So Marisa and I are now in Cuenca. This is a beautiful colonial town in the middle of the Andes at 2450m, with really nice architecture and a bit of culture. There´s a lot of restaurants and bars and people go out which is a nice change from some other towns we´ve been to.
Today we walked about the town and took a lot of pictures. It was a nice day (32C) but much less humid than the Galapagos so it felt very comfortable. The hostal we are staying in is one of the best ones I have ever seen, it´s in an old colonial house, which has about 12 or 16 rooms, hardwood floors throughout, completely re-done bathrooms, and our room has a little nook on a 2nd floor overlooking the rest of the room! All for $24 US, including a breakfast in the courtyard. We get a free half hour of internet access and here I am. Oh yeah, it also has cable tv, so yesterday watched CNN. There was a protest march here today which Marisa and I avoided just because I believe it´s generally not safe to be near protests. There were no problems but I prefer to be safe.
Before Cuenca we went to a small town near Riobamba called Quisapincha which I doubt gets many tourists. It´s known for its leather crafts. Marisa shopped while I watched this lady make the biggest pot of soup/stew ever. The pot was about 1m in diameter, and sat on an open fire just outside the restaurant on the sidewalk. She started with meat, water, and a bag of salt, and then later I watched her add green onions, the bunch was bigger than I could put my hands around! There was other stuff added as well. She stirred it with this big ladle that could have been a paddle. Unfortunately we left before it was ready to eat.
Tomorrow we head back up north, first stopping at the best Inca ruins in Ecuador, called Ingapirca. It´s not as spectacular as say Macchu Pichu but it still looks pretty good from the pictures I have seen.
Thursday, March 20, 2003
Tuesday, March 18, 2003
Quito, Ecuador
So we made it through the Galapagos in one piece and are now back on the mainland, a couple days later.
The Galapagos trip was amazing. About half way through the 8 days, we finally got over whatever ailments we had and were able to enjoy the sights fully. Every day had a similar schedule but the sights were always different and I was amazed that it could be. I figured after the first few days, why would I want to get up early at 5:30 and leave an air conditioned room to go for a 2 hour walk before breakfast to see something I've already seen? But it was always worth it to get up, always something new. (Although one day it was to see the great frigate bird (as opposed to magnificent frigate bird which we saw quite frequently), but after a few days in Galapagos this somehow becomes important)
A typical day was a landing on an island from 6 - 8, back on board for a big breakfast (fresh fruit, eggs or french toast or banana pancakes, freshly squeezed juice, tea), then another landing at another location from 9:30 - 11:30, some snorkeling, back on board for lunch and a siesta, then another landing from 3 - 5 and some more snorkeling. Back on board for dinner, and usually we were so tired no-one could stay up past 8:30.
The species all had cool-sounding names, like the blue-footed booby, Galapagos land tortoise, great blue heron, magnificent frigate bird, and others. There was one island where I took a picture of 7 species of birds in one shot! I became quite the ornithologist (thank you very much), able to distinguish between several species of Darwin's finches, and identify the song of the yellow warbler. Maybe it will come in useful in a game of trivia some day... My favourite was the giant land tortoise which we saw in the wild (there are a whole bunch in the Charles Darwin Research Centre), some of them weighing 250 kg!
It was amazing how much was packed into the 8 days. The weather was also perfect, it only rained once (at night for an hour) and other than that it was sunny and hot (34C).
So now we are back on the mainland in much cooler temperatures (18C). We flew back to Quito and then left south for Riobamba where we are now. Tomorrow we are headed for Cuenca, which is a nice old colonial city. The odd part about being back on land is that both Marisa and I still feel like we're on a boat, and especially when we are tired we get dizzy like the land is swaying (and no we haven't been drinking).
Well I hope everthing is going well back home. We are so out of touch with the news, I don't even know what's going on with the Leafs (or Iraq for that matter).
The Galapagos trip was amazing. About half way through the 8 days, we finally got over whatever ailments we had and were able to enjoy the sights fully. Every day had a similar schedule but the sights were always different and I was amazed that it could be. I figured after the first few days, why would I want to get up early at 5:30 and leave an air conditioned room to go for a 2 hour walk before breakfast to see something I've already seen? But it was always worth it to get up, always something new. (Although one day it was to see the great frigate bird (as opposed to magnificent frigate bird which we saw quite frequently), but after a few days in Galapagos this somehow becomes important)
A typical day was a landing on an island from 6 - 8, back on board for a big breakfast (fresh fruit, eggs or french toast or banana pancakes, freshly squeezed juice, tea), then another landing at another location from 9:30 - 11:30, some snorkeling, back on board for lunch and a siesta, then another landing from 3 - 5 and some more snorkeling. Back on board for dinner, and usually we were so tired no-one could stay up past 8:30.
The species all had cool-sounding names, like the blue-footed booby, Galapagos land tortoise, great blue heron, magnificent frigate bird, and others. There was one island where I took a picture of 7 species of birds in one shot! I became quite the ornithologist (thank you very much), able to distinguish between several species of Darwin's finches, and identify the song of the yellow warbler. Maybe it will come in useful in a game of trivia some day... My favourite was the giant land tortoise which we saw in the wild (there are a whole bunch in the Charles Darwin Research Centre), some of them weighing 250 kg!
It was amazing how much was packed into the 8 days. The weather was also perfect, it only rained once (at night for an hour) and other than that it was sunny and hot (34C).
So now we are back on the mainland in much cooler temperatures (18C). We flew back to Quito and then left south for Riobamba where we are now. Tomorrow we are headed for Cuenca, which is a nice old colonial city. The odd part about being back on land is that both Marisa and I still feel like we're on a boat, and especially when we are tired we get dizzy like the land is swaying (and no we haven't been drinking).
Well I hope everthing is going well back home. We are so out of touch with the news, I don't even know what's going on with the Leafs (or Iraq for that matter).
Thursday, March 13, 2003
Galapagos Islands, Ecuador
So Marisa and I are half way through the Galapagos trip and it's turned more into a survival trip than anything else. Between the heat and the sun and the boat motion and the cold I started with and passed to Marisa we have spent a lot of time just trying to keep ourselves in one piece!
Despite that we are having a great time. We are both feeling pretty good today. We have seen some of the islands in the south east and now looped back to the main island, some passengers got off and we get new ones today for the 2nd half of the trip. So we have an hour on the main island to kill and are spending it at a computer (!)
The weather has been fantastic. Sunny, hot, about 30C is my guess, and the water temperature is about 24C. A typical day is getting up at 5:30, having the first trek to an island around 7 - 9, then we go somewhere else, have lunch, snorkel a bit later on, then in the evening we have another landing on an island to see more wildlife. They plan it like that so we're not out trekking under the midday sun. The amount of wildlife is incredible. You have to be careful not to step on iguanas and the sea lions (or seals, I forget) are all over the beaches. The Lonely Planet has a nice little checklist and so I've been keeping track. So far we have seen about 40 species out of the 100 or so listed. My favourite so far is the blue-footed booby, a type of bird. (they sell tshirts here with 'I love boobies' on the front). Unfortunately the albatross are not here right now, and I hope to see a hammerhead shark during the snorkeling. Many many pictures.
The food has also been amazing. The crew on our boat (16 passengers, 7 crew + guide) are quite good. The cook is quite funny and has taken a liking to Marisa and he was quite disappointed that Marisa was sick earlier and not finishing all of his wonderful cooking! But yesterday she was better and now the cook is happy again. Yesterday he even baked and iced a cake!
It was very odd to come back to civilization last night. As well, we finally have sea legs so now we are getting dizzy on land!
Anyways I will write more later on but I have to catch a boat :)
Despite that we are having a great time. We are both feeling pretty good today. We have seen some of the islands in the south east and now looped back to the main island, some passengers got off and we get new ones today for the 2nd half of the trip. So we have an hour on the main island to kill and are spending it at a computer (!)
The weather has been fantastic. Sunny, hot, about 30C is my guess, and the water temperature is about 24C. A typical day is getting up at 5:30, having the first trek to an island around 7 - 9, then we go somewhere else, have lunch, snorkel a bit later on, then in the evening we have another landing on an island to see more wildlife. They plan it like that so we're not out trekking under the midday sun. The amount of wildlife is incredible. You have to be careful not to step on iguanas and the sea lions (or seals, I forget) are all over the beaches. The Lonely Planet has a nice little checklist and so I've been keeping track. So far we have seen about 40 species out of the 100 or so listed. My favourite so far is the blue-footed booby, a type of bird. (they sell tshirts here with 'I love boobies' on the front). Unfortunately the albatross are not here right now, and I hope to see a hammerhead shark during the snorkeling. Many many pictures.
The food has also been amazing. The crew on our boat (16 passengers, 7 crew + guide) are quite good. The cook is quite funny and has taken a liking to Marisa and he was quite disappointed that Marisa was sick earlier and not finishing all of his wonderful cooking! But yesterday she was better and now the cook is happy again. Yesterday he even baked and iced a cake!
It was very odd to come back to civilization last night. As well, we finally have sea legs so now we are getting dizzy on land!
Anyways I will write more later on but I have to catch a boat :)
Saturday, March 08, 2003
Quito, Ecuador
Well Marisa and I made it no problems to Ecuador yesterday on the start of our trip to see the Galapagos Islands. Despite all the media announcements about 3 hour waits at the airport that made me worried about missing our flight out of Toronto (being the start of March break and the busiest travel day of the year) it took us about 20 minutes to get through everything.
The flights were okay and we got to Quito about 11:00 pm last night. I had called ahead to reserve a hostel and they also arranged for a taxi. So when we got out of the airport there was a nice lady holding a sign for 'Erick Dsousa' and we were whisked off to a nice old colonlial house in the centro. The weather is really nice, it's supposed to be the rainy season but it was clear and about 13C. Marisa and I were both pretty tired so we just went to bed.
This morning we got up to another nice day (sunny and about 18C), had breakfast on this cool little terrace inside the hotel. Today we just have some paper work to do to pay for the Galapagos trip, and then tomorrow morning we're off pretty early to fly there to begin a 8 day 7 night boat trip around the islands. Although I have been surprised at where internet cafes can now be found I doubt that they will have access on the boat. So the next time I email will be after the Galapagos trip.
ps to prevent my hotmail from filling up with spam I have turned on the maximum filter so I only get email from people in my Address Book. So on the off chance that you do reply from a different email address than what I've sent I won't get it.
The flights were okay and we got to Quito about 11:00 pm last night. I had called ahead to reserve a hostel and they also arranged for a taxi. So when we got out of the airport there was a nice lady holding a sign for 'Erick Dsousa' and we were whisked off to a nice old colonlial house in the centro. The weather is really nice, it's supposed to be the rainy season but it was clear and about 13C. Marisa and I were both pretty tired so we just went to bed.
This morning we got up to another nice day (sunny and about 18C), had breakfast on this cool little terrace inside the hotel. Today we just have some paper work to do to pay for the Galapagos trip, and then tomorrow morning we're off pretty early to fly there to begin a 8 day 7 night boat trip around the islands. Although I have been surprised at where internet cafes can now be found I doubt that they will have access on the boat. So the next time I email will be after the Galapagos trip.
ps to prevent my hotmail from filling up with spam I have turned on the maximum filter so I only get email from people in my Address Book. So on the off chance that you do reply from a different email address than what I've sent I won't get it.
Thursday, June 13, 2002
Arica, Chile
So I made it out of Bolivia okay without being affected by the road strikes. Although I met some other travellers that did get stuck in cities for a few days by them so I guess I got lucky.
The first view of La Paz is one of the more amazing cities to see. You´re driving along the altiplano at about 3600m, and suddenly there´s a huge chasm in the earth and inside is a city of 1.5 million people, filling the entire thing. The main street runs right down the middle, so it´s impossible to get lost because if you head down you´ll always find the main street. But when you´re in it it´s like how the futuristic cities in space must be like, it looks like people are literally living all around. The city itself is pretty lively, there´s always people about.
So I spent 3 days relaxing and souvenir shopping (La Paz is also one of the best places in South America to buy souvenirs). Then this morning I took a bus from La Paz to Arica (Chile). I was surprised because the road was paved the entire way. The border crossing is a pass at 4660m, and then in the next 3 hours we dropped all the way to Arica at sea level. Wasn´t as impressive as the Friendship highway between Tibet and Nepal but the scenery still was pretty good.
See most of you soon!
The first view of La Paz is one of the more amazing cities to see. You´re driving along the altiplano at about 3600m, and suddenly there´s a huge chasm in the earth and inside is a city of 1.5 million people, filling the entire thing. The main street runs right down the middle, so it´s impossible to get lost because if you head down you´ll always find the main street. But when you´re in it it´s like how the futuristic cities in space must be like, it looks like people are literally living all around. The city itself is pretty lively, there´s always people about.
So I spent 3 days relaxing and souvenir shopping (La Paz is also one of the best places in South America to buy souvenirs). Then this morning I took a bus from La Paz to Arica (Chile). I was surprised because the road was paved the entire way. The border crossing is a pass at 4660m, and then in the next 3 hours we dropped all the way to Arica at sea level. Wasn´t as impressive as the Friendship highway between Tibet and Nepal but the scenery still was pretty good.
See most of you soon!
Sunday, June 09, 2002
Potosi, Bolivia
Well I have returned from a 4 day trip around Uyuni. I took the train from Tupiza to Uyuni, which was quite nice in Ejectivo class. It was even heated, which is a novelty in transportation here. I got to Uyuni around midnight. Uyuni is at 3600m and it's pretty cold at night. Unfortunately most hostels don't have heating, but they do have a million blankets. So I was quite warm at night but my nose froze.
The next morning I woke up without a headache so I figured I was acclimatized enough (given the altitude) to sign up for the trip. There was a driver, a cook, and 6 of us (4 Danes, another Canadian and me), in a Toyota Land Cruiser. This is the slow season in this part of the world, and there were about 6 or 7 other groups that left the same day. I'm glad I'm not here in the busy season.
The first day we saw Salar de Uyuni. This is a huge dried up salt lake at 3600 m. It is a big huge flat surface, white as far as you can see. It was so flat that I could have raced my Civic across it. This is one of the top 10 things to see in South America in my opinion.
The next day we reached Laguna Colorado, which is a lake that is a type of red colour (I guess Colorado red). It was quite beautiful. Unfortunately I decided to climb up a little hill (about 100m up) to get a better view but the exertion triggered a headache from the altitude (we were now at 4200m).
On the third day we got up very early (at 5:00) to see geysers. This was at 4950m, and the combination of altitude, early morning and season meant that it was -30 C outside. I didn't take many pictures. Then we got to some hot springs at 4600m, and it was quite refreshing just to stick my feet in (I think the water was at 35C, and the air temperature had warmed up to about 5C). Unlike other hot springs that I have been too, this one had absolutely no infrastructure around it. Just the water coming out of the ground. Some other tourists from the other groups actually went fully in, with bathing suits, but I think it would have been too cold after.
Then we went to Laguna Verde, which is a green lake. (They are very boring with the naming of the lakes here. We also saw a Laguna Blanca and Laguna Negro. There's an area we drove through that's called Valley of Dali. Not the original name I'm sure.) Laguna Verde is at 5000m, and the peak of Volcan Licancabur at 5950m is in the background. This also makes my top 10 for South America. The whole area that we traveled through over the 4 days is very beautiful, one of the most amazing natural areas that I have seen.
The last day was a long drive home. The whole trip cost only $70 US, including transportation, accommodation and food (although not the Hilton, but still pretty good). I think Toyota should be doing commercials here. Almost all the vehicles were Toyota Land Cruisers, and over the 4 days we drove over salt lakes, through dusty sandy areas, temperature ranging from 10C to -30C, fjording rivers up to 3 feet deep, without problems.
That night I caught a bus to Potosi, which in the 1600s and 1700s was a very important city because of its wealth from the silver mines. Potosi sits at 4050m, and according to the LP is the highest city in the world. Although I'm sure there's a bunch of cities that claim this title. In any case, this morning went on a tour of the mine. They still mine in much the same way as they did years ago. The conditions are terrible, most miners die after working there 20 years. We bought cigarettes, coca leaves and dynamite (!) for gifts for the miners so we could take pictures. Yep, you can buy dynamite from street stalls here. And there I was, dynamite and fuse in a plastic bag clambouring about in narrow tunnels in the mine hoping it wouldn't go off before I gave it to a miner.
Potosi itself is a beautiful little town, with cobblestone streets and colonial architecture. (Even with my jaded view of colonial architecture I still think the town is beautiful.)
So now I sit in an internet cafe, drinking a CocaCola, eating a llama burger, catching up on my news and sending emails. It's still very odd for me that in the middle of nowhere I can do this. Next I am going to La Paz to buy a whole bunch of souvenirs, and then somehow get back to Santiago for my flight. I have heard that the road from here to La Paz is being blocked occasionally by strikers, but that on Sundays I should be okay. Well I have a week to get to Santiago in any case. (The llama burger tastes like a burger).
Hope everything is going well at home!
The next morning I woke up without a headache so I figured I was acclimatized enough (given the altitude) to sign up for the trip. There was a driver, a cook, and 6 of us (4 Danes, another Canadian and me), in a Toyota Land Cruiser. This is the slow season in this part of the world, and there were about 6 or 7 other groups that left the same day. I'm glad I'm not here in the busy season.
The first day we saw Salar de Uyuni. This is a huge dried up salt lake at 3600 m. It is a big huge flat surface, white as far as you can see. It was so flat that I could have raced my Civic across it. This is one of the top 10 things to see in South America in my opinion.
The next day we reached Laguna Colorado, which is a lake that is a type of red colour (I guess Colorado red). It was quite beautiful. Unfortunately I decided to climb up a little hill (about 100m up) to get a better view but the exertion triggered a headache from the altitude (we were now at 4200m).
On the third day we got up very early (at 5:00) to see geysers. This was at 4950m, and the combination of altitude, early morning and season meant that it was -30 C outside. I didn't take many pictures. Then we got to some hot springs at 4600m, and it was quite refreshing just to stick my feet in (I think the water was at 35C, and the air temperature had warmed up to about 5C). Unlike other hot springs that I have been too, this one had absolutely no infrastructure around it. Just the water coming out of the ground. Some other tourists from the other groups actually went fully in, with bathing suits, but I think it would have been too cold after.
Then we went to Laguna Verde, which is a green lake. (They are very boring with the naming of the lakes here. We also saw a Laguna Blanca and Laguna Negro. There's an area we drove through that's called Valley of Dali. Not the original name I'm sure.) Laguna Verde is at 5000m, and the peak of Volcan Licancabur at 5950m is in the background. This also makes my top 10 for South America. The whole area that we traveled through over the 4 days is very beautiful, one of the most amazing natural areas that I have seen.
The last day was a long drive home. The whole trip cost only $70 US, including transportation, accommodation and food (although not the Hilton, but still pretty good). I think Toyota should be doing commercials here. Almost all the vehicles were Toyota Land Cruisers, and over the 4 days we drove over salt lakes, through dusty sandy areas, temperature ranging from 10C to -30C, fjording rivers up to 3 feet deep, without problems.
That night I caught a bus to Potosi, which in the 1600s and 1700s was a very important city because of its wealth from the silver mines. Potosi sits at 4050m, and according to the LP is the highest city in the world. Although I'm sure there's a bunch of cities that claim this title. In any case, this morning went on a tour of the mine. They still mine in much the same way as they did years ago. The conditions are terrible, most miners die after working there 20 years. We bought cigarettes, coca leaves and dynamite (!) for gifts for the miners so we could take pictures. Yep, you can buy dynamite from street stalls here. And there I was, dynamite and fuse in a plastic bag clambouring about in narrow tunnels in the mine hoping it wouldn't go off before I gave it to a miner.
Potosi itself is a beautiful little town, with cobblestone streets and colonial architecture. (Even with my jaded view of colonial architecture I still think the town is beautiful.)
So now I sit in an internet cafe, drinking a CocaCola, eating a llama burger, catching up on my news and sending emails. It's still very odd for me that in the middle of nowhere I can do this. Next I am going to La Paz to buy a whole bunch of souvenirs, and then somehow get back to Santiago for my flight. I have heard that the road from here to La Paz is being blocked occasionally by strikers, but that on Sundays I should be okay. Well I have a week to get to Santiago in any case. (The llama burger tastes like a burger).
Hope everything is going well at home!
Tuesday, June 04, 2002
Tupiza, Bolivia
Well I´m now in Bolivia.
I spent the last few days making it through Argentina. Mendoza was nice, it reminded me of Guadalajara (Mexico), both of them are big cities that are very nice to walk around in. I went to a restaurant for a big barbecue dinner. In Argentina they are called `Parillas` and this one was an all-you-can-eat, which here is a tenedor libre, literally translated as free fork. It was very good. I had a steak, then some pork chops, and then some beef ribs. Had a 3/8 bottle of local wine, and dessert. All for $5.
The next day I got on a bus for Salta, which is in the north west of Argentina. Unfortunately this meant I missed the Argentina-Nigeria game, which the bus driver and bus attendants were very disappointed about. The long distance buses in Argentina are very good, I was in a semi-cama which means it`s almost level to sleep. Plus they serve you dinner, snacks and breakfast, show movies, and play bingo. (Fortunately I didn´t win because two people tied and because they only had one prize the two people had to tell a joke to decide the winner, and my spanish isn´t that good yet.) We were stopped at a gas station when Argentina scored their only goal so that was good because we got to see it on TV.
Salta is a nice colonial town, unfortunately I have seen too many nice colonial towns to care. At night, watched game 7 of the Lakers-Kings game. Travel really has changed since I went on my big trip 5 years ago. It´s so easy now to keep in touch with email, read the Toronto news on the net, most places have satellite TV with all the US stations, there are ATMs everywhere. A lot of travellers now travel with digital cameras and download their pictures in internet cafes to wherever they have disk space.
Argentina really went crazy after their win. It was the same as when the Leafs won the second series. They haven´t really won anything yet but everyone was partying in the main plaza until daylight. It would be pretty crazy if they actually win the whole thing. Although this country does need something to cheer about I guess.
So from Salta I crossed the border at La Quiaca, and then made it up to Tupiza where I am now. Last night I was a bit affected by the altitude but I´m okay now. Tonight I am taking a train to Uyuni, I upgraded from the regular class to first class for a whopping $2. In Uyuni I´m hoping to take a jeep trek around the southwest corner of Bolivia for 4 days, there are some really cool natural sights to see.
I spent the last few days making it through Argentina. Mendoza was nice, it reminded me of Guadalajara (Mexico), both of them are big cities that are very nice to walk around in. I went to a restaurant for a big barbecue dinner. In Argentina they are called `Parillas` and this one was an all-you-can-eat, which here is a tenedor libre, literally translated as free fork. It was very good. I had a steak, then some pork chops, and then some beef ribs. Had a 3/8 bottle of local wine, and dessert. All for $5.
The next day I got on a bus for Salta, which is in the north west of Argentina. Unfortunately this meant I missed the Argentina-Nigeria game, which the bus driver and bus attendants were very disappointed about. The long distance buses in Argentina are very good, I was in a semi-cama which means it`s almost level to sleep. Plus they serve you dinner, snacks and breakfast, show movies, and play bingo. (Fortunately I didn´t win because two people tied and because they only had one prize the two people had to tell a joke to decide the winner, and my spanish isn´t that good yet.) We were stopped at a gas station when Argentina scored their only goal so that was good because we got to see it on TV.
Salta is a nice colonial town, unfortunately I have seen too many nice colonial towns to care. At night, watched game 7 of the Lakers-Kings game. Travel really has changed since I went on my big trip 5 years ago. It´s so easy now to keep in touch with email, read the Toronto news on the net, most places have satellite TV with all the US stations, there are ATMs everywhere. A lot of travellers now travel with digital cameras and download their pictures in internet cafes to wherever they have disk space.
Argentina really went crazy after their win. It was the same as when the Leafs won the second series. They haven´t really won anything yet but everyone was partying in the main plaza until daylight. It would be pretty crazy if they actually win the whole thing. Although this country does need something to cheer about I guess.
So from Salta I crossed the border at La Quiaca, and then made it up to Tupiza where I am now. Last night I was a bit affected by the altitude but I´m okay now. Tonight I am taking a train to Uyuni, I upgraded from the regular class to first class for a whopping $2. In Uyuni I´m hoping to take a jeep trek around the southwest corner of Bolivia for 4 days, there are some really cool natural sights to see.
Thursday, May 30, 2002
Santiago, Chile
Well I made it to Easter Island and back. It was amazing on Easter Island. The weather was perfect, it was sunny the whole time and about mid 20´s. The first view I had of the island was from the plane, it got in at 8:30 at night. The sky was clear and there was a full moon.
I met up with a guy from France and a guy from England. That night we went to see our first moai which are right in town, taking pictures by moonlight.
The first full day we climbed up the highest point on the island, 511 m. It was an amazing view of the whole island, which is only about 35 km in circumference. We could see the Pacific Ocean in every direction. Then we walked home and got lost a couple times trying to take short cuts. We spent about 7 hours walking the first day.
The second day we did a tour which takes you to the major sites. The most amazing part was the quarry, which is where the typical pictures of Easter Island are from. I didn´t find the 'At least you have a nose' moai but there were lots of others. Ate lunch amongst the heads. Then later in the evening took some pictures of the sunset and some more moai.
The last day the french guy and I climbed up the south volcano (about 300m) but this was also amazing. The inside is a lake, about 1.5 km in diameter, and had marsh growing in this cool pattern. The french guy thought it was the most amazing thing he had seen (and he was pretty well-traveled), I thought it was amazing but not that great, not the top 10 anyways. But it was still cool. Plus you could see the whole island again, but from a different view than the first day.
It is the off season on Easter Island (apparently it´s the rainiest month) and so there were hardly any other tourists. In fact there was nothing to do at night so we just had dinner and a beer and then went home. The residencial where we stayed, the family had a big tv, (about 32" at least, I didn´t actually measure it) and their friend came over with his laptop and we watched DVDs most nights. Actually the busiest place at night on the island was the video store, made to look like the Blockbuster logo.
I read in the paper while on the island that it had rained the whole time in Santiago, and that there was flooding. None of the internet places on the island could get a good connection, which they blamed on the weather. However today when we landed it was nice and clear. But the pass to Mendoza (Argentina) has been closed on and off because of the snow -- and apparently tomorrow it´s going to be closed again. So thanks to the internet, I just bought a plane ticket to Mendoza and I´ll be flying there tomorrow. The french guy has just come from Argentina, and everything is very cheap there now because of the devaluation of the currency. He was having big steak dinners with a bottle of wine for $3 US. Sounds good to me.
So I haven´t checked any sports sites yet and last I heard the Leafs had won 1-0 in game 5. I´ll check next.
I met up with a guy from France and a guy from England. That night we went to see our first moai which are right in town, taking pictures by moonlight.
The first full day we climbed up the highest point on the island, 511 m. It was an amazing view of the whole island, which is only about 35 km in circumference. We could see the Pacific Ocean in every direction. Then we walked home and got lost a couple times trying to take short cuts. We spent about 7 hours walking the first day.
The second day we did a tour which takes you to the major sites. The most amazing part was the quarry, which is where the typical pictures of Easter Island are from. I didn´t find the 'At least you have a nose' moai but there were lots of others. Ate lunch amongst the heads. Then later in the evening took some pictures of the sunset and some more moai.
The last day the french guy and I climbed up the south volcano (about 300m) but this was also amazing. The inside is a lake, about 1.5 km in diameter, and had marsh growing in this cool pattern. The french guy thought it was the most amazing thing he had seen (and he was pretty well-traveled), I thought it was amazing but not that great, not the top 10 anyways. But it was still cool. Plus you could see the whole island again, but from a different view than the first day.
It is the off season on Easter Island (apparently it´s the rainiest month) and so there were hardly any other tourists. In fact there was nothing to do at night so we just had dinner and a beer and then went home. The residencial where we stayed, the family had a big tv, (about 32" at least, I didn´t actually measure it) and their friend came over with his laptop and we watched DVDs most nights. Actually the busiest place at night on the island was the video store, made to look like the Blockbuster logo.
I read in the paper while on the island that it had rained the whole time in Santiago, and that there was flooding. None of the internet places on the island could get a good connection, which they blamed on the weather. However today when we landed it was nice and clear. But the pass to Mendoza (Argentina) has been closed on and off because of the snow -- and apparently tomorrow it´s going to be closed again. So thanks to the internet, I just bought a plane ticket to Mendoza and I´ll be flying there tomorrow. The french guy has just come from Argentina, and everything is very cheap there now because of the devaluation of the currency. He was having big steak dinners with a bottle of wine for $3 US. Sounds good to me.
So I haven´t checked any sports sites yet and last I heard the Leafs had won 1-0 in game 5. I´ll check next.
Saturday, May 25, 2002
Santiago, Chile
Well I made it to Santiago no problem over night. Tomorrow I take off for Easter Island so I haven´t done much here. It´s rained non-stop since I arrived. Supposedly this is just a `largo lluvioso` (big rain) and it´s not always like this. In any case it´s different weather on Easter Island and then again on the other side of the Andes for the rest of my trip. Well I´m off to go eat dinner (I had to check my email because I forgot when my flight was tomorrow). This place is a bit different from when I was here about 5 years ago -- everyone has a cell phone and internet cafes are everywhere.
Friday, October 13, 2000
Buenos Aries, Argentina
Well I`m back in Buenos Aires so this is probably the last update for this trip. Don`t know when or where the next trip is, the when will decide the where, but there`s still lots of the world to see.
So came back yesterday from Uruguay. Saw Montevideo and Colonia. On the bus ride between the two, if I had taken a picture it would have been hard to tell if it was Canada or Uruguay, it was pretty much the same countryside.
In Montevideo I stayed in this really nice old colonial hotel, with huge ceilings and a balcony that overlooked the main drag. It was a pretty cool room. Ate lunch one day at the market, it was one of the best meals I had so far. The people here eat even more meat than in Argetina. I had a half portion of asado for lunch (which is grilled beef), it was more than enough. Everyone else had probably three times as much as me, and this was only lunch! I took a picture of the grill, it´s amazing (if you like barbeques).
Then went to Colonia, which is as the name suggests a nice colonial town. I took a bunch of pictures, and then the next day I think I took the same pictures all over again. It`s very picturesque.
Now I´m back in BA. Tomorrow, Kirsty & I are planning to go to El Tigre, which is a bit west of BA, then I´ll jump on a plane and head back. There´s supposed to be a big arts and crafts place there, which hopefully will have some things worth buying. So far, the places I´ve been too have lacked indigenous arts & crafts, so there hasn´t been any cool souvenirs to buy.
BMC update:
There are McD`s in Paraguay (saw billboards in the street) but never actually saw any restaurants. So no update from there. In Uruguay, a BMC is 44 Uruguayan pesos (about 3.75 US). Which is about right, Uruguay is somewhat cheaper than Argentina (here´s it´s 3.99 US), but still a bit expensive of a country. (BTW, the lunch I had at the market, came to about $5 US). And presumably there are McD´s in Brazil, but not in Foz do Iguacu.
So came back yesterday from Uruguay. Saw Montevideo and Colonia. On the bus ride between the two, if I had taken a picture it would have been hard to tell if it was Canada or Uruguay, it was pretty much the same countryside.
In Montevideo I stayed in this really nice old colonial hotel, with huge ceilings and a balcony that overlooked the main drag. It was a pretty cool room. Ate lunch one day at the market, it was one of the best meals I had so far. The people here eat even more meat than in Argetina. I had a half portion of asado for lunch (which is grilled beef), it was more than enough. Everyone else had probably three times as much as me, and this was only lunch! I took a picture of the grill, it´s amazing (if you like barbeques).
Then went to Colonia, which is as the name suggests a nice colonial town. I took a bunch of pictures, and then the next day I think I took the same pictures all over again. It`s very picturesque.
Now I´m back in BA. Tomorrow, Kirsty & I are planning to go to El Tigre, which is a bit west of BA, then I´ll jump on a plane and head back. There´s supposed to be a big arts and crafts place there, which hopefully will have some things worth buying. So far, the places I´ve been too have lacked indigenous arts & crafts, so there hasn´t been any cool souvenirs to buy.
BMC update:
There are McD`s in Paraguay (saw billboards in the street) but never actually saw any restaurants. So no update from there. In Uruguay, a BMC is 44 Uruguayan pesos (about 3.75 US). Which is about right, Uruguay is somewhat cheaper than Argentina (here´s it´s 3.99 US), but still a bit expensive of a country. (BTW, the lunch I had at the market, came to about $5 US). And presumably there are McD´s in Brazil, but not in Foz do Iguacu.
Thursday, October 05, 2000
Buenos Aries, Argentina
Well, I have returned to BA. I flew back yesterday from Ushuaia, which was much quicker than the bus rides to get there. (Only 3 hours).
So Ushuaia was pretty cool. There were a bunch of war ships from 5 countries in port, doing some naval exercises. Unfortunately that meant that the entire town was filled with navy types. On Tuesday me & the german guy from the hostel who spoke really good spanish tried to trek up one of the peaks to see a glacier. It took us about 3 hours walking uphill in snow to get near the top, only to find out that at this time of year the glacier is covered with snow and you can´t see anything. But there were cool views of Ushuaia (I think we were at about 1250 m) and also looking south. We tried to figure out which way was exactly south, but we weren´t really sure. There´s a lot of islands further south than Ushuaia, in fact the next one south is only about a couple km across the water, but you can´t get to any of them cheaply. We slid down the peak on our backs in the snow (it was about a 45 degree incline) which in retrospect wasn´t such a good idea cause I got my only jacket and sweater wet, but it was way fun. Then that night we splurged on dinner and went to an all-you-can-eat (here´s it´s a tenedor libre, which translates to free fork) and ate too much. After in the hostel there were actually lotsa backpackers, so we drank most of the night away, in a combination of mostly spanish and some english.
Then next morning I caught my flight back to BA, and stayed at Kirsty´s place again. We went to salsa class again (this time I wasn´t so tired so I did better). Then I was trying to buy groceries for dinner, and was looking for zucchini (sp?) but didn´t know the spanish word for it, and couldn´t tell the difference between a zuchini (that spelling looks better) and a cucumber, and ended up buying a cucumber. Who´s to know with all these similar vegetables.
Today I was supposed to go to Iguazu but decided to relax a day in BA and do some sightseeing (saw Eva Peron´s grave amongst others), and tomorrow I´m going to the falls. Then I´ll try to see if they´ll let me into Paraguay, (Canadians need a visa in advance according to the embassy in Canada, but at the border maybe they´ll have a different opinion).
So Ushuaia was pretty cool. There were a bunch of war ships from 5 countries in port, doing some naval exercises. Unfortunately that meant that the entire town was filled with navy types. On Tuesday me & the german guy from the hostel who spoke really good spanish tried to trek up one of the peaks to see a glacier. It took us about 3 hours walking uphill in snow to get near the top, only to find out that at this time of year the glacier is covered with snow and you can´t see anything. But there were cool views of Ushuaia (I think we were at about 1250 m) and also looking south. We tried to figure out which way was exactly south, but we weren´t really sure. There´s a lot of islands further south than Ushuaia, in fact the next one south is only about a couple km across the water, but you can´t get to any of them cheaply. We slid down the peak on our backs in the snow (it was about a 45 degree incline) which in retrospect wasn´t such a good idea cause I got my only jacket and sweater wet, but it was way fun. Then that night we splurged on dinner and went to an all-you-can-eat (here´s it´s a tenedor libre, which translates to free fork) and ate too much. After in the hostel there were actually lotsa backpackers, so we drank most of the night away, in a combination of mostly spanish and some english.
Then next morning I caught my flight back to BA, and stayed at Kirsty´s place again. We went to salsa class again (this time I wasn´t so tired so I did better). Then I was trying to buy groceries for dinner, and was looking for zucchini (sp?) but didn´t know the spanish word for it, and couldn´t tell the difference between a zuchini (that spelling looks better) and a cucumber, and ended up buying a cucumber. Who´s to know with all these similar vegetables.
Today I was supposed to go to Iguazu but decided to relax a day in BA and do some sightseeing (saw Eva Peron´s grave amongst others), and tomorrow I´m going to the falls. Then I´ll try to see if they´ll let me into Paraguay, (Canadians need a visa in advance according to the embassy in Canada, but at the border maybe they´ll have a different opinion).
Tuesday, October 03, 2000
Ushuaia, Argentina
Well I am now at the bottom of the Americas. For the last time, this is the furthest south I have ever been. I got to Ushuaia yesterday evening, finally reaching the furthest south you can get by road & ferry. Just bought a ticket to fly back to BA, cause it´s cheaper and also I don´t want to spend all that time on buses. So today I plan to trek out to another glacier, and then send a bunch of postcards. If you don´t get one, it must have got lost in the mail. You know how it is here with the post.
In the hostel that I´m staying at, there´s a couple other backpackers whose spanish is pretty good. So last night we talked mostly in spanish, which I always find odd when people speak in their second (or non-first at least) language, when I think we all spoke english better. But it´s good for the practice. Last night I also splurged on dinner and ate in a restaurant (as opposed to buying stuff in a store and eating in the hostel). I had cordero, which is a lot of meat. Too much meat in fact, I couldn´t even finish half. But it was way good. Beer´s also pretty cheap here, $1.60 US for a 940 ml 4.9% bottle. (Actually, I guess that´s about the same price as Canada. It just seems cheap for Argentina).
Punta Arenas (the last town I was in) was a really nice place. The centro is pretty small, so it´s easy to walk around. People don´t seem to mind the temperature either. Although there´s not much of a range here, I think the temperature is between 5 and 15 in summer and 0 and 10 in winter, but when it´s 15 it´s like it´s summer. Most locals are in short sleeves, and at night people go out for ice cream! Although I guess it´s like how I drive on the first nice spring day with my window down (but I do have the heat blasting).
Ushuaia I´ll see today, but there´s about 12 navy ships from different countries in port, so there´s a tonne of military people all over town, which isn´t so nice (darned tourists). At first I thought that they were on vacation or something and that the flights to BA would all be full but they´ll be leaving by boat (or whatever the term is). It was also strange after being in all these towns before tourist season and now there´s a million tourists.
In the hostel that I´m staying at, there´s a couple other backpackers whose spanish is pretty good. So last night we talked mostly in spanish, which I always find odd when people speak in their second (or non-first at least) language, when I think we all spoke english better. But it´s good for the practice. Last night I also splurged on dinner and ate in a restaurant (as opposed to buying stuff in a store and eating in the hostel). I had cordero, which is a lot of meat. Too much meat in fact, I couldn´t even finish half. But it was way good. Beer´s also pretty cheap here, $1.60 US for a 940 ml 4.9% bottle. (Actually, I guess that´s about the same price as Canada. It just seems cheap for Argentina).
Punta Arenas (the last town I was in) was a really nice place. The centro is pretty small, so it´s easy to walk around. People don´t seem to mind the temperature either. Although there´s not much of a range here, I think the temperature is between 5 and 15 in summer and 0 and 10 in winter, but when it´s 15 it´s like it´s summer. Most locals are in short sleeves, and at night people go out for ice cream! Although I guess it´s like how I drive on the first nice spring day with my window down (but I do have the heat blasting).
Ushuaia I´ll see today, but there´s about 12 navy ships from different countries in port, so there´s a tonne of military people all over town, which isn´t so nice (darned tourists). At first I thought that they were on vacation or something and that the flights to BA would all be full but they´ll be leaving by boat (or whatever the term is). It was also strange after being in all these towns before tourist season and now there´s a million tourists.
Sunday, October 01, 2000
Punta Arenas, Chile
Well once again this is the furthest south I´ve ever been. I´m in Punta Arenas, a stop on the way to Ushuaia. Tomorrow I take a bus / boat / bus / bus to get to Ushuaia, about 14 hours. Then I´ll fly back to BA and go to Foz de Iguazu after.
So I saw the Perito Moreno glacier two days ago. It was pretty cool, I took a lot of pictures but I don´t think they´ll look as impressive. I went on a tour, and there were actually other backpackers on it! It was a good group, I can´t remember the names, but there was a girl from Ireland (whose spanish was excellent), a girl from Japan (who was seeing the highlights (Machu Pichu, the glacier, Foz de Iguazu, the tepuis in Venezuala) all in 4 weeks! I thought my trip was rushed), a American guy, a local guy from Argentina who was there on business, and an Italian guy (and me). So we had a great day at the glacier, watching for the big chunks of ice to fall. There´s always pieces breaking off, but every now and then a huge piece falls off. Not the day we were there though. Apparently 28 people have been killed by flying pieces of ice as they break off since 1960, but now they don´t let you get as close. It was a perfect day, there wasn´t a cloud in the sky. Our driver said that there´s only 3 days like this every year, but I don´t believe that´s true. Although some other people in town went to see it a couple days ago it was totally cloudy and they didn´t really get a good view. We had lunch there, and then got back for the evening. We all went out for dinner, and then ended up playing pool at some bar. The Argentina guy also explained something, that if you speak in spanish, the locals will try to reply in their best english, because you have made the effort to speak in their language. It´s not like in France. At first I thought it was rude that whenever I was talking to our driver in spanish, he would reply in english, but I guess that´s why. It´s awfully confusing to me, to listen in english and reply in spanish though.
Yesterday I spent on buses (this is a big continent!) getting to here. The Chilean border guy was pretty amused with my passport, he checked out each and every stamp and tried to figure out where it was from (muy lejos (very far) he kept on saying). Meanwhile there was a line up waiting but you don´t rush border officials. At least there´s no visa fee. I got here (Punta Arenas is in Chile) late in the evening, but travelling is very easy now with ATMs and the internet everywhere. Even say 4 years ago, you couldn´t just show up in a new country on a Saturday night, because all the money exchange places would be closed. But now you can just go to an ATM, withdraw the local currency, and Bob´s your uncle. (Back when I was young...)
Checked out the Saturday night in Punta Arenas. It´s like Argentina here, things don´t really start until 1:00 am. Unfortunately, I did not know that I´m now in a different time zone, so I went out at what I thought was midnight (a little early, but I figured not too bad), but in fact it was only 11:00 pm so everything was dead. I thought that everything just wasn´t busy. Only found out about the time change when I was rushing to get up to make it for breakfast (the hostel I´m in serves breakfast until 10:00) and then it turned out I was an hour early.
So I saw the Perito Moreno glacier two days ago. It was pretty cool, I took a lot of pictures but I don´t think they´ll look as impressive. I went on a tour, and there were actually other backpackers on it! It was a good group, I can´t remember the names, but there was a girl from Ireland (whose spanish was excellent), a girl from Japan (who was seeing the highlights (Machu Pichu, the glacier, Foz de Iguazu, the tepuis in Venezuala) all in 4 weeks! I thought my trip was rushed), a American guy, a local guy from Argentina who was there on business, and an Italian guy (and me). So we had a great day at the glacier, watching for the big chunks of ice to fall. There´s always pieces breaking off, but every now and then a huge piece falls off. Not the day we were there though. Apparently 28 people have been killed by flying pieces of ice as they break off since 1960, but now they don´t let you get as close. It was a perfect day, there wasn´t a cloud in the sky. Our driver said that there´s only 3 days like this every year, but I don´t believe that´s true. Although some other people in town went to see it a couple days ago it was totally cloudy and they didn´t really get a good view. We had lunch there, and then got back for the evening. We all went out for dinner, and then ended up playing pool at some bar. The Argentina guy also explained something, that if you speak in spanish, the locals will try to reply in their best english, because you have made the effort to speak in their language. It´s not like in France. At first I thought it was rude that whenever I was talking to our driver in spanish, he would reply in english, but I guess that´s why. It´s awfully confusing to me, to listen in english and reply in spanish though.
Yesterday I spent on buses (this is a big continent!) getting to here. The Chilean border guy was pretty amused with my passport, he checked out each and every stamp and tried to figure out where it was from (muy lejos (very far) he kept on saying). Meanwhile there was a line up waiting but you don´t rush border officials. At least there´s no visa fee. I got here (Punta Arenas is in Chile) late in the evening, but travelling is very easy now with ATMs and the internet everywhere. Even say 4 years ago, you couldn´t just show up in a new country on a Saturday night, because all the money exchange places would be closed. But now you can just go to an ATM, withdraw the local currency, and Bob´s your uncle. (Back when I was young...)
Checked out the Saturday night in Punta Arenas. It´s like Argentina here, things don´t really start until 1:00 am. Unfortunately, I did not know that I´m now in a different time zone, so I went out at what I thought was midnight (a little early, but I figured not too bad), but in fact it was only 11:00 pm so everything was dead. I thought that everything just wasn´t busy. Only found out about the time change when I was rushing to get up to make it for breakfast (the hostel I´m in serves breakfast until 10:00) and then it turned out I was an hour early.
Thursday, September 28, 2000
El Calafate, Argentina
Well now I am really south. I spent most of yesterday and today on various buses, getting as far south as Rio Gallegos before getting another bus for El Calafate where I am now. It´s the nearest town to the Moreno Glacier, which I´m going to tomorrow.
So I forgot to give the BMC update from Argentina last time. (For those of you who are new, every time I go to a new country I look up the price of a Big Mac Combo. There was some economic theory that says you can tell how expensive a country is by how many hours it takes someone to work in order earn enough money to buy a loaf of bread. Well, my newer theory is that you can do the same thing by figuring out the price of a BMC in the equivalent US$. A while ago some economist actually published something along these lines, and won the Noble prize for economics or something (well I know they were published at least). So far the cheapest has been El Salvador at something like $2.30 US. The most expensive is Europe, almost $10). So anyways, here it´s $3.99. I didn´t actually have anything there, so I didn´t get to test my other theory which is that one of the universal phrases is ´Big Mac combo with Coke´ (I only eat at McDonald´s when I´m travelling if I´m having stomach problems).
It´s been getting colder. Some sign said it was a high of 6 degrees. I went out and bought a scarf just now because I´m going to be down south for a while. Some other observations, Argentina is one of the cleanest countries I´ve ever visited, kinda like Toronto used to be... The LP says that the Patagonian wilderness is supposed to be amazing, but to me it´s not that different from say the altiplano in Peru or even Mongolia. Actually, the only difference between here and Mongolia as far as landscape is that there are no fences in Mongolia... I haven´t seen any other extraneros (foreigners), only local Argentinian tourists. That´s okay, it´s better for my spanish. Mostly I´m understanding, except some locals talk with such a thick accent I have no idea, just nod my head and say I don´t understand. Which doesn´t seem to perturb them, they just keep on talking... The biggest thing on tv today (I had some time to kill in the bus station) was a big debate on whether Diego Maradona and his wife (?) were going through a bad time. This would be like Canadians debating whether Gretzky is appearing in too many commercials. (well, I guess we do debate that)... Lotsa people have cell phones here, and there´s a lot of DirectTV dishes. It looks like the whole country skipped the wire phase and moved straight to wireless.
Well anyways, tomorrow I´m off to the Moreno glacier. The LP says it´s one of the top two sights in South America, but I´ll reserve my opinion. It´s up against some pretty stiff competition on this continent.
So I forgot to give the BMC update from Argentina last time. (For those of you who are new, every time I go to a new country I look up the price of a Big Mac Combo. There was some economic theory that says you can tell how expensive a country is by how many hours it takes someone to work in order earn enough money to buy a loaf of bread. Well, my newer theory is that you can do the same thing by figuring out the price of a BMC in the equivalent US$. A while ago some economist actually published something along these lines, and won the Noble prize for economics or something (well I know they were published at least). So far the cheapest has been El Salvador at something like $2.30 US. The most expensive is Europe, almost $10). So anyways, here it´s $3.99. I didn´t actually have anything there, so I didn´t get to test my other theory which is that one of the universal phrases is ´Big Mac combo with Coke´ (I only eat at McDonald´s when I´m travelling if I´m having stomach problems).
It´s been getting colder. Some sign said it was a high of 6 degrees. I went out and bought a scarf just now because I´m going to be down south for a while. Some other observations, Argentina is one of the cleanest countries I´ve ever visited, kinda like Toronto used to be... The LP says that the Patagonian wilderness is supposed to be amazing, but to me it´s not that different from say the altiplano in Peru or even Mongolia. Actually, the only difference between here and Mongolia as far as landscape is that there are no fences in Mongolia... I haven´t seen any other extraneros (foreigners), only local Argentinian tourists. That´s okay, it´s better for my spanish. Mostly I´m understanding, except some locals talk with such a thick accent I have no idea, just nod my head and say I don´t understand. Which doesn´t seem to perturb them, they just keep on talking... The biggest thing on tv today (I had some time to kill in the bus station) was a big debate on whether Diego Maradona and his wife (?) were going through a bad time. This would be like Canadians debating whether Gretzky is appearing in too many commercials. (well, I guess we do debate that)... Lotsa people have cell phones here, and there´s a lot of DirectTV dishes. It looks like the whole country skipped the wire phase and moved straight to wireless.
Well anyways, tomorrow I´m off to the Moreno glacier. The LP says it´s one of the top two sights in South America, but I´ll reserve my opinion. It´s up against some pretty stiff competition on this continent.
Tuesday, September 26, 2000
Puerto Madryn, Argentina
Well here I am in Argentina. I flew into Buenos Aires, arriving not so awake on Saturday morning. I managed to get myself to Florencio Varela, (about an hour outside of BA) which is where my friend Kirsty now lives. Some of you may remember her from my trip to Mongolia that we had about an adventure a day. Anyways, she now teaches english in Argentina. So we met up after 3 years, but it didn´t really seem like 3 years. She has latin dance classes every Sat., so I went along. It must have because I was so tired that I couldn´t catch on. (must have been). I looked quite the fool. Later that night we went for dinner at the house of the guy who runs the school. His family was very friendly, and I managed to half understand the conversation (it was in spanish mostly). Much later that night we went out dancing. People here only go out around 2:00 am, even that is a bit early. We got home around 6:30.
The next day me & Kirsty and one of her friends explored around BA, saw some tango in the streets, tried to see Eva Peron´s grave but it was closed for the day, then I took off by bus south. I ended up in Puerto Madryn (where I am now), which is probably too small to be on most maps but it´s just outside Peninsula Valdes. The peninsula is a reserve, where today I went to see right whales, elephant seals and sea lions. The right whales were huge! We went out in a boat into the bay, and then they cut the engines and we just floated. Some of the whales came right up to the boat and swam under it. They were bigger than the boat I think. Took lotsa pictures. Maybe some will turn out. Then after we saw where the elephant seals were nesting (?), there were two born while we were there.
It´s much warmer here in Pto. Madryn than in BA, I think it went up to 19.3 degrees today. (well, that´s what the sign said anyways). In BA I thought I was going to freeze to death, but I guess I can always buy winter stuff. The spanish here is weird too. The double ll, which is pronounced as a ´y´ everywhere else, is ´sh´. On the plane over, the flight attendant asked me if I wanted carne or posho for dinner, and because I had no idea at the time what posho was, took the meat. Only later I found out she was trying to say pollo, which is one of the first words you learn travelling in latin america (it means chicken). But for a while I thought that my spanish had really deteriorated because I had no idea what posho was. But today I managed to do okay again, I´m starting to understand people when they speak which I could never do before (unless in context).
It´s also pretty cosmopolitan over here, I have no idea who is a tourist and who´s local. There´s a lot of mixed european backgrounds.
So tomorrow I´m headed for eventually El Calafate, which is near the Moreno Glacier near the border of Chile.
Well hope everything is okay over there. I saw that Canada now has something like 9 bronze, which ranks us 26th? Go Canada!
The next day me & Kirsty and one of her friends explored around BA, saw some tango in the streets, tried to see Eva Peron´s grave but it was closed for the day, then I took off by bus south. I ended up in Puerto Madryn (where I am now), which is probably too small to be on most maps but it´s just outside Peninsula Valdes. The peninsula is a reserve, where today I went to see right whales, elephant seals and sea lions. The right whales were huge! We went out in a boat into the bay, and then they cut the engines and we just floated. Some of the whales came right up to the boat and swam under it. They were bigger than the boat I think. Took lotsa pictures. Maybe some will turn out. Then after we saw where the elephant seals were nesting (?), there were two born while we were there.
It´s much warmer here in Pto. Madryn than in BA, I think it went up to 19.3 degrees today. (well, that´s what the sign said anyways). In BA I thought I was going to freeze to death, but I guess I can always buy winter stuff. The spanish here is weird too. The double ll, which is pronounced as a ´y´ everywhere else, is ´sh´. On the plane over, the flight attendant asked me if I wanted carne or posho for dinner, and because I had no idea at the time what posho was, took the meat. Only later I found out she was trying to say pollo, which is one of the first words you learn travelling in latin america (it means chicken). But for a while I thought that my spanish had really deteriorated because I had no idea what posho was. But today I managed to do okay again, I´m starting to understand people when they speak which I could never do before (unless in context).
It´s also pretty cosmopolitan over here, I have no idea who is a tourist and who´s local. There´s a lot of mixed european backgrounds.
So tomorrow I´m headed for eventually El Calafate, which is near the Moreno Glacier near the border of Chile.
Well hope everything is okay over there. I saw that Canada now has something like 9 bronze, which ranks us 26th? Go Canada!
Sunday, January 02, 2000
Eric D'Souza's Top 100
- Machu Picchu (Cuzco, Peru)
- Bagan (Bagan, Myanmar)
- Angkor Wat (Siem Reap, Cambodia)
- Moai (Easter Island, Chile)
- Monastery (Petra, Jordan)
- Tikal (Flores, Guatemala)
- Perito Moreno Glacier (El Calafate, Argentina)
- Erta Ale (Ethiopia)
- Mountain Gorillas (Ruhengeri, Rwanda)
- Great Mosque (Djenne, Mali)
- Angel Falls (Venezuela)
- Abuna Yemata Guh (Tigray, Ethiopia)
- Great Wall (Simatai, China)
- Taktshang Goemba / Tiger's Nest Monastery (outside Paro, Bhutan)
- Palenque (Mexico)
- Shwedagon Pagoda (Yangon, Myanmar)
- Borobudur (Indonesia)
- Salar de Uyuni (Boliva)
- Potala Palace (Lhasa, China)
- Laguna Verde (Bolivia)
- Punakha Dzong (Punakha, Bhutan)
- Oval Plaza (Jerash, Jordan)
- Bete Giyorgis / Church of Saint George (Lalibela, Ethiopia)
- al-Siq (Petra, Jordan)
- Tanneries (Fez, Morocco)
- Iguazu Falls (Brasil and Argentina)
- Friendship Highway at "roof of the world" 5150m (Tibet to Nepal)
- Salt mining in Lac Assale (Lac Assale, Ethiopia)
- Swayambunath at dawn (Kathmandu, Nepal)
- Hermitage Museum (St Petersburg, Russia)
- Terracotta Army (Xi'an, China)
- Great Pyramid (Giza, Egypt)
- Recumbent Buddha in Gal Vihara (Polonnaruwa, Sri Lanka)
- Jomsom Trek at Muktinath (Muktinath, Nepal)
- Khongoryn Els sand dunes (Gobi Desert, Mongolia)
- Plains of the Serengeti (Tanzania)
- Las Torres (Torres del Paine National Park, Chile)
- Sunset in Mazatlan (Mazatlan, Mexico)
- Galapagos Islands (Ecuador)
- Taj Mahal (Agra, India)
- Cathedral of the Resurrection of Christ (St Petersburg, Russia)
- Prambanan Temples (Indonesia)
- Acropolis (Athens, Greece)
- Volubilis (outside Meknes, Morocco)
- St Basil's Cathedral (Moscow, Russia)
- Stonehenge (Amesbury, England)
- Nazca Lines (Nazca, Peru)
- View of La Paz from the altiplano (La Paz, Bolivia)
- Las Lajas Sanctuary (Ipiales, Colombia)
- Wailing Wall (Jerusalem, Israel)
- Convento de Cristo (Tomar, Portugal)
- Copan (Copan Ruinas, Honduras)
- Geiser del Tatio (Chile)
- Royal Palace (Luang Prabang, Lao)
- Ngorongoro Crater (Tanzania)
- Deer Cave (Mulu, Malaysia)
- The Kremlin (Moscow, Russia)
- Snorkeling with Whale Sharks (Djibouti City, Djibouti)
- Victoria Falls (Zambia, Zimbabwe)
- Bayanzag (Gobi Desert, Mongolia)
- Teotihuacan (Mexico City, Mexico)
- Valle de la Luna (Atacama Desert, Chile)
- Church of St Stephen (Umm ar-Rasas, Jordan)
- Forbidden City (Beijing, China)
- Wat Pho (Bangkok, Thailand)
- Panama Canal (Panama City, Panama)
- Chichen Itza (Mexico)
- Trollfjord (Lofoten, Norway)
- Leaning Tower of PIsa (Pisa, Italy)
Thursday, November 06, 1997
Pokhara, Nepal
Hey Everyone,
How's it going? Well, I survived the kayaking and I'm now back in Kathrnandu.
The kayak course started on the lake beside Pokhara. There were 12 of us in the course, all of us beginners. The first day was pretty sad to watch, we just had to paddle across to a beach, but everyone was going in circles and a couple people flipped. Then we tried to learn how to roll, another sad sight to watch, although one person did get it that first day.
The next four days were spent on the Seti River, an excellent place to learn. It starts out with smaller rapids (Class l & 2) and the water gets bigger until the last day where there's a Class 4. I spent the first two days on the river very frustrated cause I couldn't roll and almost everyone else was learning it, but on day 3 in the river, I finally figured it out and was very happy. I didn't flip the last two days either, and made it through the Class 4! I hugged a rock and then got turned by the eddy line behind it into a 3 metre hole, but made it. (We learnt some lingo too) It was pretty funny on some of the rapids, one of them we called Carnage City cause about 10 of us flipped, and after the rapid, all I could see were upside kayaks and paddles and people swimming about. It was way more fun than rafting, and way more team building too, cause everyone was cheering everyone else trying to learn stuff. We were all surprised at how quickly we progressed. I still can't roll in white water though, but I'm definitely addicted.
The take out was half way between Pokhara and Kathmandu, so I came here directly. We all got to sit on the top of the bus for four hours (and only l50km) and the views were amazing of the Kathmandu Valley.
So now I'm relaxing in Kathmandu, sorting out kayaking bruises / sore muscles, waiting for Marisa (from Canada) to arrive (she gets here on the l0th) and then we'll be traveling together for 5 weeks and returning home for Christmas.
Toilet Update:
When rafting, had a dug out hole, squatting only. Also used the helmet-on-the-paddle signal, if the helmet was on the paddle, the toilet was available. The easiest way to remember if helmet meant available or not (as our guide explained) was that you put the helmet on to use the toilet. Well, it was funny at the time.
Well, see most of you at Christmas.
Love Eric
How's it going? Well, I survived the kayaking and I'm now back in Kathrnandu.
The kayak course started on the lake beside Pokhara. There were 12 of us in the course, all of us beginners. The first day was pretty sad to watch, we just had to paddle across to a beach, but everyone was going in circles and a couple people flipped. Then we tried to learn how to roll, another sad sight to watch, although one person did get it that first day.
The next four days were spent on the Seti River, an excellent place to learn. It starts out with smaller rapids (Class l & 2) and the water gets bigger until the last day where there's a Class 4. I spent the first two days on the river very frustrated cause I couldn't roll and almost everyone else was learning it, but on day 3 in the river, I finally figured it out and was very happy. I didn't flip the last two days either, and made it through the Class 4! I hugged a rock and then got turned by the eddy line behind it into a 3 metre hole, but made it. (We learnt some lingo too) It was pretty funny on some of the rapids, one of them we called Carnage City cause about 10 of us flipped, and after the rapid, all I could see were upside kayaks and paddles and people swimming about. It was way more fun than rafting, and way more team building too, cause everyone was cheering everyone else trying to learn stuff. We were all surprised at how quickly we progressed. I still can't roll in white water though, but I'm definitely addicted.
The take out was half way between Pokhara and Kathmandu, so I came here directly. We all got to sit on the top of the bus for four hours (and only l50km) and the views were amazing of the Kathmandu Valley.
So now I'm relaxing in Kathmandu, sorting out kayaking bruises / sore muscles, waiting for Marisa (from Canada) to arrive (she gets here on the l0th) and then we'll be traveling together for 5 weeks and returning home for Christmas.
Toilet Update:
When rafting, had a dug out hole, squatting only. Also used the helmet-on-the-paddle signal, if the helmet was on the paddle, the toilet was available. The easiest way to remember if helmet meant available or not (as our guide explained) was that you put the helmet on to use the toilet. Well, it was funny at the time.
Well, see most of you at Christmas.
Love Eric
Wednesday, October 29, 1997
Pokhara, Nepal
Hey Everyone,
How's it going? Well, after 3 months, I'm now on my own, Gerry left to go on a 12 day trek yesterday.
When we got to Kathmandu, we decided to rest for a while, cause after China, it felt like a vacation. We could order food in english, listen to Bob Marley and Sting (everywhere I've been, local bar and restaurant owners seem to think that that's all we like), eat western food (although we did stick to local stuff). So for 5 days we did nothing but stand in lines for visa extensions, trekking permits, relax.
After Kathmandu, we came here to Pokhara for a 5 day raft trip down the Kali Gandaki. The rafting started out like a jeep trip in Mongolia, The first day, about 10 minutes down the river, the supply raft wrapped itself around a rock, It took us three hours to get it free, half of the people on the trip had to go to across the river with a rope to help pull it free, Then maybe another 100 metres down, the frame popped of the supply raft (l guess weakened from being stuck in the rapids) and so some of our supplies started floating down the river.
All of us were down river from this accident, so all we saw were tomatoes and other stuff (fortunately no beer) floating by us, not a good sign. Also all the eggs were lost (and they were all stored in the same raft...). By the time this was straightened out, it was dark, so we set up camp in the dark, probably 250m from where we had put in that morning, I figured all we needed now to complete the day was rain, it rained. Then me and Gerry made the mistake of telling everyone our Mongolia trip, so then we were blamed as being bad luck, (even though me and Gerry knew that it was the other people on the Mongolia trip who were bad luck.) But the next day more supplies were sent down, we got a new supply raft driver (?) and everything was fine after that.
The 4th day was pretty calm on the river, so I got to try kayaking for a couple hours. It was way fun, I got addicted, so now I'm doing a kayak trip from Nov 1 - 5. The first day is on a lake where we learn stuff, then we head down the Seti River. On the last day there's Class 3s, that should be fun.
On the 5th day we had a couple Class 4+'s, ours was the only raft to go over. This was after the night before when we bragged that we were the only raft (out of 4 on the trip) not to have any swimmers yet. We called our raft Mr. Wolf, cleaning up after everyone's messes, Then we flipped. Oh well.
A couple days ago I climbed up Sarangkot (about 1800m) to stay the night, cause it hs amazing views of the Annapurnas (mountain range) and of Pokhara by sunset and sunrise. It was the only cloudy morning I‘ve seen here so far. Coincidence? I'll tell you about coincidence. Gerry carried around a set of darts for 3 months from Germany to here, and finally decided to get rid of them in Kathmandu, cause we had used them exactly zero times. The next day here in Pokhara we found a bar with a really nice dart board.
Oh yeah, before I came to Nepal, I knew nothing about it, I figured I'd just do a trek or two. Now I’ll be here for around 45 days, and do everything but trek.
I need sports news! How are the Leafs doing? Better than Montreal?
How are the Raptors doing? Did Chicago keep their team together for another season?
Big Mac Combo Update:
None here. No chains at all of any kind (except DHL express)
Anyways, I'm just hanging out here for a couple days until my kayaking begins. Life's rough.
Love Eric (or Eric)
How's it going? Well, after 3 months, I'm now on my own, Gerry left to go on a 12 day trek yesterday.
When we got to Kathmandu, we decided to rest for a while, cause after China, it felt like a vacation. We could order food in english, listen to Bob Marley and Sting (everywhere I've been, local bar and restaurant owners seem to think that that's all we like), eat western food (although we did stick to local stuff). So for 5 days we did nothing but stand in lines for visa extensions, trekking permits, relax.
After Kathmandu, we came here to Pokhara for a 5 day raft trip down the Kali Gandaki. The rafting started out like a jeep trip in Mongolia, The first day, about 10 minutes down the river, the supply raft wrapped itself around a rock, It took us three hours to get it free, half of the people on the trip had to go to across the river with a rope to help pull it free, Then maybe another 100 metres down, the frame popped of the supply raft (l guess weakened from being stuck in the rapids) and so some of our supplies started floating down the river.
All of us were down river from this accident, so all we saw were tomatoes and other stuff (fortunately no beer) floating by us, not a good sign. Also all the eggs were lost (and they were all stored in the same raft...). By the time this was straightened out, it was dark, so we set up camp in the dark, probably 250m from where we had put in that morning, I figured all we needed now to complete the day was rain, it rained. Then me and Gerry made the mistake of telling everyone our Mongolia trip, so then we were blamed as being bad luck, (even though me and Gerry knew that it was the other people on the Mongolia trip who were bad luck.) But the next day more supplies were sent down, we got a new supply raft driver (?) and everything was fine after that.
The 4th day was pretty calm on the river, so I got to try kayaking for a couple hours. It was way fun, I got addicted, so now I'm doing a kayak trip from Nov 1 - 5. The first day is on a lake where we learn stuff, then we head down the Seti River. On the last day there's Class 3s, that should be fun.
On the 5th day we had a couple Class 4+'s, ours was the only raft to go over. This was after the night before when we bragged that we were the only raft (out of 4 on the trip) not to have any swimmers yet. We called our raft Mr. Wolf, cleaning up after everyone's messes, Then we flipped. Oh well.
A couple days ago I climbed up Sarangkot (about 1800m) to stay the night, cause it hs amazing views of the Annapurnas (mountain range) and of Pokhara by sunset and sunrise. It was the only cloudy morning I‘ve seen here so far. Coincidence? I'll tell you about coincidence. Gerry carried around a set of darts for 3 months from Germany to here, and finally decided to get rid of them in Kathmandu, cause we had used them exactly zero times. The next day here in Pokhara we found a bar with a really nice dart board.
Oh yeah, before I came to Nepal, I knew nothing about it, I figured I'd just do a trek or two. Now I’ll be here for around 45 days, and do everything but trek.
I need sports news! How are the Leafs doing? Better than Montreal?
How are the Raptors doing? Did Chicago keep their team together for another season?
Big Mac Combo Update:
None here. No chains at all of any kind (except DHL express)
Anyways, I'm just hanging out here for a couple days until my kayaking begins. Life's rough.
Love Eric (or Eric)
Tuesday, October 14, 1997
Kathmandu, Nepal
Hey everyone,
So Kathmandu is nothing like I expected. I thought it was cold and there was nothing to do but trek, but it's amazing! In Kathmandu it goes up to about 25 C (that's about high 70s for you non-metric people) in the day. There's white water rafting (we're going on a 6 day trip soon), elephant safaris, cool villages and markets. Also trekking. I could spend months here.
We seem to be giving the impression that all we do is drink. Some of you may be wondering why we just didn't stay home and do a round-the-world tour at Milwaukee's (that's a bar in Toronto that has about 150 beers from around the world). So in this message we won't mention beer anymore.
Later today we're going to a slide presentation from one of the Rafting companies. Normally we wouldn't go to boring slide shows, but they're serving unlimited rum and cokes. It should be good. Yesterday we went to a similar one from a different company, also cause they gave away free rum and cokes.
Hmm, I could use a BEvERage.
Last we wrote were in Shanghai. Life's been fairly uneventful since then, no major accidents, no one's got lost or missed trains. We've even been fairly regular. After Shanghai, we wanted to take a boat cruise to HongKong, but that service has been cancelled. (so we took a train). Then, in HongKong (China), we went to a Chinese embassy to get a visa to enter a country we were already in. Does this make any sense? Cost us 30 bucks too. HongKong hasn't really changed much since I was there last (2 years ago), but then that's only from a tourist view. One resident we met said the only thing that's changed is the colour of the mailboxes.
Next we went to Macau. We thought we would go in the middle of the week cause it's not as busy (read cheaper), we managed to hit China National Day and so it was busier than ever. We really liked Macau though. It's much more European than HongKong. Also good cheap red wine (imported from Portugal). We did the tourist thing and went to a casino, Gerry lost, I won.
Then we wanted to take a boat on our way to Yanghuo via Guangzhou, but that's been discontinued as well. So we took a bus. Then a boat. Then a bus. Ended up in Yanshuo at about 3:00am. All the hotels were booked up, there was a group of 8 people outside a bar, who were going to stay up till 11:00 hoping to get a room in the morning (they had arrived shortly before us). We decided to do the same, so spent the next 8 hours in delightful conversation. At 11:00 we got a room (don't read into that), slept a bit. Then we got up, went to the same place and had some more delightful conversation. We didn't really like the town cause there were far too many tour bus groups there (Gerry's impression of a tour group person 'Hey Frank, didja see this over here' (read it in a slow drawl)). So we got the next available train out (had to wait a day).
Three buses, a train and 48 hours later we were in Chengdu. The only reason people go to Chengdu is to fly to Lhasa (in Tibet) However, we really like the place.
So then we were in Lhasa, courtesy of China Southwest Airlines (anyone know if I can use that for Aerolplan?) (I may just send them the flight coupon to mess them up). A really good flight, new plane, even got served an in-flight meal and got english newspapers! Lhasa is the home of the Tibetan monks, or what's left of them after China liberated Tibet (that's the Chinese official description) (we would use other verbs). Our major reason to go there (to the disappointment of many other people we met) was to the do the 'once-in-a-lifetime' (LP description) Lhasa to Kathmandu crossing by land. We did see the major sights in Lhasa, then started the 3 day journey by bus to Kathmandu.
The crossing was pretty cool. We did get altitude sickness, cause we had flown in from pretty much sea level, and the crossing reaches 5200 metres at its maximum. But after the pass, it's almost a straight drop down to 500 metres in Kathmandu. That part was cool. We did get our cheapest room yet the second night of the trip, 10 yuan ($1.25 US) for a double, and it wasn't too bad.
So in Kathmandu, we ran into Eileen and Kirsty (you may remember them from our little adventures on the jeep trip in Mongolia). They have a much better story of their Lhasa-Kathmandu crossing, their driver was a litle careless/dangerous, and managed to roll the vehicle off a 20m drop (and rolled it six times). Fortunately no one was seriously hurt, although one passenger had to be taken to a hospital. We thought about doing the rafting trip with them, but we're not sure if we should wait until we up our insurance policies.
BigMac Combo research:
HongKong 17.30 HKD, 5.6 HKD = $1 US
Macau Never visited one.
We'll let someone else do the math, apparently (as pointed out by Roach) our math skills have deteriorated (I hear delightful conversation kills brain cells).
Toilet Update:
We're still regular.
That's about it, now we're off to have some delightful conversation.
Love Eric and Gerry (or Gerry and Eric)
So Kathmandu is nothing like I expected. I thought it was cold and there was nothing to do but trek, but it's amazing! In Kathmandu it goes up to about 25 C (that's about high 70s for you non-metric people) in the day. There's white water rafting (we're going on a 6 day trip soon), elephant safaris, cool villages and markets. Also trekking. I could spend months here.
We seem to be giving the impression that all we do is drink. Some of you may be wondering why we just didn't stay home and do a round-the-world tour at Milwaukee's (that's a bar in Toronto that has about 150 beers from around the world). So in this message we won't mention beer anymore.
Later today we're going to a slide presentation from one of the Rafting companies. Normally we wouldn't go to boring slide shows, but they're serving unlimited rum and cokes. It should be good. Yesterday we went to a similar one from a different company, also cause they gave away free rum and cokes.
Hmm, I could use a BEvERage.
Last we wrote were in Shanghai. Life's been fairly uneventful since then, no major accidents, no one's got lost or missed trains. We've even been fairly regular. After Shanghai, we wanted to take a boat cruise to HongKong, but that service has been cancelled. (so we took a train). Then, in HongKong (China), we went to a Chinese embassy to get a visa to enter a country we were already in. Does this make any sense? Cost us 30 bucks too. HongKong hasn't really changed much since I was there last (2 years ago), but then that's only from a tourist view. One resident we met said the only thing that's changed is the colour of the mailboxes.
Next we went to Macau. We thought we would go in the middle of the week cause it's not as busy (read cheaper), we managed to hit China National Day and so it was busier than ever. We really liked Macau though. It's much more European than HongKong. Also good cheap red wine (imported from Portugal). We did the tourist thing and went to a casino, Gerry lost, I won.
Then we wanted to take a boat on our way to Yanghuo via Guangzhou, but that's been discontinued as well. So we took a bus. Then a boat. Then a bus. Ended up in Yanshuo at about 3:00am. All the hotels were booked up, there was a group of 8 people outside a bar, who were going to stay up till 11:00 hoping to get a room in the morning (they had arrived shortly before us). We decided to do the same, so spent the next 8 hours in delightful conversation. At 11:00 we got a room (don't read into that), slept a bit. Then we got up, went to the same place and had some more delightful conversation. We didn't really like the town cause there were far too many tour bus groups there (Gerry's impression of a tour group person 'Hey Frank, didja see this over here' (read it in a slow drawl)). So we got the next available train out (had to wait a day).
Three buses, a train and 48 hours later we were in Chengdu. The only reason people go to Chengdu is to fly to Lhasa (in Tibet) However, we really like the place.
So then we were in Lhasa, courtesy of China Southwest Airlines (anyone know if I can use that for Aerolplan?) (I may just send them the flight coupon to mess them up). A really good flight, new plane, even got served an in-flight meal and got english newspapers! Lhasa is the home of the Tibetan monks, or what's left of them after China liberated Tibet (that's the Chinese official description) (we would use other verbs). Our major reason to go there (to the disappointment of many other people we met) was to the do the 'once-in-a-lifetime' (LP description) Lhasa to Kathmandu crossing by land. We did see the major sights in Lhasa, then started the 3 day journey by bus to Kathmandu.
The crossing was pretty cool. We did get altitude sickness, cause we had flown in from pretty much sea level, and the crossing reaches 5200 metres at its maximum. But after the pass, it's almost a straight drop down to 500 metres in Kathmandu. That part was cool. We did get our cheapest room yet the second night of the trip, 10 yuan ($1.25 US) for a double, and it wasn't too bad.
So in Kathmandu, we ran into Eileen and Kirsty (you may remember them from our little adventures on the jeep trip in Mongolia). They have a much better story of their Lhasa-Kathmandu crossing, their driver was a litle careless/dangerous, and managed to roll the vehicle off a 20m drop (and rolled it six times). Fortunately no one was seriously hurt, although one passenger had to be taken to a hospital. We thought about doing the rafting trip with them, but we're not sure if we should wait until we up our insurance policies.
BigMac Combo research:
HongKong 17.30 HKD, 5.6 HKD = $1 US
Macau Never visited one.
We'll let someone else do the math, apparently (as pointed out by Roach) our math skills have deteriorated (I hear delightful conversation kills brain cells).
Toilet Update:
We're still regular.
That's about it, now we're off to have some delightful conversation.
Love Eric and Gerry (or Gerry and Eric)
Wednesday, September 17, 1997
Beijing, China
Hey everyone,
How's it going? We are now in Beijing, having crossed by train into China about 4 days ago. It was pretty neat, we took local trains (as opposed to one international train that most travellers take) and so got to stop in a couple towns that probably have never seen tourists before. Got to learn to count to ten (in Chinese, we know how to count to ten in English, we're math majors) in some restaurant with the whole family helping out. Gave them a Canadian flag pin for that...
So today we just got back from the Great Wall. We camped there over night, at Simitai (about 3 hours from Beijing). It was way cool, first we had to climb up the wall, it's in a non-touristy condition, so quite dangerous in parts (climbing up 75 degree slopes with a tent on your back ain't easy...) but well worth the effort. After about 2 or so hours, we reached the tower that we camped in along with 5 other people we had met in the hostel earlier. It was amazing, as the sun set in the west the moon was rising in the east, I couldn't decide which way to look... as if that wasn't enough, a gentle cloud cover passed in front of the moon. It's enough to give a guy inner peace, and I haven't even got to Nepal yet.
After mastering the Cyrillic script, we are now onto Chinese characters. We know about 10? so far, at this rate by the year 2013 we will know enough to read a newspaper.
So back to Mongolia for a sec... It appears that we only talked about the problems we had on our trip. Lotsa good stuff happened too:
Mongolians are amazingly polite and curious and helpful. (There's no thesaurus on this thing). I think it's cause the borders have just recently been open to tourism, and so we're the first wave. (Sullying the place up for future travellers.) We went to sand dunes in the Gobi over 100m high, and the edges on them were perfectly crisp... unlike some that I went to in Chile, which were amazing in themselves, but there was major evidence that you weren't the first one there... Our guide even took us to a Ulaan Baatar disco after our trip (everyone was watching us as the official dance gurus cause we were from the west, (and Gerry's from Strathroy, Ontario for crying out loud))
Local Customs (Mongolia):
- Drinking fermented milk of various milk-producing animals (camel, horse, mare, goat, sheep...) I kinda liked it after a while, Gerry got gas
- Living in Gers... as nomadic people they move around a lot and so live in portable tent-like things that they can move in about 7 hours. (as former co-op students we can appreciate this)
- Brewing home-made vodka... first round of which each person must skull (that means drink it all for you non-Aussies) an entire glass. This one we're bringing home
Toilet Update: (Mongolia)
- Gerry writes 'In the open air baby... well for 8 days at least' Otherwise it's a mix of fully functional toilets, toilets placed over holes in the ground, or just holes in the ground. But the toilet paper has improved immensely from Russia. (quite impressive for a country with few functional toilets.)
See you soon from Xi'an (that's in China)
Love Eric and Gerry (or Gerry and Eric)
How's it going? We are now in Beijing, having crossed by train into China about 4 days ago. It was pretty neat, we took local trains (as opposed to one international train that most travellers take) and so got to stop in a couple towns that probably have never seen tourists before. Got to learn to count to ten (in Chinese, we know how to count to ten in English, we're math majors) in some restaurant with the whole family helping out. Gave them a Canadian flag pin for that...
So today we just got back from the Great Wall. We camped there over night, at Simitai (about 3 hours from Beijing). It was way cool, first we had to climb up the wall, it's in a non-touristy condition, so quite dangerous in parts (climbing up 75 degree slopes with a tent on your back ain't easy...) but well worth the effort. After about 2 or so hours, we reached the tower that we camped in along with 5 other people we had met in the hostel earlier. It was amazing, as the sun set in the west the moon was rising in the east, I couldn't decide which way to look... as if that wasn't enough, a gentle cloud cover passed in front of the moon. It's enough to give a guy inner peace, and I haven't even got to Nepal yet.
After mastering the Cyrillic script, we are now onto Chinese characters. We know about 10? so far, at this rate by the year 2013 we will know enough to read a newspaper.
So back to Mongolia for a sec... It appears that we only talked about the problems we had on our trip. Lotsa good stuff happened too:
Mongolians are amazingly polite and curious and helpful. (There's no thesaurus on this thing). I think it's cause the borders have just recently been open to tourism, and so we're the first wave. (Sullying the place up for future travellers.) We went to sand dunes in the Gobi over 100m high, and the edges on them were perfectly crisp... unlike some that I went to in Chile, which were amazing in themselves, but there was major evidence that you weren't the first one there... Our guide even took us to a Ulaan Baatar disco after our trip (everyone was watching us as the official dance gurus cause we were from the west, (and Gerry's from Strathroy, Ontario for crying out loud))
Local Customs (Mongolia):
- Drinking fermented milk of various milk-producing animals (camel, horse, mare, goat, sheep...) I kinda liked it after a while, Gerry got gas
- Living in Gers... as nomadic people they move around a lot and so live in portable tent-like things that they can move in about 7 hours. (as former co-op students we can appreciate this)
- Brewing home-made vodka... first round of which each person must skull (that means drink it all for you non-Aussies) an entire glass. This one we're bringing home
Toilet Update: (Mongolia)
- Gerry writes 'In the open air baby... well for 8 days at least' Otherwise it's a mix of fully functional toilets, toilets placed over holes in the ground, or just holes in the ground. But the toilet paper has improved immensely from Russia. (quite impressive for a country with few functional toilets.)
See you soon from Xi'an (that's in China)
Love Eric and Gerry (or Gerry and Eric)
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