Go West! Adventures of a Mario in South America

And so it ends, as it began

2008-06-24T17:37:00.002+01:00

I felt the need to write a concluding post on the old blog though whoever was reading it will most likely definitely not read it after I have returned from the journey it was supposed to chronicle. I hvae come nack to the homeland now and my wanderlust has been sated for the moment. Real life has recommenced unfortunately but new things await me and I no longer have to make sure I "have space" for an object I wish to possess. This is probably going to be a bit like a museum piece now but I think I'll leave it up in case I forget where I was for the last 4 months. Maybe I should write things like this more often :).

That's it, go home.

New York, New York!

2008-06-16T01:12:00.002+01:00

I haven't posted since we got here unfortunately because now I think I've forgotten a lot of the nice things I'd noticed. We're staying in a really lovely part of Harlem in a house where if you put a penny on the ground it rolls rather quickly towards the wall. In all seriousness though it's really lovely, relatively inexpensive (New York accommodation is *very* expensive last minute), quiet and with lots of natural light which I love. There's computer in each room too which is very handy for the laptopless traveller. The pic on the frontpage is of the room I'm in right now. It's lovely. It is called MichaelNY . I could even learn English here if I wanted, how useful :). So we've done some touristy things, walked around Central Park in which Padraig got some good pics for his steps series, went to the MoMA which is really interesting and I think one of the best modern art museums I've been to, tried to get to South Ferry to get the Staten Island ferry to see old Lady Liberty but were thwarted, went to a huge M&Ms shop with every kind of merchandise imaginable, saw some sealions do tricks at the aquarium, went on the boardwalk at Coney Island, had numerous pints in various Irish pubs, saw the Rockefeller centre ice rink covered in tables and marquees, peered at the city from the Empire State Building, went on the Subway at 3 a.m and didn't get mugged, had some lovely icecream in Madison square park, saw the giant Piano in FAO Schwarz and the suicidal Lego people in the nearby lego diorama of New York, ate some beautiful Carribbean, Japanese, French and Chinese food and pizza within days, went to Chinatown, hung out in the Dominican community in Spanish Harlem (well with our Irish friends and their new roommate from L.A), drank some mate and sake with the lads, got peanutbutter M&Ms, saw Carmina Burana at Carnegie Hall, cheap food, cheap drink. Fantastic. So there ends my little summary of the past few days. This could be the last post I make in the blog. I hope not, I'm sure I'm missing something. In short I really like New York, you can truly do anything here at any time of day. Maybe I should live here too :). Til next time! I'm gonna put up some new pics too.

Somewhere in the atmosphere above Northern Argentina

2008-06-16T01:09:00.000+01:00

This post is from a programme originally broadcast on the ninth of this month.

We are experiencing rather serious turbulence and some passangers behind me are giving me an earache giving out to people standing up who probably need to go to the toilet -the turbulence is going to last an hour, it's understandable some of us may need to void our bladders - the captain said it was ok. Maybe it's just the tone I dislike, anyway she was pissing me off. Really I was pissed off already because of all the questions we had to go through at Buenos Aires airport and the bag checks that and the fact that the entry form to the U.S makes you sign something which waives your right to appeal deportation for any reason that the immigration officer things is reasonable. Why not just put up mile high metal fences if you don't want people coming into your country. Ah I'm probably being a little harsh but ever since we got mugged on Friday I've been a little on edge and annoyed. Foe those of you who haven't heard we were walking along in a park in , Tigre, a town famed for its peace and tranquility and frequented by old people from Buenos Aires when we were set upon by a bunch of little shits who managed to wrest my bag from me and knock over my brother. Every time some little bastards do something like this (i,e when they stole the wheels off the bike and then stole the bike - twice, broke into my house etc.) I become closer to condoning vigilante justice despite myself. Really I was most pissed off when we were waiting at the police station just about to give the statement when I realised (for a reason unknown still to me and giving me status as one of the most stupid people who has ever lived) the keys to our apartment in Buenos Aires (one hour away by a train that departs every ten minutes or so from Tigre) was in the bag that was stolen. I tried to appeal to the policeman to send someone to the apartment to keep it safe for the few minutes we'd be making the statement but he got a bit pissy and said something like, they won't go there because they know they'll be arrested. Understandable, most likely true but absolutely useless to someone who has a possibility of having all their most important possessions stolen. Anyway we asked to come back the next day and beat a hasty retreat. On returning the next day, as we were told, I was told the policeman wasn't there and that I should come back the day after.So I wasted another 3 hours of my time and became unsure if he would be there the next day even though I was told he would be. He was there the next day but wouldn't talk to us for quite a while some of whihc was spent talking to another of his colleagues and having a laugh. Rage stirred within me. In the end I got the statement I needed for the insurance but it was all rather stressful. The last while in Buenos Aires has been a bit nerve wracking between crazy taxi drivers being assholes and the mugging. Argentina has been a cruel mistress indeed but things could've been much much worse.
Jesus was unfortunately overlooked due to time wasting trying to get police statement. We hadn't actually gotten to see anything in Tigre before we got mugged either so that was a washout too and we decided not to go to Boca because it has a bad reputation for petty theft and we were feeling a bit paranoid. What we did do though was eat dulce de leche pancakes so full of butterscotch it came out the ends in huge lumps! Eat jamaican food and have large tubs of icecream delivered to our door late at night, go to a massive international art fair with an installation featuring an arcade game machine and a portrait of Jesus kissing Superman, go to one of the largest street markets I've ever seen and go to a necropolis filled with very bueatiful burial monuments and one Evita. I found Buenos Aires a very inspiring place and I hope it'll give me good ideas for the portfolio for the design course I hope to do in September.
Now, though it is goodbye to South America as we go further and further north,up to New York and back to long evenings and summertime, warmth and sunshine. I can't say I'm not looking forward to it though there are a lot of things left to do in South America, Machu Picchu, Nazca Lines, Galapagos islnads to name but a few. I hope very much I'll have the chance to do these things in the future but Ireland beckons me back once more and I couldn't say I was anything if not a homebird at heart so I welcome its damp, gren embrace :) We're off to visit a friend (my oldest friend actually at a good 19 years) and I can't wait. It'll be good to bitch about things and relate our marvellous adventures too. This ends chapter one of my round the world travel. I'm not really sure where I should go next, Asia (including Russia, or Afirca. I wish I could put a poll on this. Please post comments, your opinion is important to us! :p. Ciao muchachos, back to the anglophone world I go. Adios.

Pics - It is done

2008-05-29T20:50:00.002+01:00

Finally I have sorted and uploaded all my pictures up to the present day. 200 new ones in Rio. I've been trying to upload those for 2 months! Still some to go in Vids. Very glad to ave the lot uploaded. Now I'm gonna go through them as thoroughly as I can titling and descriptioning them before I forget what the hell they all are. This is one way of combatting my chronic amnesia like memory! In other newswe found a museum that was a restaurant and a Holy Land theme park. More to come on that with a real post later in the week. Tourism has been suspended for administrative issues (including possible fixing of suspected whiplash hopefully). Hasta luego!

New Pics

2008-05-26T15:38:00.002+01:00

Finally having a decent internet connection has done wonders for my photo album - check out the updated folders (detailed on the right). There's about 300 new ones I'd say. New ones in Buenos Aires will be put up every day. No kidding. It takes about 10 minutes for me to upload 100 pics so it's no prob.

Buenos Aires - Buenos Aires

2008-05-26T01:49:00.006+01:00

Just like New York Buenos Aires is so good they said it twice :). Well it's truly a pleasure to be out of Patagonia. Every time I see Patagonia in a travel agent's window or on the cover of a coffee table book I think to myself thank the good lord I've escaped. It's very sad really, I really enjoyed my time there until the whole fiasco wih the car and now that large ancient seabed of an expanse of nothing only reminds me of pain (physical at that!) and a sense of entrapment. Let me elaborate. The last time I wrote gentle reader I was still in Comodoro Rivadavia convalescing. You will remember there had been a volcano which caused havoc all across the country with transport etc etc so flying seemed an impossibility thus we chose to take the 24 hour bus journey instead, all well and good. Up we get to get on our bus at 8.30 in the morning only to find it a little delayed. No matter, I thought, Argentina'a a bit like Ireland like that, it'll be along within the next alf an hour. After 2 hours standing in 0 degrees I began to have second thoughts and eat the face, literally, off the drivers who were sitting in our bus eating croissants and laughing. What the fuck are they doing I asked myself!? Ire rose within me and clouded my weary brain. I was convinced that I was in the village of Prisoner fame except it was not Wales, it was Patagonia. A large village but nonetheless inescapable. You will also remember that due to an immense brush fire a month before we were unable to to go to Buenos Aires from Colonia in Uruguay. This time it was snow. All the time we spent waiting for snow so we could frolic about in the white and now the bastard was trapping us in Patagonia..Again!!! The road was cut off indefinitely. It was all a bit fushy though. We were told the road was cut off in every direction yet Comodoro was completely free of snow. The drifts rose to 60cm in some places we heard and nothing but a film of deep anger lay upon me. I fully expected a large white balloon to appear and swallow me up. Needless to say and to cut a long story short we managed to get a flight the next day having spent another considerable amount of time at the bus station and arrived in the much warmer Buenos Aires that night around midnight. It felt like a deliverance. I really felt that I had been freed. Poor Patagonia, it did nothing to deserve this harsh treatment but that's unfortunately how I felt about it at the time. I really hope I'll want to come back. The placeis really rather awesome in it's way.
So now I'm in Buenos Aires. It's really, well words escape me. It's really something! We managed to rent an apartment here which is lovely and homey and right beside Plaza de Mayo while still being a haven of peace and quiet (difficult to come by in the city). We'rea 5 minute walk from the subway too. It's great. It kind of feels like I live here. The previous place we were in was the Casita de San Telmo. This is quite a place. For one it's a beautiful house, if you read the website you'll get the details. There is also a cat that tries to invade your room but likes a good sword fight :) But the nicest thing about it is how friendly it is. We only saw the proprieter once suring our stay. It really felt like a friend had just given you the key to their house. The kind of house where everyone comes to hang out. Everyone is very friendly, always willing to have a chat and share some food or drink with oyu. It reminded me of living in student accomodation :). We met a lovely Swiss lady who had come to Buenos Aires to write a book and a very nice, interesting and cool irish guy called John. We spent some time with John in out few days in the casita and had a great time. I taught him about dulce de leche and a couple of Spanish words and he taught us about tango, gave us lots of handy advice and brought us to a great Milonga (Tango show, open to participation) where we met another interesting chap called Andrew who packed in his vegetable growing in Wales for a life of tango in Buenos Aires. If you're reading this, John, thanks for everything mate and we hope to see you in Toronto if we get the chance!Sound man as they say. Here's a link to his business website. He knows about cranes. If you're around Toronto and want a crane give him a bell!
The area we were staying in was San Telmo, very historic and ,I've realised, a source of Art Nouveau antiques!! Now, those who speak to me about art will know that I adore Art Nouveau and the prospect of owning such a thing makes my toes curl with delight. The relative cot of things is about a fifth of what it is in Ireland - I may be able to procure such an item without selling a kidney. I'm thinking of it strongly. There's loads of art nouveau architecture everywhere too. It's really great!
Today is the 25th of May as some of you who are keep up with the passage of time will know. Today is alos Argentinian independence day and so we expected the streets of the capital (and the main square) to be thronged to capacity with proud (rabid, or whichever way you look at it) Argentinians but no! The streets were empty, much quieter than a normal day. It was like the Marie Celeste in some places. Very strange. We did see a sort of variety show in the local cafe though. It reminded me of the entertainment you get on those ferries to France but there was a dance to the music of Cinema Paradiso which was really good.
I must mention ,before I go, the sculpture park we found whilst wandering along looking for something else. Giant metal lizards, cows and dinosaurs made out of bits of cars, typewriters, circuitboards, anything solid it seemed and preferably metal or plastic. There was even some giant ants climbing a telegraph pole. All the work of Carlos Regazzoni who is from Comodoro as well. If you've ever been to the town you would wonder how an artist could come out of it. It's like the Argentinian equivalent of Leitrim or something. It's also a city of knowledge we were told by a lady in the airport. Curious. Anyhow the sculpture park was completely unexpected and one of the reasons which I like Buenos Aires so much. It's very very different from Rio but I love them both in different ways. Viva Sudamérica! Hasta la vista!

Comodoro Rivadavia - Chubut

2008-05-16T20:50:00.004+01:00

The time has come to end my silence! Suitably dramatic I hope :) For those of you who haven´t heard me and my travelling companions were involved in a car crash about a week and a half ago in the middle of nowhere in Patagonia. I´m disgusted that a boy who gets knocked off his scooter and sustains no injuries except a possible punishment beating from his da gets news coverage in the local paper and we don´t. Our car is now similar(in the front at least) to one of those cars you see in a little cube in a scrap yard. The other two have put pictures up of thier injuries and all sorts but I still find that a bit disturbing so I´ll try get a pic of the car to put here (not the one with the blood on the door frame.) You may have guessed, gentle reader, from my flippant tone that none of us is seriously injured. Indeed that is true although my back is at me something terrible and makes me feel like some sort of geriatric every so often :). The other two have fashionable bent noses (but only a little, don´t get offended if you read this! :p )
Head on collision can put a bit of a damper on travel plans though and due to the temporary messed uppedness of muscles involved in carrying large objects (i.e backpacks) and those involved in any serious walking or climbing we´ll have to be a bit more sedate for the next while. I think Macchu Picchu may be off the list but we´ll see, still dore now but might have cleared up by then. For the moment we will be leaving Comodoro Rivadavia on Sunday. I can´t say I´m not glad - bad memories of stressful waits in hospitals I´d rather leave behind. Off to Buenos Aires we go. Unfortunately we´ll have to go on a bus for 24 hours because where a huge tract of fields on fire was stopping air travel before a Chilean volcano has stepped in and covered everything to the east in ash. Sometimes the wind whips up the ash and makes flying not so safe. I get the feeling someone is trying to tell us not to go there! Whoever you are - if it was you who put that 4x4 on the wrong side of the road you´re a bastard!
Having said that though we got better accommodation in the little hopital in Perito Moreno than we got in some hotels! Breakfast in bed, free transfers to the bus station, television, adjustable beds! Even free, really stong painkillers!. It was all free. God bless Argentina. The cops also sorted out te car thing completely for us, it was great. *And* they gave us tea. It´s a pity really, we were making such good progress towards weird gnome town in the north. Maybe they were warding me off!
On our way while we still had an intact car we stayed in Baja Caracoles. It´s a town of 31 inhabiatants. Yes, you read right, I didn´t miss a zero. I was wonderng why everyone looked at us funny when we got in. Seems to me now that half the population of the town was in the bar of the hotel we stayed in. Literally. God it was remote. It was at least an hour from anywhere else in any direction.
On the upside we did get to see the "Cueva de los Manos" the ancient handprints on a rock wall in an an equally ancient canyon. That was pretty cool, couldn´t get over the idea that someone just came down with an airbrush and did it in their spare time, there being a lot of it in the Patagonian wastes I imagine. Actually after that we ran out of petrol on the way to Perito Moreno too (another sign!?) but after only about half an hout of waiting a nice couple came along and sold us some. On arriving in Perito Moreno to fill up properly we discovered we´d rimmed one of the wheels and petrol was leaking from the car. So we fixed it adn it only cost about 20 euro. We met the nice couple there again anf they told us to divert off the road and head east (to where we ended up having to go anyway!) because of the volcano. After checking the news we decided o head on the way we were going anyway. "Great", we thought,"the rental agency will never know we messed up their car and we managed to escape a scary accident!" Ah if speaking too soon was a sport we´d get a gold medal. It was the next day we ran into the other car. Still lucky are we to escape with pretty minor injuries and the hospital did some excellent soup! I think I´ll leave it there for today and relate to you again my adventures when I am in the capital. Hasta lluego mi amigos!
P.S Happy Birthday Ferd! Sorry we´re late on the pressie, we´re getting our heads together now. With superglue!!

El Calafate - Santa Cruz - Argentina

2008-05-04T04:07:00.006+01:00

Perito Moreno glacier in all its glory

Well, once again I may have left too much time between posts and now will have to try to condense or dredge the memories of less than a week ago out of my befuddled mind. I think the last time I wrote was before we went on the Beagle channel. I suppose that's a good place to start then. I've also just noticed that this computer is spell checking for me as I go along. I approve. My multiple typos were a great source of chagrin to me.
So, the Beagle channel. Well it was a very fun trip and having had a very...vigorous (i.e somewhat painful) massage and been covered in a substance that smelled like deep heat we went out into the cold waters of the southern Atlantic. I admit to feeling a little like Withnail. The picture on the previous post is of a me standing on Isla Bridges, one of the stops on the trip. Having been told I looked too cheery for someone who was slowly freezing and being eroded by the rain I decided to look slightly more apt for the camera. I think I look like Geoff in this picture for those of you who know him. I'm sure he would disagree. I really felt like I was in Galway on that little boat. Freezing, raining and with fog on people's glasses. Ah, home!
It was a little boat which could fit about 10 people in it. Cheap and cheerful, cosy one would call it if it had been warmer and it was great craic. We drank beer and hot chocolate, we got to call the driver El Capitan and we lurched around on the waves trying not to spill it all. We nearly fell out while trying to take pictures of cormorants and jumping seals and one of us felt seasick :). I met a nice Danish man who'd gone kayaking in the freezing water the day before, an interesting man he was too on his way around the American continent kayaking in impossibly cold and harsh places and some nice ones. Fair dues to him. Hi, Ole if you're reading this! He's a nice man with a very red jacket :)Around the most southerly lighthouse in the world in the most southerly boat in the world with, I'm sure, the most southerly drinks in our hands. They really make a big thing of that end of the world stuff there! The Apocolypsists (sp?) would love it. Then I got off the boat and went home and we all lived happily ever after :)
We went to stay with the self proclaimed "freaky" Ana after that in her "Posada del Fin del Mundo". It's a lovely place and I recommend it to anyone - bright, warm and with a kookie proprieter. She told us about how relatives of Shackleton would stay on their way to Antarctica and of the kayaker who after paddling around the Argentinian peninsula there died on another trip from Australia to New Zealand. There was also a lovely cat and a dog and lovely books. I felt very at home :)
Ushuaia began its life as a penal colony for really bad people. So bad were they that they put them in a place where even if you did escape there's no way in hell you could get anywhere without dying or starving first. So we went on the train that the convicts used to take to go cutting down trees to build the town. It's a lot nicer now and we even had sandwiches and scones and things and took pictures of horses :) It was snowy up there too and that was where Ernesto was born. I'm glad we got to do something with the snow seeing as it's too snowy for ice climbing now. I couldn't believe that one - it's too SNOWY for climbing on ice and not snowy enough to go sledding. For chrissake! But that's for another time. So Ernesto was born but all too soon his mothers left him and he had to fend for himself. Such is the life of a snowman at the end of the world!
Continuing with the prison theme we went to visit the museum in the old prison too. It was very interesting and very large. The art there particularly enthused me, there are some pictures of it on my photo website.
And so we were to leave Ushuaia. I really liked it there but the in between season thing messed it up a bit. As far as feeling like I'm in a wintery place here is a little better! I think it's because the climate's better. Ushuaia is very like Ireland with a lot of rain and damp. We are, of course as the post name implies in El Calafate. The calafate is a bush with blueberry like fruit and one can get calafate jam, ice cream, tea, sweets, probably calafate flavoured edible underwear for all I know. It's a bit like dulce de leche is everywhere else in Argentina. For the uninitiated dulce de leche is like a soft butterscotch toffee that you can spread on things. I can't say it's not tasty but when it's included in nearly every dish you could get a little tired of it. But I digress hugely. The reason why we came here is because of a big (or multiple actually) fuck off glaciers which I find simply breathtaking and I think I prefer over Iguazu falls.
Parque Nacionale los Glaciares is populated by many glaciers but Perito Moreno is the most incredible with Upsala as a close second in my opinion. Perito Moreno is a 60 metre tall and 5 kilometre wide sheet of ice moving at 7m a day. You can see it coming over the Andes and into the blue grey waters of Lago Argentino, the largest lake in Argentina. It's a truly magnificent sight to behold. the enormous spikes of ice with the bluest colour I've ever seen in nature apart from the sky in the crevasses between them. Huge pieces of ice regularly fall off and crash with immense noises into the lake beneath and ships are dwarfed beside it. Incredible. Some of my pictures, I admit, don't really look real but they are. The blue seems too blue or the ice seems a bit too big to me. I've really enjoyed being here. We went on another boat trip to see more glaciers and I must say that the boat trip with the 10 of us in the Beagle channel was much more fun. It was that bit too plush and cut off from the outside world which was kind of the point of the journey. The fact that we had to get up at 6.30 in the morning to go on it didn't help either :). The redeeming features though were a small walk through a very nice and strangely ravaged looking forest to a lake filled with icebergs with two glaciers flowing down towards it and the sight of the Upsala glacier. This glacier is receding (it's gone back 5 kilometres in my lifetime) and has left the lake immediately in front filled with gigantic pieces of ice - they must be about 30 or 40 metres high. Some of them have sort of cracked in the middle to reveal very old ice which is the deepest, most beautiful colour blue. It really is something. Such a pity we can't go ice climbing in El Chalten :)
And another thing about El Calafate. It seems to have some sort of gnome invasion going on. Everywhere there are gnomes. I can't say I know why but I'm beginning to think the former hippie town, El Bolson, and its inhabitants may have something to do with it. I like gnomes, don't get me wrong, but their proliferation in this part of Argentina, not an overtly mystical place, is confusing. Usually all talk is of the most earthly things; sheep farming, wildlife watching, rock climbing, trekking, mate drinking. Gnomes, fairies and magic just don't figure. I think I'll enjoy being in El Bolson too, it seems just weird enough. As long as it's not filled with pretend mystic wannabe assholes I'll like it. Real weirdos are more in my line :)
And so we prepare to leave El Calafate and continue on to Perito Moreno (Perito Moreno is a very popular chap and has a lot of stuff named after him. This can make navigation a little confused to the unknowing traveller. We hope to see a cave, Cueva de los Manos, decorated with the 9000 year old handprints of cavemen, paw prints of rhea and other Patagonian animals. The canyon that it's in sounds pretty cool too, very deep with condor lairs in it and huge caves. I'm looking forward to it. Oh and there's a casino shaped like Machu Picchu here too. Hasta lluego mi amigos! My Spanish is improving!

Ushuaia - Tierra del Fuego - Argentina

2008-04-27T14:59:00.004+01:00

Here we are at the bottom of the world and the biggest disappointment is that we can see snow but can't use it for leisure purposes. It's Autumn in the southern hemisphere and so there isn't enough snow for the fun stuff and it's not warm enough for the other fun stuff, however we will be going on a boat trip down the Beagle channel, yes that's the Beagle of Darwin fame. Otherwise we've been advised to get a bottle of wine and, presumably, drink ourselves silly in the nearby national park. The proprieter of the guesthouse we'll stay in next is a little odd, I really like her. She's a psychoanalyst and that seems to be one of her stress relieving strategies.
Though people say this the most southerly town in the world the title apparently belongs to the Chilean town of Puerto Williams. I'm not sure how much farther south it is but I think I can settle for here. I even got some stamps in my passport with "end of the world" on them! :) From here I am approximately 8000 miles from home. That's a really long way and I'm sure the furthest I've been. I've just confirmed that it is by the magic of the internet actually. One could, of course, go about 1000 miles further in the southerly direction when one would hit the continent of Antarctica - you can get boat trips from here but they can last up to 3 weeks. I think another time. I'm already contemplating driving around the continent when I learn to drive and have a chance to come back. I'm sure that could include a trip to the white continent! Ah looks like the sun's coming out, visibility may be better on the Beagle channel than I thought. Capital.
I don't think I mentioned our trip to the petrified forest. Though the park itself wasn't as spectacular as we'd hoped (though I did like the chinking sound of what looked like splinters of wood but was actually rock under my feet) we had a very interesting time at the forest. Unfortunately I can't remember the name of our guide but in a strange twist of fate he knew more about tango, wildlife and music than he did about the forest and even gave Amber a tango lesson. The video I think is one the stranger ones we've made and I've made a few wierd ones in my time. I'll try and get it uploaded. After getting ourselvs lost due to his limited knowledge of the park and then found again he played some tunes for us and a very good singer he was too. I think it was worth the 11 hour trip there and 2 overnight stays for that. I appreciate those weird offbeat happenings. We went to the oil funded town of Comodoro Rivadavia afterwards and then off to Ushuaia.
From here I'm not sure where we're going, north in any case of course. Maybe up through Chile or straight back into Argentina again. We will consult our knowledge banks. In either case I will update in our new destination and let my gentle readers know I'm still alive. Ciao

Trelew, Chubut, Patagonia

2008-04-22T23:28:00.005+01:00

It´s a terrible pity that I can´t upload pictures and videos most of the time since I have one that would sum up the post quite well. We saw penguins. I now have a picture of me with a penguin just as I said I´d hope to have in my profile. We went a long long way to see them and we were all very glad there were some left when we got there as it´s out of season for them really, a fact we only discovered a few days before we left. Having said that the sight of the penguins and sealions was still worth the 12 hour day we spent on the little feckers. Patagonia really makes one feel like a David Attenborough. In the last 2 days or so we´ve seen numerous Rheas, Guanacos (they´re like llamas), armadillos (soft on the inside crunchy on the outside), penguins (which at least Jenny will be glad to now are called pinguinos in Spanish), hawks with prey still attached, desert foxes and most likely loads of other things. Oh yes, also petrified oysters.
I really like Patagonia and in ways I´m glad we skipped Buenos Aires in its deathly cloud and came down to this great expanse of nothing, unlikely at it seems. We stayed in Gaiman and Trelew, 2 Welsh towns in the Chubut Valley. The Chubut seems to be one of the rare rivers in the region and when viewed from above reminds me of the Nile valley in Egypt, green in the strip down the river and desert wastelands on either side for hundreds of miles. The Chubut valley, actually Patagonia in general, is kind of like a geography fieldtrip all the time. The valley is most definitely a U shaped valley and today we went to a paleological park and strode the many layers one after the other til we got to modern day. Like a ladder through time it was and at only 100 metres up I´m convinced we could see for hundreds and hundres of miles. Incredible really. In any case, the Welsh town thing is worth a mention after all that talk about landscape.
We arrived in Gaiman witha great hunger on us and though (for me at least) the hunger wasn´t really sated I did feel very satisfied. The reason for this was because we had tea and cakes and real apple tart!! AND a cake with redcurrants in it, which anyone who knows me at all well will know is my favourite fruit! We stayed in this lovely tea room slash B&B for two nights and had our fill of lovely cakes. Breakfast even lasted three of us for 3 meals on our trip to the desolate and foodless peninsula. I was very appreciative. The place we stayed was called Ty Gwyn in Welsh of course as is the norm with a lot of places in Gaiman. In the town´s museum we met a lovely girl called Tatiana Rodgers who was desceded from some of the first settlers to arrive on the pilgrim ship, for pilgrims they were. A group of npnconformist Welsh who fleeing from persecution decided to go live in a desert thousands and thousands of miles away. Fair dues to them says me. Anyhow Tatiana let us have a look at her boyfriend´s book of photos of the town which I linked to above and it really was fascinating. Seems like Welsh customs are more protected here than in Wales, Male voice choirs, tea and cakes even love spoons. I´m not kidding about that and Tatiana is learning Welsh too - it´s taught in school here. I never thought I´d be asking an Argentinian how to pronounce Cymru properly but there you go.
Gaiman though is not one to disappoint and even after all of these nice and unexpected surprises it had something else up its sleeve. The Parque Desafio. This was really something and something I wish I had created or would like to create maybe in another time and place. I suppose I felt some sort of fellow feeling with the creator. This park is a park of rubbish, all sorts of things made of rubbish and without pictures I´m sure it doesn´t sound impressive, it has to be seen to get the scale of the thing. Mr. Alonso who made the place over 25 years has a great sense of humour too, which I like very much with his litterings of penguins, Celtic towers made of bottles, the Taj Mahal and the petrified forest which he testifies was formed 65 million years at about 3 o´clock. It seemed the kind of park Douglas Adams would make, or at least write the captions for. And so ends our Welsh adventures for the moment.
We´ll be away to the petrified forest next, for real this time, some many miles away and from there to the end of the world. I really need to fix my map. Looks like I´ll be making it at least some of the way up Chile given the time we´re making. Snowsports may unfortunately not be our friends given out strange in between season. Too late for penguins in great numbers and too early for snowboarding but as it has been pointed out to me when we visit the giant glacier at Perito Moreno surely we´ll find some snow. It is a big fuck off chunk of ice after all, it´ll be cold enough!
Til the next one!

Montevideo Airport - Buenos Aires is closed due to "meteorological" conditions

2008-04-19T14:23:00.006+01:00

The first part of this post was deleted in an effort to make sure the post wasn't deleted. God I hate it when things like that happen. Anyhow as you can see we are in Montevideo airport and not Buenos Aires and we hoped we would be. Due to leave from Colonia and cross the small distance over to Buenos Aires we realised something had gone awry when we were told the port was closed and the thick smoke that had been covering Colonia the day before began to make sense. If you haven't already heard it is the fault of the farmers as many things are :p. They set fire to some fields because they're pissed off about something and that means I can't go to Buenos Aires. Unlike most Irish people I won't bitch and moan and say what a horrible selfish bunch they are because *I* can't do something. I always found that ironic and infuriating in the "selfless" outpouring of rage that we(Irish people that is) often exhibit. Instead I will say that I am very happy to be going to Trelew, one of those Welsh towns in Patagonia hopefully in time to catch the end of the penguin season and hopefully in time to miss the "Orca slaughtering baby seals" season for that is where we are headed now. Trelew is in a region dotted with villages and towns where nonconformists of Welsh origin fled to in the face of persecution. Now you can get nice tea and cakes there and they have an Eistedfodd every year. Hooray for persecution! We hope also to go the Peninsula Valdes and look at some whales, who didn't feel the urge to slaughter some fluffy seal pups, and a petrified forest some distance down the road. We've heard there's diving in old wrecks around here but I'm sure if I want to get into such cold water especially having become used to temperatures that never drop below 10 degrees. We shall see. From there off to Ushuaia I think and to the most southerly city in the world. I think I'll need a new jumper.

Colonia del Sacramento - Uruguay

2008-04-17T03:04:00.003+01:00

And here we are in a lovely picturesque (colonial, of course) town in Uruguay but 20 miles across the bay from Buenos Aires, our next port of call. A sleepy place this is though we have seen some cool dune buggy quad like little cars for rent that we had considered racing around the quiet streets. Slowly we continue southwards and into the cold. 12 degrees in Montevideo and I felt like I was freezing my balls off if I had any to freeze. Just shows how unused I've become to temperate climate, tropical lass I am! Tonight we went to restaurant and enjoyed some very close range operaesque singing. Quite good really but at close range feels a bit more like assualt than entertainment. Tomorrow we will explore the tiny town and the lighthouse which is at alarming proximity to some people's homes. The next time I'm on I'm sure I'll be in Argentina and most likely the great metropolis of Buenos Airs, until then! In other news I'm just about finished the Baroque Cycle by Neal Stephenson. Anyone who's been around the past year and a half or so will be aware of the gargantuan task it has been for me. It's been so long it feels like a part of my life is coming to a close (a huge exaggeration but I'm feeling hyperbolic!). Goodbye Waterhouses and Shaftoes and of course, Isaac Newton!

Montevideo and summary of last week

2008-04-17T03:02:00.000+01:00

It's been quite a whie since last I wrote and given any more time I may not write at all. It would take too long. I've gone to a new country since, met some missionaries, been 5 hours on dirt roads and gotten red dust everywhere possible to get red dust, posed as the virgin Mary, washed the dust off in a thermal spa resort and gone to another capital city.
As I remember I think we had one day left in Asuncion last time I wrote. We visited a nice cultural centre where we saw a man climb into a hammock which was 15ft off the ground more or less. He was willing to work for his relaxation. Soon after we managed to find a part of Asuncion which seems to be totally composed of garden centres, shopping centres and some beautiful old towers that happen to be paint shops.The distinction in affluence between that part of town and downtown is huge, The 5 star Sheraton lives here.
Given we were in the area anyway to see a museum buried in the middle of a residential district we decided to pop into the Sheraton to investigate dining options, the exchange rate to Guarani and lower cost of living being such as it was that one can comfortably afford to eat there. On arriving there we saw there was a spa type thing and decided to have a massage. I had never had a massage before but had always wanted to give it a go. It was very pleasant though I think I bothered my masseuse a little by asking which way up I was supposed to face when I have already taken off all my clothes. She was politely trying to avert her eyes and pointing up to the celing with her free limbs which was her head, if that counts as a limb. After that I decided I was going to be brave and resolved to go into a sauna naked when we got to the thermal bath town I knew we were going to next. Little did I know that they seem even more modest than Irish people in Uruguay so that was totally off the cards. Should have gone in Brazil where approximatlely 3cm square of material counts as a bikini and undies. I have omitted something however. Before we went off to have our respective massages we went to have some foodies over in the nearby shoppng centre where we met some born again Christian missionaries. They were very nice and I learned a lot about their beliefs. Luckily, despite the fact that we're quite argumentative people (Padraig more so than me but also me nonetheless) it didn't end in bloodshed, the combination of rationalist atheist resistant to conversion (me) and eager to convert christian amounted to nothing more than an exchange of views. All of this was in the one day - it was a varied and full day. I'm glad to be able to experience so many new things in a period of 12 hours :) Unfotrunately this was also the day that I lost my hat. And I'd aslready bought a badge for it :(. On the other hand I had only gotten it about 2 weeks beforehand, had it been my orange hat I may have had to enter into a period of mourning and wear my one set of black clothes for a month which I'm sure would not be terribly savoury to others around me. But I digress.
From there we made a retreat to the countryside after having failed, once again, to find my hat. Off we went on a 5 hour trip into an expanse of prarie occupied by little more than cows and the odd town. We managed to get off in the wrong place though having not eaten in many hours and unable to contact our hosts for a means of transport to the ranch we were going to, to which there was no other means of transports, it being confirmed as dangerous by the one taxi driver that seemed to live at all times just outside the bus station. There was a nice man, called Miguel, there who was willing to help. He gave us orange juice which seemed to be his sole source of income and we gave him some tea. He also managed to get through to the ranch and get their resident vet to rescue us. We were very very grateful. Miguel reminded me a bit of my friend Khiet, if he sees this, Hi Khiet! Off we went on about a 40 minute onward journey to find out the nice lady who owns the place had been waiting for us for an hour somewhere else. Oops. Marta is the lady's name and very nice and interesting she is too and the place we were staying is called Estancia Loma Linda in Caazapa. She was very understanding that one of us doesn't eat meat (which is rare) and gave us some tasty soya bolognese. We went on horses the next day and I somehow managed to get two dead legs and had to be lifted bodily off the horse. I looked like a real tool. Sigh. Anyhow the estancia was a very nice quiet place to be in the middle of at least 9000 acres of land and we felt nice and rested on out departure to the jesuit ruins and the Argentinian border some 5 hours away by dirt track. Something rather remarkable that did happen was that Padraig, who had lost his glasses on the bus on teh way down got them back - the bus was the exact same bus that we'd been on two days earlier with the same driver and going to a different place. What are the odds. I feel it deserves a mention to spread the good karma around :)
Fast forward to El Tirol near Encarnacion on the Paraguayan Argentinian border. We went in the blistering heat to see some Jesuit missions ruins where we met the lovely Amanda and Elliott (hope that's how you spell it!) and where we got a taxi to Jesus. I also attacked Amber on a sacrificial pyre with a knife. It could have been an altar but let me have my moment. El Tirol, where we were staying was a strange place, completely devoid of other guests but furnished with a sinister washing line from which many teddy brethren were hanging by their ears. They also had puppies. I was happy there :) A little red setter. Awwwww. And a weird wooly little dog which may have been a poodle. Neoooown, off we went to Uruguay the next day and after some fun at border control we were in Argentina. We neglected to get our passports stamped on the way into Paraguay but got away with a nominal fine for our crimes and not the lengthy stay and possible cavity search conjured in my more pessimistic thoughts. Zooom, across Argentina and into Uruguay we went. I will summarise for lack of time. We stayed at a thermal resort which was surprisingly chep and relaxing except for the fucking big spiders and the grasshoppers, argh!!! The waters were relaxing and I had a facial, a massage and was covered in chocolate for some time. That was nice. It wasn't edible as far asI could tell though, having tried it while the lady was out of the room. Somehow I never thought if I was going to be covered in chocolate it would be a middle aged Latino lady who'd be doing it. Them's the breaks I guess. The cleanest I think I've ever been in my life due to frequent submersion and being lightly boiled and off we went to Montevide where we are now. An interesting place with interesting architecture and the first nice chinese I've had in ages. Yum!! Well better sign off now, off to the National Symphony Orchestra. Hasta lluego.

Asuncion, Paraguay

2008-04-03T22:37:00.005+01:00

Having had a look at the post I put up last about Puerto Iguazu I'm horribly disappointed in my grammar and expression. I apologise for these and regret any such future lapses. Usually my time is rather short at the internet and I must chronicle hastily, but enough with these apologies. Today I am in Asuncion, the capital of Paraguay. I find it funny that in the time (+ a little) it takes to get from Galway to Dublin one can have been in 3 countries. Border control was surprisingly lax in Parguay, I'm wondering how easy it'll be to escape from here though.After having had an interesting converstion with a gentleman in the Paraguayan parliament today we have a better idea of what Paraguayan admin is like - it may not be a problem. A very interesting tour and perhaps refreshingly representative. The congress is apparently one of only 2 in the world that visitors can come in and look around properly and sit in the speaker's chair (which I did) and look belligerent (which I did). We have also discovered that Paraguay may be a haven for Paddies too. A street very near our hotel is called Juan E. O'Leary street after a Paraguayan of Irish descent who wrote a disparaging poem about the then leader who brought Paraguay into a war between (tiny) Paraguay, (bigger) Uruguay, (even bigger) Argentina and (gigantic) Brazil. Silly Paraguayans! As one goes futher south so the Irish, Germans and Swiss emerge. There's a town in the Andes where chocolate and fondue is very popular. I look forward to seeing it. So far Paraguay is to my liking and not at all the scary awful place that Argentinians have made it out to be. Maybe it's part of the Neighbour syndrome that dictates that every country that borders another must hate eachother, its hard to know. Doubtless there are some slightly more dangerous elements and strange incongruities (I hope that context is right) such as the fact that the parliament buildings (containing all the civil service, senate and lower house) has a shanty town in its front yard, quite literally, about 50m from the entrance. We were told by our lovely and informative guide not to go too close because not even our clothes would remain let alone wallets etc. Hmm. All in all though very interesting and appreciative to be able to get lunch for about 40,000 Guarani (about 5.50 Euro). Perhaps we away to a ranch in the next couple of days. Reports will be forthcoming. Another thing I have discovered. Peru is portuguese for turkey and if I see another peru cracker as long as I live it'll be too soon. Be warned. Hasta lluego!

Puerto Iguazu, Missiones, Argentina

2008-03-30T22:05:00.005+01:00

I was trying in vain to find a little clip of "La cucaracha" to stick up here to illustrate my next post. A cheerful little song it is and not many people who don´t speak Spanish know what the word cucaracha means. I know it only too well having gotten a little more familiar than I´d like with a can of Baygon and a worried expression. Cucaracha is Spanish for cockroach and Baygon a very deadly chemical spray used to kill them. I had to sleep in a miasma of the stuff last night after a horrible incident with about 4 cockroaches of about 4cm x 2cm. I know what you´re going to say - well they´re not dangerous, and they´re not, unlike the Black Widows that also live here but they´re not at all nice to have scuttle under your feet while you´re going to the toilet and I´ve been very happy to not have any incidents the whole time I´ve been here til now. There was also a cute little yellow lizard in our room and it was he who let us in on the possible hiding palace of the mass of cockroaches I suspect to have been living in our ceiling. There were about 6 or 7 in the bathroom when we awoke. Time to move. Luckily the other wildlife in our hostel consists of Hummingbirds, cute birds and teeny ants which, though they bite, don´t scare me :)So apart from that Argentina (though we`re about 1 mile from the border with Brazil) is great! Cheap cheap food and good too (much better than Brazil), lunch for 3 Euro and Main course and drinks in a fancy restaurant for about 5! The waterfalls on this side are more impressive too - a lot closer which I hope to illustrate in photos if I can get them to upload! The park was also full of large butterflies and lots of them. I do happen to be afraid of butterflies too so yesterday was really rather stressful for me on the insect front. On the upside I now consider the beetles and things we get at home to be rather puny in comparison to the behemoths you get here. Everything has its upsides!
Next stop Asuncion, Paraguay. Technically I´ve been in 3 different countries in the past 3 to 4 days. When we visted Itaipu, the largest hydroelectric dam in the world, (whihc I´m sure now I´ve probably mentioned)half is in Paraguay and half in Brazil. Soon we will be returning. Techinically I´ve passed in and out of Argentina 3 times though because of our visit to the "largest duty free shop in the world" in the neutral zone between the two border controls. If it´s the largest in the world then I think Dublin must be excluded from the privilege of being part of planet earth. It was pretty nice though and they had sour skittles whihc unfortuantely included watermelon sweets that actually tasted like watermelon. Not good. When we told our kind of tour guide, Luis, about us going to Paraguay he asked "really?" with a look of incredulity. After the third time I began to wonder whayt was awaiting us on the other side of the border? Monsters? Aliens? Some sort of mind exploding ultra bureaucracy which would cause us to sleep in the border control station for 2 nights while we awawit passport processing. I don´t know and only time wil tell. I´ve heard it´s poorer than many South American countries but I´m sure it´s not the void in space that people seem to amke it out to be. I´ll report so that others will not have to tremble in fear at the insensitivities of influential tropical tour guides.
I was hoping´d get the chance to update this a little more often so I wouldn´t forget my experiences but such is life, large chunks of Rio are slipping from my mind now only to be revitalised later so I may wish to stick them in if they feel relevant or if it´s a story I wanted to put in but forget, like the brownide we got in Rio but I´d forgotten. The largest brownie I´ve ever seen in my life with a mountian of icecream on top. All in all it would´ve been about 15 cm tall easily. Ah the food here really is a sight to behold. I haven´t been to a parilla yet and I´m not sure if I will. If you don´t know what it is it is easily explained. One obtains an animal and cracks it down along its breastbone, pulls it out like a fan and roasts it on its back. A full one. Rather unpleasant to behold but at least Argentinians aren´t afraid to see exactly what they´re eating.
I think I´ll have to leave it there for the moment for all else escapes me. Spanish I am finding easier than Portuguese too. Hang on I´m thinking of more stuff to say! This somehow reminds me of Mate. Mate is the natinal drink here in Argentina. It´s made from a herb called yerba into which one adds hot water and drinks it through a metal strawlike thing. Yerba is very high in caffeine and mate tastes a bit like tea that been sitting around for a long time but quite nice really. It´s also *very* high in caffeine. When our hostel guy told us it was like red bull he wasn´t kidding. Fun stuff. Being able to say bueno and not be joking is rather fun too. The Mask is also actually funny in Spanish! It just seems to suit the way it should be acted :). This reminds me a bit of the announcer in Rio airport who sounded like he should´ve been in a 70s game show. I tried to recoed him but to no avail. Never have I so wanted to visit Vitoria, I don´t even know where it is! His relaxing voice could make me take a plane to anywhere :) Ha.
Right well that´s that for now. Buenos Noches!

Foz do Iguazu - Parana - Brazil

2008-03-28T01:19:00.002Z

It´s been rather the while since I´ve posted and I´d say once I get the pics up they´ll tell the story of what I´ve been doing better than this will. Well I´ve been pretty busy since last time I posted what with family being over and moving town and so on. Rio is behind us now but I´ve resolved to go back soon if not just to see the Swiss town and the sloth recuperation centre! At the moment we´re at Foz do Iguacu on the Brazilian, Argentinian and Paraguayan borders. We´re constantly being tempted to "Visite o Paraguay e compre na Mona Lisa" (Visit Paraguay and buy the Mona Lisa). The veracity of the goal of this request is dubious to me but I do hope to pop over for a bit anyway to see how it is. The falls are pretty amazing, taller than Niagara and wider than the Vistoria falls. The border between Argentina and Brazil cuts the river and the falls with the lion´s share on the Argentinian side though the view from here is pretty damn good. We´ll explore the Argentinian side in the nexy while and say goodbye to Brazil. I can´t believe I´ve been here a month! I think I´ll really miss it, though not the caipirinha´s, they must be much better drinkers herethan me, I find them very very strong though I can imagine a few people I know liking the sugar cane spirit, cachaca :). Not many minutes remain in my internet access so I must be brief. In Rio we went hanggliding which was fantastic and has made me want to join a club in Ireland. Yesterday we wne to a bird park and had some toucan sit about 50cm away from us aswell as seeing little raccoon thingies which were really cute and lots of very cute lizards! I even managaed to get very close to a big butterfly and not get too scared. I also went to a German town high in the mountains in Rio de Janeiro state for Easter Sunday and had some lovely melted chocolate with marshmellow. It was a bit surreal, so alpine but with palm trees! We also lost a travel companion. Not literally, she went back to England. Goodbye Christine, I´ll be visiting soon, especially for those scones!Saw some serious waves on Ipanema, must´ve been 15 ft tall! You´d be jealous, Edel.Went to see a match at the Maracana which felt smaller than I thought but was impeccably clean. The match was good too! :)Well I must away now but I´ll update again soon! Boa Noite!

Rio - day three... New Pics.

2008-03-15T23:12:00.001Z

It´s day three of near constant rain. It´s starting to become a bit of a downer. Apparently it´s due to last til Thursday. Today´s Saturday. Urrrrgh. Anyhow gives me an opportunity to put up new pics - have a look. Reports will be better once weather lifts! A bientot.

I has forgets! Itzacon.

2008-03-12T22:10:00.002Z

I forgot to say hi to everyone at Itzacon and hope everything went great!! I´m sure it was a resounding success!

Rio - Diamonds are a girl´s best friend

2008-03-12T21:51:00.003Z

Well I never thought I´d be trying on diamond rings and being given coffee in a large jewellery emporium but apparently this is the kind of thing that tourists (dressed in vest tops and three quarter length trousers and brandishing backpacks) can do here in Rio. We decided to go down to the jewellery museum (Amsterdam Sauer and H Stern maybe see a few gemstones, some old rings, that kind of thing only to be brought around by a personal guide, sat down and served drinks and shown a lot of different, very valuable and very precious gemstones set in various bits of jewellery made from gold. I felt distinctly out of place (though the place was full of similarly clad, similarly touristy people) but we were all treated with perfect respect and it seemed that they didn´t mind when we decided not to buy the 8000 US dollar solid sapphire watch they were displaying. Some were inlaid with emerald and diamonds too.... I have learned that diamonds are the same all over and we were informed that they would be the same price as diamonds in Europe and encouraged to look at the indigenous (context?) gems instead; sapphire, emerald, opal, topaz, citrine.. the list went on. I mut say I felt a bit guilty in a way because part of the tour included watching people working on the jewellery, cutting, setting and all that malarkey. I don´t know how much they earn but I know they don´t get the full value of every 4000 dollar worth diamond they fashion into jewellery. I´m well aware that the same is true of so much manufacture but given that there is a higher level of poverty here (and that Brazil seems to have more mineral wealth than all of Europe and most likely a lot of other places). I feel maybe the miners are a bit hard done by. Perhaps it´s some socialist (not sure if that´s the right word) impulse that´s not really justified but anyhow. Maybe I just don´t like being put in the same box (easily and understandably done) as the unbelievably arrogant and obnoxious tourists that frequent the place treating the employees like slaves. That probably is it actually. Anyway, back to the shinies.
They also offered us free transport (the entry was free) to our hotel whether we bought something or not. It was rather fun trying all the fancy gems on and looking at the 3 foot tall sculptures of parrots, toucans and eagles made of precious gemstones and gold. Chunks of amethyst are just stuck willy nilly outside shops here - I found a huge one in a church for no apparent reason and one outside a hotel. It´s really amazing. I have always liked the shinies so it´s fun to see them lying around all over the place!
Please excuse the cheesy title by the way but I couldn´t resist. Let´s see what tomorrow brings.

Rio - Walk back from beach update

2008-03-11T21:05:00.001Z

On my way back from Copacabana beach I saw a middle acged to elderly lady eating a pastry (fair enough) and holding a small cactus in her other hand. This, of course is not a particularly unusual acitivity nor deviant but something in the combination and the not-really-there look in her eyes gave me cause to take note. Strange place. Saw a postwoman asleep on the street the other day too. Homeless people, sure, strange place for a job endowed person to take a nap though! Hallo to Dee in cold , wet and windy Cork by the way!

Rio de Janeiro - intro post

2008-03-11T18:52:00.004Z

Finally, I have made it to one of my dream destinations in the world, Rio! Bit disappointing to find it´s pronounced Hee-oh but apart from that I love it!! Looking up apartments for the fun of it and discovered you can buy a 3 bed apartment with internet, washing machine about 200 metres from Copacabana beach for about 300k euro. I can´t actually buy a house in the village where I´m from in Offaly for that much anymore. Holy shit, if you´ll pardon my French. It´s a very attractive prospect I´m telling you. Rio has an average temp of about 25 degrees all year round and lovely sunshine. I think it barely ever rains and when it does it´s only for a few days at a time and then it´s over! The place we´re staying is equally nice, a kind of apartment building/hostel/hotel with a little park outside where little kids play and people bring their tiny dogs. Tiny dogs are extremely prevalent here in Rio, I even saw a tiny version of a tiny dog yesterday, though they also have Huskies which are sooooo cuuuute. aww.
We went to pay old Cristo a visit day before yesterday - he´s been summoning clouds to prevent our picture taking from below. It was rather intersting to have a cloud advance on you and watch planes fly and eagles circle under you. I must say. Cristo´s on his perch at 700m altitude, pretty impressive.
The fact that the city is dotted with such mountains, about 4 miles of beautiful beach (maybe more) and a huge tropical rainforest between the beaches and the centre is impressive in itself! It has a great transport system and seems pretty affluent. I really really like it here, as you may have guessed! If only I´d been around for Carnaval! The samba schools are closed for a bit of shuteye after the party and so we can only watch and not join in on a show. I´d prob feel a bit self conscious anyway but it would´ve been nice to try.
This is truly a change from Brasilia. I enjoyed it for the time I was there but the feeling of extreme danger while trying to get from one place to another and the concrete really gets to one. Actually it´s probably better I was in such a place before here so I could appreciate it.
Despite the fact that I´m not ususally interested in soccer I can´t wait to go to the Maracana either (I thought the biggest stadium in the world, but apparently only one of according to wikipedia, damn!). I´m not sure whether to support Fluminense, Botafogo or Flamengo :)
They have a mountain called the Sugarloaf here too, so I don´t feel to far from home. More to follow, should be here for another week and a half or so, and I´ll need it!

Evidence

2008-03-05T02:49:00.005Z

Please ignore this post - it is the result of some photobucket wrangling! I´m in the process of getting facebook albums to work. Go have a look on facebook from time to time, I hope to be able to upload very soon. God, this photo business is hard work.

POSTSCRIPT - Facebook is also proving annoyingly difficult, revert to Photobucket, if it asks for a password go to my facebook page - it´s written on my profile page

Brasilia, Distrito Federal

2008-03-04T23:28:00.004Z

Brasilia is more than anything a strange strange place. There will be pictures now because I'm changing to a different site that works and you'll see what I mean. Despite the fact that an address can be SHS 401 Bl.A Casa 201 it can be very difficult to navigate. Actually now that I've written it down it sounds really difficult - it's logical but involves north south coordinates as well as west and east and the street numbers refer to what's between the streets rather than the streets themselves - prob a good idea but difficult for someone from the land of streets that were made like that because they used to be the thoroughfare for cows. I love Brasilia, it's like constantly being in a 70s scifi movie. Buildings like giant white igloos or bowls, huge open spaces and streets only identifiable by number. It has its beauteous bits though - the sactuario Dom Bosco, I think is incredibly beautiful, a cube completely covered in blue and clear stained glass to look like the night sky! Being a pedestrian is not easy however as I think the crossings number single digits on miles of roadway and the smaller roads are 4 lanes across. We crossed something akin to a super motorway Irish standards - 2x6 lanes of traffic and managed to survive somehow. I must say there's something to be said for having a hotel district, shop district (they even have a sports club district and the districts aint small) etc.m it made finding a place to say very easy and somewhere to eat equally so. I like it but I don't think I could live here - the sheen would diminish. That and even though it is new (opened as the capital in 1960, freshly built after only 3 years of construction) it's rather run down in a lot of places which really takes away from the clean design (also very ugly in places, ah the 60s, Irish university buildings a go go). So have very much enjoyed this place - next stop Rio, or He-oh as they pronounce it here. I think it'll be very different. A bientot mes chéries!

Salvadoooor

2008-02-27T13:53:00.004Z

Hello dearest friendlings. I write to you from Salvador or as they say in Portuguese Salvadooor :). It is warm, very warm but nicely so. Last night we nearly got set upon by some fruit. I like it already. Speaking of fruit, Brazil seems to be home to the humble Umbu - also known as yummy yummy sour fruit that Mario loves now. I also had some pineapple soaked in lime juice last night, I could really get used to the place even if it was only for the fruit, but enough about food! I've met up with my other travel companions, incl my bro who was good enough to come and collect me in my semi conscious state from the airport - saved me thinking which I always like :) and the lovely Amber and Christine (sorry if I spelled your name wrong!) who so graciously fed me with plantains, potato and other choice foods when I arrived. The coffee is also excellent and not at all like the acetone flavoured Tesco finest Brazilian blend .
Perhaps I should explain the fruit attack. We were sitting by the promenade, I eating papaya and sipping Agua de Coco and the others sipping and supping on other lovely foodstuffs when a storm, which had been threatening with it's flashy displays for some time, arrived. Rather suddenly. It blew a large parasol onto the beach some 30-40 metres away and started a concerted assault against terrace dwellers by means of fruit. Luckily we didn't stick around to be brained. Seems fruit will be an important theme in Salvador :)
I will stick the pics up now and you may wonder at the lovely view from our 9th floor apartment . I think I'll leave it there for now. More adventures with foodstuffs to follow. Watch this space! Oh and it looks like I needn't have worried about the supplies, I have all I need except a phone that works! Damn you thieving meteor! If anyone wants my o2 no. email me.

First contact - Lisbon

2008-02-25T21:56:00.002Z

Lisbon, city of light, city of magic (or is that Mournhold?). Turns out Lisbon is where the Clangers went. I was awoken from my siesta this afternoon by a sound only describable (sp?) as a clanger whistle. I thought of course that it could be some sort of half dream but upon hearing it in my fully woken state I could confirm. Clangers still exist and they live in Portugal. I did not see the being emitting this noise so I can't guess as to its purpose. The fact that I found a Hello Kitty emporium has also added Lisbon to my top destinations list. I think the look of wonder on my face convinced the shop assistant I was a no good shoplifter. That and the fact that I kept pawing at my handbag due to my severe paranoia about pickpocketing. Portuguese is a strange and misleading language. Sounds like Russian, written like Spanish. I'm convinced now that the lonely planet language guide exists only to fool unfortunate travellers into making a fool of themselves and provide a cheap laugh for tourist trappers in Portugal. One example - restaurante. Is it like the French or English pronunciation....NO. It is pronounced hestoroch. Why? Lovely to listen to, impossible to learn in 4 hours. In short my little trip to Lisboa has gone well and without a hitch that I can remember though my memory is limited to 5 minute bursts at the moment due to the 6 hours of sleep I've had since Friday night. It's Monday. Gragh. A more coherent post will follow soon. Boa noite!

Mario's pre leaving freak out

2008-02-13T14:51:00.003Z

Argh, only a week and a half to go and suddenly all those things I was getting to prepare have to be gotten now, I have to buy a large bag, a pair of walking boots, a new phone to have my old crap one as a spare (also because I hate my phone and I think I'm due an upgrade :)) some special travel towel thingies, maybe some sort of water bottle thing, insect repellant, a sleeping bag cover, raincoats in bags, some sort of small shampoo, a pair of swimming togs (hopefully ones that necessitate minimal shaving, urgh!) etc etc etc. I know a week and a half is ample time for such but I get nervous about such things. Suddenly realising, standing in a spanish colonial church in a german speaking town in Argentina, that I've forgotten my extra sim card could be a nervewracking experience! Realising I didn't bother to even so much as bend my ear to some crap portuguese pop to get my head around their bizarre pronunciation and perhaps even learn how to tell some young lady to show me her bikini has also left me a little regretful. I may never need to ask a young lady for such a thing but I think asking where the toilet is and if that dish comes without entrails could be good, much as I like some entrails. I must away now and stop wasting time writing in my literature replacement pod and try to find these necessaries. It doesn't help that I'm trying to apply for courses next year either although that's pretty much fixed up. Yay! Next time I post here I'm sure I'll actually not be in the country anymore which will make it infintely more interesting :)

So it begins....Nearly.

2008-01-07T16:20:00.000Z

I looked up my flights today. I may well be leaving this green and verdant isle on the 26th of February following go ahead from my travel partner, my well esteemed brother. I hope I can get map to post on this page to map my progress. If not good old text will have to do. As it says in my profile "About me" piece this blog will be about me and my travels in South America. It will most likely not contain deep personal secrets or too much musing of a personal nature. I wish to create it so people who know me, even, dare I say, who would like to know what is becoming of me in that land colonised by the conquistadores can drop in and have a look. I plan to post pictures and to give comments on my surroundings in hopefully a not too boring manner. Let's face it though, this will mainly be for my benefit so read it if you like but no literary criticism is welcome :). So... as a first post I think it suffices to say that I have gotten my shots, now I have to get plane tickets, a place to stay for a night in Lisbon and some travel insurance. Wish me luck. Next stop Salvador, Brazil!