I rocked up to Buenos Aires looking every inch the tourist to begin my adventure around South America, my worldly belongings strapped to my torso and the “look at me, I’m totally lost and vulnerable” look plastered across my face, able to conjugate exactly one verb in Spanish and ask someone when their birthday is. I might as well have had “Please Rob Me” tattooed on my forehead. I’ve no idea how I even made it to my hostel in one piece. What commenced was an epic eight month adventure packed with waterfalls, fried street food and leg-numbing hikes. I loved every sweaty second of it. Apart from maybe Roraima. That was fucking miserable.
Argentina
¡Hola! Erm… No Hablo Español…?
At the risk of sounding like a filthy hippy, even leaving a country can be a journey, albeit an emotional one, maaan. Two of my closest friends, along with my mrs came to the airport with me and waited around…
Buenos Aires In A Damn Fine Tasting Nutshell
I’ve been staying in Argentina’s capital for three weeks on account of the fact I’ve been waiting for mail to arrive. I am now bored of waiting for mail to arrive so I’m outta here tomorrow but here are a…
Paraguay
Taking The Show On The Road
Ah my very first bus ride in South America and shit, do Argentina know how to lay on a bus ride. They have five comfort levels ranging from your basic common or garden bus right up to fully reclining seats…
Well I’ll Be Dammed
Well I had big plans for Paraguay, me. There were places I wanted to check out, I intended to go camping and walking an all kinds of things you have to do outside but Paraguay had other ideas and dumped…
Argentina
I Just Really Like Rainbows
You know when you have a puppy and you’ve left the puppy all day to go to work and you come home and open the door and the puppy is waiting for you and it’s really excited and it’s trying…
Brazil
Argentina Has The Falls, Brazil Has The Views
Well goodbye then budget, it was nice knowing you. I only got to Brazil three days ago and already I’ve managed to cane over R$300 (reais) which is about £110. Then again I did get to the national park and…
A Rude Awakening & A Sandboarding Fail
It’s about 15 hours from Foz Do Iguaçu to Florianópolis so I hopped onto the bus and took my seat, locked my bag and secured it to something that didn’t move then snuggled down with my pillow for a nice…
Keeping It G-A-Y
I already had plans to visit São Paulo to catch up with my mate, Bottles, who I used to work with at Family Bar in Auckland and hadn’t seen for over a year since she moved to Wellington then headed…
I Go To Rio… De Janeiro
When my baby, when my baby smiles at me I go to Rio. De Janeiro… Now see how long it takes you to get that damn tune out of your head. Ha. Yes, it could be something akin to legal…
Hangovers, Waterfalls & Walking
I’d had a brilliant couple of days in Belo Horizonte hanging out with another Brazilian friend I’d met in New Zealand, Ricky. He’d shown me around to a few places including a wicked sunset spot, and told me about other…
The Epic Journey North
Listen, Mr Rodoviaria Buteco Man. 31 hours on a bus, plus a 5 hour wait with nothing to do but contemplate the next 10 hours you have to spend on a bus makes me want to drink beer. I don’t…
If You’re Fond Of Sand Dunes
If you’re fond of sand dunes then Parque Nacional Dos Lençóis Maranhenses is the place you want to be on account of the fact its pretty much made entirely of sand dunes with a few rain water swimming holes thrown…
Don’t Even Bother Trying To Rush
I wasn’t actually going to come here to Belém. The original idea was to get a bus to Santarém then a boat to Manaus but having discovered the cost of a bus to Santarém (R$300!!) I changed my mind and…
I’m (Mostly) On A Boat
Well there aren’t many roads up in this part of the world are there which means your transport options are limited to air travel which is quick and only requires your first born as payment or, for miserly buggers like…
In The Jungle, Brazilian Amazon Edition
Edit, 22/04/2020: This post was written back in 2010. Since then I have educated myself a lot more with regards to animal tourism and I now understand that yanking animals, in this case caimans, from the wild to maul them…
Local Snacks And Jungle Camping
In order to watch the sunrise you have to be up before it. In this case it is generally best to let your tour guide wake you up rather than set an alarm so as your body clock doesn’t go…
Day Three Of The Jungle Tour
By the time I emerged from my swinging pit, coffee was already on the table and pineapple had already been peeled and chopped. I fuelled my new caffeine and fruit addiction, picked at my new bites and became slightly concerned…
How To Milk A Rubber Tree
Yeah I know, day four of a three day jungle trip. Maths was never my strong point… I was meant to leave yesterday after rice, beans and over-salted meat time but I was easily coerced into an extra night with…
Venezuela
And Exactly What Are You Doing In Venezuela?
I admit it, I was already a wee bit stressed about Venezuela after all the stories of police corruption I’d heard from travellers that were passing through Manaus fresh from the country, but I had my little heart set on…
Roraima 2010
I have absolutely no fucking idea what I thought I was doing when I booked onto this six day organised hike up to the top of Roraima Tepui and back. I’d literally sat there in Manaus, recovering from shingles, as…
Salto Ángel: Size Matters
Size does matter, sorry guys but it’s the truth. Why else would anyone pay the slightly ridiculous amounts of money to fly into Parque Nacional Canaima to check out Salto Ángel if it wasn’t the highest motherfucking single drop waterfall…
A Love/Hate Coffee Affair And Some Lightning
After I bid Freddy goodbye and jumped off the bus in Barquisimeto, I had it in my naïve little head that I’d be able to get a bus straight away to Mérida, one of Venezuela’s most popular tourist destinations, slap…
General Mérida-ness
My main reason for visiting Mérida was to see the Catatumbo Lightning near Lago De Maracaibo but as it turns out the town as a whole is a pretty pleasant place to be and I liked it from the minute…
Colombia
Well That Was Overrated
I’d been trying to ignore the fact that Venezuela and Colombia weren’t talking to each other as I travelled though the former on the way to the latter. The two countries have never been particularly fond of each other and…
Cartagena Plus A Vat Of Volcanic Mud
There are three obvious types of people in Cartagena; Gringos, cops and dealers. There are others of course, going about their daily lives, but as you walk through Getsemani it seems that everyone wants to sell you cocaine or weed.…
The Journey Vs The Destination
I’ve come to the conclusion that there’s an extra Insanity Section in the Highway Code that all Colombian bus drivers have to pass before they’re granted a license to transport people from place to place. Exercises include overtaking at high…
A Very, Very Short Time In Medellín
Sooo… Medellín. Didn’t think much of it to be honest but then again I didn’t stay here for long enough to give it a proper chance. It used to be the cocaine trafficking capital of the world. It ain’t that…
Grog, Gunpowder & Coffee
Salento is in the heart of Colombia’s Zona Cafetera which says it all really ay. Oh well, sleep is for the weak. I got here two nights ago from Medellín after dark, checked into The Plantation House and met a…
Made For Mushrooms
I fucking hate mushrooms. I always have. I dislike the taste, the smell and the texture. Cooked mushrooms are how I would imagine slugs to taste, mushroom soup represents all that is wrong with cuisine and don’t get me started…
Ecuador
Journey To The Middle Of The World
So I’ve left the land of coffee and entered a country where they drink their coffee instant which is a bit of a push for someone who only started drinking coffee because obtaining a decent cup of tea was a…
Getting High
At 2850m Quito can be described as pretty fucking high up which means you can blame the altitude for everything. Drunk after two drinks? Altitude. Can’t walk up a flight of stairs without dying? Altitude. You’re looking a bit porky…
Shut Up And Take My Money
I’ve fallen in love again, this time with Ecuador’s little town of Baños but she’s not a cheap mistress to keep. It’s one of those epically cool places where you might as well hand over your wallet when you get…
Peru
Chimú Ruins And Ugly Dogs
Got to Peru. Tried to log into Facebook. Fail. Someone had hacked it and changed my password. They also got to my Hotmail, Skype and this blog (2019 Edit: This blog used to be hosted on the now defuct Travelpod)…
Visiting The Moche
Huaca Del Sol. It’s a big pile of adobe bricks and sand, they haven’t started digging it up properly yet. Huaca De La Luna. Now that’s worth a look. I wasn’t going to bother but I had free time and…
Mad Dash To Cusco
I’m not a fan of mad dashes regardless of how shiny and comfortable the buses are and here in Peru the days of your fellow passengers being of the feathered, egg laying variety are long gone. They can put some…
Broken Stuff And Ruined Things
If you don’t want to fork out S./130 for a boleto turístico which is necessary to see 16 of the attractions around Cusco you can buy the S./70 ticket which gets you into the four Inca ruins closest to the…
Bloody Incas And Their Bloody Hills
There were six more ruins left on my boleto turístico. I managed three which isn’t bad going really considering the travel time involved, the fact that some of them require extra effort to get to once you get to the…
The Inca Trail
I’d had my little heart set on doing the Inca Trail even after Roraima highlighted my inefficiencies when it came to getting up hills and I’d renounced any thing resembling a multi-day hike, especially if it involved portions that can…
A German Night Out In Lima
I was going to make my way through the central highlands to Tingo María, hopping from small town to small town but as I sat at the bus station in Andahuaylas at stupid o’ clock in the morning, waiting for…
Making The Most Of Tingo Maria
It was pissing down with rain when I rocked up to Tingo María just as it was getting light. Fail. After checking into Hostal Roosevelt, drying off and having a wee nap I located the tourist information centre and put…
Desert Oasis
Think of a refreshing lagoon nestled between endless sand dunes. Think of blue skies and sunshine and sipping cold beer in the heat. Think of palm trees and pedal boats and people splashing around in the water. Think chaffing every…
Doing Lines
So Nasca was surprisingly good then considering I wasn’t planning on spending much time there. I figured I’d part with a painful sum of cash to fly over the famous Nasca lines then bus it straight through to Arequipa to…
Second Deepest But Not Second Best
When one thinks of big canyons one’s mind usually wanders to the Grand Canyon in the USA or the space formally occupied by my brain cells before I discovered vodka, but the deepest in the world is actually right here…
Peruvian Munchies
I’ve been right impressed with the grub in Peru, I have. You’re never short of a slice of pineapple, sugar coated pastries and even boiled eggs, all there on the side of the road waiting for an impulse purchase. In…
Lake Titicaca
At 3820m, some say it’s the highest navigable lake in the world. Some say that’s a load of bollocks but whatever, when you’re travelling from Peru to Bolivia (or vice versa) Lake Titicaca is a handy place to cross the…
Bolivia
The Death Road
The Plan Cross the border on the first tourist bus I’d ever caught, complete with an English speaking stewardess who would tell us which stamp to get and where, and all whilst the bus waited for us to complete the…
Welcome To The Jungle
Welcome to the jungle, we got fun ‘n’ games. Dah dah dah dah something something dah dah dah dah jungle, welcome to the jungle… But first you gotta get there. In order to get to Rurrenabaque, the gateway to Bolivia’s…
And You Thought Your Job Was Shit
We were down there for over an hour before we emerged, a bunch of sweating, gasping messes, congratulating each other for handling the claustrophobia fabulously in the parts where dragging ourselves along on knees and elbows was necessary, wiping the…
Tupiza To Uyuni Salt Flats Tour
Finally, a tour that didn’t leave traumatically early. I wasn’t brutally forced from my bed at some god awful hour usually reserved for staying up until, not getting up at. The sun had risen, my basic motor functions had kicked…
In Conclusion
Back in April I left New Zealand with a heavy heart. I uprooted myself from a life I didn’t want to leave because my visa had expired and headed back towards Europe via South America. I didn’t really know what to expect to be honest, it was a choice between South America or South East…
Travel & Shit 