Flying visit

Its all very well being jet-set and international but there is always a schedule to meet and a budget to adhere to. Sometimes the former takes priority but mostly the latter, hence this trip to HK following a very roundabout route.

The direct Paris-HK flight prices were not only astronomical but there was zero availability for the dates we needed so Christophe (IT Director) and I are flying via Amsterdam and Kuala Lumpur! It makes the journey hell but nearly cuts the cost in half and means we get to spend a day in KL and take in one or two sights...



Honestly, from the small amount i've seen, KL doesn't rock my world ( I doubt a nation governed by Islamic law ever will...) but just 20 mins by taxi outside of the city sits FRIM (the Malaysian Institute for Forest Research) which has some of the oldest rainforest in South East Asia in a peaceful and well preserved park.



After a week of solid concrete and giant tower blocks it was fantastic to be dwarfed by such beautiful trees and for a couple of hours to escape the noise, dirt and pollution of the city. I took literally hundreds of photos in an attempt to capture the beauty of the forest so if you're in need so some green check out the latest album on Flickr.

x

Back in the Kong...

Just visiting for a couple of days to follow up on the project I worked on here and took my camera out with me for the day yesterday. For once the weather was behaving itself and the pollution joined in to give some stunning scenery at sunset...






More photos and news to follow when I ditch the jet lag.

x

Two for the road

Just a quick post as I'm busy packing but rather than reading my ramblings I'd much rather you read the posts of Will Okun & Leana Wen, the two candidates who won the latest 'win a trip with Nick Kristof' competition.

They're currently traveling in Africa with Nick and my friend Naka posting some candid, enlightening, horrific and heartwarming observations and photos giving us all a much needed reminder of how much help is needed and how powerful hope can be.

Please do take time read and also check out their fantactis video posts.

x

My Dad





Its Father's day in the UK this weekend; another commercialised celebration giving everyone the opportunity to consume goods they dont need and feed those materialistic desires cultivated by the media. Yep, as far as i'm concerned Father's day is up their along with Easter, Christmas, Halloween and Valentine's day in the top ten of marketing marvels, and it seems that each year theres another new 'day' to add to the list.



My Dad (much to his disappointment but probably not to his surprise) will not be getting a gift from me but I want to take this opportunity to let him know just how much he means to me and that frankly a new fangled fishing knife, a book or CD would be a pretty poor show of my appreciation.



Many of my traits I can trace back to my father; my passion for reading, my love of the Rolling Stones and my basic knowledge of plumbing and central heating systems. And for each similarity between us there is a difference; Marmite for starters, I dont have a watch, shoe or trailer fetish and if I go to the rubbish dump I come back empty handed. And as I get older I notice a few more of my Father's traits in myself; I run around turning the lights out, tidy up before the cleaning lady comes and look for the yellow discounted stickers in the supermarket.



Behaving more like my father doesn't scare me - quite the opposite in fact. He is someone I'm incredibly proud of and have enormous respect for. Although we've had our differences, looking back on my childhood and youth I cannot fault him, quite the opposite in fact. Right from the word go my dad chose a path that many other fathers would have shied away from and he stuck with that path through some pretty shitty circumstances.



Today despite being geographically distance I think we're probably closer than ever. Its ironic though as when I was younger he and Yvonne didn't always have much spare time (they were busy working hard to provide for me & Hayden), yet now their retired and its me that's working my arse off with little time to play. Although Hayden maybe jealous of my lifestyle I'm jealous that as he lives just around the corner from Dad & Yvonne and therefore gets to hang out with them much more often than I do.



I find it hard to show my emotions and therefore hard to tell my Dad face to face just how much he means to me. If a plasma TV, Bang & Oulfsen stereo, swanky watch or shiny new trailer would cut it then I'd be having them gift wrapped as I type but as I said, they wouldn't even come close. So Dad, don't be surprised and please don't be disappointed this weekend. Just know that I love you very very much.




xxx

Good food...

Good friends...

(you know who you are...)

and some great music...

= perfect bank holiday weekend

merci

x

What makes me tick?


Fishing around on my friend Pier-Andrea's blog the other day I found his visual DNA - a collection of images hes selected, which strung together represent his take on life. Its an interesting concept and if you scroll down past the labels and links you'll find my cluttered collection of x&y chromosomes represented in picture form. The whole thing got me thinking though about if I had to represent myself (not the me that goes to work every morning or the me that goes out with friends or curls up with a book but the real 'me') which images would I choose? And so my reflexions started.

This all kind of links in nicely with the fact that since i'm back from that little Irish jaunt i've had this niggling, gnawing feeling that something is missing, and after a weeks deliberation I think i've identified it. I'm craving the open road.

Let me be a little more precise. Its not just the road i'm craving, but the car, and the driving; the feeling of liberty and the spontaneity that comes with 4 wheels and a full tanks of fuel. Something that has been all too absent in my life the last couple of years.



I grew up in an area where a car was essential. From the aged of 7 I was saving frantically for my first car and have always loved driving, yet I haven't owned a car for the last 12 or 13 years and I now climb into a plane more often than I get into a car, let alone drive.

Driving and the open roads are however not the only thing that makes me 'me'. If I could choose where i'd want to be whenever I have time it would definitely be up a mountain.

I've been lucky enough to trek and hike in many beautiful places, two of which i've found truly awesome. Awesome in the true sense of the world in that i'm left dumb by the impact of the scenery; the vastness and strength of it. Trekking in the Annapurna region first did this to me in Nepal in 2000. I remember waking up early one morning, climbing on to the roof of my hut and watching Annapurna's silhouette slowly turn pink as the sun rose.



At that moment in time I left so small, so insignificant, and yet at the same time so young. Young because unlike us adults who simply recognise the environment around us and take little notice of the details I felt more like a child watching the world for the first time; noticing leaves, stones, wildlife and seeing how it all knitted together.
El Chalten in Argentina had the same effect on me. Faced with one of the most stunning vistas i've ever seen I took literally hundreds of photos of the same view, realising now that I wasn't trying to capture the image I saw but more the emotions I was feeling sat before that image.



Looking at the photos now its difficult to conjure up those same emotions, whats not difficult to materialise is the craving to relive those same or similar moments.

There is one other activity that I think totally liberates 'me' and gives me a similar childlike sensation and one that again I find myself doing very rarely; flying my kite.
I remember my first kite. I remember failed attempts at making kites during school holidays and I remember the sting and burn as the rope has run across the folds of my fingers on countless occasions but what I remember most of all is how I feel when I fly my kite. The Australian cartoonist 'Leunig' sums it up best...




Why does kite flying do this to me? Maybe because being able to fly properly involves being out in the country or on the coast, preferably without too many people around. Perhaps its because being up high helps where the wind is stronger and more fickle in its currents. I guess there are all kinds of analogies that could be drawn but honestly the reason is not important, its the sensation and emotion that counts for me, and hence kite flying is an integral part of who I am, even if I dont get to do it that often.

The psychologists and therapists amongst you are now probably all brimming with theories and facts that will enable you to compartmentalise me into one of your little boxes but although the images of my visual DNA described above may differ from those on the VisualDNA website i'll stick with their definition of my character type thanks.

If you get a chance do check out their site and do the test yourself. If you feel like sharing drop the code for your DNA or the images you'd choose to represent yourself into a comment. Lets see what makes everyone else out there tick.

a lot to say...

There are so many topics I want to post on right now and i'm working on a few of them as we speak, in the meantime Doug fwded me this extract of Al Gore's new book that appeared in Time.

If you've the time its highly recommended reading, as are the comments that follow.

K

On the road again...

I've made references to traveling companions in previous posts and the bonds formed with complete strangers when you find yourselves in bizarre situations or moments of extreme beauty in strange places. Thats where I met Mat (previously known as 'The American') as we bussed out of Beijing on a cold clear December morning towards the Great Wall of China.

The day we spent walking the wall was truely awesome. On countless occassions during the hike I had to remind myself I was in the middle of China standing on one of the wonders of the world in beautiful sunshine. Its an experience thats been hardcoded into my memory, and its a memory that Mat and I will always share.

Mat was in Paris when I was in Argentina but we'd promised to try to travel again together at somepoint and so dates were set and flights booked for an Irish roadtrip rendez-vous.

The last time I was in Belfast was back in 1995 when the Troubles were very much apparent. I remember driving up across the Newry checkpoint which resembled a war zone with armoured tanks and rocket launchers lining the road and I clearly remember the night I spent in the Stormont hotel looking out over the city as it burnt and wondering if the streets would be opened again by morning so that I could get to my meeting. Belfast was a broken city; divided and explosive with no sign of peace in sight.

When I arrived in Sarajevo back in 2001 SFOR were doing their best to keep the fragile peace but the tensions between the ethnic groups were all too tangiable and the violence bubbled up regularly in pockets around towns and on the borders. It felt like war and it felt all to famililar - it felt like Belfast. I've resisted the urge to go back to Sarajevo as i'm afraid nothing is going to have changed but since 1998 things have moved on in Belfast and the city I discovered was vibrant, booming and basking in good weather with students sunning themselves in the parks and sidewalk cafes spilling out into the streets.

There are still sparodic tensions (old habits die hard) and the wall that divided Catholics from Protestants is still in place and closed each night, but these days Belfast is celebrating its future whilst remembering its past and marketing its history in the form of black taxi tours - not to be proud of its Troubles but so as to learn and not to forget. The 90 min taxi tour that Mat and I took was truely a whistle stop tour of the history and geography of Ireland and Belfast, much of which is emblazoned on the buildings and walls in murals and it gave us a very broad and yet very real taste of what the city has been through, and how far its come in the last 12 years.

Next morning with the wind in our wheels we drove North to the Giant's Causeway and to explore the Northern Irish coast.

Back thousands of years ago when giants roamed the earth and the moon was made of cheese Fin McCool (the local Irish giant) built this causeway to Scotland so as to fight his Scottish nemisis, Benandonner. Since then some clever scientists have debunked this legend claiming that the huge hexagonal stones were formed when basaltic rock from volcanic eruptions cooled into these regular shapes. Either way, giants or volcanoes, the causeway definitly is cool and we had a great couple of hours clambering over the columns and up the stepped cliffs.

Although the main area was quite touristy armed with the Lonely Planet's 'Hiking in Ireland' guide book and picnics in our daypacks after only a short walk along the clifftops we pretty much had the place to ourselves and after lunch found the perfect place to snooze in the sunshine. This had become a bit of a habit; hike, picnic, snooze and if anyone from Lonely Planet is reading i'd be happy to contribute a couple of entries to the 'Napping in Ireland' guide book when its published.

The perfect spot for a snooze.

The other habit we feel into all to easily was that of frequenting Irish pubs...

Irish bars are legendary, quite literally the world over, for their hospitality and music, and none more so than in Ireland itself where going to the pub is almost a full body-contact sport when the band is playing and the place is jumping.

The good weather had left us and the usualy Irish showers and rain returned so next morning we jumped in the car, threw away the map, pulled out the compass and headed West until we hit the water.


This is the stuff that great road trips are made of; stunning scenery, good music, twisty winding lanes and nothing but the open road and the unexpected ahead.

What we'd certainly not expected was to find the small town of Ardara in which every pub and bar on the high street was hosting (inside and out) a band, group of fiddlers, flautists and whistler players for their weekend music festival.

It seems every kid in Ireland is born with an instrument tucked under their chin or in their mouth and even the most timid of 8-year olds in pink sweatshirts armed only with a junior sized accordian is capable of getting an entire pub up and jumping or singing. Like all good road trips our Irish jaunt needed a themesong and with 'Dirty old town', 'The gambler' and 'Molly Malone' being bashed out in every pub we set foot in we had plenty to choose from and hearing any of them ever again is sure to bring back the memories of that spectacular day.

Our final days were spent in Dublin wandering the town by day and the bars by night (cue 'Dirty old town'...) with some Irish friends Mat had made back in Thailand.



The next morning I picked up the headlines in the Irish Times to find that the country had completed its troubled journey and jumped into a new phase of peace with the end of control from London in Northern Ireland and power sharing agreed between two previous enemies, Ian Paisley and Martin McGuiness. History completes its cycle in Northern Ireland and I hope someday i'll see the same cycle run its course in Sarajevo. For now though our little roadtrip had run its course and Mat and I went our seperate ways at Dublin airport knowing our travels will probably cross again sometime, someplace now that we've some great Irish memories to tack up alongside those great wall moments.

Life, Liberty, Egality?

There are many things in life that are precious to me, but if I had to draw up a list I know my friends, family and freedom would definitly be in the top 5.

Freedom for me is all about choice. For example when the weather was bad in Cordoba I had the freedom to jump on the next bus North where the weather was better. And when I turned up at the port in Buenos Aires only to find there were no economy class seats left on the next boat I was able to upgrade to first class rather than wait. I was able do both of these things because i'm affulent enough to be able to afford to choose. Hundreds of thousands however are not so lucky.

After the ecomony crashed here in 2001 it was the middle-class Argentinians who were hit the hardest. Whilst the rich had their property investments and US dollar savings the middle-class saw their savings become worthless overnight, and their salaries could no longer support the bare essentials needed to support their day to day life. The economy here is improving, but its unlikely the middle-class of today will see their standards of living improving in the near future.

Having left Cordoba 3 days earlier than I planned thanks to El Nino I decided to cross over in Uruguay for a while in order to check out the scene over there.
The 24 hour bus journey from Iguaza Falls down to BA, coupled with the 1-hour boat trip and 2.5 hour bus transfer into the capital,Montevideo, left me shattered so on my first day in town I took it easy, wandering about, enjoying the curious mix of architecture and checking out the old port. Although Uruguay's economy did not crash it too took a blow back in 2001 as much of the Southern coastline of the country is the weekend playground of Buenos Aires', and so when people couldn't afford to play any longer hard times befell the Uruguaians. You can see this clearly in Montevideo where areas that were once middle-class housing are now no more than slums and you dont have to look too far to find poverty.

In the hostel the night before i'd met a Swiss girl, Isabelle, and as i'd already explored the port the day before I agreed to go back there with her and show her the great cafes and galleries i'd found. The next morning a young American girl, Veronika, in our dorm asked if she could join us. OK, we said, and arranged a rendez-vous in town as we all had various chores to attend to.
At the designated time Isabelle and I showed up wearing standard backpacker gear (trousers, t-shirts, sneakers, daypacks) 15 mins later comes Veronika in short shorts, heels and swinging a handbag, apologising for her delay but she'd had a problem with the ATM and had by error withdrawn USD300 rather than 300 pesos (USD30). Right from that moment on I wanted to be shot of her.

We walked down through the city centre and out along the seafront , enjoying the sunshine and watching all the old guys line fishing off the harbour wall.
Its about midday now and its hot and as Veronika doesn't have either sunglasses or a hat shes suffering and so rather reluctantly we agree to cross over the 4 lane road and walk in the shadow of the container port. I didn't like this one bit and I could see Isabelle was just as uncomfortable. We had just both said as much when a guy with a broken bottle jumps out from between 2 containers and grabs the Veronika's handbag.
Isabelle runs out into the road (away from the guy and to stop a car). I grab the arm hes holding the bottle with so that he cannot harm Veronika and meantime Veronika screams and hands him her bag. I've still got hold of his arm and somehow manage to get a hand on the bag. He tried to run off so I set off with him and as a couple of cars had stopped I guess he took fright and let go, disappearing between 2 containers, leaving me holding the bag.
The whole thing took no more than 15 seconds and 15 seconds after that we'd pegged it back to the other side of the road, into the sunshine and safety. Both Isabelle and I were furious at Veronika. What the fuck did she think she was doing a) dressed like that, b) carrying a handbag and c) begging us to walk on the dark side of the road as she had neither hat or glasses. We were both also furious at ourselves. We should have ditched her the moment we saw her, or at least refused to have crossed the road. We'd all escaped though, unharmed and nothing was lost so I put that down to a positive experience rather than a negative one.

Isabelle and I dropped Veronika back at the hostel (she was a miserable shaking wreck by now) and continued our day at the port as planned both wondering just how someone like Veronika manages to get as far as Montevideo in the first place, and just how long it'll be before her luck really does run out (Darwin theory anyone?).

For that guy though Veronika's bag was possibly his chance at freedom. It's contents may have been enough for him to pay his rent, feed his family, buy a bus ticket somewhere to find work or maybe even simply just to have bought drugs enough for him to have escaped from poverty, if only mentally. Thats the thing about liberty, it comes with a large price tag and its only those of us with money that can afford choice, freedom. Its something i'm reminded of constantly on my travels and I think being reminded helps me appreciate just how lucky I am. I wish more people could get to see both sides of the picture and appreciate just how fortunate they are too.

xxx

Road Fever

Often when I travel I find myself doing things I would never entertain the idea of at home; sharing a bathroom with 17 other people, living on a crap diet and travelling large distances by bus.

I´m currently half way through another 2-day road trip that started in the very far Northern tip of Argentina (on the border with Brasil), brought me here to Resistancia after 12 hours in a bus and will see me finishing up in Buenos Aires after another 13 hours on the road. From BA I´ll then head to Uruguay, by boat.

I estimate that by the time I get to BA i´ll have covered around 6000 Km by bus, taking almost 102 hours (mostly overnight). To add to this i´ve taken 3 internal flights since I got here which will probably bring the total distance covered closer to 10 000Km - thats the distance from Paris to Dakar, or Teheran!) Never before in any of my travels have I covered such huge distances.

Unless you can afford to fly between cities here (and tourists pay 2.5 times more for a flight than an Argentine resident...) then the bus is your only option.

Up here in the North buses and roads are both of an excellent quality. The roads are sealed and the buses come in two classes; ´semi-cama´ which reclines more than a usual chair, and ´cama´ which goes all the way back to an almost flatbed giving you a ride pretty close to Air France business class (only with crap food).

The further South you go though the service of both bus and roads deteriorate. To get from El Chalten to Bariloche in Patagonia Johan and I spent 2 days on a bus. The first day being broken with regular 15 min rest stops, both for us and the drivers as the road was nothing more than a dirt track. The second day was about 50% sealed roads, but the same driver drove almost continously (2 stops, 1 of 10 mins, 1 of 15 mins) for 14 hours straight. With about 7-hours remaining and with both my legs and bum numb I asked Johan the question, ´That El Chalten trek again in the wind, rain and snow or this bus journey?´ His response matched mine. We´d both gladly expose ourselves to the elements for a grueling 5-hours of shivering pain than sit coupped up in a bus for 2-days again.

Somehow though when you´re on holiday it all becomes part of the adventure, adds to the experience. If I come back to Argentina though i´m going to buy myself a car and have myself a real roadtrip. The most popular variety around here seems to be an old citreon, which I think will suit me quite nicely!

xxx

V.

I´m having a hard time trying to decide which I hate more; mosquitos or Isreali backpackers. Both seem to come in large groups, make a lot of noise, keep me awake at night and generally giant pains in the arse.

I dont remember when I first encountered mosquitos but I clearly remember the first time I came across a platoon of Israelis 7-years ago in Asia. In fact in Asia you often come across hostels, cafes or restaurants that have signs saying ´No dogs, No Isrealis´. Unfortunately my impression of them has changed little over the years.

Having just completed one or two years of obligatory military service it seems they then all set off on an obligatory ´round the world trip´ before continuing their education. There is nothing wrong with this, Gap years are incredibly popular and infact I think that getting out and seeing the world should be obligatory - the idea being to meet as many people as possible, interact with other cultures, learn new languages and broaden your horizons and experiences.

Isreali´s however always seem to travel (like mosquitos) in large groups, often 8 or 10 of them together at a time. They are reluctant to mingle (either with the culture their visiting or other travellers) and being faced with a dorm full of them the chances of them speaking to you is remote, so unless you´re fluent in Hebrew interacting with them is impossible, in face they´re downright intimidating.

The chances of them taking over the entire dorm with their baggage (escessive), leaving the bathroom in a total mess, hogging all the lockers and then stumbling in at 5am totally pissed, turning on all the lights and making as much noise as possible is however incredibly high, and it happened to me again, in Cordoba.

Having spent the previous 22hrs on a bus I was keen to get an early night and so sorted out my stuff and bumbled off to bed around midnight. It was stinking hot so the windows were open with the protective mozzie screens in place. At 4am I awoke to find I was the only person in our 8 bed dorm in bed. Strange... until at 5am the other 7 returned, drunk beyond belief and making as much noise as possible. One guy, I guess complaining about the heat, in an attempt to open the already open windows pushed out the mozzie screens (we were on the 3rd floor overlooking the street, I dont know what they landed on below, a car I guess).
Theres no point trying to reason with a pissed 23yr old Israeli surrounded by his mates so I stuck in my earplugs and did my best to sleep.

At 7am I woke and decided to grab a shower before the bathroom queues started.
I nearly didn´t recognise myself in the mirror. In total I had 44 mosquito bites. 6 of which were on my face.

I have reason to believe that there must the a giant Mozzie ´McDonalds´ sign above my head as they often seem to flock towards me for a quick snack and therefore I do my very best to avoid getting bitten. Not only does getting bitten increase the risk of malaria, and dengue fever (very common in this area) but each bite on me swells up, affecting an area at least a couple of square centimetres around it.

The girl on reception looked somewhat shocked when I went to check out. My face was swollen and my arms, neck and shoulders peppered with swollen red blisters. The lady at the pharmacy gave me a lecture on dengue fever and the lady at the bus station went as far as to give me a flyer warning of the dangers of mosquitos, dengue fever and how to avoid being bitten.

I wonder if they produce a flyer on Isreali backpackers and how to avoid them?

I hate to appear prejudice or to tar an entire nation with a single brush but I know that the experiences i´ve had and sentiments i´ve shared are common among backpackers. Its a shame as from time to time you do meet an Israeli travelling by themselves, and just like many of the other Israelis i´ve worked with they´re incredibly open, friendly and considerate people. Its sad really that after their obligatory national service they then travel the world doing a total disservice to their nation and culture as the worst possible international ambassadors.

xxx

Missing In Action...

Friends, I have sad news.
Sunday night Mixie and I had ourselves a little crisis meeting. After 2 days stuck in Cordoba in continuous rain we decided to cut our loses, forgot those dreams of skydiving and landsurfing, and run for the border instead.
A quick check of the weather maps showed Puerto Iguazu, up North on the Brasilian & Paraguian border, to be basking in unbroken 30c sunshine and after 22hrs on a bus we were able to confirm this for ourselves.

Most people come this far north in Argentina for only one of two reasons; they´re skipping the country, or their visiting the amazing Iguazu falls and it was the second that made our itinerary.

The falls themselves are awesome and frankly i´ve no idea why i´d never heard of them before. Lets be honest, they kick Niagra´s arse and even though we saw them during low water their size and capacity was still stunning.
Whats even more amazing is the way the national park has been designed, with a series of catwalks and gangways that literally let you walk out over the lip of the fall, or within meters of the pounding water. Within the park you can also opt for either the ecologically sound tour (row boats, nature trails) or the ´Big fun´ pack involving the 4-wheel drive trucks and powerboats under the falls (guaranteed to come away drenched from head to toe).

On the bus on the way out there Mixie and I metTim, from NZ, and with whom we spent the day trekking. Tim had just entered Argentina from Brazil and Mixie was more than inqisitve about his travels in the rest of South America. Shes already dropped more than casual hints about Equador and Columbia being within spitting distance.

Anyway, to cut a long story short at somepoint during the afternoon I noticed it had been a little too quiet and on searching my backpack pocket (Mixie´s favourite hiding hole) I found her gone!
A quick rumage around in the pack confirmed that she´d not slunk off for a quiet nap or buried deep in order to raid the biscuit bag. yes dear friends, Mixie is officially MIA.

I believe there are a number of possible explanations for her absence:
The trail was rough and at somepoint she may have just bounced out or she may have turned stowaway and scuttled under a lifejacket to hide during one of our river crossings. There is however a 3rd rumour currently swepping the conspiracy theory message boards, that shes not MIA but more AWOL, having decided to make a break for the border and continue her South American adventures.

I grabbed my passport early this morning and crossed over into Brazil to make a quick sweep of the area from that side of the border but was able to pick up no scent of her trail. Mixie dear friends will therefore no longer be continuing this adventure with us, but i´m sure that somewhere out there shes starting her own adventure, and man is it going to rock!


Party on Mixie. We´ll miss you.


xxx

Los Amigos

One of the things I love about solo travel is that you meet other like-minded travellers. Some you meet on the road (bus buddies) with whom you spend X hours sat side by side. Some you meet in hostel dorms or kitchens and some you meet out and about, trekking, at a museum, the possibilities are unlimited. All of these friends however seem to fall into one of two catagories; those whom you meet for a couple of hours/days and may never see again, and those with whom you travel for a while and become good friends.

Johan and I finally managed to get ourselves on a bus out of El Chalten for the arduous 2 day bus journey on the infamous Route 40 that follows the Andes North. Personally I would have liked to have spent more time in the mountains, especially now that the weather had improved but Johan had a rdv with a friend in Bolivia so after 10 days of travelling together we said our goodbye promising to keep in touch, knowing that our Laguna de les Tres adventure would always be a strong bond between us. I would have loved to have continued North with him but had an important rdv in Bariloche to arrange...

Back 7 years ago I landed in Hanoi on a cold dark wet February evening and over the next couple of days became friends with Martin from Holland. We hung out in Hanoi and then headed in different directions. Vietnam being a long thin country though a week or so later out paths crossed and for about 2 weeks, along with a Danish couple and two Brits, we travelled together. Those of you who remember my ramblings from way back then may remember ´The Night of a Thousand Badgers´- a night that i´ll never forget and an experience that cemented Martin and my friendship for life. Not put off by the ordeal Martin and I both continue to travel and keep in touch, and so it came to be that we´d organised a rdv in Bariloche (Argentina´s answer to Switerland, complete with chocolate and St Bernards...)

He and his girlfriend, Ingeborg, quit their jobs and have been bumbling around S. America for the last 6 months and it was truely awesome to see Martin again, re-live those Vietnam memories ( favourite quote from Martin: ´we should have died so many times on those motorbikes´, hes right!) and meet Ingeborg. Their plans are to keep travelling for quite a while longer (7-years were mentioned...) and i´m insanely jealous that their able to take their time and see more of the country. I would have loved to have stuck around and spent more time with them. I´m grateful that we managed to arrange our RDV though I didn´t take any photos-doh!- and hope that we dont have to wait another 7 years before we all meet up again (M&I - Les Alps are calling...).

Thats the difference between bus buddies and good friends. With good friends even after 7 years you´re able to pick up right where you left off. And one of the joys of these friendships is the element of serendipity. Of not knowing when your paths may cross again.
Imagine my surprise when 3 days later arriving in a hostel early morning in Mendoza i´m tapped on the shoulder and theres Johan again. Plans may change but good friends don´t.

xxx

ps. For those of you that answered ´West´ i´m sorry to report that you´ll not be continuing the adventure with us. With at least 56hrs of bus journey between here and Buenos Aires (to the East) heading further West doesn´t make sense, especially given that Chile is more expensive than Argentina and El Nino is screwing with the passes over the Andes. We´ll save Chile for another time.
At the risk of sounding like I have a plan the next 5-6 days are going to be spent in the Central Sierras before heading NorthEast up to the Brasilian border for Iguazu Falls. We´ll see...

El Chalten


Having said goodbye to Alex in El Calafate Johan and I jumped on a bus NorthWest up a bumpy unpaved road to El Chalten, high up on the Chilean border.


Established in 1985 so as to claim the area as Argentinian the place has a very temporary feel about it. It lacks unpaved roads, has no banks or cash machines, no mobile phone connections and in fact all communications with the outside world rely on the satelitte links that allow phone calls and internet connections. What El Chalten lacks in technology it makes up for in natural beauty with the town being surrounded by fantastic hiking trails and the stunning Fitzroy peak towering at 3441m.


Arriving at night the first thing that struck me was the stars. Here in the Southern hemisphere there are just so many more stars (proximity to the milky way or something...) but high up in the mountains where there is zero light pollution the number of stars visible is awesome. Having been dump struck by the stars I was then quite literally swept off my feet my the wind. El Chalten has a bit of a reputation when it comes to blustery weather and what would be light rain anywhere else is transformed into a hail of bullets as the rain is driven horizontally at a rate of knots, and when it was not raining the wind will drive the dust at you with the same force.


The next morning the weather was a little better. It wasn´t raining but the wind was vicious. We set off none the less, wrapped up in Gore-tex and armed with the ubiquteous ham & cheese sandwichs and some cereal bars. Our route was the 8hr hike up to the Laguana de los Tres whch climbs up about 1200m. The first couple of hours were hard work thanks to the wind but nothing overly strenuous. The fun really started when the rain came on.


After about 3 hours of slight climb the last kilometer was at almost a 45º ascent on loose rocks and as we climbed that driving rain turned to driving snow so that when we reached the top visibility was seriously hampered, as was my ability to stay upright against the wind. This little hike had just turned seriously nasty. The tops of our bodies were somewhat warm and dry in Gore-tex but neither of us has waterproof bottoms on and so my trekking trousers and Johan´s jeans (!) were soaked. Stopping to admire the view or take a break at the top was not an option. I took a quick photo to capture the moment then we scrambled down that steep kilometer of loose rocks and an incredible speed, however with the wind in our faces the volume of water running off my jacket and down my legs was too much for my boots and for the first time ever my boots started to fill up giving me cold wet feet. Quickly I lost feeling in my toes making walking all that more difficult and dangerous.










The flash helps make the scene seem prettier than it was, I promise.









In the basecamp at the bottom there was, thanks to the trekking gods, a German couple who had just fired up their stove. We traded a bar of Milka for a couple of cups of tea but having stopped moving we were both quickly turning hypothermic. Johan rang out his jeans and we put our heads down for a quick march back into town against that bloody wind.

What should have taken us 8hrs took a little under 6hrs given that we practically jogged back to the hostel in order to keep warm, the only thing we stopped for being the supermarket to pick up mountains of pasta and a bottle of wine to sooth our aching limbs. We were still quite literally soaked, as was everything in our packs; money, passport, camera, maps. Even Mixie!


A hot shower, change of clothes, plate of pasta and couple of glasses of tinto later we could look back and laugh about the day, and also reflect on how lucky we´d been. If either of us had slipped or fallen on the climb or descent, or if that German couple hadn´t been their with their stove we´d not have faired so well, in fact things could have gone seriously wrong. Johan is a soldier in the Swedish army so when he says a hike is pretty hardcore I consider that relatively extreme.



Still we survived and over the next 2 days the wind dropped and the clouds evaporated giving us the most spectacular views of Fitzroy and some of the best hiking i´ve done in a long time. This is what I crave. Being in the wild, under enormous skies, in the mountains with high altitude sunburn being my only concern.



xxx

East or West, which is best? You decide!

So, i´m currently in Mendoza and wondering which way to go. West over the Andes into Chile for a couple of days unplanned adventure in Santiago and on the coast, or East for high-jinx big-fun paragliding, skydiving and land yachting...

You tell me! post a comment below and we´ll let the votes decide

xxx

Ice Ice Baby




Large swathes of Southern Chile and Argentina are in fact covered with glaciers and the area contains some of the most active glaciers in the world. Active unfortunately not just in that they advance and receed quickly, but that they're disappearing. Between '95-'00 the area experienced twice as much melt as it has for the last two decades.



Being one of Air France's favourite customers I have a carbon footprint the size of the Antarctic (thanks Jenko...) and so probably contribute considerably to the stat above so I thought i´d pop by the Perito Mereno glacier in order to apologise.

I´ve seen a few glaciers in my time but none quite as awesome as this. Its a 65ft high wall of ice, twisted into sharp towers with deep fissures and undulating through different shades of grey, blue, white and green. The photos really dont do it any justice, especially as you cannot hear the deep groans as the mass moves or the gunshot cracks as chunks break off and crash into the water below.




Many agencies in the area sell tickets to allow you to hike on the glacier, or if you´re skilled enough ice climb, however given that I was supposed to be paying my respects I decided to skip these and head for the ecologically sound walkways that have been constructed nearby.


It used to be that you could get a lot closer for the glacier face but since a couple of folks were killed by falling icebergs you´re now kept a safe 30m or so back, but thats plenty close enough to really appreciate how amazingly beautiful and powerful these things are. I´ve stolen the photo above from someone elses blog as it was kinda grey and rain the day I was there - punishment for my polluting now doubt...

Pictures!

Yeah, finally in a town that has a real internet connection (ie not via satelitte) and a PC that has a USB socket.

Mixie, having always to be first has managed to get some photos up on her earlier posts (scroll down) but for the time being i´m putting everything up on Flickr. Click here to take a look.

Hope you´re all doing well

X

Dont mention the war....

Pick up any Argentinian map and huddled just off the east coast, right down there at the bottom you´ll find Islas Malvinas, better known to the rest of the world as the Falkland Islands.



Easily mistaken for cake crumbs on the map they should be avoided in all conversations by Brits travelling in Argentina, and if you must talk about them dont for god´s sake call them The Falklands.

Back in 1976 in a bloodless coup the military took control and launched the ´Dirty War´ in which thousands (30,000 by some human rights group´s estimates) of Argentinians ´disappeared´. The wives, mothers, and children of the missing still parade every Thursday afternoon at 3pm in Buenos Aires in the hope of getting information of the fate of their loved ones or retribution for the crimes commited.

In 1981 public support for the military leader was fading fast so he played the nationalistic trump card and in 1982 General Galtieri invaded the Falkland Islands (sorry, Islas Malvinas).
A wave of national support and pride quickly swept through the country, then just as quickly disappeared when it became obvious that Galtieri had wildly underestimated the Iron Lady´s determintation not to lose an inch of British territory.

323 soldiers drowned on the Belgrano after it was torpedoed and every village town and city in the country has a public square, street or avenue named after the ship so that no one forgets. After just 74 days and with substantial losses, the Argentina forces, most of whom where no more than 20 years old, surrendered.

There is a happy end to this story though. All support for the military rule was quashed and in 1983 the civilian Alfonsin was elected President and the Dirty War ended once and for all. Those guilty of the crimes however have yet to be charged and the wives, sisters and children continue to parade each Thursday.

Tastes, Sounds & Smells

As scratch and sniff blogs have yet to be invented with the help of my amazing discriptive powers and your wild imagination i´m going to try and help conjure up the sights, sounds and smells of Argentina for all you armchair/desktop voyagers out there.

First though we need to set the scene so pop open a new browser and find some Gotan Project out there on the web or click here and search them out.

Next you need to get yourself 3 tins of condensed milk, 2 jars of caramel and 1.5kg of sugar. Mix throughly and ´hola!´ you´ve just made Dolche du Leche, the nation´s favourite food. Spread throughly on everything you eat, squeeze it into sandwichs, bake it into cakes and mix it into drinks at every opportunity. The quantity outlined above should be sufficient for an adult for about 8 hrs. Mmmmmm feel that sugar rush :-)
So far i´ve managed to pretty much avoid the stuff given that i´d quite like to keep all my teeth and i´m living on a diet of purely ham and cheese sandwichs, about all my backpacker budget will allow.

It would not be fair to describe the Argentian´s as only eating Dulche du Leche (DDL). Meat figures heavily on the agenda with crucified lamb being a firm favourite.
Take 1 lamb, lop its head off (smear head with DDL and eat for breakfast - probably).
Crucify lamb on iron cross and lean it up against a fire. Bingo, dinners ready!



The preferred serving suggestion seems to be as part of a chinese all-you-can-eat buffet which, let me tell you, when you´ve been living on ham and cheese sandwichs is pretty damn good. Washing the whole lot down with a 1 litre bottle of Quillmes, the national brew should set you back no more than Eu4.


Bon app!

x

Tierre del Fuego - Land of Fire

Sorry about the complete lack of photos on the blog but until I get to somewhere with decent internet service and reliable PC´s you´ll just have to use your imagination....

Looking back over my last entry I really didn´t say much about Ushuaia or Tierre del Fuego so here goes with an attempt to fill in the gaps.

Split unevenly between Chile & Argentina the area was named Land of Fire after the activities of the Yaghan tribes people that inhabited the area when Fitzoy first navigated the Beagle into the channel. These days the tribes and their fires are nearly extinct, replaced by the exploitation of the natural gas fields in the area.

Although the remaining tribes people are rare the region has abundant marine and wildlife. Even without really looking I saw penguins, sealions, guls, cormmorants, seals, albatross and a whale (ok, it´s hump) in the Beagle channel and whilst hiking in the national park came across foxes, woodpeckers, rabbits (hundreds of) and eagles, although the beavers and pumas remained elusive.

Despite being the Southern most city of earth with all the tourist trappings that the moniker brings Ushauaia remains remote. Its a damn long way to the nearest town and all communications with the outside world have to be transmitted via satelitte. These could be seen as inconveniences but coupled with the long daylight hours and stunning views they just add to its appeal.