dutchy) who I'm rather convinced is stalking me. He's a great guy, however, so there was no reason for me not to humour him. We first met in Fox Glacier some weeks ago while I was bike touring. We have since then inadverdently met up in Haast, Wanaka (half-planned), Milford Sound and Christchurch. When I walked in to one of the 30 or so hostels in Christchurch (and not a particularly good one at that), who should I find staring in disbelief at the top of the stairs? Only The Dutchy!

It was great timing, actually, because a couple of hours earlier my family had departed from Christchurch for home and I was at a bit of a loose end. We were both up for going out for a few beers so we did exactly that. I thrashed him at pool, and then we tried going to a club but were scuppered by my lack of ID (honestly, did I expect to need it?) New Zealand is very strict on alcohol policy.

Having had no plans I decided to accompany The Dutchy to the Banks Peninsula for one night, where we stayed in a great little hostel called Chez la Mer in Akaroa. We met up with some great people there and had a good evening. It was only made better by the making of pancakes, in true Wanaka style. In the daytime we went out for a nice bike ride down towards the coast.

He's since left for Australia (was it something I said?), and I'm looking forward to meeting up with him there.

I've since come up north to Nelson to bide my time for the last few days before Emma arrives on Tuesday. I've brought my bike up and I'm trying to make the most of some of the excellent mountain biking opportunities here. Tomorrow I'm going on a 2 or 3 day ride, staying at some backcountry huts along the way. Then it's back to Christchurch on Tuesday.

Keeping up with the Joneses

2007-04-11T06:01:00.000Z

Us Joneses take some beating when it comes to the competition of How Many Things Can You Fit Into 10 Days In New Zealand? I took a bus down to the brilliantly named Twizel last Wednesday to meet them and my usually laid back (aka tight-arsed) travelling style immediately upped several gears to a pace at which it has stayed until now, at which point we've finally arrived back in Christchurch. On Wednesday we took a chopper light over Mount Cook, on Thursday we went bungy jumping near Queenstown, on Friday Anna and Rich went diving in Milford Sound (while we wheezy buggers stayed on the boat), on Saturday and Sunday we did an overnight tramp, on Monday we took a jetboat ride near Queenstown and yesterday and today we travelled back up to Christchurch, via the West Coast of all routes. In attempt to preserve the life of this computer I will therefore just concentrate on the flight over Mount Cook here.

The helicopter flight was fantastic. A helicopter can do many things that a plane can't, namely get you right up close to the mountains by flying alongside the ridges and right over the passes, and land on glaciers! Our pilot Phil flew us north out of Twizel, close over the foothills and turquoise lakes, and right up to the south face of Mount Cook, the highest mountain in New Zealand.

Once we'd flown over the glaciers surrounding Mount Cook Phil took us to a snowfield at the top of a glacier. The snow was virgin and we all rejoiced in stealing her beautiful flower by running around and frolicking and loving the fact that no one had been up there in many days.

Now I'm tired and I'm going to leave it there because I'm a hungry hungry hippo!

Rolling good...Greymouth to Wanaka

2007-04-02T01:34:00.000Z

I left Global Village in Greymouth last Sunday and started making my way down the West Coast on my bike. The West Coast is a beautiful area and hardly anyone lives there. I looked at a map and I realised that there wasn't a single cash machine between Hokitika and Wanaka - that's over 400km of road in between! Clearly this was an area that was worth exploring. I found this sign in a cafe on the way down to the glacier region.

Three days later I arrived at Fox Glacier where I first met a number of people who I have kept bumping in to ever since. I had a rest day here and spent it wisely by spending all day in the hostel cinema room watching films! I felt I deserved it. Two days of riding later I arrived in Haast, the point on the West Coast where the road turns inland and begins climbing up over the Southern Alps. Haast is a tiny place and the hostel in which I was staying would have been a terribly depressing place had I not met a nice group of people there. I met up with Sven, a Dutch guy who I met at Fox and with him Felix, a German. The next day we all set of for Wanaka, me hoping to reach it in two days on my bike and Sven and Felix planning on getting there in one day in their car. The scenery between Haast and Wanaka is spectacular, and mostly looks like this:

I made it into Wanaka yesterday afternoon and guess who I found at my hostel? Sven, Felix, and an Irish guy called Mike who I'd met in Fox. It's nice to meet up with these people continually. Last night we ate pancakes for dinner, and then for a bit of variety, did some pancakes for breakfast this morning.

My bike odometer is now reading 850km from Christchurch. Rock! Tomorrow I'm going to do some mountain biking in this beautiful area and then I'm going to leave my bike in Wanaka for a couple of weeks while I spend some time with my family who have just arrived into Christchurch. After that perhaps I'll head to Queenstown and bide my time till Emma* and Matt arrive here on the 24th.

*Great news: she aced her viva so now she's officially Doctor Emma Joseph Bowles Esquire. (At least that's what I'm calling her).

Mountains, but quicker

2007-03-24T06:58:00.000Z

That's why I like mountain biking. It means you can go to the mountains but do them quick and fast. You get to experience the wonder of the hills and get some serious speed too. Yeeeeeeeeah!

Yesterday I cycled from Greymouth to Blackball, the start of the famous Croesus tramping track, 25km away. New Zealand, being full of switched-on people, have made lots of these great trails available to mountain bikers as well, which is fantastic. Some of the trails are closed during peak months to bikers, but that's certainly preferable to them not being open to bikers at all.

The route from Blackball snakes up 19km or so to Ces Clarke Hut, 900m higher up, just above the bushline. The biking up was through beautiful forest. Some of it was quite hard and unrideable, but I knew that with each metre gained I would be adding to the smile factor on the way back down.

I stayed the night at Ces Clarke hut, the halfway point for trampers doing the Croesus track in two days. My next day's ride would take me back by the same route that I had come up however, since carrying on on the Croesus track is a bit hard on a bike. I met some great people at this hut - a couple of New Zealanders (one an ex-Brit, as a surprising number of them seem to be!) - who gave me lots of good advice on places to go and things to do in New Zealand. It's great to meet like minded people in these huts - you end up being thrown together with them and there's nothing to do but talk and share experiences with each other.

This morning I came down from the hut to Blackball, and then on back to Greymouth. The descent was terrific - virtually all top class singletrack. I'm pleased with my bike - so far it seems to be happy to do both touring and mountain biking. Long may that continue.

Tomorrow I'm starting the ride down to Franz Josef, 174km away. For the time being I'm enjoying my time at what must be one of the best backpacking hostels in the world. It was recommended to me by Tim, a mate from Cotswold, and it has a spa, sauna, free bike and kayak hire and quite possibly the nicest hostel communal area I've ever seen. (It's called Global Village and is in Greymouth, if anyone wants to know where to stay if they're heading here).

New Zealand is wide

2007-03-22T07:04:00.000Z

At least that's what I realised, when I started cycling across it!

I picked up my bike in Christchurch last Wednesday, and after tinkering about with it for a day or so and mentally preparing myself, I set off on my trip to Greymouth on the West Coast last Friday.

Cycle touring is something quite different from the cycling that I'm used to, namely lightweight XC (cross-country). For flexibility, I decided to buy a mountain bike (so that I could, when I liked, take off the paniers and go mountain biking), with some modifications. I had the tyres changed so that they'd work well on both roads and off-road, I added panier racks and bags, and I got a stand installed. Then I was off! This is what my complete set up with all my luggage looks like:

The first day I covered 70km, as I had intended. The next day I set off up to Porter's Pass. It's quite high!

The way up to Porter's Pass was incredibly punishing, and several times I had to walk the bike up. I'm just not used to lugging myself plus many kilos of luggage up big hills like this! Then I set off down the other side. That was initially quite fun, but when I realised that the prevailing North Westerly wind was actually causing me to need to pedal down hill to keep up momentum, it all got a bit frustrating! I decided that I wasn't going to make the the further 62km to Arthurs Pass in that one day. The scenery was beautiful but the hills were plentiful and steep, and the wind was strong and blowing precisely the wrong way. When you have fully laden paniers on the back of your bike you don't have all that much ability to slip through wind without it holding you back. I was beginning to understand why my touring guide suggested doing this ride the other way round!

I decided there and then that I would make things easier for myself, and extend my proposed 3 day trip to more like 4 or 5 days. The next morning I set off for Arthurs Pass from Lake Pearson, and being only 35km I arrived at AP quite early. I decided to reward my effort by staying overnight at Arthurs Pass, where I ended up undertaking a two day tramp with an Austrian and a German. I had originally intended to do this tramp when I was last in AP but the weather didn't hold. This seemed like a nice opportunity to do it, and a timely break from cycling too.

I finished the tramp on Tuesday and set off from AP yesterday morning, intending to do the remaining 103km to Greymouth in two days.

I rolled in to Greymouth this morning, a little tired but incredibly happy with myself. I had just cycled across New Zealand! All in, the ride was 257km. At times I had felt incredibly cross and upset that things (specifically the wind) weren't going my way. But now I'm really glad I've done it, and I'm thinking of now cycling down the west coast for a while. However, before I do that I'm going to do some mountain biking! There're some great mountains to bike up round here, and now I'm really glad I went for a mountain bike instead of a road bike. There's something very satisfying about lugging yourself and all your travelling belongings along the way with you, going from tramp to tramp or mountain bike ride to mountain bike ride. I'm going to do some riding in this area, and then head south where I'll be meeting my family in a couple of weeks. Better get going then!

Trampin' n tourin'

2007-03-13T07:39:00.000Z

New Zealand suits me down to the ground because it's a nation of 'trampers', ie hairy people who go walking in the mountains all the time. I'm not hairy, but I like to go walking, so I'm generally accepted by these people. I met a few nice trampers when I went tramping in an area of the Southern Alps called Arthur's Pass National Park. It is a testament to the quality of the mountains in New Zealand that APNP is actually one of the less popular places to visit, but you can see from some of these photos below that it's a spectacular area.

I really love New Zealand, but in some respects it's not half as easy to travel in as South America. Obviously the English language element to NZ is an advantage for me, but in all other respects I have found it more difficult. For one thing, you actually have to book buses and hostels in advance. This is quite a foreign concept to me. In South America, if you want to travel to the other end of the country, you simply get on a bus, pay the nice man or lady on the bus, and then get off several hours/landslides/coups later. What's more, in South America it only costs you between USD 1 and USD 3 per hour of your journey. Here, you have to book it the day before and spend getting on for ten quid for a 2.5 hour journey. Nightmare!

Expenses and the requirement to think ahead aside, New Zealand is a great country. Though, I'm not quite sure how lucky New Zealanders realise they are. Two days ago, when I was hitchiking back from my tramp to my hostel with a lovely elderly New Zealand lady, she remarked to me how the country was going downhill, since nowadays they were letting in far too many people. She lamented the fact that her beautiful country was becoming overcrowded. Quite distressed at this news, I asked her what the population had lately risen to. 'Well', she said ('Well' came out 'Will'), 'We were at about 3, yis, 3 million. Now I think we're nearing 4 million.' What a joy it must be to have the population of half of London living in a country larger than the whole of the UK.

It's a beautiful country too. And the network of backcountry huts that are scattered around the mountains means that every overnight tramper can have a comfortable night while they're out in the wilds. I did a five day tramp around APNP, and took these photos.

Barker Hut, in the last shot, was in possession of a toilet with surely one of the best views in the world. The toilet was missing a door, which meant that whilst relieving yourself you had the choicest view over a glistening glacier hanging under a jagged-edged peak.

Enough of the faecetious [sic] remarks; let me tell you about a little plan of mine. You see, further to my comments about buses, I feel that bussing around NZ is a foolish idea. One alternative would be to do what lots of travellers do and buy a car for 3 months, and then sell it before I leave. But I have a much more cunning plan: namely to buy a bike. You see, New Zealand doesn't seem all that big, and it's incredibly bike friendly, so I feel that I might as well regain some fitness, and have lots of fun, by riding my bike around as a means of transport. I visited the superbly named 'Around Again' second hand bike store in Christchurch earlier today, and I've managed to sort myself out a bike fitted out with all the touring goodies. I'm looking forward to picking it up tomorrow; it has paniers, panier bags, a helmet, a pump and various other things. Hence, as of tomorrow, I hope to join the rank of 'New Zealand bike tourers'. I can't wait!

Check back next week for exciting pictures of me trying to make it up alpine passes on two wheels...

New Zealand

2007-03-03T21:28:00.000Z

I'm in New Zealand! It's all different! Here are some things regarding New Zealand about which I am particularly excited:

They drive on the left
Christchurch has a district called St Albans
Everyone is really friendly, polite and helpful
The have Her Majesty The Queen on their money
Everything is clean and shiny
It smells like England
You can't get in to your room till 12, and reception isn't open 24 hours
They do a good old English breakfast
There are parks everywhere
They have GOOD OLD BOURNVILLE MADE CADBURY'S CHOCOLATE
They have a FISH AND CHIPS VAN
The computers smell like the ones at Birmingham university's learning centre
The colon is in the right place on the keyboard and in order to attain an @ sign you need not perform the typing equivalent of patting your head and rubbing your tummy at the same time.

I already really like the place, and I'm looking forward to relaxing from jet lag here in Christchurch for a couple of days before deciding which mountains to go to.

Yesterday I caught a flight from Santiago over the Pacific Ocean to Auckland. The flight was brilliant - I haven't slept so much on a flight ever before. I found that they had Pink Floyd's Pulse in the in-flight music selection, so with the aid of that and an eye mask I dropped off immediately. I love flying so much - I just love the idea of getting on a plane and flying over a whole ocean.

Before my flight yesterday I caught up with my Australian friend Nina, who is going to be spending the next five months in Santiago pretending to be a student. In reality she's going to be 'studying' mountaineering and Italian, a language she already speaks. We spent most of the afternoon swapping anti Australian/British jokes which was most delightful.

Due to the fact that my flight took off on the 2nd March and arrived on the 4th March, I decided to award my achievement at spending absolutely no money on the 3rd by treating myself to a full English breakfast. It was shockingly expensive at 5 pounds, but I suppose I'm going to have to get used to that. And the sausages were real sausages, and the bacon was greasy, and there were HASH BROWNS. It was worth far more than what I paid for it. What's more, the waitress smiled all the time (not in an annoying fake-smile way), and thanked me for my order. New Zealanders seem very happy people. (But I suppose I might be if I was luckily enough to be born in such a beautiful country). I'm very much looking forward to exploring and finding out more about this great country.

The end of our Bolivian adventure

2007-02-28T23:44:00.000Z

Today was the day that Emma got on a plane to go back home from La Paz, and the day that I left Bolivia in completely the opposite direction: for Chile. I suppose she had to go back for her viva at some point, but that knowledge didn't make it any easier this morning as we said goodbye for another eight weeks. (I know, it's not that long, I'd just got used to having her around and I loved it!)

Bolivia is a country that we both came to love. It is undoubtedly my favourite country so far, and I'm sure it will stand out as one of the highlights of my trip. As well as the wonderful natural landscapes that we mentioned in the previous blog, and those that we saw on our trek last week, we came to love La Paz. It is a completely chaotic city - absolutely mental - but great fun to be in. Plus, you can get a half hour bus ride for 10p, which I think is great. On our trek we walked from a 4850m pass all the way down to the Yungas rainforest which stretches through to the Amazon. Along the way we saw huge butterflies, and I managed to see something I spent tens of hours trying to see at Los Cedros in Ecuador without success: a Capuchin monkey! Needless to say I completely failed to engage monkey habituation protocols (ie scratching yourself, eating leaves and so on), and the monkey scarpered before Emma could get a look.

In the time since we returned to La Paz from our walk, we've done some fun things. On one day we mountain biked what is officially designated as 'The World's Most Dangerous Road'. Until two months ago when a new and safer road (no less than twenty years in the making) was opened, this un-barriered road - in parts only one vehicle wide and with drops on one side of up to 300m - was the only transport route between the country's capital and basically everything to the north east. Our guidebook informed us that this road had an average of 26 vehicles per year disappearing over the edge. Well, it's fun to mountain bike from 4700m down to 1000m in five hours! And we've got the t-shirts to prove it. Yesterday we travelled back up to the pass at the start of last week's trek to catch the captivating views of the Cordillera Real, since pass was clouded over when we went the first time. When we weren't doing these things, we were exploring La Paz, experiencing some of its lively markets and colourful craft shops. We also splurged on a nice hotel for the last couple of nights. Before you snort in disgust, I ask you: would you pass up the opportunity to stay in a suite in a 5 star hotel in a capital city for 80 dollars a night? (On the topic of dollars, I'm loving the exchange rate that I've had for the last few months, because all prices here, even ones in local currency, seem to be pegged to the dollar).

This morning I repeated the trip I did nearly three weeks ago to meet Emma in Santiago. I'm now sitting in Arica, where I'll catch a flight down to Santiago tomorrow. On Friday evening I will finally be waving South America goodbye when I board a flight to Christchurch, New Zealand, via Auckland. I feel that with the border crossing out of Bolivia earlier today, I was prematurely saying goodbye to South America. I'm afraid that what I've seen of Chile just doesn't cut it compared to everything else I've seen. I might as well be in Florida - the roads are actually wide and don't have pot holes, the sun is relentlessly hot and there are McDonalds and Blockbusters everywhere. I'm sure Chile has its charms, but it doesn't fit in with everything else I've experienced in Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia. I've lately felt that my Spanish has improved a huge amount and I've been enjoying speaking to the locals in Bolivia. I'm going to miss improving on my Spanish, and to that end I've bought Harry Potter 1 in Spanish to try and improve my reading and vocabulary.

I'm looking forward to meeting up with a travelling friend in Santiago tomorrow, Nina, who I've repeatedly bumped into over the last few weeks. Then it'll be over to NZ, where I fully intend to go and live in the wilderness for a few weeks before my family come over to visit at the beginning of April. I will be armed with a mountain hut pass, in an attempt to see how cheaply I can live in a country I'm expecting to shock me quite considerably with regard to prices of things. It feels very strange and quite sad leaving South America. From initial feelings of anxiety and a bit of excitement about travelling on this continent, I've found I absolutely love the place. I hope that the rest of my travelling lives up to this experience (albeit most likely in different ways). Still, I can't wait to experience a new country, and the one that I was looking forward to most of all before my trip began, at that.

A quick hop down to Santiago and back (a meagre 2500km away)

2007-02-19T19:50:00.000Z

Everything was going so smoothly...Mike was in La Paz writing his last blog entry, about to drop off his laundry and book a nice hotel for Emma's arrival, when things went a little awry. He spoke to Emma on the phone at 3pm British time (5 hours before her flight from Heathrow) to sort out final plans, when she dropped the bombshell that American Airlines weren't going to let her fly into La Paz. This was because the Bolivian miners were striking in the city and fuel supplies to the airport were cut short. Fortunately, she managed to negotiate flying to the same continent, but the best AA could offer was Santiago, a cool 2500km away. Mike had to make it down to Santiago within 48 hours. To accomplish this formidable feat, he had a rickety Bolivian bus not unlike one of these:

whereas she had one of these:

The race was on! When it became apparent Mike wasn't going to make it to Santiago before Emma, he got off the bus at Arica in the far north of Chile, and hopped on a cheeky plane the next morning to cover the final 1500km, thereby thrashing her to the finish line.

We had a lovely couple of days in Santiago, spoiling ourselves by staying in a surprisingly cheap 5 star hotel (shoestringers to the end), before heading back up to Bolivia. The question was, what means of transport should we use to travel back up to the border? We went to the bus station and were faced with having to wait over a day until the next bus, and then to spend about 24 hours on the bus itself. Hmmm, we thought. How about we get on a quick bus to the airport and see if there are any more cheeky flights? We got to the airport one hour before a flight, promptly bought the ticket, ate some tasty donuts and got on board. Once in northern Chile we made our way to the border town of San Pedro de Atacama, where we hoped to get public transport over into Bolivia. However, we found out that the only way to travel in this part of South America is by 4WD tour (since the whole area is one roadless barren wilderness). We booked ourselves onto a tour and got going the next morning.

It was rather fortunate to be crossing the border with a group as there wasn´t even a proper road there. Once in Bolivia, we got comfy in the back of a Jeep and rocked down the bumpy roads. The landscape was absolutely stunning with an incredible mix of snow-capped mountains and brightly coloured lakes.

On the second night of the tour we stayed in the Casa de Sal, a hotel built almost entirely from salt, brilliant.

The other highlight of the trip was the Salar de Uyuni which covers 12000 square kilometres, the largest salt flat in the world. When covered in water, the salt flat acted as a mirror, giving the illusion that we were in the clouds. Rather controversially, there are islands in the middle of the salt that are home to many many big cacti.

On arrival in Uyuni the driver announced that we were to visit the town´s greatest attraction, a train museum. We rolled our eyes a little but were thrilled to find that we were actually allowed to climb on the rusting old trains. It´s great to be away from England´s health and safety crikiness!

Bolivia: great first impressions

2007-02-08T13:36:00.000Z

I've moved on to Bolivia, and so far I love it. Bolivia is one of South America's poorest countries, ranking only above the Guianas in its GNP, and the poverty shows. Yet Bolivia is a country of immense richness and diversity. It is one of the world's top eight most biodiverse countries, contains some of the world's highest and most spectacular mountains, shares one of the world's most impressive lakes (Lake Titicaca) with Peru, contains vast swathes of Amazon rainforest, is home to one of the world's largest salt flats and best of all has some of the world's best evidence of the dinosaurs' existence: dinosaur footprints! It is a country that offers so much to the people that come and visit it, yet very few well-off people from North America and Europe do come as tourists. Until a few decades ago, the only foreign visitors to Bolivia were mountaineers, utilizing the country's spectacular cordilleras. Let me demonstrate to you how cool this country is.

Where do you think these photos have been taken? The mountain picture, perhaps, is a view across to the Alps from some pristine mountain lake in Italy? And perhaps the images of ruins sitting above an idyllic beach and the sheltered cove were taken on a luxurious and inexplicably tourist-free Greek island? Wrong. They were both taken from virtually the same spot (in different directions) on Isla Del Sol in Bolivia. 'But hang on', you say, 'Bolivia is landlocked. You can't fool me. Bolivia has no coast. That can't be Bolivia.' Well it is! Hard as it is to believe, that water that you can see isn't the ocean. It's a lake. And it's not any old lake. It's quite a big lake, and it's called Lake Titicaca. It's so big that you can't see the far end of it, being about 160km distant. Lakes like that just don't exist where I come from. And the even more ridiculous thing is that this lake is a whopping 3800m above sea level. Let's think about this for a second. Here we have a lake 9000 square kilometres in area, containing an unimaginable 900 cubic kilometres of water, sitting nearly four kilometres above the ocean. What's more, there are mountains rising up from the lake, towering two kilometres above it! This is a country of astonishing proportions, famous for having the 'highest of everything', but it is a country that falls short of many a traveller's itinerary.

I arrived in Bolivia last Friday and decided to head out to Isla del Sol with my tent for a couple of days, to explore the relaxed but beautiful island. The walk to the end of the mainland was beautiful. This is what Isla del Sol looks like from the shore.

This two friendly locals helped me get there in their boat.

I'm now in La Paz, Bolivia's capital, awaiting Emma's arrival tomorrow evening. It would be fair to say that I'm quite excited! It's hard to believe that I'm catching a plane to New Zealand in three weeks. I really hope we can do this country justice by seeing a large part of what it has to offer for the curious traveller.

The manifold delights of the Cusco area

2007-01-31T18:31:00.000Z

Well hello folks, it's been a while since my last post. There's a lot to do down here in Cusco. I arrived here back on the morning of Saturday 20th and I've been doing rather a lot since. I begun by doing some ruin bashing, in the local vicinity of the town. I'm too stingy to go to the sacred valley so I went to some local unsung ruins instead. Imagine then my astonishment, when I realized that the rip-off ticket for the local ruins included those far more famous ones in the sacred valley as well! You would have thought I'd have been pleased at this unexpected revelation, until you consider the fact that I discovered this, oh, less than half a day before I was due to go off on a trek to Machu Picchu. Hence, my 12 pound ticket (and that's extortionate for Peru), which was only valid for a few days, went largely unused, and I ticked off just five of the twelve possible sight entrances that it allowed me.

The Cusco area offers lots for tourists and travellers. I won't bore you with pictures of mundane ruins here, since there are some more exciting Machu Picchu ones at the bottom of the post instead. Rather, I will show you some photos of other things. A week ago, I went river running with some jolly nice American and Czech people.

It was a bit rubbish, but good fun nonetheless. The river did get a bit rougher than the photo suggests, but not a lot. The second most exciting thing I did pre-trek was eat some carrot cake.

The next day I embarked on a trek with a friend of mine called Dale. He's a molecular biologist, but otherwise OK. In fact he's a lucky bugger, because he lives in Seattle and gets to play in mountains all the time. Anyway, we had met on the Chiva party in Quito back at the end of November, and by chance we were in Cusco at the same time, and ready to explore the mountains. Dale likes both proper cultural travel and trekking, so we're a good mix. We set off early on the morning of Thursday 25th for the Salkantay trek. It is an alternative trek to the Inca Trail, that lacks the Incan sites, but gets much more into the wild, and closer to indigenous communities. It's a longer trek (usually advertised as five or more days), and sounded to us like good fun.

It didn't quite work out as desired, owing to a severe back pain that overcame Dale pretty much as soon as we got off the bus at our start point. Dale's not the kind of guy to manifest pain in order to avoid trekking, and we eventually concluded it was probably the undesirable product of two nights' worth of nightbuses in a row. We worried that this would jeopardize the whole trek, but we decided to walk for a couple of hours and set up camp at a nice spot overlooking the general area, with the thought of reassessing the situation in the morning. The sun was beating down on that day, and we eventually came up with a cunning shelter, with the aid of my tent outer, a few pegs and a couple of trekking poles.

As it turned out, we deemed it best for Dale to turn around and nurse his back in Cusco, which was, by the next morning, causing him crippling pain. I was gutted to lose him as a trekking companion, but I carried on anyway.

I had a great trek, saw some excellent mountains, spoke to some very friendly local people, and got to Machu Picchu Pueblo in only three more days. It is a beautiful walk, around 88km in total, and includes the Salkantay mountain pass, at 4700m. Numerous different types of terrain were passed through, including mountains, lush valleys and cloudforest.

I have been speaking more to local people lately. I've found that my Spanish has come on a long way, just from having been in Spanish speaking countries for so long. I can now understand South Americans far more easily than Spaniards, who to me sound like they're harbouring an overallowance of ping pong balls in their mouths. This friendly guy saved me on the last day by providing me with bananas and sugary drinks. He was lovely and very hospitable, but was quite lacking in the tooth department.

I eventually arrived at the Machu Picchu hydroelectric station, about 9km from the town below the ruins. The final 9km was hence along these train tracks in the searing heat, which didn't agree with me at all.

I arrived in Machu Picchu Pueblo on Sunday afternoon and pretty much couldn't move my legs. I was very tired, and put off Machu Picchu itself for another 24 hours. I finally ended up at the ruins yesterday morning, on the first bus, at 6am before the crowds arrived.

Machu Picchu was better than I expected. If you spend any time in Peru you are constantly shown pictures and postcards of Machu Picchu, to the extent that you start to become numbed to the wonder of the ruins. However, when I actually arrived there, I was stunned into contemplation about how long these ruins had gone un-discovered by the modern world. The Spanish completely failed to find them in the conquest; they were discovered hundreds of years later by an American historian. I find it fascinating that such a huge Incan city could go unnoticed, and so unspoilt, for so long. These ruins are something to get excited about.

Enough of Cusco, I'm outta tomorrow morning. I'm heading to Puno on Lake Titicaca, before entering Bolivia there.

Before I finish, I want all of you to buzz positive vibes to Emma, my brilliant girlfriend who is on the verge of submitting her PhD thesis. All being well, it'll be done and dusted tomorrow, and there is the hope that she may come out to Bolivia next week to visit me. I think the collective brainpower of all the distinguished readers of this blog can push this thesis over its final hurdle. Thanks!

The Nazca Lines

2007-01-19T19:23:00.000Z

It's been an expensive week. Two touristy type tours - that's not like me; but I feel that for the things I'm seeing they're quite necessary. I've noticed that the rate at which I blog is proportional to the amount I'm spending (currently quite a bit more than ten pounds a day).

The Nazca Lines begged to be flown over - there is a tower that you can observe some of the figures from, but the view is quite limited. After some Spanish haggling that I'm quite proud of, I got the total price of a flight down from $60 to $43, and so this morning, I boarded a Cessna for a thirty minute flight over these famous and mysterious markings in the Nazca desert. I got to sit up with the pilot - woo hoo!!

The lines were first noticed by a German mathematician (get in) called Maria Reiche. Despite the fact she blatently looks like a man, she became a respected authority on the Lines and had lots of good solid mathematical theories behind why they exist. A number of slightly less well educated personalities have since come up with all the inevitable 'out there' theories, involving aliens and so on.

The Lines comprise a number of animal figures, tonnes of straight lines and many 'trapezoid' figures. It's intriguing to wonder how these huge objects were marked out from the ground, with no advantage of an aerial viewpoint.

I'm enjoying myself very much, but occasionally I get tired of being in this part of Peru. After having been in Ecuador and northern Peru for so long, I had forgotten the downsides the the 'gringo trail'. The tourism industry is much more prolific here, and it shows. There are more taxi drivers beeping at you for business and trying to rip you off, more annoying Peruvians shout out 'gringo!' and 'mister!' (it's sir) and more tourist company employees who try to grab you straight off the bus, telling you anything you want to hear for their commission. I say this as I'm imminently going to board a bus to Cuzco - here the rip-off factor will no doubt be unsurpassed. But nevertheless, I am really looking forward to seeing Machu Picchu and the other sites, before heading on to Lake Titicaca and Bolivia. Roll on 14 hour bus!

Sandboarding above the oasis

2007-01-18T10:50:00.000Z

At the moment I'm staying in the beautiful oasis village of Huacachina, which sits amidst towering sand dunes close to Ica, a major city on Peru's coastline south of Lima. I left Lima on Monday on my way through from Huaraz; meeting a bunch of nice people in my hostel along the way. This is the sort of building that characterizes Miraflores, the more modern part of Lima:

Huacachina is a popular tourist destination for Peruvians living nearby, but its idyllic loation is attracting more and more foreigners too. I didn't know such beautiful oases existed.

Lots of locals go swimming in the pool, in which it is reputed a mermaid has her abode.

Yesterday a few of us from my hostel went on an excellent buggy trip into the desert, where we drove at high speed across the extraordinary landscape, and had a go at sandboarding too. All the hotels run these trips at the same time, in the late afternoon. Any earlier than about 4pm, it is too hot to go sandboarding. I tried to walk up a sand dune at about 1pm on the day I arrived, and after about ten metres I was running and squealing like a little girl into the nearest bit of shade, the sun was so hot!

Sandboarding turns out to be much harder than snowboarding (or that was our excuse). The sand isn't very responsive and when you land on it, it's a lot harder than powder. But it's still great fun! After a couple of disastrous foot attempts, most of us decided the stomach option was preferable.

I'm next going to head to Nazca, the location of the famous and enigmatic Nazca Lines. Whether my budget will stretch to a flight over the lines waits to be seen. Either way, I'll probably spend one night in Nazca before getting on the very long bus journey to Cuzco.

A change of plans

2007-01-12T17:20:00.000Z

I changed my mind about the Amazon, realising that I wanted to use that time to explore more of Southern Peru and Bolivia. There are too many tempting options on this continent! Thus began my journey south.

Since leaving Vilcabamba, Ecuador, I have travelled for over 36 hours in five different types of transport (car, pickup, combi, truck and bus), and I have ended up here, in Huaraz, Peru, again. I like this town, and I thought it would be a nice place to spend my birthday. I had come here with the intention of going mountain biking again, but I've just discovered that my guide from before, Julio, is out of town, so that plan's out the window. I've also discovered that Huaraz is a different place out of the May to September trekking season. Nearly all of the traveller hangouts - book exchanges, cafes and so on, are closed. A bit of a let down then, but I'm still happy to be here, in the shadow of the beautiful mountains.

Let me tell you about my journey here. It turns out that travel through southern Ecuador and northern Peru takes time. The border itself was the easiest part. I've heard some stories of border guards asking for bribes and so on, but the ununiformed official on the Peruvian side who met my French companion Thierry and I across the border was very friendly and gave us a genuine welcome and a smile. This particular point of entry is an infrequently used frontier, and I believe Thierry and I were the only gringos to pass through that day, as the man opened up his office specially for us. When Peru and Ecuador put an end to their war in the late nineties they agreed that this small bridge south of Zumba could become a legal crossing point.

Before making the border we journeyed from Vilcabamba south to Zumba, and from there on to the border in a truck. The journey from Zumba to the border was going fine, until we came upon this.

After the border, we took a 2 hour car ride to San Ignacio, where we stayed the night. In the morning we made our way to Jaen, where we went our separate ways. Thierry headed off to the east to Chachapoyas and I headed west to Chiclayo. My night bus to Chiclayo was supposed to take six hours, but ended up taking over twelve, due to a landslide. I'm not complaining - I don't think my South America trip would have been complete a landslide or public unrest causing a major hold up! This particular hold up seemed very mysterious at the time. At about 1am the bus stopped in the middle of the road and turned its engine off. After an hour or so of not moving, I assumed we had broken down, so I patiently waited and caught a bit of sleep. When it was light at 6am I went outside, and imagine my surprise when I saw buses, as far as the eye could see in both directions.

I previously had no idea that there were other buses around us and I was quite pleased that the whole of northern Peru was at a standstill (for this is the main route through northern Peru), instead of just us. The rocks were eventually cleared and we went on our way again, seven and a half hours after having stopped.

Another two long bus rides got me to Huaraz. Tonight I'm going to celebrate my birthday with Tommy (Nelly's son) and his friends at one of Huaraz's fine discotecas. I'm in half a mind to do a bit of trekking before I leave the area, but I may decide it's best to hit the road and find the South.

En route to Northern Peru

2007-01-07T18:52:00.000Z

On Thursday evening I left Quito on board a 17 hour bus to Loja, 500 miles to the south, and the most southern major city in Ecuador. My plan is to head into the Amazon basin via Northern Peru, eventually ending up in Iquitos, a large river port Peruvian city, in about 10 to 14 days. At the moment I´m sitting in an internet cafe in Vilcabamba, a nice spot to stop for a few days. I had planned to come straight from Loja to Vilcabamba without stopping, but a severe case of diarrhoea convinced me to stop and take advantage of the medical services in the bigger city of Loja. I´m on two sets of antibiotics to make whatever is causing it go away (they seem to be working)!

Vilcabamba is in the famous "valley of longevity" - residents here claim to live to 100, and some claim to be 120 years old, due mainly to a low fat diet and agreeable climate. Vilcabamba reminds me of Baños in the sense that it´s nestled among tall hills. This morning I took a hike up one of the hills surrounding the city, and captured these views.

In a couple of days I´m going to head to the Peruvian border, about four hours away. From there it is a similar length of time to Jáen, the first largish town in Peru, theoretically reachable in one day from here. From Jáen I plan to take my time stopping at various places en route to Yurimaguas (the end of the road), from where it is a two day boat trip to Iquitos. Along the way from here to Yurimaguas, there are one or two pre Inca ruins that I would like to see, and some jungle/waterfall excursions I could do. After spending a few days in Iquitos, I´ll fly back out to Lima.

I´m now well over half way through the South America part of my trip. I put my flights to New Zealand back by a couple of weeks, to the 2nd March, but I´m flying out in less than two months! In that time I hope to get to Iquitos, then explore southern Peru and Bolivia, before dashing to Chile to catch my plane. I´m really enjoying my time here, but I can´t wait to join Emma in New Zealand.

Happy new year everyone.

Photos from the cloudforest

2007-01-02T22:58:00.000Z

Today I arrived back in Quito after 30 days stay in what became a very special place for me here in Ecuador. Now I finally have some fast internet, I can show you what it looks like. Some of the photos below are by Rebecca - I´ve mentioned which ones. Hovering over images (in Internet Explorer at least) will give you some information about what the photo is about.

It all started off with a bus ride from Quito to Chontal, about 60km away and a 3.5 hour bus ride.

When I got off the bus I met up with Rebecca, Jose (the man who made the Reserve what it is) and two Spanish tourists who were visiting Los Cedros for a few days. After a short while we jumped on some mules for the ride up to where we would be staying for the next month.

The bunkhouse in which volunteers, scientists and tourists stay is situated in an idyllic area, part of a complex which also comprises Jose´s house and the kitchen and dining area.

On the first full day, Ray, a long term Canadian volunteer, took us out on a hike to show us some of the trails in the bosque nublado. We did some river crossings, and went to see the waterfall that lies about 3km walk away from the bunkhouse.

Most days we would go out on the trails, be it looking for monkeys or for our own enjoyment. We even had our own swimming pool, naturally formed by the river.

I had a number of encounters with animals, some tame and some less so.

The best animal I had a glimpse of in the forest was a Jaguarundi, on Christmas Day. I was incredibly lucky to see it - Jose said he´s seen about five in his 20 year time in the forest. Suffice to say it was too quick to fall victim to a photo.

Christmas Eve was a very fun event. We had several more people up at the Reserve: myself, Rebecca, Jose, Pedro (Rebecca´s boyfriend), Tony (a Spanish artist), and Courtney and Elise (from Colorado). Much rum was drunk, and much dancing was engaged in. Christmas Eve is the main Christmas event in Latin America so who were we to pass up the opportunity of a good party?

Reserva Los Cedros has many species of bird that are endemic to the region (not found anywhere else). During my stay I saw amongst others, several species of toucans and parrots. This poor creature succumbed to being held only because she was knocked out when she flew full pelt into one of the bunkhouse windows. We later picked Rebecca up off the floor and told her to try to be more aware of where the windows of the bunkhouse were in relation to the doors.

Christmas, Los Cedros style

2006-12-21T13:58:00.001Z

It's hard to believe I've already been at Los Cedros for two and a half
weeks, but it's even harder to believe that Christmas is only four days
away! It's going to be a spectacularly un-western Christmas here, no
presents, cards, turkey, mistletoe; not even Santa Claus (I suggested to
Jose that he'd make a good SC - he really would - but we realised that our
bunkhouse has no chimney so that idea went down the drain). I'm really
looking forward to a Christmas of this style, as it's unlikely I'll ever
again be isolated from all the commercialism that comes along with
Christmas in the UK. I'm making a point of doing volunteer work on
Christmas day itself, as I may never again work on Christmas. Perhaps
I'll have more chance of spotting a Spider Monkey on the day itself, as
his paper hat from his cracker will inevitably make him more conspicuous.

Primate searching is what Rebecca and I have predominantly been doing
here, intermingled with some computer work updating the volunteer
information for future volunteers. I haven't yet seen any monkeys, but
I've heard a Capuchin on one occasion (quickly rushing over tree tops when
he heard me coming), and Spider Monkeys on two occasions (further off).
It would be quite special to catch a glimpse of the latter, being as there
are only an estimated 250 left in the whole world (they are classified by
the IUCN as Critically Endangered, the level slightly above Extinct In The
Wild). Interestingly, howlers, the loudest mammal on earth, have not yet
been heard by either of us even though they are much higher in number than
the spiders. Whilst out on the trails spotting primates, we follow the
formally laid down protocols to ensure that the data we collect can be
reliably used for the PrimeNet project (a project being run by the
University of Sussex, funded by the Darwin Initiative). These protocols
have been worked on by us, and include advice on primate habituation in
the event of encountering a primate (scratching yourself, looking
uninterested), and pace requirements (covering 50m in three minutes).
School science projects were never this fun!

I have caught glimpses of a number of other animals I've never seen before
in the wild. I've seen a couple of snakes, which thankfully are kept away
from the research centre by the cat, who takes away their prey, the rats.
I've also encountered two armadillos, several parrots and toucans, and a
beautiful tarantula about six inches across with its legs bent.
Spectacled bears are very occasionally encountered (three times so far
this year), and there is evidence of sloths and pumas, though I don't
think these have ever been seen. Most mammals in this forest do a very
good job of hiding or fleeing before humans can spot them, and I doubt
I'll be lucky enough to capture a glimpse, but it's fascinating to think
that when I walk through the forest I am sharing it with them.

In the afternoon we usually read or chat, on the porch of our bunkhouse.
The bunkhouse has electricity and can hold about 20 volunteers, but we
have it to ourself at the moment. For a few days last week, we were
without electricity, because on one particular evening we drew too much
power from the inverter and it blew. At the moment we're using a 350W
inverter, which can power a suprising number of things - numerous laptops
during the day and many energy saving light bulbs in the evening.
Sometime between Christmas and New Year, a friend of Jose's is bringing up
a 2500W inverter to replace the original one which was struck by lightning
the day we arrived. 2500W never sounded so good - the place will look
like Disneyland!

In the mean time I hope everyone has a really enjoyable Christmas and New
Year - I will be here over this period, until I head back to Quito on
around the 3rd January. I will put up photos as soon as I get there, I
just cannot do it here when my connection is a quite astonishingly slow
1.2kb/sec!

Reserva Los Cedros

2006-12-06T20:10:00.001Z

I think I might just be in paradise.

Reserva Los Cedros is a 6400 hectare area of cloudforest on the
western flank of the Andes, just 60km north west of Quito but a whole
world away. I arrived on a three hour bus from Quito to a village
named Chontal, on Sunday morning. There I met up with Jose, the owner
of the reserve and the administrator of the projects that go on here
and Rebecca, another volunteer who is originally American but who has
lived in Venezuela for the past few years. We were joined by some
Spanish tourists who are visiting from a short time, and after a while
we began the several hour trek up to where we would be staying and the
base for our volunteering. I hadn't counted on getting to ride on the
mules, which made the trek much easier! By the end of the five hours
my mule was well under control, having become familiar with some
Spanish commands I also taught it some English ones. The trek took us
up and out of the lush tropical valley in which Chontal sits, over
several rivers and higher up into the forest.

The research centre at Los Cedros comprises several buildings - Jose's
house, a bunkhouse, a kitchen /communal area, several toilets and a
shower. Water is run through hoses directly from the river higher up
the hill, and electricity is generated by a dynamo in the river.
Water is so plentiful, that it is actually preferable to leave the tap
<i>on</i> in the kitchen, so that the river doesn't overflow and run
down into the mule pasture. Walking past a flowing tap initially
really went against the grain for me, but now I'm used to it! After
all, the water is simply re entering the river somewhat further down,
once it has travelled down the hand-dug drains. The internet here is
very patchy, but sometimes accessible. In order to access the
internet we dial up to the ISP on a radio phone, and the noise on the
line often means it takes several attempts to dial up. Unfortunately
I don't think I'm going to get any photos out till I'm back in Quito
in January, but you can see some photos of the place at www.reservaloscedros.org.

Rebecca and I are mainly going to be going out in search of primates
while we are here. Primenet is one of the projects that has been set
up here by scientists and students, and the primate spotting program
continues to run in their absence. Three species of monkey: the
Spider Monkey, Capuchin and Howler, are found in this relatively small
pocket of forest in North West Ecuador. Only about 4% of the original
beautiful cloudforest is left in this part of Ecuador and it is a good
job that Jose bought up this land and has fought over it because
otherwise this figure would be even lower. The devastating
deforestation has led to the drastic reduction of many animal species,
but this pocket of paradise still allows many species to survive. As
well as monkeys, spectacled bears are occasionally sighted here, and
there is evidence of big cats, though they're virtually never seen.
I'm looking forward to working on an ongoing scientific project -
tomorrow will be our first time out looking for monkeys.

As well as that, there are some other projects that sometimes need
doing here at Los Cedros. This morning we went out into the forest to
plant to begin recolonising the forest with a tree species which was
at one point felled by humans, and at some point we're going to tackle
the water supply to another building a kilometre or two along one of
the trails, in the hope that in the future it can be used for
volunteer accommodation. The trail network here is quite extensive,
and it feels incredibly exciting to go out on hikes on trails that
really no one else in the world has access to. When it is clear,
simply looking out from the research centre into the mountainous
cloudforest landscape affords me views of hillsides that have quite
possibly never had a human step on them. We even have a impressive
waterfall, a couple of hours walk away on the appropriately named
`Cascada' trail. The whole experience so far has been amazing - Jose
says he lives in the best place in the world, and it was only when we
arrived here on Sunday evening that we agreed he may be right.

As well as the exciting animals, there are stunning plant species
everywhere you look; huge tree butresses, leaves the size of my torso
and orchids abound. There are a ridiculous number of insects here,
including several species of spider (the tarantula being one). I have
yet to find anything much bigger than a grasshopper in my room, I am
glad to say, and the research centre cat keeps the snakes away by
destroying their prey (the rodents).

Right now I'm going to go and read and generally enjoy my afternoon
off (the afternoons off and the great food that the cooks produce are
two of my favourite things about the place).

Latitude zero

2006-12-01T21:31:00.000Z

Today I visited the Northern Hemisphere, several times in fact. I went to Mitad del Mundo nearby, which sits on the equator. It was from Mitad del Mundo that the French scientists confirmed the location of the equator, deduced that the earth was not quite spherical, and conducted measurements that would lead to the metric system.

I´ve been in the Quito, Ecuador´s capital, since Sunday. It´s a beautiful city. You can probably tell I prefer it to Lima by the fact that I´ve managed to stay here for more than one night at a time. Lima has its plus points but Quito is much more pleasant. I´ve been staying in a cheap hotel in the Old Town ($5 a night for a whole room with three beds in it to myself), which is the quieter but more beautiful part of the city.

Quito is only 25km south of the equator, but retains a spring-like climate all year round thanks to its high elevation. It is surrounded by several volcanoes and the old town in particular is very hilly. The steep cobblestone streets are hard going if you´ve got a full rucksac on but the views from the top of the hills and church towers are fabulous. Within the space of a few blocks are several beautiful plazas, picturesque colonial buildings and cathedrals, basilicas, monasteries and churches everywhere you look. I´m not one for walking round churches all day (the Spanish art gets quite tiring after a while), but some of the interiors of these buildings are quite stunning. One church, La Compañia, is reputed to have required 7 tonnes of gold to deck out its interior, and Quiteños proudly regard it as the most beautiful church in Ecuador. Almost every church is steeped in gold, art and architecture, something quite different to the churches back home. It´s evident that the Catholic church has always been a holder of great wealth here in Latin America.

Quito´s New Town is more like the cities in North America and Europe, with skyscrapers dotted around the place. It´s not as pretty as the Old Town but it´s still a pleasant place to explore, graced as it is with several parks. Most of my trips to the New Town have been to the South American Explorers clubhouse. It´s a home away from home, what with free tea and coffee, chillout area, book exchange and a multitude of resources on volunteering and other things to do in South America. Speaking of books, I´ve just finished my fifth of the trip, Long Way Round by Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman. It recounts their motorbike trip from London to New York via Siberia and is of special interest to me because I dreamed up the exact same trip (though imagining I´d do it in a 4x4) when I was about 12. It´s good to read a book about travelling while you´re travelling yourself, and it is inspiring me to do more adventurous things in the future. I once heard of a man cycling (ie on a bike with pedals) from Holland to Nepal, and then climbing Everest. Hardcore!

One thing I love about Quito is its transport system. It has a tram network that I think is at least as good as Sheffield´s (and only $0.25 no matter how far you go). The trams generally have their own lanes so they can whisk you from the Old Town to downtown in just a few minutes. Last night however I experienced a much more fun form of transport. Starting yesterday and going on until the 6th December is the week in which Quiteños celebrate the anniversary of the founding of Quito. There are many street parades like this one

and many instances of an intriguing type of bus called a chiva, a picture of which is here, hurtling past you on the street. In keeping with the fiesta spirit they all sport bands on the roof, playing all kinds of loud music! It´s great fun, and last night, SAE organised one for all its members. We cruised round the streets of both New Town and Old Town, complete with beers and whistles. It was a good laugh! (Sorry, no photos of night time things because my camera flash isn´t working properly!).

I´ve found some volunteering to do! In the next couple of days I´m going to head up to Reserva Los Cedros, which is only 60km northwest of Quito, but which takes about two days to reach. The volunteering here will probably be a mixture of trail maintenance and building, bear tracking, admin work and plant/insect species research. I´m going to be there for at least a month, and all my accommodation and food is included for $300 per month. I´m really excited about it and I hope it will be a great experience to do over the Christmas and New Year period. I think there is internet access, so I´ll keep blogging - with any luck I might capture a picture of the famous bespectacled bear.

Quito on election night

2006-11-27T02:27:00.000Z

Just a quick one - I arrived in Quito today, inadvertently managing to time my arrival at the same time as the presidential elections. I got into my hotel, turned the TV on, and every channel was showing footage of a press conference and public celebrations in the centre of Quito following exit polls which currently suggest the left-wing guy, Correa, has won. So I thought I´d pop down and join in the fun! A quick bus ride later I found myself in Parque La Carolina, and the crowds weren´t hard to find - I simply had to follow the noise and shouts of "¡Correa, Presidente!, ¡Correa, Presidente!".

I picked up a couple of photos of the madness:

The election campaign has been a bloody one, with its fair share of controversy. Correa is a renowned anti-American and once called George Bush a dimwit! The usual promises to increase employment and reduce poverty have been the central theme through the campaigns of both candidates; I wonder if Ecuador will see these come to fruition this time, or will it suffer at the hands of more corrupt politicians?

Baños and the upper Amazon basin

2006-11-25T15:39:00.000Z

I left Cuenca on Wednesday evening and arrived here, in Baños, on Thursday morning. Baños is a tourist hotspot, popular with both Ecuadorians and foreigners, due to its idyllic location in the central highlands. It´s name literally means `baths´ - it is named after several nearby hotsprings. Baños sits in the shadow of the huge and humbling Tungurahua volcano, which gave the town some trouble in 1999 when it decided to erupt after years of dormancy. This seriously damaged the tourist business here, as all the locals had to move out for some months, but the town seems to have recovered. Even now, seven years on, there is clear evidence of the lahars caused by the eruption. This is Tungurahua (hovering over images will give you some extra descriptions):

On Thursday afternoon I walked up to Bellavista, an appropriately named building on a hill overlooking Baños. This was the beautiful view of the town that awaited me:

One of the main reasons I wanted to come to this area was to do the recommended bike ride from Baños down to Puyo. Puyo lies 60km by road to the east of Baños, and about 850m lower in altitude (Baños being at 1800m, Puyo at 950m). The setting of the two towns couldn´t be much more different. Travelling this relatively short distance takes you from the highlands, right down into the Amazon basin. Puyo is the gateway for the Oriente, basically the jungle area of Ecuador. The bike ride was amazing, and hard - there was more down than up but there was plenty of up! This is what the upper amazon basin looks like, on the road between the two towns:

The best part of the journey was the impressive Pailón de Diablo waterfalls near the village of Rio Verde. These falls were about 20km east of Baños, a short walk from the road, and are apparently one of the most impressive waterfalls in Ecuador. I walked right up to their base, and the noise from the water here was deafening. The force of the water crashing into the pool at the bottom sent rain flying upwards!

Near to the waterfall was an authentic jungle-style rickety bridge:

There were several other waterfalls en route, including several that dropped straight onto the road.

The whole journey to Puyo took about 4 hours, and the bus shamed me by climbing back up to Baños in only one hour. It was a very worthwhile journey. Today I plan on some serious hammock time, before catching a bus to Quito tomorrow.

Parque Nacional Cajas

2006-11-21T20:42:00.000Z

I´ve just got back from four days of hiking in Parque Nacional Cajas which I´ll talk about in a bit. First of all, I thought you may enjoy seeing a picture of the Peru-Ecuador border which I travelled over last Tuesday

and a couple of pictures of Cuenca, the town I´ve been based in for the last week. It´s a beautiful city!

On Saturday morning I got on a bus bound for Guayaquil, Ecuador´s largest city and got off after about an hour at Laguna Toreadora, the ranger station for Cajas. Here I bought a tourist permit for $10 and hiked up the road to the start of the trek at Tres Cruces. I was following the trek plan described in the Lonely Planet book that I used for my treks in Peru, but I decided I´d like to spend 4 days instead of 3 in the park so my plan was to explore the area around one of the central lakes for a day or so, in between the described second and third days of hiking.

I mentioned before that Cajas looks like the Scottish highlands. It does (in fact it looks quite like parts of Snowdonia and the Lakes as well) until the point where you find the following three things: llamas, puya and cloudforest!

The puya is a plant related to the pineapple that is characteristic of the Andes. The picture below shows a typical puya, although I found much bigger versions of this plant. Generally they live for about 30 years and flower just once, when they send a massive shoot up 10m into the air.

Cloudforest is home to a huge diversity of wildlife, including bespectacled bears (the species that Paddington was based on). Unfortunately I didn´t see any such bears, I was more interested in trying to work out how to clamber over and under the branches with my large rucksac! The mist that flows through these forests adds a mystical element to the atmosphere.

This was the view from my first camp spot, on the morning of the second day:

On the second day I climbed over two mountain passes to reach another lakeside camp spot, here:

On the third day I decided to explore a side valley, climb up a small peak and then head down to the final campsite near some Incan ruins and surrounded by waterfalls.

This morning was the last part of my trek, I walked passed this impressive looking lake:

and on to the road that would take me back to Cuenca. I was waiting for a bus by the road, when a policeman offered me a free lift! I´m not one to turn down a free lift, but I was rather disappointed that he didn´t involve me in an exciting police chase. Still, I saved $2 so I can´t complain.

I´m quite tired now and I´m going to chill out here for a couple of nights, before moving on to Quito, perhaps via Baños. I´ve heard that there´s an excellent bike ride to be done from Baños down to Puyo - it´s about 60km along and 1000m down, and takes you pretty much from the Andes to the Amazon basin. I´m keen to get to Quito quite soon though, so I can try to sort out some volunteering. In the mean time, I´m waiting for my tent to dry (perched up on its end in my cheap hotel room) and my clothes to wash themselves (I´m going to leave it till I get back to my room in ten minutes to see if this has happened; if not I´ll resign myself to the fact that a laundrette trip may be in order).

Into Ecuador

2006-11-15T15:22:00.000Z

I´m very pleased to say that my first land border crossing went flawlessly. Yesterday morning I peeled myself away from the hammocks and sandy beaches of Máncora onto a combi headed for Tumbes, the last major town in Peru before the border. Tumbes, with its incessant heat and mosquitos isn´t the sort of place to hang around in, so I jumped on a bus straight through to Machala, Ecuador. The immigration offices for both countries aren´t at the border itself, but several kilometres behind the border in both cases. I was cleared out of Peru (and successfully avoided a local man who wanted to charge me for filling in my Ecuadorian immigration form), and got back on the bus. The border itself was simply a bridge over a dried canal in the middle of a town. There was no security at the bridge and the local Peruvians and Ecuadorians seemed to have an agreement whereby they could just walk between the countries without a care in the world.

A few kilometres into Ecuador, on the far side of the town, was the Ecuadorian immigration office. I had taken my buff (funky coloured hat thing) off especially, in an effort to look more respectable. Officially, Ecuador requires that you have in your possession a ticket out of the country, and $20 per day in funds, but they virtually never ask for this unless you turn up looking particularly stoned or bedraggled. I had no problems, and the chap even gave me 90 days which I was very pleased about (the guidebook mentions most people only get 30).

I arrived in Cuenca, Ecuador´s third largest city and base for the southern highlands, yesterday evening. Myself and a couple of Canadians found a hotel and somewhere to eat; I have just found a far nicer hotel for 50 cents less, which I will promptly move in to. Ecuador is completely dollarized which makes things easier in some sense, but I´ve become so used to the Peruvian sol that I keep on converting back to soles in my head to determine whether things are good value or not. They plumped for the dollar in 2000 or so, after their currency had devalued to just a third of what it was in only a year.

I am in Cuenca because it´s a good base for a trek I want to do in Parque Nacional Cajas, which looks to me uncannily like the Scottish highlands. Mike and Rachael from Máncora may join me for this trek in a few days, having elected to soak up some more sun in Peru before dashing to Ecuador. For the next couple of days, however, I plan to stay here and acclimatize whilst exploring the beautiful colonial centre of Cuenca.

I don´t have a very structured Ecuador plan, only that I would like to do this trek, and I would like to see Quito (the capital) which sits about 20km south of the equator. I just can´t justify (let alone afford) the $900+ that a Galápagos trip would set me back, and besides I don´t have much time. How long I stay in Ecuador all depends on whether I find volunteering in Quito...I should think any length of time between two weeks and two months for the whole country is appropriate. Afterwards, I plan to spend some more time in Peru (to see Machu Picchu and other parts), before heading down to Bolivia and then Chile. My only time constraint in this continent is my flight out in three months time, and I am finding that there is more and more to do in Latin America. I promise more photos next post.

The north coast

2006-11-11T16:12:00.000Z

I left Lima on Monday night to explore some of Peru´s north coast before crossing the border to Ecuador, which I expect to do at the beginning of next week. I´m currently in Máncora near the border, and earlier in the week I spent a few days in Trujillo, Peru´s third largest city. The north coast of Peru has been largely undiscovered by tourists, which makes it a nice break from the well carved Lima to Cusco gringo trail. Life is more laid back here.

Trujillo is about halfway from Lima to Ecuador, situated in the coastal desert. It´s not until you step off the nightbus into Trujillo´s surroundings that you really believe it´s situated in desert. The city is flanked on one side by the Pacific ocean, and on the other by huge sand dunes rearing up to the Andean foothills. It´s quite a sight. The area receives just 6mm of rain per year, unless it´s an El Niño year, where it receives rather more. The impact of El Niño on the area is incredible - every few years when it hits, bridges in the area are washed away and many towns on the North Coast are partially destroyed.

Trujillo is situated near the ancient Chimu city of Chan Chan, the biggest pre Columbian city in the Americas. I stayed at a guesthouse run by a lovely Peruvian lady and her English husband, who provide excellent tours of Chan Chan and the nearby Pyramid of the Moon, a Moche monument. Here are some photos.

On Thursday night I took a bus to Máncora and arrived here yesterday morning. It is permanently sunny here at this time of the year, indeed most of the year, being so close to the Equator, and is a popular holiday resort for Peruvians. Yesterday evening those of us staying at my hostel went out for some food and drinks, which was good fun. All the food here is fresh, probably pulled out of the ocean only a few hours before.

I am going to stay here for another couple of days, making the most of being near the beach, before heading to Ecuador for more trekking (and volunteering if I can find it) in a few days. Thanks to all of you for your emails and blog comments; it´s really great to hear from you.

Mountain biking in Huaraz, and Lima

2006-11-06T23:09:00.000Z

On Saturday I went mountain biking with Julio Olaza, the local trails guru. He´s quite famous in the area and knows the singletrack in the surrounding mountains better than anyone, according to Lonely Planet. It was a splurge at $48, but you have to do these things sometime don´t you? Besides, I have been spending well under a tenner a day so far so I thought I´d treat myself.

It was my last day in Huaraz but I wanted to fit some biking in as I´d heard it was a world class location for it. Julio´s driver took us 1000m up into the Cordillera Negra, an arid set of hills which protect the snow on the Cordillera Blanca from melting in the warm pacific winds. The town down in the valley that you can see in the picture below is Huaraz. It´s about 30km away and 1000m down. That got me grinning.

The first few kilometres were double track, a good warm up for what was coming next. Then Julio took me down 18km of singletrack, virtually all down hill and nice and dangerous! There were some really rocky sections, lots of startled looking locals and the occasional pig sitting in the middle of the trail. There were views like this most of the way down.

I´m looking forward to what mountain biking I may find in Ecuador, and Cusco in Peru later in the trip.

Later that day I got on a night bus to Lima, and managed to stay here a whole 36 hours before deciding to get out again. It´s not so bad, it´s just more expensive than the rest of Peru and not nearly as exciting. I´ve got a bus to Trujillo in an hour. It´s nearly half way to the Ecuadorian border and has lots of ruins and beaches and things. I´m heading to Ecuador but taking my time about it - on the way I plan to shock other travellers and locals by trying to tan my pasty skin. Perhaps I´ll learn to surf too. Somewhere up the coast is the 'longest left handed wave in the world' apparently.

Meanwhile, here are a couple of pics of some nice parts of Lima.

Photos of Huaraz and the Huayhuash

2006-11-03T20:30:00.000Z

Below is a photo of myself, Ofri, Nelly and Eyal in Nelly´s living room last Friday, just before I departed for my trek. Notice, I am the tallest for a change!

Peru has gone election mad lately, with the keenly anticipated ballot on the 19th of November. Everywhere you go, even in the smallest rural villages, you see candidate posters and slogans painted on walls. Two of my favourite candidates are below. I particularly like this jovial looking fellow

and this trustworthy looking chap.

I hopped onto the bus to Chiquian and took these pics the following morning, just before I found my way to the start of the trek at Pocpa.

My first night of camping in the Huayhuash was here, just north of Quartelhuain, with Rondoy (5870m) behind.

On the second day of trekking I got closer up to the mountains. This is Jirishanca (6094m), in the evening from my campsite (southern end of Laguna Mitacocha) and then the next morning, in the stunning sunshine.

Lastly, here are four photos from my third and final camp, at the Eastern end of Laguna Carhuacocha. The first shows Siula Grande (6344m, made famous by a certain mounaineering book and film) and Yerupaja (6617m, Peru´s second highest). The second overlaps, showing Yerupaja and Yerupaja Chico (6089m). The third overlaps again, showing Yerupaja Chico, Jirishanca and Jirishanca Chico (5446m). I quickly snapped the fourth as the sun set behind Yerupaja Chico.

Cordillera Huayhuash

2006-11-01T22:11:00.000Z

I'm back in Huaraz again, having just spent several fantastic days down in the Cordillera Huayhuash.

The Huayhuash is a remote range of mountains within the Andes that contains Yerupaja, Peru's second highest mountain (6700m ish). It is wilder and rougher than the Cordillera Blanca (which contains the Santa Cruz trek, see my previous post) and is less well known to trekkers. Huayhuash is pronounced "why wash". I didn't need telling twice!

I knew that the best season for trekking was May to September, but I thought it was worth a go anyway. On Friday I caught a bus down to Chiquian, in the hope of finding good weather and other companions to trek with. I found neither. However Saturday morning brought blue skies, so I hopped on another bus to Pocpa, the start of the 8 day circuit.

I'd already decided that I wasn't going to do the full 8 days, because I was solo and the weather was bound to be bad at times. From the map and the guidebook I had determined that after 4 days I could exit to a village called Queropalca, the only village on the East side of the range. I had packed 8 days worth of food in Huaraz, so my pack was a little heavy, but I looked forward to the prospect of eating 8 days worth of food in 4.

The first day of trekking was really boring - just walking along a track to the start of the trailhead proper. It took me past a few tiny villages and to be honest, I didn't enjoy this day at all. I'd heard from a local that there were thieves in the area, and I didn't like the idea of losing all my gear, money and passport in such a remote place. I just tried to look hard and scary whenever I passed groups of locals - in fact I think the sight of a gringo with blond hair took most of them aback to the extent that they forgot to rob me. I was feeling much better by the time I was in my tent in the mountains that evening. The mountains scared me less.

The next 2 days of trekking were absolutely spectacular. Virtually all of the trek was above 4000m; I think I reached about 4850m. I saw several huge Andean condors on the route - spectacular birds with up to 3m wingspan. I was humbled when I saw an avalanche fall off Yerupaja. I had a scary moment when it started hailing three quarters of the way up some steep fine scree and I thought it was all going to slide off. But it didn't, and the views that were afforded from the pass to which it led made it all worthwhile.

The weather was almost brilliant. Unlike in the UK, the weather in this part of the Andes is predictable to some extent. At this time of year the weather seems to follow a pattern. It is dead clear in the morning, it rains hard for a couple of hours in the afternoon and then it clears up again in the evening. This meant that each day I had some spectacular weather and brilliant views. When I get back to Lima in a few days and find my USB cable I'll put some photos up. The lakes, glaciers and peaks come together to form a stunning backdrop.

During this time I became proficient at outstaring and outbarking pissed-off dogs. There are so many of the beasts! If you go anywhere near a campesino's hut, a dog will come and have a go at you. I find that a mixture of ignoring them, barking at them and pretending to throw rocks at them does the trick.

During my four days of trekking, I encountered no other trekkers or mountaineers. I was quite suprised by that, but not put off. It was fantastic to have the mountains to myself - it only enhanced the wilderness experience. That's not to say I prefer to hike alone - in general I don't. But it's good to get out there on your own from time to time.

The journey back is another story...

Huaraz

2006-10-25T22:26:00.000Z

I gave up on Lima after a couple of days and got on an overnight coach to Huaraz, the "basecamp for the second biggest mountain range in the world". This area of Peru truly is stunning. So much has happened in the last week here but I will mention some highlights.

I´ve been staying, together with an Israeli couple (Ofri & Eyal Wagner-Lebel), at a place called Nelly´s house in Huaraz. It´s what it sounds like. It´s a house with a lovely lady in it called Nelly. It really feels like home - sometimes we eat together, she helps me hang out my clothes, and one evening we even danced together. This morning she told me off for not getting up for desayuno (brekkie).

Yesterday, myself, Ofri and Eyal completed a beautiful 4 day trek (known as Santa Cruz) through Peru´s Cordillera Blanca. This long walk afforded us stunning views and some real altitude, the highest pass being at 4760m. Ofri got quite ill walking up here but was fine once we got down low again. I had spectacular views of several mountains above 6000m. 6000m! We all had a great time, despite the three of us being packed into a small 2-man tent built for Peruvians (it was about 10cm short of my height and only wide enough for two), which persistently leaked water.

The journey back from this trek stands out in my mind as something rather astonishing too. It basically involved piling into the back of a truck with 2 other Brits, 2 Dutch, a Japanese bloke and a native Peruvian and holding on for dear life as this truck navigated what must be one of the highest road passes in the world (4700m). This road was not paved, and the excitement was only exacerbated when we saw a bunch of crosses sitting on one of the many tight hairpin bends. It was one of the most fantastic journeys in my life.

I´m hoping to spend another while here in Huaraz, hopefully doing some walking down in the equally spectacular but less oft visited Cordillera Huayhuash. Ofri and Eyal don´t want to do this, they enjoyed our Santa Cruz trek but they aren´t used to the rain! It is somewhere in between the dry and wet season here, but the rain isn´t British. It just isn´t hard enough. Perhaps I will take them for some walking in the Scottish rainy season sometime ( the rainy season that started back in the dark ages).

I´ll blog again when I have some more cool stuff to talk about. I hope you´re all well, I miss you all.

I´m a traveller

2006-10-17T17:25:00.000Z

I´m typing this from a internet cafe in Lima which charges all of half a dollar per hour. This whole concept of travelling is amazing. I keep getting hit by it.

My journey started at 6am British time yesterday morning, and I eventually found Lima and crawled into bed at 1am local time this morning (7am British time). Saying goodbye to people yesterday was very hard and for much of the flight to Miami I was wondering what the heck I was doing. I just wanted to crawl up and not come out of my shell. But since then I´ve mainly been feeling content and happy, though the thought of what I might do over the next 10 months is pretty mind blowing.

The presidente of Peru died yesterday so everyone´s having a national holiday. I think Lima is going to be quite busy over the next couple of days, but I´m going to see the sights anyway. I´m off to find a hostel now, then I´m going to explore a little. I´ll probably head to Huaraz in a couple of days.

still in england

2006-10-08T17:21:00.000Z

I finally have an excuse to set up a blog. How exciting! At the moment I'm sitting at home and it's eight days until I leave. I'm finding that trying to fit in visiting friends and relatives, whilst also applying for PhDs and learning Spanish is a non trivial exercise in time management.

Expect more exciting posts when I'm actually travelling.