Argentina – my next home

I apologised for the lack of blog updates due to Christmas and New Year and this one will start off no different but for lots of different reasons, which I’ll go into now…

After NYE we allowed ourselves a day to recover, pack and get a bus to Patagonia. I don’t know why people to do it, we’ve all done it but we’ve gone on holidays whether it’s for a week or 6 months in our case but everyone ends up flocking to a British bar or having a fry up, we and I say this hand on heart have not done either.

We have however, visited the home of our ancestors. History lesson coming up…

In the 1800’s hundreds of people from Wales upped and left in sight of a new home, tired of all the Rhondda boys driving around in their BMW’s and the shitty weather. When they got there they set up farms and established two villages called Gaiman and Trelew, with Trelew being the key city for sale of the crops that the famers had for sale.

(This is not exactly what happened but you get the idea…)

We had to get a bus to Trelew and then get another bus to Gaiman to experience the full Welsh atmosphere. We were told that Gaiman was the “welshest” of the two towns. When we got to Trelew it must have been around 35 degrees.  I tell you if our ancestors got there in the summer they’d have been back on their boat sailing back home, unless they were from the Rhondda then they’d have had their tops off by the time the boat had docked!  We had 30mins before the next bus to Gaiman so we thought we’d have a quick tour of the town and as we’d been told, there were welsh flags everywhere, even the streets had welsh names…

After getting the bus to Gaiman we expected a living version of St Fagan’s but sadly this wasn’t the case. In fact we got more a deserted town with tumbleweed. Fortunately for us, one of the welsh tea shops was advertised as being open and after a 1mile walk down a narrow lane being chased by dogs we arrived at “Te Ty Caerdydd”.  Marvellous I thought, there we were sporting our new Welsh tops proud as punch their going to love us. I imagined them saying –

“Come on in Rich, have a sit down. We heard that you may be coming. Do you want a welsh cake?”

Sadly this wasn’t to be the case, in fact all we got off the woman at first was a bit of a grunt and that it was going to cost £15 for afternoon tea. Anyway not to let this deter us we sat down and the woman came over, looked at us like we were eejits for wearing our welsh tops and took our order for two afternoon teas, then told us that the toilet was through the corridor and we might want to go and wash our hands – it was exactly like being at home!

Anyway as much tea and cake was brought out to us while we sat there staring at the surroundings. Lady Di had visited there in 1995 (a good job as Leah said because she wouldn’t be going there a few years later) and since then the place had become a shrine to her.  The exact tea cup that she’d used was stored in a cabinet for all to see, along with the napkins she’d used and the toilet seat she’d put her royal arse on. After a while, I was full and the creepy ness of the place got to us and we needed to head back to our hostel with full bellies (and a doggy bag of cakes).

To get to these villages we decided to stay in a little place called Puerto Madryn which would be our base for the few days we were down on the east coast of Argentina. When we got there early in the morning, the staff were really helpful and told us about all the different tours that we could do, from penguin watching to whale spotting. The woman was busy explaining that there was a colony of over a million penguins just around the corner but if we wanted to see them we needed to be quick as they were going to leave to go to Brazil to follow their food. Leah kept her mouth shut and was overwhelmed with all the information, when the woman finished Leah asked the infamous question:

“How do they get all the way to Brazil? Its miles away…”

When we explained to her that they swam, she couldn’t get over it, but it left a lasting impression with the woman on reception and Dave, one of the lads that we’d been traveling with since Christmas. Once she’d pulled herself together, the woman explained that we were outside of whale watching season but people had been fortunate to see them the day before and baring a huge storm then we were most likely to see them. After we returned from Gaiman and Trelew we went to get some food and a birthday card for Dave (everyone should have a birthday card on their birthday! – shouldn’t they?) The skies opened and the biggest storm the area has seen for a while come in and cut off the power. (We were told that night that they only have 6 days of rain a year and we were there for one of them!) This didn’t bode well for the next day but we went to bed excited about seeing penguins, seals, sea lions and whales.

We got up early to a dry town so it was on with our best summer wear as we’d been told it was always boiling hot after a storm. Our bus picked us up and we were off full of anticipation of the day ahead. I’m not the best first thing in the morning and neither is Leah, in fact until I lived with Leah I didn’t realise how tired someone could be in the morning. So there we are, sat on the bus going to pick up the next lot of whale spotters and something catches my eye. I did the usual double blink, rubbed my eyes and took a second look. I wasn’t hallucinating it really was a dog standing on the roof of a car, happy as Larry as the car passed the bus we were travelling in, doing at least 30mph! As you may know Leah is dog mad and so was Dave and they were hysterical when I pointed it out to them. I think if you were to ask Leah the favourite thing she’d seen so far this would be at the top of the list!

After we got to the first stop with the elephant seals it became quickly apparent that we’d chosen the wrong clothes for the day, trousers, jumpers and coats would have been a better option. Not to be deterred we stayed out in the freezing cold to see the seals wriggling along the beach and grunt at each other, after turning a dark shade of blue we decided that it would be better to move on to see the penguins, which for me were the highlight of the day.

After the penguin stop it was off to find some whales. We got to the harbour to get the necessary lifejackets on, when the woman who would be taking us out looked at Leah and I she asked us if we had any more clothes – now my father never said to me:

“You’re not going out dressed like that are you?”

However, if he ever did then I’m sure I would feel like we did in front of this woman. She was a kind soul and went and got Leah a nice little waterproof and warm jacket. While she was away I’d spotted a North Face jacket about my size sat on the back of a chair in the office and thought that my luck was in. How wrong could I be? Instead she gave me this giant size piece of orange tarpaulin that you could use to cover a garage roof. As she handed it to me she said “and here’s your cape…” A cape? A fucking cape? Now, Batman has a cape he uses it to fly, that’s cool, as does Superman. This was a piece of orange plastic that made me look like I’d been tango’d and not a super hero.

Anyway after the embarrassment of having to get on a boat with my orange cape with people pointing and laughing we set off to find the whales. It wasn’t what you could call an easy trip out to the open seas, in fact at times it resembled a sea saw! We’d gone from being blue in the morning to green but once we were out in quiet waters, it cooled down and we returned to our normal colour (and me with the orange cape) after an hour out at sea we saw a few penguins and a few seals, but not a whale in sight which was a little disappointing. So if you’re ever going there to see whales pray that a storm doesn’t happen the day you get there!

After returning to our hostel we made it straight to the bus terminal to get the overnight to a place called Bariloche, on the east coast of Patagonia’s lake district.  We’d been told that Bariloche was stunning but nothing actually prepared us for what we were to see the next morning.

Bariloche is a little town on the edge of a huge fresh water lake and is the biggest city within Argentina’s Lake District; it was founded by the Swiss and therefore resembles an alpine town, which included all the good and bad things of an alpine village. (Good: Chocolate – lots of it and Bad: Fondue…) In fact in the winter it’s Argentina’s main ski resort.

We’d heard about a hostel in Bariloche from a few lads that we’d met en route and they said that in the 6 months that they’d been travelling it was the best hostel that they’d stayed in. It’s pretty exclusive to get into, they’re not online and they don’t accept email bookings so all we could do was rock up and see if they had any space for us. Rather than me come along and look all awkward, we decided that it would be better if I was left to look after the bags in a café while Leah went off to sort it out. During the time Leah was out I’d made friends with the café owner Hernandez and when Leah returned in a bath of sweat after walking miles I was stood behind the counter eating ice cream and fixing Hernandez’s wireless internet.

The hostel is called 1004 and is the only hostel that we’ve ever felt comfy, check out these photos and the view from the balcony, all for only £10 a night!

In 6 weeks I’d not been cycling once and it was starting to get to me and Leah even more! There were hundreds of cycle rental companies around so I went off in search of a decent chap that I was prepared to hand my money over to. We ended up finding a chap called Daniel who was about the same size as me and was a proper cycling nut, after 10mins we’d agreed on 6 hours cycling taking in some of the best tracks that the Andes had to offer and using his bike rather than the shitty rental ones he gave out to everyone else. I was now like a kid waiting for Santa to come, how would I (and Leah) manage the next day?

To keep my child like mind occupied, we went Kayaking on some of the fresh water lakes which was brilliant fun, I was of course captain of the kayak with Leah in front doing all the hard work (Boys – something I’ve picked up from the South American men. You should try it?!) The guys organising it were awesome, they took us out on to the lake and at ½ way we stopped and had mate, tea and medialunas!

One thing that’s been bugging us since we got to South America is that they don’t call croissants, croissants they’re called medi lunas and it took Leah ages to figure out why. For those of you that don’t speak Spanish, let me explain – ‘media’ is Spanish for half and ‘luna’ is Spanish for moon, so ½ moon! Clever hey…? Well the best medialunas we’ve had have been in Bariloche so we were over the moon (Excuse the pun…) when they pulled out a bag of them and if you don’t know what mate is Google it…

On our way back in the Kayaks we were talking to one of the guides and he was telling us about a local restaurant that does the best food and does a different special  each day, todays was lasagne. When Leah heard this, she was nearly in the water with excitement. Yes – she loves lasagne too!

Anyway after being dropped off at the hostel we had a quick shower and a chill out and got there before 8.30 the time that guy told us to get there. We walked in to an already busy restaurant full of locals, our food arrived fairly quickly and the guy wasn’t lying that the food was good, in fact it was the best food we’d had in Bariloche yet (probably because I’d been doing the cooking..)

Though one thing I can’t understand is the South American’s fascination with ham and cheese, you get it with everything. Every sandwich is ham, ham and cheese, ham, cheese and tomato the list goes on but Leah’s beef lasagne also had ham and cheese in it! How bizarre…

Anyway, we pay the bill which was something ridiculous like £15 for the pair of us we leave a tidy tip and then walk out to find the restaurant rammed around us and over 50 people queuing outside! Including the Kayak guy, who was at the back of the queue and wasn’t going to be eating before 11 that night. I’ve never felt so many people staring at me with disgust and impatience!

So, if you’re ever in Bariloche, please try out La Fonda Del Tio and try the Lasagne on a Friday or the Chicken Milanesa and if you’re names not Gavin Roberts don’t bother trying the full size Milanesa, just have the half (oh yeah and get there before 8.30pm)

Boring cycling talk coming up ….

The next day’s cycling was awesome, we took in some huge climbs, and we climbed over a 1000meters in the first hour! Saw some brilliant sights, rode some different terrain that I’m not use to and I only fell off once!

Some photos of my day out…

Cycling talk over…

Leah enjoyed her day at the beach too if you were wondering!

We’ve been away from home for over 2 months, visited four countries and tens of different places but Bariloche is the only place that I can safely say that I could live. I said this to the guys that we were kayaking with and their response was that if I could live there for a full year taking in their winter when it rains for 2 months constantly then I could pass as a resident. 2 months of rain? That’s nothing is it compared with Wales????

After our spell in Bariloche it was time to buy some chocolate from the numerous chocolate shops, some as big as a Tesco to help our 24 hour bus journey back to Buenos Aires, where we would be flying to Bolivia for 2 weeks.

Not only did I love Bariloche but I loved Argentina, yes I took a few days to get into Buenos Aires but in the end I got to love it too. The steaks, the beer, the cycling and the views of Bariloche, I’d be quite happy to be stuck at a desk looking out at some of those views!

With all the stuff that I’ve mentioned above you can see why we’ve not had time to sit down and write about what we’ve been up to!

Next up my review of Bolivia, not quite sure what to expect yet, we’ve been at altitude already so don’t expect to be too shocked in what it can throw at us. I expect it’ll be very similar to Peru and like Leah keeps saying:

“It’s proper South America….”

New Year in BA

We left Rosario to go to Buenos Aires on the day after boxing day, one of the guys working in the hostel we stayed in in Sao Paulo recommended us a hostel in BA, but after a Google search we found some horrendous reviews of it so we were dubious about staying there for the full 6 nights we had planned on being in BA for, so we only booked 3 nights there and would need to get another hostel for the first 3 nights. We’d heard good stories about one hostel when staying in Rosario, so we booked ourselves in there. We got there and found out we didn’t have a bed for the night in this hostel due to a balls up with overbooking. Not great once you’ve just got off a 6 hour bus journey and are sweating loads! They managed to sort it all out and we had to stay in another hostel a few streets away for one night. We went out for a walk and bumped into one of the girls that did the Inca trail with us. It was really strange actually seeing someone you know on the street rather than being a total billy no mates for a change…

The following day we went for a walk and found a Burger King in the middle of the city at this point we had been away for 6 weeks and have not yet  eaten a Mcdonalds or a Burger King. Not bad going considering we’ve not got a clue what we’re ordering and sometimes its quiet nice to be able to walk into somewhere and order something and know what it will be! Anyway after a quadruple burger I was fed and watered and we went off to explore the city. BA has a reputation for being a massive party city but there is so much more to do there. We walked for miles and got back to the hostel, fortunately one the lads that we had met in Rosario told us about an awesome Chinese around the corner, as some of you know what Leah doesn’t’ know about Chinese food isn’t worth knowing about. In fact she’s Wales’s version of Gordon Ramsey when it comes to the Chinese take away. After our meal she sat there and announced that it was the best Chinese meal she’s ever had! So, if Come Enjoy in Aberdare is closed, head to BA next time!

One of the things we’ve learnt (and were told when we left home) was that Argentinians are very strong willed. We were also told on the bus from Rosario that if a bus is late by more than an hour then a riot may get started. After walking the streets of BA I can believe this, everywhere we walked there were people protesting about something or another, from the dread sporting hippies moaning about the price of conditioner to students moaning about the increase in price of Rizla papers.

One of the big things that we wanted to see whilst in BA was some people performing the tango. Lots of restaurants had dancers outside and whilst you were eating your dinner, you’d often have two people kicking their legs up in the air and strutting their stuff. However, we were told about a tango bar where you got very close to the action. We ended up there one night and were lucky enough to be two in an audience of 10 watching a tango show , which was just great. However, as there was a shortage of men in the room, they kept picking on me when it came to someone practicing the tango. I’m sure Len Goodman would have given me no more than a 5 but I was wearing flip flops…

It was now time to leave our other hostel and make our way over to our new hostel, filled with total fear of the hole we were about to move into. Due to our first hostel’s total inadequate organisation skills we weren’t able to stay in the same room twice and had moved 3 times! We got to our new hostel and were pleasantly surprised and found the staff to be quite helpful, the only downside was no air conditioning and a distinct lack of ventilation in our room but we weren’t going to be there much!

As I’ve said many times before, my friends are football mad and they’d mentioned Boca Juniors to me many times when I said about visiting BA. So on NYE day we went down to the area of La Boca, this area has a bit of a reputation as being a bit rough so we were armed with our abusive language and one hundred security devices. We got to the stadium and decided that I would go on the tour of the stadium as there were loads of shops that Leah could get lost in for an hour or so. I went to the counter at 1:05pm to be told that the last tour was at 1 and I was too late. I do however have photos of the stadium…

Believe it or not Argentina is a fairly corrupt country with Buenos Aires being the most corrupt city out there, the height of corruption being all the bus companies running a racketeering scheme to keep all the coins that exist within the country and then sell it back to the government at a profit of around 20%, this then causes more of a problem because they will only accept coins when you go to catch a bus in the city, so it’s a bit of a catch twenty two situation.  This situation is then compounded by shops refusing to give you loose change when buying things, in most situations they would rather give you more change (in notes) than to give you change. However the only way of getting to La Boca is via a bus and we’d manage to accumulate enough change to get there but not quite enough to get home. So we tried everything we could to get change, Leah started tango dancing with Men on the street and I started singing but after an hours effort and no change we quickly realised it would be better to walk. We even restored to scouring the streets for loose change! However, Leah sharp as a knife said to me :

“Rich, if we buy me that bracelet, ring and necklace then we’ll tell the chap that he has to give us change so we can get home”

Brilliant idea I thought, until we were paying for it and I realised how much it cost… Nevertheless the guy was more than happy to give us a £1 worth of change for us to get back to the city centre in return for £50 of jewellery he made when he was stoned last night.

{Leah: ‘He is such a liar, I only bought a ring and it was a total bargain! He wasn’t complaining when I got the change for the bus back….’}

Now, for me New Year’s Eve is one of those times of year that no-one ever knows what to do, do they stay in, do they go out and spend a fortune or do they have a party, then you end up having to wake up and clean up all the empty cans and pasties that are left over. Thankfully, our hostel had decided that they would have a BBQ on the roof and get some beers and champagne in for everyone. Awesome idea we thought as there were a good group of people in the hostel and we’d know where to go and the Argentinians love a BBQ more than anyone else so we knew we’d eat well that night.

Now after celebrating midnight with a group of pissed welsh lads we left the hostel at 3am to go and find somewhere to go, now in my book if you’re going out at 3 then its normally 3pm and there’s football or rugby on, but in Buenos Aires  3am is a normal time to go out. Unfortunately as with all groups there was one girl who insisted that she could speak Spanish (even though she was American) and knew where to go that night. Now, when someone sticks their head above the clouds and says that they know where to go and no-one else does then you have to admire her for it and follow her like a lemming.  So we leave the hostel and get in a taxi (flagging one down there was hard enough!) and set off in the direction that she’s giving the driver.

I’m sure we’ve all had “fun” taxi journeys, whether its you’ve either been sick in the back of a taxi and the driver doesn’t know, you’ve tipped you’re cheese, chips and beans on the backseat or you don’t have enough money to pay him and you’re waiting for the closest red light to home so you can do a runner. However, this taxi journey was slightly different. There were 5 people in the back seat, Welsh, English, American, Chilean and Argentinian (The UN would be proud of our peace keeping) and I was in the front.  Now we’ve all been in taxi journeys where the taxi driver smelt or was a bad driver but I’ve never been in a taxi with a driver who has gold teeth and has a crazy glint in his eye. How do you define a crazy glint in his eye? When he thinks it’s funny to start cutting people up, doing wheel spins from traffic lights and starts lighting fireworks from his cigarette and throwing them out of the window of the taxi. This was his way of ringing in the new year with a bang!

As we’re travelling along out of the city, its quickly apparent that this girl who thinks she can speak Spanish and knows where to go hasn’t got a clue, we eventually get out of the taxi near a “club” which when we get there is closed but thankfully across the road there is a party that we can go to. As I’d had a drink, I decided that this girl should have a piece of my mind (and in much embarrassment to Leah which I’m sorry for) in fact looking back at the incident she was quite possibly  the most annoying person I’ve ever met. As someone said to a mate of mine when he was drunk, I should have said to her:

“I’ve been around the world and met lots of people, but you really are the biggest prick I’ve ever met!”

Anyhow after getting this off my chest we managed to find the party in one of BA’s biggest parks. We got there and found a lot of DJs playing different music in this huge park, after falling over in the dark a few times we found the field playing the best music. Now South American music does leave a lot to be desired, in most bars and restaurants that you got there’s either annoying samba beat or its Phil Collins crooning his best songs. However, we did manage to find a field playing something half decent and stayed there until day light managing to see the first sunrise of 2011!

Hopefully there’ll be more like this to come…

Christmas Argentina Style

As its Christmas and New Year holiday and (nearly) everyone is on holidays, I thought it essential that I also take a break from the only job that I have for the next few months and have a rest from writing the blog. Though as we’re now on a 20 hour bus journey I thought I’d kill the time by updating the blog and it’ll keep me quiet so Leah will be happy too.

After we left Iguacu Falls we had planned on spending Christmas and New Years in two separate places as over a week in one place can be a bit much. We had read in “the book” that Rosario was Argentina’s “Second City” so we decided to spend a few days there for Christmas and then after Christmas we would make our way to Buenos Aires for New Years. The journey to Rosario from Iguacu was going to be a mammoth one and as we had time we decided that we’d stop off in a little place called Posadas for a few days before getting to Rosario.

Posadas was a little town on the banks of the Rio Paraguay river with the town of Encarnacion in Paraguay on the other side, so it offered us the opportunity to get over to Paraguay for the day and for us to get another stamp in the passport. Our hostel was a really small one with a totally chilled out vibe and a small swimming pool a few steps outside of our bedroom to cool down in. We were greeted with 37 degree temperatures and over 90% humidity, so our first day was spent sweating and getting in and out of the pool to cool down. We met a girl in our hostel who had been over to Paraguay the previous day and had got there with very little hassle and it only took her an hour. So we decided that the following day (Monday) would be a good day to get over to visit Paraguay.

We got up and caught the local bus and duly got out with all the other locals at the border to be confronted with a queue like no other. Now we Brits are known for our love of queuing but I think the Argies love it just as much! There must have been over 500 people queuing to get into Paraguay, with a queue of cars going back as far as the eye can see. After 30mins queuing where we moved about 30ft we decided that enough was enough and we would take one of the several offers that we had from taxi drivers and any lad that had a car with some space in it to take us across the border faster than we would be in standing in the queue.

We agreed that sitting in some locals clapped out Peugeot was the least preferable option so we took a taxi driver up on the option of taking us across. After 10 mins we had got through the  Argentina and Paraguay borders and were entering the town of Encarnacion. We found out from the taxi that we’d decided to cross the border on the first day of the Christmas holidays and the busiest shopping day of the year!  Argentines go shopping in Paraguay because the Peso is worth more in Paraguay and the town has the biggest market I have ever seen, selling all manner of junk. Think of Rheola Market on steroids, covering an area about 30 football pitches and you’ll be not too far off.

We had a walk around the town and found out that along with Posadas they are set to lose a good proportion of the town due to the level of water in the Rio Paraguay rising due to global warming.  After a tour of the town and experiencing  the bus station we made our way back to Posadas.  The bus when we got on was empty and apart from us another few tourists we had the bus pretty much to ourselves.. However, the bus stopped in the shopping market and about a million people got on the bus, all with bags of shopping full of kids toys, clothes and the usual Christmas shit. One chap even had a flat screen telly! He was the envy of all the bus.

I’ve now realised that something has to go wrong every time that we travel by bus, if it’s not us missing a bus or us getting on the wrong bus it’s something. This bus journey was no different, we expected the bus to stop at the Paraguay border for us to all get our passport stamped on the way out of the country so we could enter Argentina without any hassles but it didn’t, it sailed straight through without a care for the world and we ended up going straight to Argentina. We got to the border control and expected that we would have to go all the way back and get our passports stamped to enter. However, the guy just waved us on without a concern and stamped our passports. So we’re currently in a state of limbo, we both have our passport stamped but the chap didn’t add us on to his little computer but I’m sure we’ll soon find out if there’s a problem when we go to fly to Bolivia on the 12^th of January! Fingers crossed there won’t be.

The only thing that is worth writing about Posadas is the food! We went to a restaurant not far from our hostel which was offering an all you can eat Assado (BBQ) for 50 pesos, that’s about £8! We were both hungry and they kept bringing out fillet and sirloin steak, chicken, pork and Chorizo until we could eat no more! Sadly, I’ve not found a steak the size of my face…

After 3 days in Posadas we left to go to Rosario, our home for Christmas. We got to the hostel and were offered the “suite” for an extra few quid a night, after a few nights in a dorm with 4 other strangers we were looking forward to our own bedroom but this place was more a boutique hotel, the room has it all, air conditioning, own bathroom and even a table and chairs! Now, this doesn’t sound like much but we were over the moon after bunk beds and shared bathrooms! (BTW: Leah has successfully slept on the bottom bunk at two of our recent hostels)

The heat hadn’t been suppressed but we were starting to adapt to the heat and on the morning of Christmas eve it was a little bit cloudy so we decided that as I hadn’t ridden a bike for the entire time we had been away, Leah thought that we better had or if I didn’t, then I may go crazy. We’d also heard that as Rosario was as flat as a pancake it would be a good way to see the city. So we hired bikes and set off to find a beach that we’d heard about a few miles away. En route, one of the many hundred street dogs decided that he wanted to follow us and we somehow recruited this mutt for the next 3 miles. Not content with just following us he also decided that he should look after us and fended us from any other dog attacks. I repaid the favour by promising him some of my sandwich when we got back. Though, on the way back he decided that two runners coming the other way maybe more fun and ran after them. I have to say that it was great to get back on two wheels even though they did have shopping baskets on the front and even though she’s sat next to me and will read this before it gets upload I was very proud of Leah’s cycling efforts, her first for many years! I can see her in Lycra when we get home…

As it was our first Christmas away from home, we knew it would be a bit different to the usual of overeating  turkey dinners, chocolate, mince pie’s, getting as pissed as parrots on Christmas Eve, working in between Christmas and New Year and then getting stressed about where we’re going to go for New Years eve.

The last time I updated the blog we were getting ready to go out on Christmas Eve. Now, Christmas Eve is usually about going out catching up with people that you don’t see from one year to the next and them asking you what you’ve been up to and what they’ve been up to. (Usually this is not very much) however we could guarantee that this Christmas eve we wouldn’t be seeing anyone that we knew (Though, if my old man was there I’m sure he’d meet someone that he knew!) The hostel staff had been less than helpful and generally any information we were told should be total discounted, they couldn’t even be bothered to organise anything at the hostel for Christmas day and preferred to be miserable in work instead. They did explain though that Christmas was celebrated at midnight on Christmas eve and after opening their presents everyone went out so there would be little point in going out early.

We knew that for Christmas day we would be with one of the guys that we did the Inca trail with, but we also met up with an English couple who also thought that something would be going on in the hostel so hadn’t thought about sorting something out. Anyway our little of gang of 5 had a few drinks in the hostel and made our way to the club that we had been told about that would open at midnight. So we left the hostel to be confronted with the streets of Rosario resembling something out of 28 days later. Not a single person could be found on the streets, as we walked towards the area where this club was, we found ourselves to be under fire from people living in the high rise flats setting fireworks off.  I’ve never been to Baghdad and don’t intend to go either but I can imagine this was not too dissimilar. With no sign of anyone on the street or this club being open then we decided that we’d try to find a bar serving drinks, we continued to walk the streets much like Joseph, Mary and the 3 wise men following a star in the distance, however this star was in the window of a restaurant. We walked up to the door to see if they’d let us in and a crying woman came running out and started kissing me and wishing me merry Christmas. I thought bloody hell she’s a bit forward and Leah’s behind me! Anyway, she did the same with all of us and so did her husband but I offered him my hand rather than accepting a kiss from a bearded bloke. Anyway they let us in and brought us drinks. As we sat there, like at home people were opening their presents, getting jumpers, pants and even DVD players! It just so happened to be a Greek restaurant and after opening their presents, they all got up and started dancing around the restaurant, Stavros Flatley had nothing on these lot but the Ouzo was flowing so everyone was happy.

We left the bar to get to the club about 2:30 and the streets were slightly different to a few hours ago, with people everywhere which made finding the club a lot easier! We duly got in the queue only for a bouncer to come up to me to tell me that flip flops weren’t allowed, after a quick check we noticed that everyone is wearing flip flops so I turn around and reason with him but he’s not having any of my welsh bouncer banter, so I lead the walk and turn around and march off. He obviously saw the error of his ways and came running after us to tell us that as we’ve come all the way from Wales then he’d let us in. We get in the club just after 3 and the place is empty! However, within 30mins it’s full of people, sadly for us we were the oldest in the club by at least 10 years, a rule that Leah now applies to girls and guessing their age:

“If their hair is down to their arse, then they’re not old enough to be in a nightclub”

I’ve mentioned that there are loads of street dogs in Argentina and this club was full of them, something that Leah found hilarious especially one hairy ass dog who was walking around the top floor of the nightclub like he owned the place!

We got up on Christmas Day to our cards from our parents and presents from Lynne and Roger – thank you very much! And Skyped home to see everyone with their new presents and getting ready to face the snow, we then we set off for the beach for the day! After a couple of hours of chilling out on the beach we went back to the hostel to get our Assado on the go, the 3 of us all had jobs to do. Mine was to get the BBQ going, however after 30mins of trying it was clear that it wasn’t going to happen. I blame the lack of fire lighters, but I did manage to get a few coals red hot but there wasn’t enough to get the rest of the coals burning.

However Juan (one of the guys working at the hostel), came and took all the glory and got the coals burning quiet quickly, smart arse!  Once all the coals were white hot we got the steaks and Chorizo cooking (Leah had no faith in my Assado lighting abilities and decided that she’d better cook the chicken in the oven!) 3 hours after we first set out to get things going we sat down to eat our Christmas dinner.

How does it look compared to yours?

Samba, Speedboats and Waterfalls

After we finally left Sao Paulo, we got to our destination called Florianopolis to be greeted by lots of sunshine which was good considering we were going to spend the next 4 days lying on the beach or by the hostel pool. After a short bus ride and another which lasted too long (e.g we missed our stop and had a guided tour of the island.) We got to our hostel and decided that we were going to chill out by the pool and have a few beers, however our chips were quickly pissed on when the rain came to spoil our fun. This turned into a regular occurrence of the rest of our stay, we’d get up thinking the rain would leave us alone, we’d have chance to eat breakfast then it would piss down again.

We did as much as we could do to keep entertained – we would do our washing, eat, drink, play uno, I’d read, Leah would look at the pictures but the boredom was still there. However, one night we did manage to get out with everyone from the hostel and go to a local Samba club. Now, after our little visit to the club in Sao Paulo we’d thought we were experts in Samba. To cut a long story short (as my dad would say..) we got to this club and it resembled the Ferny on a Sunday night (Anyone over the age of 28 and from Aberdare will be smiling as they read this) it was essentially a wooden shack – on stilts rammed with loads of young boys and girls wanting to get shit-faced and get off with each other.

Now, when I was going out looking for women, you would drink a few pints with the boys, stand on the side of the dance floor and when a bird gave you the eye or one you thought would be up for it looked at you, you would go up to her and ask her if she fancied a drink and then maybe at the end of the night you’d get lucky and you’d end up pulling her. Nope, not in Brazil. The etiquette is this – you see a bird you fancy/has a pulse, go up to her and start Samba dancing with her. Pretty simple really and in the 45mins we were there I saw a few boys get lucky – fair play I thought must tell the boys back home. So off I go’s to get Leah and I a drink, instructing Leah to not move and stay where she was. I return armed with drinks after queuing twice for things as you do in Brazil (1 to pay and get a chitty and the second to get my drink), to find Leah looking panic stricken dancing with this lad who thinks he’s Brazil’s answer to Patrick Sweazy. He clocks me and is soon standing on Leah’s toes better than I can and making his exit.

Apart from the Samba party, Florianopolis was pretty much a non-event for us. So we decided we should head off and make it to Iguazu Falls. Now, apart from Christ the redeemer, this was the other thing that I wanted to see in South America, after seeing the falls in James Bonds - Moonraker when Bond drives a boat over the edge of the falls and flies off in a hang glider. So we left Florianopolis on another overnight bus to get to Iguazu. For those of you that didn’t know, Iguazu straddles the border between Brazil and Argentina and the falls can be seen from the both sides. We were told that the Argentina side provided the more up close and personal view but the Brazil side provides the better perspective, but it was well worth seeing them from the Brazilian side if you can. We got to the park minus our bags and got to see them from the Brazilian side and was totally blown away by what we got to see.  I’d imagined seeing them from some platform where we could see them in the distance but when we got there we got soaked by the spray from the falls. I started thinking about the drunken conversation a few nights before and had I got it wrong – was the Brazilian side the one that you got up close and personal with?

We woke up the following morning and made our way to the park from the Argentina side and were again totally mesmerised by it! (You can start to see a pattern here – I liked the falls!)  Anyway, after 5 hours of taking photos and just watching water falling off big cliffs and getting soaked by the spray we’d decided to take the advice of some guys we’d met in the bar the night before, that a ride in a speed boat taking you right up and actually into the waterfalls was a must see. Surprisingly Leah was bang up for it too (She’s even considering paragliding soon but I can’t see her doing a bungee when we get to NZ!) after paying our money and signing our life away we got our lifejacket’s on and got on the boat to take up the last two seats on the boat. We’d been told to wear only swimming clothes on so Leah’s got her Bikini on and I’m in my best Baywatch shorts that would give Hasslehoff a run for his money! Now I’d always expected there to be some pikey young kid (Equipped with a baseball hat the wrong way around) driving the boat with a heavy right foot to give us maximum thrill factor. Sadly as I got on the boat I’d clocked the driver and a pair of driving gloves, a pipe and a dai cap would be better suited. However we soon found out this guy was re-living his youth and drove us all head long into the falls and got everyone in the boat duly soaked, after a few high-speed blasts and turns I turned around expecting to see him grinning like a Cheshire cat, sadly he was just sat there expressionless . I guess once you’ve seen a load of tourists soaked once it’s not that funny, when it’s the 15^th time and the end of the day you just want to go home!

That night we decided to celebrate at the hostel and as it was ½ price drinks for 3 hours of the night we were going to get on it. So the Cubra Libre’s were flowing and everyone chatting around by the pool and with Leah only having had 2 drinks. I turn around to find her rolling backwards down the stairs, her drink going in the air and the prospect of another 5 steps for her to go I do the just and honest thing and instead of helping her up , I get the camera out to take a photo! We’d heard that it was a party hostel so we expected kids drinking all night by the pool and not much sleep.  At 1am everyone had gone to bed and all that was left was Leah and I and two other’s we’d met the day before propping up the bar until 4 am. You’ll all be pleased to hear that we filled one side of the bar (About 5.5ft) in empty 600ml bottles of lager!

Anyway we’d been totally absorbed by the falls and hadn’t managed to get around them in one day so decided that we had to go back for the second day and take them up on the offer of a second days’ entry at ½ price. We went back to take some more photos and have a walk around as the weather had improved over night, sadly this was not good for my hangover and Leah had to put up with:

“Lea – I’m bad. Can we have a sit down?” & “Shit, I’m getting old. I can’t drink like I use to”

Normally – met by

“Look, forget the hangover, where are the monkeys?”

Anyway we’ve got loads of photos and some videos for you to see the falls. Photos don’t do it justice so have a look at these videos to “Wet” your appetite… (I’ll get my coat!)

First Video

Second Video

Amazing – hey?

Finally - I have to apologise for the delay in writing these blog updates. This was over a week and ½ ago but as you can imagine, us creative, arty people struggle to keep churning out quality work day after day and I’ve had a lot on! It’s also been absolutely boiling here so I’ve struggled to think let alone type. Anyway, it’s now Christmas eve and we’re off out tonight for celebrations with the Argentinians (They celebrate Christmas tonight) We’re off to the beach tomorrow and then it’s a BBQ on the roof of our hostel tomorrow evening/night. Feliz Navidad to you all! 

Patience in Sao Paulo

After the 7.5 hour bus journey, 2 metro rides and a taxi ride we got to our hostel at quarter to midnight, we had all sorts of thoughts – are they going to be open, will they have let our beds go, because we told them we’d be there by 7, etc. but we were pleased to find that they were open, they hadn’t let our beds go and to our surprise – they even knew our names when they opened the door for us! Now, that’s rare – Casa Club was going to be our base for the next few days.

Sao Paulo is a huge city, with a very American theme running through it. Distance is measured in blocks, there’s valet parking everywhere and the hilly streets remind me very much of San Francisco. Casa Club was located within one of the new, up and coming neighbourhoods called Vila Madalena. There were a few hostels to choose from but the reviews for Casa Club were really good and it certainly didn’t disappoint. The hostel was owned by most of the staff and Paulo and Leo were helpful giving us information on where we should go in the city and on what days and giving us the lowdown on the best places to go. Which is a good job really as there’s over 15,000 bars, restaurants and nightclubs in Sao Paulo and over 400 museums (You know we love our museums – yeah?).

We checked in and Paulo takes us up to our room (as it was a city and somewhere where we’d be out of the hostel a lot, we decided that a private room wasn’t worth it and we’d be staying in a dorm) In every dorm we’ve stayed in there have been  bunk beds and in some places there are triple bunk beds and to date – Leah hasn’t had the option of staying on the bottom bunk!  Something that is starting to get to her – I hope our next place offers her the bottom bunk! (Argentina – are you listening?)

Anyway we went to bed in readiness for a busy day the following day, as you can imagine getting up on to the top bed of a bunk bed is difficult when you’re trying to not to disturb the person below. As I’ve always been on the top bunk I’ve never actually seen Leah getting into a bunk bed and I have to say, it is something that you have to see! She does however confess that she’s not that ladylike, putting that aside for one minute – it’s hilarious, she bangs both her shins on the ladder on the way up then when she gets to the top, takes an age to turn and get into the bed – its nigh on hilarious. I even found myself waking up 5mins before her 7:15 toilet trip just so that I could see her climbing down the ladder!

As I said earlier the hostel owners were great in advising us where we should go on each day and they advised of us of a brief tour of the city, taking in the sights and sounds of the huge city that is Sao Paulo.  They’d advised us that a local club was well worth a visit as they have live music, if I’m honest I had pictured a group of past it old blokes playing with their banjo-strings but in fact when we got there we realised that we’d gone to an awesome Samba club. Now, we all know that I love a dance as much as the next person (more if I’m standing next to Pie) but this club was amazing, there were people dancing up from the minute the band had started, which is quite different from the usual in my local, where blokes have to sink at least 10 pints of Stella before they’ll even get their left leg twitching. It was truly amazing, to see people young and old, getting up and jigging about.

In fact, it got a bit heated and I’d never had myself down as a bit of a prude but to see people with hands over each other from start to finish was great/a bit much (delete as appropriate.)  I know I should be prepared for such eventualities - I have been to the “boot” on a Sunday night before but to see a woman’s eyes being crossed and her hair everywhere as her partner is rubbing up against her Samba style a true eye opener!

We were also told that Brazil has a national football museum, located in Sao Paulo. Now, I’m not that bothered about football if I’m honest but I thought my mates (who are all massive football fans) would disown me if I had the option of going to the museum and turned it down. After eventually finding it, I can honestly say that we both had an amazing afternoon and learnt so much about the “beautiful” game. The following day, happy about our cultured day at the museum, we decided that we should go to another museum we were told that the Portuguese language museum was well worth it so we made our way to it, paid our entrance fee and then spent the next 2 hours being totally clueless and understanding nothing. It would seem that the language museum is all in Portuguese and has not a single sign, piece of information or any additional piece of information in English! Disappointing to say the least…. However, the highlight of the day was to be our evening meal, we stopped for food in a little place in the Japanese district of Sao Paulo that had been recommended to us by the Lying Planet. It said it is one of the best places to get authentic Japanese food at the cheapest prices. For once, it wasn’t lying to me this was the best Japanese food I have ever tasted. The biggest bowl of noodles, veg, pork and broth I’ve seen, enough to keep even the Pie and his monster hunger at bay all for the very small amount of £4!

All good things must come to an end and with the help of the guys at the hostel we’d booked our bus journey to a place called Florianopolis, the journey was going to be a mammoth 12 hours so we’d booked an overnight bus to enable us to save money on a bed for the night and not have to waste our days on a bus. So, armed with our booking reference number and seat numbers we made it to the bus terminal early to get something to eat before the journey. For those of you that don’t know, Sao Paulo has the second largest bus terminal in the world and our bus was on Platform 4 out of 89! As we were early we decided to go and get some food and get to our bus stop early, being the boy-scout I am, I thought I’d better check with the guys that I had the right bus stop. The dude there confirmed I was at the right one - result! The driver hops out and an orderly queue forms, we get in the queue and I leave Leah to manage it while I take a pee. I return to see Leah in a state of panic and I realise that I’ve got the reference number including seat numbers; I calm every one down and produce the necessary numbers.

Then the driver drops the line – “You need ticket – no ticket, no autobus” So I run up the escalator, the 100m through the middle of the bus station, to the ticket office to be confronted with 3 queues of at least 15 people to each window, so I bite the bullet and push past them all where I can feel all of their eyes focusing on the back of my head, I point out to the stupid bint that the bus should be leaving now and I need to be on this bus! She then tells me that she needs our passports – I could have died. So, I turn around and run all the way back to get the passports – Leah’s face was of sheer relief however this turned quickly to fear when she realised I needed the passports and again I set off like Linford Christie’s training partner. I get back to the front of the queue, the guy hands me the tickets and I make it back to the bus, expecting to see Leah lying down behind the bus to stop it from leaving without us. No, in fact Leah is sat on the bus in our seats calm as anything and I’m a total bath of sweat from running the 1000m in an Olympic gold time. Now, before we left my mate Van handed us a list of the 10 travelling commandments, following his travels a few years ago. 

Number 4 reads –

“Be Patient – You’re not going to catch every bus/train, instead of getting angry use the time to explore”

Now butt, I’d seen a fair bit of Sao Paulo and I’d paid £70 for my bus ticket, like hell was I going to relax – I’ve got the legs for it, so I wasn’t going to miss that bus. I’m sure you can understand that… (It was £70 after all… Enough to get you back into your house after you’ve locked yourself out!?)

Next stop is a little place called Florianopolis for a few days then we’re off to The Iguasu Falls. Hopefully we’ll catch every bus without hassle this time…

Birthdays, buses, boats, booze, BBQ’s and Baby David!

As it was Leah’s birthday weekend, we decided that this should not go without miss and booked a room on an island called Ilha Grande. We’d heard lots about it and couldn’t wait to get there, a proper oasis, no roads, no cars a proper little remote island. We were told to take extra money, not because it’s expensive but because there’s no cashpoints on the island. To get over to the island we needed to catch the once a day ferry from Angra Dos Res, which in itself was a challenge.

Buses in Brazil seem to have the most stupid turn style right in the middle of the bus where some fat, over opinionated bint sits, whilst listening to samba music on her phone and grunts at people when they ask for a ticket. Now, this turnstile is a bitch to manoeuvre when you’ve got your towel and wallet in your hand let alone when you look like a turtle with an extension, equipped with your 75kg backpack on your back and a rucksack on your front!  To expect some patience and some consideration from this woman would be I guess, expecting too much. She does have some samba music to listen to and chocolate milk to drink, so I guess I’m the fool for expecting it!

I was going to dedicate a whole post on the blog on my view of Brazilian people, then after I started writing it I realised that it would be wrong of me to bundle them all in together. So, I won’t! But I will dedicate this rant to people that work on the bus network!

Our first poor experience of these people started in Rio, we got to the Rodivario (Portuguese for bus station, I know – check me out!) again poor signage didn’t help us but we needed to get our tickets to get to Paraty and there was no obvious ticket office apart from a little shed (Lonely planet was of no help it said there was a little shed out front selling tickets). So off we go, like turtles and we approach these 3 women with the view that they may be able to help direct us to the relevant ticket office, no! First of all they refused to acknowledge us (by totally ignoring our existence!) Then,  Leah stood in and with her best Spanish asked for two tickets to Paraty. I know, they get people asking them for things in broken Portuguese/Spanish daily but there’s no need to be so rude about it. What happened next was actually the rudest thing I’ve ever seen. Two of the women leave their colleague in the shit and alone with us and this last woman shakes her head, gets her big ass finger out and waves it in our face indicating NO! Then puts her big ass finger to her mouth to tell us to shut up and corrects us on our pronunciation of Paraty (it should be pronounced Para-chee), so we walk off cheesed off, insulted and mouthing some obscenities at her.

Once we were off the bus, we needed to find the port to get the bus. Now my powers of deduction are en par with Hercule Poirot. The port has to be near the sea and will generally have big boats in it I think, so rather than asking some local drunk I decided that I knew better, we’ve now managed to pick up two guys who are getting the ferry over to Ilha Grande too so we set off, safe in the knowledge that I know where we need to go. After 5mins of wandering aimlessly in 30 degree heat I give in and decide it would be better to ask for directions – fortunately for my pride I was leading our troop in the right direction. We turn a corner and are at the port, we’re aware that we have 2 hours to wait but as true brits we thought it better to be a little bit early!

As we’re making our way to the (empty) ticket office this dude comes up to us and offers us 

an alternative to being bored for the 2 hour wait, it becomes apparent that he’s no expert magician prepared to entertain us with his magic card tricks but has another “Super Fast” boat that he can take us over the island on and it will leave in 10mins but it’ll cost R$25. Like the money conscious travellers  we have become, I point out that the ferry is only R$7 and we’re prepared to wait two hours for R$18 (Note – at this time I became the voice for our group of 4!) so we walk off in disgust towards the ferry cool as cucumbers, knowing that this dude had plenty of room for haggling. Our group of 4 now becomes 5 with this guy hot in pursuit, instantly he tells us that he’s feeling kind and that he can drop it down to R$15 but we must not tell anyone else on the boat that we’ve had it cheap, again I nominate myself as the voice for the group and point out that he must be able to reduce it a bit more as its still double the cost of the normal ferry, he gives in and takes it down to R$10. So we agree and head towards the dock expecting some speed boat that will get us there in minutes, sadly this is not to be. We were greeted with what resembled the titanic having been resurrected from the ocean floor with a few bits of wood added to make it sea-worthy, we eventually set sail and over 2 hours later we get to the island.

After getting off the boat, we try and find our hostel in amongst the hundreds of restaurants, shops, and other hostels. I have to ask the question – if you see two people sweating, looking like turtles do you think it’s appropriate to ask them there and then when their clearly not interested if they would like to go scuba-fucking-diving? No, nor me. So why this one guy did I don’t know but it was met with the international look of – “Leave us alone butt”. After 5mins we decided to down tools, find a bar, get a drink and send one of us off to find the hostel. Being the gent I am, I suggest to Leah that she should sit down while I go and find the hostel. However, women weren’t burning their bras for nothing in the 60’s and Leah insist that she should go and do it and who am I to argue, within seconds I’m sat down my book is out of the bag and I’ve got Pedro getting me a beer. Leah returns later sweating and exhausted to tell me that she’s found it but it’s a bit of a walk…

We finally get to the hostel and are introduced to the lad that runs the place who looks not that much older than Leah’s nephew Iestyn. His name’s David and it became quickly apparent that he’s a bit of a wide boy and can you get anything you want legal or un-legal. After filling in the necessary forms we go to pay to be told by David that the hostel doesn’t accept cards and he’s a cash-only kind of guy! Balls – we don’t have enough money to pay for the hostel and eat and drink for 3 days plus as I’ve said there are no cashpoints on the island! However, David does have a plan and that plan is he’ll come with us to the mainland on Monday and we can get cash out for him there and then – sorted!

After a huge thunderstorm, that’s good enough to make Shaggy and Scooby jump into bed together we wake up to a clear day with not a cloud in the sky – not a bad day for Leah’s birthday! We booked a boat trip to one of the famous beaches on the island, called Lopez Mendes.  Our boat picks us up directly from the jetty at the hostel and we’re greeted with one of the whitest beaches I have ever seen – so crisp from the previous night’s storm it’s like walking on snow!

The photo just doesn’t do it justice but you can at least see how deserted it was and how stunning the views were….

We celebrated Leah’s birthday night with a BBQ at one of the many bars on the beach, called Café Do Mar (Which we’re told is legally different to the famous Ibiza bar, even though the sign looked exactly the same!) We finally left the bar at 2am after drinking as much Brahma as they could throw our way to celebrate Leah's Birthday in style! (Lianne/James – No Rules! ;-))

When it finally came to leaving on Monday morning we were confronted with really bad rain, which made leaving the island tolerable. The walk to the port, soaking wet and our bags soaking wet made it less tolerable however. We’re currently sat in the local bus station waiting for our bus to Sao Paulo which is going to take 7.5 hours! Hopefully we can sleep or it’ll be a killer game of eye-spy!

Will let you know what Sao Paulo had to offer…