Monday 31 August 2009

Under pressure

Or not. I don´t fully understand how this high altitude works as we are in Potosi, the worlds highest city. Already, well from the second the border of Argentina was crossed at 8 O´clock on a freezing Sunday morning, the look of Bolivia is significantly different. Yet in its odd little way - including waiters being an average age of 7 and people standing in the middle of the desert (literally miles from anywhere) to get picked up by our bus - i like it. Today we will be braving our insurance claims again going down the silver mines and throwing dynamite down them (i hope in that order).

I can´t really understand how to use the cd/dvd player to put up a photo (again) but i am hopefully that you´ll get more than the one on the first night in this entire six weeks, but no promises. There is always the endless albums on facebook preceeding an adventure like this, with my trigger happy cameraness i think i may eventually exceed 2000 photos...

The people we have met so far have been amazed by our attempt to fit in all we have planned in 6 weeks, and now i´m starting to see why. Lack of sufficient blog time alone shows how busy we have been, but i don´t think there are two other people that need to be constantly entertained as much as Ben and I, so it works well.

After the last post we coincidentally had LOTS of time to kill as we re-arranged to get a night bus up to the border, but i couldn´t do a more satisfactory blog due to a man we simply knew as "Internet" because he spent the entire time on the one computer the hostel had. This makes me feel better about lack of blogging as it doesn´t keep me addicted to the Internet. I´ve had this time as i´ve sent Ben off to get some breakfast which, like all food in Bolivia, scares me.

He´s here, and what we´ve termed as "Gringofied" our breakfast, (Americanised) so that we can be confident of eating safe so that we aren´t ill when we go kill ourselves down a mine.

Hasta Luego x


This is us playing with live dynomite:

Saturday 29 August 2009

Update

Literally no time.

Salta was cool - now we´re off to Bolivia, i can´t wait :)

Thursday 27 August 2009

Lost

So Ben reminded me this morning that i haven´t updated since he has arrived and of course i haven´t let the world know of his great start... After e-mailing back and forth to confirm where we going to meet i told him a very specific bus to get on as it had its own depot. I get a call after he was meant to be there explaining he is on some different bus and then he got bored and got off. I check the abundance of maps i had (3 local ones and 3 from the guide book) to find he is on the very end of the Barrios de Buenos Aires and no other map. A further 3 trains and us both waiting at two different train stations. But somehow we got it to work.

Yesterday we went climbing just outside of Cordoba in a standard that was at least above me, nevertheless it was fun.












We are now in Cordoba as i write, yet we are leaving to Capel Del Monte (i think), a place with ´Lost´like qualities, a funny energy that makes it a draw for hippies and other like minded people, and here we come.

Tuesday 25 August 2009

Drumroll please

Likely to be the last morning in the hostel and still pesimistic about how easily Internet will be accessible in the other cities i am writing again. Our day trip to Collonia yesterday (Uruguay)was definately enjoyable, if not a touch short, but time was short to make sure we could get back for the much hyped "Bombarderas". After queueing in a very long queue, twice, we got in and got a bit of a dance on while the drums were conducted (which i didn´t know was possible). A really enjoyable show and i hope this picture does it justice. I have to meet Ben now...i mean i want too...

p.s. Photo didn´t upload, but i will get it up a.s.a.p.

...days later... here is the photo that has taken me ages to upload

Sunday 23 August 2009

TWO

This´ll be short, as depsite it being almost midnight i am still hungover. Me, TWO people i met in the hostel and a bunch of crazy Chileans on a stag party went to a club of monumental size - it was like a castle - last night and where the spirit is about a 4 to 1 ratio of mixer and only a few drinks will quickly have you dancing inside of a glass cage with a discoball. Today we went to see Boca vs Argentinos where Argentinos got TWO in the first half for Boca to come back to make it TWO all, with all the goals being infront of us and not the other end of the stadium where the Boca fans powered by passion stronger than Duracell dancing, sang and generally went crazy for the entire 90 minutes and more. TWO nights have passed and TWO nights till Ben arrives and we leave Buenos Aires (Although it looks like i´m going Uraguay for the day tomorrow by boat) which´ll be sad as i´m getting quite into this city. I don´t have my lead so i can´t upload a picture and i know if i get back into my room then my head will hit the bed like Wild-E-Cayote having on of his trademark ACME anvils dropped on his head, but i have got some good ones.

Saturday 22 August 2009

Southern Hemisphere

I was scared of writing another negative blog and i would have done had i had access to the Internet in the ever repeating corridors of the Sao Paulo airport, like when the Simpsons get taken to the Itchy and Stracthy studio. Somehow, however i made it to the other side of the world all by myself and i´m in the Circus hostel/hotel after being driven into an area the taxi driver described as "surrounded by drugs and prostitues" and realised that maybe the bus driver misinformed me of the best place to stay.

In attempt to tackle jet lag the quick way i planned nothing for last night, but i did get the enjoyment of walking into a restaraunt and instead of being offered smoking/non-smoking the choices were flamenco/non-flamenco. Perhaps picking the wrong type of beef, i got the enjoyment of seeing a very charasmatic man take the stage (when i thought it was more of a womans forte) and realise that now i really am on holiday.



p.s. I got up this morning and get into the lift there is a naked man in there who the receptionist is forcing to put his clothes back on, lovely thing to wake up to.

Thursday 20 August 2009

I hate airports

I hate airports, i really do. I know their meant to be this place of joy and anticipation, yet for me it's just endless queueing with some waiting added like a side order at a restaurant you don't really want but will end up eating and paying for later. Why can't i get here for 9.55 for my 10.05 flight? Instead it's 3. I suppose there is now the time to actually get some of that travel insurance I've heard is so important... Unfortunately there is nowhere to connect my camera in this Wetherspoons computer, but i think we've all had the displeasure of being in an airport terminal before and don't need a picture.