Category — Travel Tips

World Trip Update #52 – Brazil/Chile & HOME

Date: Sun, 25 Feb 2007

Hello from Sydney,

Well, as much as I wouldn’t have thought it possible, we have made it home after 366 days overseas, with almost no major dramas. We had the equivalent of $50 in Bolivian cash stolen from our room in La Paz, but that was the only theft for the whole trip. I left 3 hats and a pair of gloves on transport at various times, but those were the only losses. I had 2 bouts of food poisoning (McDonald’s in Switzerland, and camping in the Amazon), a bad knee and a runny nose once, and Phil had a sore throat for about a week, but otherwise we were well all year. So all in all, we have been very lucky and have had the most amazing experience of our lifetimes, and I can’t recommend enough for you all to do it yourselves.

It feels so good to be home in Sydney again. Haven’t caught up with many yet, but am sure it won’t be long and I can’t wait to see everyone. For now, we have the nightmare of moving all our things back to our house, and getting car & bike re-registered, taxes, reconnecting things, renewing things, going through all the paperwork and millions of things that need doing, and when all that’s done, going to doctors, dentists, hairdressers, getting back to my sports, going back to work, and eventually working through the thousands of photos and editing the many hours of video tape we took on our trip. Oh, to be back to reality – aaargh!!!

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World Trip Update #51 – Brazil

Date: Mon, 19 Feb 2007

Oh my God, we are coming home – Yee Haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Do you think I’m excited. I have been counting down the days for so long now. I’m sure I will regret this desire to come home after I have been home for a while to normality, but right now, I can’t imagine anything but happiness to get back to a normal life. I think I will go around hugging my wardrobe, washing machine, bed, shower, fridge, and of course all my friends and family, and sporting buddies on the field, and dancing buddies on the dancefloor for a very long time. Strange as this may seem, I am actually looking forward to going back to work again too??????

Anyhow, this will be the last email from overseas, with only one more to come from when we get back to Sydney as the final trip wrap-up.

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World Trip Update #50 – Brazil

Date: Sun, 11 Feb 2007

Hola,

Only 2 weeks till we are home again. We are so excited. Have really loved the travelling, and am sure it won’t take long of being home before we wish we were doing it again, but right now, we just can’t wait to get back to our lives as we knew it so long ago.

Since we are covering a lot of ground in Brazil, many days are travel days, or just spent relaxing in pools, since it is so hot and it’s the only place we are safe from the mosquito plagues. After leaving Foz do Iguazu, we went to the Pantanal for 3 days. It is a rainforest area half the size of France, and apparently the best wildlife viewing in South America – even better than the Amazon. The first night we stayed in a nice air conditioned lodge, built on platforms above the lagoon filled with Cayman (smaller alligators up to 2.5m), Piranha and all sorts of birds, Capyburas (giant rodents), monkeys and anacondas (which we didn’t see those unfortunately – or fortunately). We got to swim in the lagoon and have mud fights with the floor of the river, and luckily the caymans and anacondas stayed away. Weren’t worried about the Piranhas though, as it is a myth that they eat people unless you are gushing blood and then they would only have a bite before you scared them off. Little blighters wouldn’t even take my meaty bait I had when we went fishing for them, which angered me. Everyone else caught Pirahnas (including Phil), but not me. I just caught a Snake Eye (or was it Snake Head???). Their teeth are very impressive.

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World Trip Update #49 – Argentina/Brazil

Date: Sun, 4 Feb 2007

Hola,

How are you all? Still have a snotty nose but otherwise both are well.

Since last email, we went off to do the White Water Rafting and Canopy tour in Salta. The rafting was lots of fun, even though it was pretty tame. We actually had a black Labrador come along with us. He was really cool and stayed on even when others were falling out, but he did stink a bit. The Canopy tour was very cool too. Went on 9 high wires over canyons (really high up and damn long), rivers and forest. Self controlled speed which was cool.

The next few days were basically spent driving in our bummed up truck, but we finally made it to Iguazu Falls (with a small stop at the San Ignacio Jesuit 17th century ruins) a few days ago. The Argentinian side is amazing. Although I’ve seen Victoria and Angel Falls, Iguazu is the most spectacular waterfalls I’ve seen in my life. There are just so many falls coming out of lush green jungle, and pounding down in so many places with masses of water. We did a speedboat ride into the falls, and got completely drenched. Awesome since it has been around 40 degrees here for days, and apparently isn’t going to get much cooler for the remaining 20 days we have left of our trip. Saw more butterflies at the falls than I’ve seen in my life, 1 which even has the number 88 on its wings (I wanted to keep him and race him). Also heaps of birds, large lizards and a weird looking badger/possum/racoon looking animal called a Coatis.

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World Trip Update #48- Bolivia/Argentina

Date: Mon, 29 Jan 2007

Hola,

How are you all? I shouldn’t have said how remarkable it had been travelling for 11 months without getting sick really, as it seems I’m having bad luck now. Have a bad cold at the moment, and camping in the rain is definitely not helping it (nor are the late nights partying).

I can’t believe we have less than 4 weeks left until we get home. For those who have asked, we arrive into Sydney on Saturday 24th Feb at about 7am, on the only Lan Chile (LA) flight that day. For those of you who live in Sydney, we would love to catch up with you all as soon as possible, but I’ll let you know more details and where we’ll be when soon.

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World Trip Update #47 – Peru/Bolivia

Date: Tue, 23 Jan 2007

Hola all,

How are you all? We are both well, and I have finally got my appetite back again. Lost some weight while sick, so that was good. Thanks so much for the emails. Sorry I haven’t been getting time to reply individually lately, but I love receiving them and promise to reply or talk to you in person about everything when we get back in a month’s time. We are loving this trip so much, but are so excited to come home to normality again too.

Anyhow, since last email, we went off to numerous islands on Lake Titicaca, and had an amazing time. It is the highest lake in the world, and boy did we feel the altitude. Can’t wait to drop altitude again, as we are constantly puffed out, even just walking 100m. Feel so unfit. Can’t wait to get back to soccer and touch footy. Got a great game of soccer in at about 3800m on Amantani Island on the Lake. We all went to the island to stay with individual families for a night. Ate with the whole family in their candlelit kitchen. Our group played soccer against another tour group. I was the only girl playing, but despite my lack of playing for 1 year, I did OK. The altitude didn’t seem too bad for me either. Our tour group won, with Phil scoring 2 goals. After dinner, all the families dressed us all in the traditional costumes, and we all went down to the community hall on the island to dance with the locals to local music. Heaps of fun, although I had to call it a night early as I had a splitting headache. Freezing cold night, but luckily we had plenty of Alpaca wool blankets to keep us warm in our little room high up in the hills.

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World Trip Update #46 – Peru

Date: Tue, 16 Jan 2007

Hola again,

Well, not all that much to report this time as far as our travels go. My good luck with health really came to an abrupt end in this last week. I’ll get to that in a moment though.

Since last email, we caught a train to Aguas Calientes , the closest town to Machu Picchu. Spent the arvo and night there, with not that much to do, but our room had great views over the raging rapids. The next morning we headed off in the pouring rain and fog at 5.30am to get the bus up to Machu Picchu to be the first people up there. Well, we pretty much were, however it was pretty awful viewing until about 11.30am when the rain had stopped and the clouds finally cleared. It was a magnificent place to see. So huge an area. Llamas everywhere too. A few of us were stupid enough to climb Wayna Picchu, which is the huge pointy mountain you see in the background of any postcard of Machu Picchu. It was rather steep, and only wet, slippery rocks as stairs at some difficult angles and sizes (height and width). Got a bird’s eye view of the place from up there though. The enormous place looked miniscule. If you had asked me what my 3 most desired places to see on our trip before we left were, Machu Picchu would definitely have been 1, and it lived up to my expectations if not exceeded them.

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World Trip Update #45 – Peru

Date: Tue, 9 Jan 2007

Hola,

How are you all? We have still been well. I think we have developed iron guts while we have been travelling. We never get sick or even the runs. All but about 5 of us on our tour of 36 people have had the runs the whole time. I am very surprised, as we don’t take any extra precautions than anyone else. In fact, they all drink bottled water, and we drink the tap water through our filter straw, so you would think we have more chance of getting sick.

Well, our tour so far has been awesome, and as usual we have been lucky in being with an awesome group of people. There are 34 of us, plus our guide and driver (who are both Aussies). We have a Scottish couple, 2 Pommies, 2 Kiwis, 4 Irish and the rest are Aussies. Can’t seem to escape them no matter where we are in the world. Aussies take over everywhere, whether it be on tours or in hostels or trains, etc. There are about 6 couples, 6 single males, and the rest are single girls, so the 6 single guys have quite a selection. It has only been 10 days on tour out of 49, but already we have got to know each other really well. There are 2 other tour groups running alongside our trip a lot of the time too, which we get to mingle with often. Our group looks the best though.

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World Trip Update #44 – Venezuela

Date: Sun, 31 Dec 2006

Hola!!!

It will probably be 2007 by the time you read this email, so hope you had a fantastic New Year (or have in case you are reading this in 2006) and we really look forward to seeing you all again very soon. Hope you are all well, as we still are.

Venezuela was great. People are so friendly and helpful, even if few can speak any English. Even though it is their winter, the temperatures were around 30deg everyday. Also, if I thought the petrol prices in the Middle East were ridiculously cheap, Venezuela has to top the market in the worlds cheapest fuel. Only costs about 2 US cents for a litre. You can fill a 150 litre truck tank for US$2.00.

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World Trip Update #43 – Egypt

Date: Tue, 26 Dec 2006

Hi all,

Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas. Yours is over, but ours is still continuing. I am sure yours was much more enjoyable than ours has been though. We got our transfer from our hotel in Cairo at 10pm 24th December (7am Sydney time 25th), then flew via Barcelona, a long changeover in Madrid, then a long flight to Caracas in Venezuela where we are right now. Our Xmas Day is still not over though, as we are waiting for a flight to Puerto Ordaz, and will arrive there at 11.30pm tonight (25th December still here, but by Sydney time it will be 2.30pm 26th December). So our Xmas is really 30 hours of no sleep. Then we’re on another flight at 7am tomorrow to get to Canaima where we will begin a 3 day tour to Angel Falls.

Anyhow, onto the update. Our Egypt tour was fantastic. We had a fantastic group of people. We have been so lucky with our Contiki, Turkey and Egypt tours with meeting such fantastic people, who we hope to continue our friendships with. We only have the big 7 week one in South America left, so I hope we are as lucky with that one, since it is camping with the same people for the longest time yet.

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