Month: May 2016

Vaparaiso, Pirque, Rio Hurtado, La Serena

The days are passing in Chile at at alarming rate. We spent two days in Valparasio, visiting a nice organic winery on the way – it’s getting ridiculous now, our wine consumption (ok testing) starting before midday.)

Small trip of the harbour in Valparaiso all in Spanish enabled me to concentrate on my “photography” because I understood 0,05% of the commentary 😟 so just some nice pictures of seagulls and sea lions and very nice they were as well.

Colourful walls in Valparaiso

Pirque
is just in the middle of nowhere – I say nowhere excluding the wineries of course which we visited on day 1 and incidentally the same one in day 2 as well, where they said to us “you were here yesterday as well!!!”……correct and 10/10 for observation I thought.
Each time we went we were on some bicycles – well some contraption which resembled a bicycle. The nice guy in the ticket office offered to drive us home on the second day in his “vehiculo” which I found completely hysterical after all that wine and would’ve loved to drive home in his vehiculo and not on that “bicycle”. Our accomodation was also believe it or not – yes, a wine barrel -it’s becoming a series of from wine barrel to the next….. 💃🍷💃🍷💃🍷💃🍷

Rio Hurtado…
A short domestic flight from Santiago and a long 3ish hour drive up winding, sharp curving roads had me thinking I was travelling in my wine barrel tardis and made me feel rather nauseous.
“Mother lets go horse-riding” said Dani to mother – which is me, a mother who has only ever given a horse a lump of sugar from about 3 metres away.
What a place for a lesson…this is your horse and this is yours (to me and Dani)….Mmmhh I thought – how the hell do you get on it?
You can get on, no? was the question and no was also my answer. However once shown where the stirrup was and how to use it l was amazed I managed it – if you’ve ever seen me trying to get on a banana boat – you would’ve been amazed too. Well there was no lesson and we climbed the narrowest, steepest, rockiest pathways I have ever been on – well, was I scared? to be honest as scared as what came out of the backside of the horse Dani was riding on – so yes I was. I didn’t dare look to my right or left and that poor bloody horse me clinging on for dear life.
– [ ] However giving myself a little credit, I became came nonchalant at one point – just holding the reins and pretending I was an incredible equestrian – which I am of course now. It was nice to get back on solid ground even though I was walking like a cowboy for the rest of the day!!!

La Serena

is where I accidentally stumbled across some more sea lions, making loud snorting noises and spitting fluids (and the sea lions were as well !!!).
I was so impressed it was almost a David Attenborough moment for me – I found myself hiding behind a car and filming as if I was some nature reporter on a dangerous mission – it was ace – I was ace – the sea lions were ace – it was an ace moment 👍

Afternoon beach time wine session
after my “Patattentborough” moment 👍🍷

After La Serena returned to Santiago for a few days (another flight – number 22 from 33 in total) before we fly to Peru.

Chile a diverse country, we’ve done so much here as indeed everywhere we’ve been. More challenged with the language here as out in the sticks if you can’t speak Spanish – you’re stuffed basically.
Remind me on my to do list:
1) learn Spanish

5 weeks from 22 to go……

Today was a special day in many ways…..
Francisco our jeep tour driver and guide picked us up from the hotel at 7am (7:30am Chilean time).
Into the Andes we drove, the mountains which frame the Santiago horizon, making it so unique. The tallest mountain around Santiago , the Tupungato mountain standing at 6,570m.

Francisco is one of the worlds special people – born in Chile, lived in Italy between the ages of 10 and 15, studied fashion design, produced films, lived in various other countries, a passionate surfer and an all round entertainer, now owning a company doing the tour we did today.
We stopped to make coffee, but unfortunately he’d forgotten his stove, so we gathered dry sticks for our barbecue later and drank water instead.
The Andes are truly amazing and Francisco when not telling us his life story told us many interesting mountain stories.

Our barbecue had to be the absolute highlight of the day – Francisco lit the fire with the gathered wood – the table decked with meat oozing blood (almost made me want to become vegan) a bottle of red wine, cooked salmon and tortillas.
Dani the vampire tucked into the meat, me slipping a few sneaky crisps in my mouth inbetween a polite mouthful of bloody meat washing it down with the wine.
Daytime wine makes listening to people’s life stories a lot easier and when he got to the part about how he originally wanted to become an actor as he had seen John Travolta in Grease – cue me to take over “oh Grease, John Travolta, Olivia Newton John, Bee Gees, lurv lurv lurv and who didn’t want to be her, wear the satin pants, the leather jacket, those red shoes and have that cigarette hanging out of the corner of your mouth, stubbing it out at John Travoltas foot and say, tell me about it stud ” ……
Oh daytime wine, I was possessed, I could’ve given a talk at a TED X conference, my passion being the 70’s – disco, Saturday night fever, denim, lip gloss, first love, first kiss, heartbreak, flared jeans, cheesecloth blouses, lashings of blue eyeshadow, lager and lime, lager and black, cheese and onion crisps, chip butties and cigarettes
– and so on…….my passion, my guilty pleasures.

But then it was Danis turn, when he had tried to continue about his acting career and him choosing fashion design instead – Dani then mentioned fabrics in India and then Indian history and then continued with China and Chinese history.
After this, the conversation got really deep and philosophical and I had to go and wee behind a rock to stop myself from singing “ain’t no mountain high enough ain’t no valley low enough” as it was all very mountainous and deep all at the same time.

Soon after this we cleared up – but there was more…..
I spotted some Condors eating a dead horse and the jeep halted to a sudden stop and I found myself thrust against the back of Francisco’s chair once more. Now let me just say, since I have been on tour my bird spotting skills having developed enormously. However this particular coup, was like winning the lottery, in Franciscos eyes, I was propelled into the top ten bird watching persons of all time – I actually think I was position number one at this point and I seriously considered asking for a pair of binoculars for Christmas. Condors are the lions of the Andes – there was a whole group feeding off a dead horse – we approached with stealth and caution like bird watchers do – Francisco avidly filming the whole episode – I tried to be nonchalant about the whole thing – but really I was dead proud of myself and my bird spotting abilities. 😄😄😄

After this Francisco spotted the spider – I let it crawl my anorak – because really I would like to have spotted it first 😉

However this is where the story take a tragic end and it really does – Francisco received a call to say his mother was about to die in the hospital and we drove like hell to get there – Francisco was crying and kissing a picture of his mother on his mobile and it was so tragic I felt like crying too – that and trying to hold onto something as the seatbelt was broken 😱

That’s where the story ends – a day of highs and lows – mountains and valleys, condors and dead horses and poor Franciscos mother – it’s the circle of life 😔

Not a bad way to spend a Thursday afternoon……💃💃💃

A quick description of La Boca

Our time in Buenos Aires is almost done – I didn’t just like Buenos Aires – I loved it 😍💃💃💃💃😀

Have you ever flown from one airport to another in Argentina and ended up in Brasil?
I kind of remember getting up at an unearthly hour as so very often on this journey. I thought we were flying to Iguazu in Argentina – but somehow after our flight we ended up on a bus at the Brasilian border and had to hand in our passports – not having a clue what was going on, we waited….and waited……and waited and suddenly we had a visa for Brasil. Did we want one? oh why the hell not, let’s go to Brasil. In the afternoon we saw the wonderful falls from the Brasilian side. Our hotel was in Brasil, but the next morning we got on a Spanish tour bus to Argentina and saw the falls from the Argentinian side. We understood nothing but the picture speak for themselves – magnificent!!
The bus returned to Brasil with us on it of course and the next day we caught another bus back from Brasil to the airport in Argentina and flew back to Buenos Aires. Confused? I was 🙃

The “Bird Park”

When you have to check out of your hotel and you have a couple of hours with nothing to do and nowhere to go – there is always a bird park round the corner 😳
Interesting if you have 120 mins to kill.

Saturday night tango in Buenos

Having looked at a few ads for tango shows and not knowing which one to choose, we were wandering aimlessly down a cobbled road and saw a book shop. Being a book nerd of the highest order, I felt compelled to go in. Imagine our surprise when from nowhere a little old man opened some red curtains at the back of the shop and showed us a little restaurant and a stage all ready for Saturday nights dinner and tango show. Done deal – tickets bought (well a handwritten scrap of paper) and 2 of the available 20 chairs booked.
At 9pm we turned up for “the show” not knowing what to expect at all. Through the bookshop, through the red curtain into a dimly lit restaurant we went, where the stage lit up in red lights. In total we were 14 people who enjoyed a magnificent show of one singer, two musicians and two tango dancers. The singer looked similar to Klitschko, the same physique in an aubergine coloured suit, ever so slightly tight in a few specific areas 👀
His more than overly shiny shoes shone brightly as he belted out his dramatic ballads, his teeth out shining his shoes, his lungs about to burst in the ever so slightly tight suit.

The musicians equally dramatic, the intense look on their faces, one playing a guitar, the other a bandoneon, the typical tango accompaniment.
For the most part, they had their eyes closed, their expressions reflecting the pain or delight in interchanging chords.

And then of course, the tango couple, obviously equally intense and dramatic pulling and lifting and pushing each other around the floor – that embarassing interlude when they ask members of the 14 audience to dance…..why me? I had to refuse, I would’ve looked ridiculous – 2 people accepted and they could obviously tango (remind me to get some lessons on the off chance I should return to Buenos Aires).

After the finale, we were able to speak to the singer , musicians and dancers (well if you could speak Spanish). I did however say to the dancer that I could not tango and he did that beautiful South American Kiss Kiss thing on the cheeks (maybe he thought I was asking for a quick snog 👄👄!!!!)

Great evening – Buenos Aires – the place to tango.

La Recoleta Cemetery (Spanish: Cementerio de la Recoleta) is a cemetery located in the Recoleta neighbourhood of Buenos Aires, Argentina. It contains the graves of notable people, including Eva Perón, presidents of Argentina, Nobel Prize winners, the founder of the Argentine Navy, and a granddaughter of Napoleon. In 2011, the BBC hailed it as one of the world’s best cemeteries, and in 2013, CNN listed it among the 10 most beautiful cemeteries in the world. It is eerily spooky, fascinating and captivating all at the same time.

Requiescant in Pace

We found ourselves lost on the streets of Buenos Aires today. We asked a police officer for directions to a particular street. He gave us the wrong directions. Although this may have been due to a lack of basic Spanish or miserable pronunciation, I feel as though I should arrest this officer for giving us false information. However due to our previous dealings with the police during this trip, I may just let this incident pass. Should it happen again, well we will see 👀
We also managed to book a trip to the Iguazu Falls – we fly Monday – we think 😄 and we are allowed to walk through the Brasilien border to see the other side of the falls – we think 😃
We continue to be able to order food – just look at our laden table – no problem in this area as I would be prepared to act a charade of “death by chocolate” in order to get my cake and eat it. The waiter suggested a different wine to the one we pointed out on the menu. We wholeheartedly agreed as the Argentinians know their wine. It was full bodied with an attractive aroma and the wine was nice too 😉

A few pictures of the streets of Argentina today.

I seriously think we should have a tango lesson – I might have to have a glass or 2 of that full bodied fruity wine to get started 💃💃💃💃💃💃💃💃💃💃💃

Tomorrow we start our sight seeing in earnest 👍

Buenos Aires

I am lying in somebodies bed after a 12 hour flight taking off from Auckland at 8pm on Sunday 1st May and landing in Buenos Aires at 5pm on Sunday 1st May with a 15 hour time difference. Whose bed this is I do not know – it’s one of those Air B and B thingy’s where nice people let you live in their flats for small money – it also has a toilet which means I do not have to go outside and put my coat on in the middle of the night as I have done during the past three weeks – so it’s very luxurious to me at the moment and I am enjoying it so much I’m just not getting up anytime soon ☺️
I finally got up and we ventured out around our neighborhood of Palermo – yep – it’s great – it has loads of little boutiques (I can’t buy anything a) I am a broke backpacker b) I have 25kg of luggage and my next Eco flight is 20kg)…,
But those boutiques are divine 😄
Equally important it has loads of restaurants – so I won’t starve here – as yet I have no photos but we are sightseeing tomorrow after an evening of research and 8 episodes of some random series called “togetherness” which was quite weird but obviously addictive.
We’re both loving this flat – we can stand up without bumping heads and the loos – well I’ve mentioned them already – one each 😃
– simple luxuries …

View from the window…

A final farewell to New Zealand.

Start 145455km – finish 148588km
3133 km one way from North to South New Zealand with quite a lot of east to west and west to east as well.
An amazing journey and before I even ask myself the obligatory question after visiting a country – I already have the answer – yes I would do it again…. and again…..and again. I have been cold at night, bitten by sand flies which itch more than 1000 mosquito bites – I have showered and also not showered on dubious campsites varying in their levels of hygiene – I have eaten cold tomato soup and dodgy van made sandwiches, done treks and trails till my bones ache and I have wept (oh Patty that’s just pathetic!!!) – BUT I have loved every single minute of it – the amazing open space – the silence in the mountains – the feeling of being alone in a vast universe (apart from the Asian coach tour buses) – but seriously…, breathtaking moments and sheer amazing scenery.
Meeting up with amazing people in Auckland and saying farewell to them at the end of our visit after flying back from Christchurch was also an added bonus.
I was wondering why it took us three weeks to travel down both islands and only an hour to get back – weird!!
To finish just some random photos……in absolutely no particular order 😊