Archive for November, 2008
Just a small town girl, livin’ in a lonely world
She took the midnight train goin’ anywhere
Just a city boy, born and raised in south Detroit
He took the midnight train goin’ anywhere
A singer in a smokey room
A smell of wine and cheap perfume
For a smile they can share the night
It goes on and on and on and on
Strangers waiting, up and down the boulevard
Their shadows searching in the night
Streetlights people, living just to find emotion
Hiding, somewhere in the night
Working hard to get my fill,
everybody wants a thrill
Payin’ anything to roll the dice,
just one more time
Some will win, some will lose
Some were born to sing the blues
Oh, the movie never ends
It goes on and on and on and on
Strangers waiting, up and down the boulevard
Their shadows searching in the night
Streetlights people, living just to find emotion
Hiding, somewhere in the night
Don’t stop believin’
Hold on to the feelin’
Streetlights people
Don’t stop believin’
Hold on
Streetlight people
Don’t stop believin’
Hold on to the feelin’
Streetlights people
I need some new music. What’s good?
Alright so I’m in Curitiba which is just a big city with lots of shopping. We have stopped here mainly to break up a long long journey from Foz do Iguaçu to Sao Paulo. So making the most of this as I’m not interested in (nor do I have spare money for) shopping, I’m going to take that quiet day (my friend Mary would call it a ’slug day’) and I’m going to sit in my nice air conditioned hotel room and I’m going to watch the last two episodes of The Shield and I’m going to watch 24: Redemption and I’m going to veg. I plan to get some blogging done and I have some photos to sort.
So yeah, perhaps just what the doctor ordered.
14.04 Curitiba Brazil, Saturday November 29th
I’m back in Brazil and alive and well. I’m spending the next two days at the Iguazu Falls (note to self: charge camera tonight). Things are going pretty well, I’m up to date on photos and getting there on the blog. We finally saw Bond this evening and while the movie was a bit disappointing, it was a good day.
22.32 Foz do Iguaçu Brazil. Wednesday 26 November.
Random stuff.
- I missed marking 365 days since I did any work. Yes yes, ha ha it was possibly much longer than that but there ya go.
- The Guinness mission has failed with Bolivia and Paraguay being the hangups.
- I have failed to send postcards or anything from Peru and Bolivia. I have some from Peru written and stamped in my bag but I forgot to send them.
- I watched Iron Man again yesterday on a long bus ride and it’s good good fun.
- I’m working on my final travel plans. I will be going back to live in London sometime in January. Either sometime around the 5th or if I can sort it the 22nd and I’m going to stay in DC and attend the Obama inauguration. I’ve had an offer I can’t refuse to spend a cheap week in Buenos Aires and so I’m adding that in while cutting a bit of time out of Brazil and Mexico. Flights are complicated due to the time of year but I think it will all work out…
- I finished, finally, Donna Tartt’s The Little Friend and it annoyed me pretty much from start to finish. It took me a good month to read it (not much reading time lately) but then yesterday I read and enjoyed Houellebecq’s Platform in about four hours. Somewhat over-explicit for my tastes but the travel commentary is pretty interesting and mirrors some conversations the group has been having recently (bar the S&M and the swinging of course).
- I need to take more photo. I think I’l end up with about three pictures of Paraguay, woeful!
- Gay phase is now over (sorry Del!), these things have a way of working themselves out in the end.
- New Killers album needs some listening too….not to sure I want to try the new Guns N’ Roses.
18.22 Asunción Paraguay Tuesday November 25th.
It’s Tuesday morning and I’m in Brazil about to head to the Pantenal. We had quite a journey to get here…
The new James Bond film has been out for a couple of weeks and the group has been trying to get out to see it. At least part of it is set in La Paz in Bolivia where we have just sent a few days and so we were extra keen. It was also to be a little taste of normality which is always good.
Anyway it was showing when we were in La Paz but we just didn’t get around to it, there was too much else going on. Then we didn’t get to see it in Sucre despite our hopes being right up and arriving at the cinema at what we thought was the right time. So some research was done and we knew it was showing in Santa Cruz, pretty much on the hour every hour. There was also rumour of a MacDonalds and an Irish pub with great food and we were very much looking forward to a night out just like home!
So from Sucre we headed to the airport for about a 50 minute flight to Santa Cruz. However we arrive at the airport to find out tat the flight is almost certainly canceled due to cloudy weather. It takes about an hour to confirm this and to a cut a long story short we are on a 15 hour bus ride to get to Santa Cruz airport so we can make our connection the next morning to Brazil.
From the get go we are time limited, we have a minimum 14 hour journey leaving at 17.00 and we have a flight at 09.45. We charter a coach and it’s not so bad. Pretty much everyone has two seats and we settle in for a long night. The roads, like all South American roads are not the best in the world but about two hours into it, I’m looking out the window and ahead there are some stopped cars and what looks to be a load of rocks blocking the road. There had been some torential rain the past couple of nights and we’ve hit a landslide.
Now our driver does what any good driver should do in such a situation, instead of stopping and taking a look to see what he’s dealing with, he guns the engine, swerves past the pulled over cars and pushes on through. This seems to be going well and we make it through a good bit but of course then we get stuck. It takes the guts of an hour with most of us ankle deep in mud pushing and digging to get going again. In fairness to the driver it seems that that mud wasn’t a problem for the coach but there had been a rock that we got stuck on. A pickaxe is produced and there is no more rock.
So all is good and we board back onto the coach and we continue. The road is getting worse, in places it’s non existent and there’s a lot of debris around. So it’s not the smoothest ride in the world and there’s a lovely edge that we are veering dangerously close to. The past few days have made it plainly clear how and why there are so many reports of tourist buses plummeting over cliffs in countries around South America. Anyway a short time later we come to another roadblock. This time it’s pretty much stones and again our driver goes for it. The difference being for us that forewarned is forearmed and there ain’t no way he’s going to driver over these rocks with us onboard. So we troop off and he goes topple for it and there’s more than one moment where it looks certain the bus will but no he makes it. This happens a couple more times and eventually the road clears up.
I am having the time of my life. I’m loving this bus ride and my cheerful optimism (with a few moments of “we are all going to die!”) isn’t going down so well with all around me but I’m seriously loving it. I have given up on making the flight and I don’t mind the long bus ride so much, it’s all good.
We carry on and I doze throughout the night. I reckon there were 8-12 45 minute naps so not the best night’s sleep. Kelly and Robin seem to sleep throughout the whole thing but the rest of us, well not so much. Now then roll on 8am and we should be there but of course we are not. The coach is moving along and doing a pretty good job and the common consensus is that we’ll make it. It’ll be tight but we’ll make it.
Then a tyre blows and we come to a sudden halt!
The drivers are out like a shot and working on getting the spare on. I continue to be annoyingly cheerful but most folks are not happy. Missing the flight most likely means 18 hours on a train or missing out on the Pantenal. It’s taking some time to get the tyre changed (as these things do) and our guide reckons it’s time to abandon the coach and get into some taxis. So we do and it’s off the airport. There are eight of us, with bags, shoved into this taxi with the poor driver being instructed to get to the airport as quickly as he can with shouts of “vamanos” and “andelay andelay” coming from the back of the car on a semi-regular basis.
The clock is counting down. We get into the taxi at 08.40, we are somewhere in Santa Cruz and our flight is at 09.45. Now as the first taxi off, the instructions are to get to the airport and then I’m to run into the counter and let the airline know we are actually here and want to get onto our flight! It’s getting closer and closer to take-off time but our taxi driver is happily doing 100 in a 60 zone and is doing his best to get us there. Suddenly we spot the airport and at 09.35 I’m out of the car leaving my bags to the lads and I’m into the airport looking for our counter. As soon as I get out our details and prepare to queue jump, Karla arrives and shoots ahead of me and goes off in Spanish.
We are standing around, shattered, at the back of this queue and not really sure what’s going on. Near to us, tantalisingly near, is a Subway. No-one has eaten in about 24 hours and it’s so nice and tempting. There doesn’t seem to be any rush at the top of the queue but after a moment we find out that it’s all good. They’ll hold the flight, they have already held the flight and no, there’s no need for passports or anything, here’s the boarding passes for everyone and just chuck your bags here please! So we drop our bags, we pay our airport tax and we skip most of the security queue and make it to the plane! Along the way we nearly loose Gemma who for some reason has decided that she’ll bring her proper knife in her hand luggage. Security are not so impressed. Though to be fair on our last flight there was no security. The x-ray machine was either off or broken and they were just asking what people had in their bags. Not bad in this post September 11 world huh?
Anyway on the plane and a few sighs of relief and next to me are the French couple I had been chatting with at Sucre airport yesterday! They had made it with about an hour to spare having got tickets on a local bus. Well when I say they got tickets, they had one seat for herself and they had let him on board but had him lying down in the aisle! For a little while he had the spare seat in the drivers compartment where it seems there was much tequila being passed back and forward and he reckons the drivers were wankered for the last 6 hours or so. They did make it though so all is well that ends well right?
A short time later we take off…not the best I’ve ever had and then in less than an hour we land…again not the best I’ve ever had. At the airport we queue up to officially leave Bolivia despite being a good 20 minute taxi ride from the border. We get our stamps and we get into taxis and we are off! Along the way I spot a Toucan flying over the road in front of us and it’s awesome. We hit the border to find out that it’s siesta time and we can’t get our passports sorted. However, to our amazement, this is not a problem. We swap from Bolivian taxi’s into Brazilian taxis and carry on! It seems that we can just come back later to get legally allowed into the country. So we go to our hotel where it’s most certainly time for an ice cold beer, a long shower and some lunch before we head back to the office and get let into the country. Madness!
Dinner that night consists of a pizza buffet. For just under four pounds they keep bringing out pizza and you take as much as you like of whatever. It ends with chocolate and ice-cream pizza which is hugely wrong as it’s still done with lots of cheese. There has been some beer and there are some cocktails, caipirinhas naturally, and screams some massive bugs on the street before the final four, Karla, Gemma, Kelly and myself call it a night and a good one at that.
Now it’s just before 8am…I think and I’m going to have a bit of a shave and some breakfast before we head off on the bus for more fun and games.
07.49 Corumba Brazil. Tuesday November 18th.
Alright. I am now in Asunción which is the capital of Paraguay. Lets back up a bit now and catchup a little more.
So back to La Paz. I had my power cable fixed and this made me quite happy and so I spent a while sorting out some bits and pieces. Then that evening it was Louise’s birthday and so we went out to a Thai restaurant. Service was shit but the food was pretty good and the beer was flowing. On arriving we found out that there was an Irish pub close by and so we adjourned there before planning to hit a club but we mainly just stayed there till one or two with much entertainment, mainly provided by me berating anyone who would listen as the bar had run out of Guinness the day before (boo hiss) and then Kelly who had taken a shine to a painting on the wall and spent some time trying to buy it.
.
The next day we were not leaving until early afternoon and so we went out for some breakfast and I took the chance to run around and take a few photos of La Paz. I had been in a strange mood and I was only taking photos when we were out and about, I realised that I had spent three days there and had not one photo of the city. So I rushed about. Then we took a bus several hours down the road to a train station where we were getting a train to Uyuni which was due to get us in at 3am. Ugh. Anyway we were about three hours early for the train and so we hunted a pub. There wasn’t much luck with this until Baz asked a local where the beer was and we found ourselves ushered into a dark dingy very local drinking room where the beer was dirt cheap, about half the price we had been paying, and we soon made friends with the very drunk locals. Good times.
Then onto the train which was pretty nice. They showed two movies which kept us awake till about 11. The first, to the delight…of the Australians was Rabbit Proof Fence which was okay and the second was Man On Fire which seemed to be the longest movie of all time. So we get in at 3ish and get to our hotels where we crash out till around 10 the next morning. Now we are off into Salar de Uyuni, the worlds largest salt flats. Now this is an overnight trip and we are crammed into 4×4s to get out there. We take a quick stop along the way to visit a train graveyard which is fascinating and I’m sorry that we don’t have much more time to play around, it made for fun photos.
Then it’s off into the flats, It’s pretty good going, we stop to take some silly photos as there are some great perceptive tricks.
.
That night we are staying in a hotel made entirely of salt. We get there pretty early in the afternoon and those of us that have decided not to do the optional crawling through small caves find the local store, manage to communicate to the nice man that we’d like some beer and so we sit on the basketball court of the local school playing cards and sculling beer. Back when I was a kid this was what was commonly known as knacker drinking!
.
That night with nothing else to do we continued to drink beer and play cards and listen to some music and all in all had a most excellent evening. The next morning it was a 4.30 wakeup call to go and watch the sunrise over the desert. This was nothing special, I’m glad I did it as ya know I’ll never be there to do it again but it wasn’t really worth it. It was very very very cold too.
Then it’s off for the day. We first spend about an hour trying to rescue a stuck jeep from another tour company that had tried to take a shortcut. Then we went onto a wander around Fish Island…apparently it’s shaped like a fish but it has lots of cactus and some nice rock formations.
Then it was lunch under a volcano, flamingo watching and a short walk before we were to head back to Uyuni. This was when we found out that one of the 4×4s was out of gas…not good. We did make it back but suffice it to say that it was a cramped ride. Then we had some excellent pizza in Minuteman Revolutionary Pizza (”Pizza With Altitude!”) handily inside our hotel and then a fairly quiet night as Mick got out a guitar and we had a few tunes and a bit of a singalong. An excellent evening!
.
Now the next day we took a bus to Sucre where we had for the first time in a while some actual free time and as I may have mentioned already….we drank.
We hadn’t planned on drinking. Back in La Paz we had decided that we’d all go and see the new James Bond which was showing but we just didn’t get organised enough. So when we found a cinema in Sucre there was much excitement especially as Gemma asked and it was showing at 7pm. So we had some food and got all excited and headed to the cinema to find out that her Spanish wasn’t all she had thought and they were in fact showing X-Files 2. The bar we had been in had given us free tickets to a party that night and it seemed rude not to…
I didn’t really see much or indeed anything of Sucre. The free time after rushing around was nice and there were some quiet lunches and some quiet drinks and just some quiet time and I very much enjoyed it. I did nothing touristy and took no photos and while I probably should have, I just needed the downtime and it was lovely lovely lovely.
Bolivia 8 - 17 November
I’m getting to be in pretty serious need of 24 hours on my own to catchup and sort myself out and there’s not a snowballs chance in hell of seeing that anytime soon. So I’m slowly getting there but I think it’ll be another good while before I’m caught up. The connection here is pretty good so photos are getting up to date which is good but I’d really like some time to type. I have set my alarm clock a little earlier than I need in the morning with the aim to type. Tomorrow is a 9-10 hour bus journey (ugh) and so I may get a chance to get something done then but who knows really. I may just do something possibly hugely stupid instead, it’s getting to that point.
50+ new photos up, go and look.
01.30 Monday November 24th - somehere on the Brazil - Paraguay Border