My gander to SA!

Being 2 minutes late for Bolivian border stamps, we found ourselves in a flood of illeagal immigration limbo. So for my first 24 hours of Bolivia I was missing technically from the earth in no country. But the beds were so comfortable and rediculously cheap, which reminds me of my love for Bolivia! Reminissing of my arrival also reminds me of how much of a chubster I was, I almost collapsed trying to consume a pastry whilst climby a steady slope. I´ve pretty much got used to the altitude now though, so when I go back down to sea level I´ll practically be an elite athalete.

Our first real stop, with fresh ink in our passports, was Tupiza. This is a town which generally most gringos see as a stop off point on their way up to greater things, but we found it kind of special. Maybe it´s due to it being our first proper impression of Bolivia, but the surroundings were incredible. It was literally encapsulated by these towering red mountains, almost like a natural fort. One of the days we packed enough stuff to last us the day and just headed out into the mouth of the mountains, moving from base to base through the landscape. Which was pretty incredible.

After living in Brazil and Argentina for the previous two months, I discovered it quite a novelty paying no more than 3 pounds for anything on the menu. It hasn´t quite worn off yet, so I´m several weeks into feasting like a beast.

The next stop was Uyuni, where swarms of gringos come to see the salt flats, and I don´t blame them! It was a pretty cool thing to see; infinite salt tiles in every direction.

La Paz uncovered numerous opportunities to get smashed, which I forfilled quite evenly. Was a lot of fun but after 5 days I felt like I was back in Notts on lash patrol, so Copacabana was a welcome escape. There wasn´t actually that much to do in Copacabana but that was the idea! So we spent a while doing next to nothing then we got a boat which took us on a cruise to Isle del Sol. Was pretty excited for this as it´s supposedly where the most ancient Inca ruins lay, also where they believed the sun was "born". And true to my expectations it was one of my favourite places for a while, but not for what I had originally anticipated. In fact the ruins were kind of crappy, they´d been recently renovated so for all I knew the "Incas" could have been there building it a couple of weeks ago. The island itself was full of beauty and felt very special. One thing I appreciated was that the people of the island were literally living there. Like all they needed to survive was in their garden, a couple of donkies roaming about and some herbs.

Plus some really funny stuff happened. I don´t think I´ve ever been so full of laughter and disgust at the same time. A group of five of us got up early to go and get some breakfast before we went on a walk. For starters was this really tasty vegatable soup, and before I was more than a few spoonfulls into it I noticed Theo had a blank stare on his face, so I waved my hand in front of his face and we asked him what was up. He dismissed our worries and went back to his soup, but in the next moment a look of shock came over his face and he covered his mouth in an attempt to blockade some uncontrollable force. However this handguard kind of worked as a projectile tool and the fresh liquid shot directly into Martin´s face (a German we´re travelling with). This was so hilarious I couldn´t stop laughing. I´m laughing now as I type about it. Understandably Martin was kind of pissed off; he had green slime all over his new jacket and it took a while to wipe it off his neck and face as well. I was still kind of hungry but I wasn´t going anywhere near that soup, I´m pretty sure something landed in my tea as well.

After two nights on the island we made our way back to Copacabana where we split off onto our different paths. Kit (an Alaskan guy) went back to the states and Theo Hannah and Martin headed up to Cusco in Peru. Whilst I headed back to La Paz to make my entry into the Amazon!

Before I could catch the bus to Rurrenabaque, I had to spend a weekend in La Paz so I thought I´d just chill and find some decent books for the 22 hour bus ride ahead.
One of the nights I decided to head out in the evening to find a cool place to sit and read. Thought I´d have a chilled night, however it turned out to be quite the contrary. Somehow I found myself sitting at this big performance, which turned out just to be a promotion for a phone company. Which is crazy as they must have spent millions on it, they had endless fireworks and a couple of big Bolivian bands. But the people of La Paz seemed to really enjoy it. Anyway I ended up sitting with this french couple, then a group of Bolivians started egging me on to come and dance in the middle of this space in front of the stage. At first I had it set in my mind that I wasn´t going up, but then I thought "flip it", it´s not going to kill me, just might look like a bit of a knob. So my night resulted in dancing with the locals for 2 hours! And I´m pretty sure it was televised too. Was pretty fun in the end and it was cool being the only gringo in a crowd of locals.

Unfortunately I can´t upload photos right now, but when I can I´ll add some to this blog.
Also my skydive photos are on Theo´s laptop so when I meet him in Cusco I´ll upload the Argentina blog!
Have just finished my Amazon experience which was immense! Would tell you about it now but the electricity is about to cut off for 8 hours (as it does everyday here) so will save it for next time!
Speak to you soon and have a great week!

I was going to upload my blog on Argentina, however this computer won´t let me upload any photos so I thought I´d spare that for the right occasion and share something different!

Back in Trindade me and the Norwegian crew got into this conversation about how, despite how important it is, education´s fed to us in the wrong manner. We reached this massive metaphor of how education should be the most juicy and appetising fruit, which we crave and seek naturally, but insted we are force fed in a way that makes many associate knowledge with work and hassle.
Basically this inspired me to write a poem kind of about the same subject, which I thought I´d upload as a filler until my next entry!

The fresh fruit of knowledge,
Of which we can savour,
Is full of taste and infinite flavour,
Juices that flow and seeds that grow,
to be harvested into human nature.
However the real fruit can be hard to find,
leaving the masses partially blind,
The seeds of beauty have been polluted,
And the juice while fruity has been diluted,
In this filtered form it seeps through the masses,
Filling up the books within their classes.
But there are ways to avoid this blockade,
explore and seek fruit which are naturally made.
Break through the barriers and see what you find,
Good luck on your journey to expansion of the mind!

Hope you enjoyed it and soon I´ll be hitting you up with the skydiving photos! Also had a day wondering through the wilderness yesterday which was incredible, got some awesome photos from that to slap on here soon.

Have fun and enjoy your week! Speak soon!

I have officially departed from Brazil! And it feels as though I´ve left big tasty passionate chilled out friend behind. But I´m sure they´ll be plenty of those down the line! I cannae believe nearly two months have passed by already, I can tell that before I know it I´ll be staggering back to the UK from Ecuador. Such a crazy amount of stuff has happened in the last month but I will try my best to squeeze it into this page!

So last time we spoke I was planning on heading up to Salvador for Carnaval, then maybe checking out some of the towns in the north east and staying with a friend up there. However due to a lack of haste and other things, not just on my behalf; a bus timetable is practiacally nonexistent here so it´s not hard to get behind schedule, I missed the 30 hour over night bus up to Salvador. Luckily some friends I made in Trindade had already offered me to stay in their apartment in Rio so I was sorted! For that reason I decided to hang about down south, also it saved me a flipload of money. Plus I don´t know if you heard about it but there were police strikes just before carnaval which lead to like 100 and something homicides up there. So anyway I spent carnaval in this awesome apartment with this group of Brits, which was flipping immense! Didn´t really see the typical parades and stuff but went to some crazy street parties. However one of the nights I managed to achieve my first "Oooh shit!" moment; it had to happen sooner or later, but I got ridiculously lost.
Through hours of rookie navigation and scarce Portuguese, a cheeky 2 hour trip to grab some tickets from the bus station transformed into 10 hours of hopelessness. All was going well and I had successfully purchased my bus tickets for the following day, until the bus home which I put my faith into decided not to turn up. So taking advice from some locals I hopped on a different bus which would supposedly get me closer to my compfy sofa-bed home! It did kind of, but the next step wasn´t very clear to me so again I found myself on the hunt for a ticket home. Eventually, after wondering round with a massively helpful Brazillian, I jumped into a taxi and told him where the apartment was (vaguely). Unfortunately, he spoke no English, and even if he did I didn´t really know where to direct him, so I ended up paying $50 just to be even more lost in an area which I had never seen before. I started wondering around this town until I found a bus stop with some people waiting, where I resorted to asking everyone "falo ingles?" to which most of them mumbled something I didn´t understand, until finally!! When I asked this guy if he spoke English he said "more or less" so I was like YES! I thought I´d hit the jackpot, so I began trying to figure out where I was. After 30 more seconds, my hopes and dreams were crushed as I realised that all he could say was "more or less". Nevertheless I carried on with my search and found someone who directed me to the right bus stop. He seemed helpful at first, but there was a dark twist in his nature; he asked me something which I probably won´t voice on here, but let´s just say in future I will stick to asking women for directions! Anyway I told him to flip off which he did, and soonafter a surge of joy ran through me as I saw the 332! The bus took me to the doorstep of the apartment and I stumbled in at 7 am, 10 hours after I had left! All in all it was a pretty good experience, despite how it sounds.

Besides this adventure my travels have ran fairly smoothly. The tickets which caused such havoc the previous night took me to Florianopolis which was like the perfect after-carnival remedy. It was such a laidback place with endless amounts of beautiful beaches and my hostel was like the pinacle of chilledness. I have never experienced anything like it, the hostel owners smoked copious amounts of weed everyday from like 8 am onwards. Here I met some really awesome people and it really felt like I´d known them for years. There´s already dozens of people who I´d love to meet back up with and I'm only 2 months into my travels. I feel like it's kind of raised my awareness of how much I appreciate people, not just the people I meet out here but people in general. Your constantly sharing amazing experiences with such a vast variation of people and enviroments in such a short time so it's like an intense blast of travelly goodness. Something which I appreciate from my short experience of solo travelling so far is the opportunities that you get to reflect and appreciate all the crazy stuff that has happened as you move from place to place. At the same time when you're leaving a comfortable enviroment and venturing on into the unknown, you naturally miss things, but this just makes it more exciting thinking of all the possible situations and people that are down the line waiting to be enjoyed.

I ended my affair with Brazil through Iguaçu falls, which was probably the best way I could have done it! It felt like I was wondering through Jurrasic park and kept expecting a Diplodocus to pop it´s head into the landscape. It was probably the most beautiful landscape I have seen so far. Plus I saw a ton of wildlife there, like geckos, massive lizards, numerous butterflies, some kind of racoon things and even a toucan! Her´s a cheeky glimpse of it´s beauty

Anyway I thought I would wrap up my experience of Brazil with my
===Brazilian Observations!===

• Rarity of inflated egos- Through my whole time in Brazil I was never confronted with any passing egos in the street or anywhere else. I´m pretty sure it would be a matter of minutes before meeting some aggrivated egos strolling through Nottingham city, even if it was just a subtle stare down.

• They love displaying passion, whether it´s through tango or just getting it on at the bus stop.

• Brazilians are the most helpful group of people which I have encountered so far in my life. I can´t account for all of them as I spent most of my time down south, but they will literally go completely out of their way to help you. It seems like it´s part of their culture to be extremely hospitable. Or maybe it´s just because I´m using England in comparison. Only joking, even compared to the other South American countries which I have experienced so far they are by far the friendliest. Just remember! If it´s late at night and you´re in a sketchy area, stick to women for help!!

• This isn´t particularly a Brazilian observation, but so far travelling and being seperated from my standard routine has made me so aware of the tiniest little events or decisions which snowball to create the moments we´re in.

I am sorry for my lack of blog over the last month, but I hit Argentina pretty hard and Buenos Airies thoroughly smashed out any routine which I held previously. In a good way! But I will save that for another blog. Also I met up with the Norwegian guys (Hannah and Theo) in Cordoba, who I´m travelling with now, and we ejected ourselves from a plane in the sky, which was absolutely incredible! I have some awesome photos from it but this is another thing which I will save for the next blog! I have a lot to update you with so will be bombarding you with entries over the next month!

I hope all is good whereever you are and we will speak soon!

p.s I know it´s a few of my homeboys birthdays this month and also of course my lovely mother´s! So Happy Birthdaay!!

My last week or so has been filled with some of the best experiences of my trip so far. I am sorry for my lengthy gap between blogs, but my access to the internet has been limited.

My first venture out of Rio was over to Ilha Grande, where my days were filled with beaches and waves. Really enjoyed the island, but it was slightly more commercial than I had imagined, like a center parks for the Brazilians and Argentinians. But maybe that´s because I´m basing it on the town in which I stayed; I took a 3 hour hike over to ´Lopes Mendes´which, along with the hike itself, was beautifully serene.
Also managed to find a couple late night parties next to the sea on a couple of nights, one was like full on samba party which exceeded my dancing abilities so I resorted to making up some random stuff and lingering into the crowd. (I had a cheeky crip walk for anyone who is familiar with it).

After the fourth night there I caught the 10 o´clock ferry and made my way on to Paraty, someone who I met in Ilha Grande recommended that I only spend 1 or 2 nights in Paraty, as most of it can be seen in that time, and spend the majority of my time in this place called Trindade (where I´m currently situated) which is only a bus ride away.
Had a really good stay in Paraty which was incredibly active compared to Ilha Grande where I spent most of my time in sloth mode. Went on this 5 hour boat tour which was absolutely awesome, went round some really cool islands and had stops where we could jump into the sea off the boat. We were also given bread to feed these tropical fish which was amazing, I became like one of the pack, or school or whatever you call it with fish. Literally I had them swarming all around me and practically sitting on my lap.
I don´t know what it is about my feet and Brazil but they are constantly causing conflict! Somehow I managed to cut my foot on the sand, I think I uploaded a photo, but it´s not as bad as it looks. I did a handstand and when I landed the sand kind of cheese grated my foot. By the end of this trip i think my feet are going to be indestructible.
The next day I rented some bikes out with people I met at the hostel which was cool. We headed to some waterfalls a few kilometres away from where we were staying. I don´t know if it´s to do with altitude or what, maybe we just had crappy bikes, but a slope that would take like no effort in england was rediculously hard to climb on the bikes. The effort was worth it in the end though; the first waterfall we arrived at was basically a huge slab of rock which was like a natural slide. These crazy Brazillians were like surfing down it on foot, however I didn´t feel quite competent enough for that so just went down on my arse. Still was exremely fun!
Also have some video footage of another one which involved swinging from a rope off a rock like 3 or 4 metres high and landing in a natural pool.

This isn´t very relevant to my travels but it made me laugh so I thought I´d slap it in. I was looking for some water in the local supermarket when I heard Dr Dre featuring Snoop Dogg- Next episode blasting out the speakers. For anyone who isn´t familiar with it, it´s an explicit gangster rap song. It made me laugh out loud seeing old women searching through detergent with Dr Dre shouting prolonged swearwords in the background.

Anyway after my two nights in Paraty I caught the bus and headed to Trindade. I really like the vibe here, as soon as I got to the hostel everyone was heading out to the bars so I just dumped my stuff and joined them. The nightlife was really lively with a reggae band playing on the beach and stuff, but apparently that was exclusive to saturday nights (which is tonight so I´m gonna head out again!). Met this really cool group of Norwegians who I´m hopefully gonna meet up with in Peru. Trindade itself is really beautiful, with some immense beaches in close walking distance and the hostel is like immersed in nature surrounded by trees and stuff. The only downside is the mosquitoes, they´re really aggressive here and I swear I´ve donated like a pint of blood to them.
The guy who owns the hostel took us on a trip to this place called Ponta Negra, which has been possibly the highlight of Brazil thus far. We walked about 3 hours to get to this tiny little community which almost noone knows about. It has a population of 150-200 with no electricity. This place was beautiful, in evening we had this delicious meal eating fish that was most likely caught that day. We slept over there so we had a full day to spend just chilling a taking everything in. Also had the joint scariest and coolest experience so far, we climbed this rock freehand which must have been about 6 metres high, was flipping crapping it because the drop below was just sheer rocks. Luckily we had George (the guy who took us) helping us climb up. But the jump off the rock into the sea was great, it made soiling my pants worth it. In the night we sat round this fire on the beach cooking this enormous fish which the locals had caught. Unfortunately this fish made a second appearance in the night. Got woken up by stabbing stomach cramp, then before I knew I was cleaning barfed up fish off the floor. It also went all over my stuff and now I can´t seem to escape the smokey fish smell that haunts me whereever I go. The most annoying thing was seeing the lovely meal I´d just had completely extracted from my body. But still this didn´t detract from how cool the place was. The boat trip back was so great, I uploaded some photos of it. I was happy enough seeing this beautiful sunset, but then we saw the moon actually rise from the mountains as well. So it was an incredible end to a great trip.

I had only booked in 4 nights here in Trindade but I´m still here and it´s been a week! Just trying to plan what to do with my next week, all I know at this point is that I have to be in Salvador by carnival, which is around the 16th, so I have 5 days to kill. I´m gonna check prices on flights and coaches but I might just coach up there a few days before and stop off somewhere nice on the way to break it up a bit. Otherwise it´ll be like a 24 hour bus journey. After carival I might wonder round the northeast a bit, I have a friend who I met back in Rio who lives in Fortaleza so I could stay there for a bit. Then down to Argentina!! I think I´m gonna nip through Uraguay as well, as I heard about this way of getting to Buenos Aires which sounded pretty cool. I have decided to cut down, or maybe completely cancel my time in Chile as I am spending a fair bit of time in Brazil and need to make space, also I have heard Chile is less cultured and more expensive than the other countries I am visiting. Another update to my planning is the addition of Colombia to my travels. Literally everyone I have spoken to who has been there tell me to make sure I go there or that it´s their favourite place, so if I can fit it in I´m going to nip over there before I fly home from Ecuador! Oh also I have decided not to go to the Brazilian Amazon due to travel and general expense, it´s still open but I´m leaning towards the Bolivian Amozan as it sounds immense. Also I´ve been recommended a good ecotour company in bolivia which is ran by an indigenous tribe who show you various things, at a reasonable price!

I found out the other day that the hand signal that I pull in most photos means `arsehole` in Brazil, so I may have to reconsider my posing around the locals.

Sorry for the massive essay but it´s been a while!
Next time we speak I may have been through the Carnival experience so it should be interesting!
Stay well and have a great week or so!

My first week of Latin America has been pumped full of beautiful landscapes and immense experiences. One that stood out was going to see the sunset in Ipanema, which was beautiful in itself, but it was more the locals reaction that made it cool. I was just relaxing on the sand enjoying all the scenery around me and then as the very last glimpse of sunlight was immersed by the sea, all of the locals burst out into claps and cheers like celebrating the end of the day or something. Was really awesome to be there. I think it must be tradition of some kind. However the train back wasn´t so joyous! We´d been warned about this mode of transport as they go through lots of slums and stuff, but we were open to experience! Anyway these crazy crackheads were doing crazy crap all the way home. I was like half asleep but basically they were using the train as a climbing frame, literally one guy spent most of the journey on the outside of the train hanging off.

Good news! My ankle has reappeared between my shin and my foot so I am no longer shackled by my former disability. I´m off to Ilha Grande on Sunday for 3 nights, but I don´t have many plans after that so I will let you know how they develop over the next few days. Probably gonna head to the beach with my new found freedom, especially since some guy serving me at the shop the other day made an observation of my pastyness.

I don´t know if you´ve heard about it but some buildings have collapsed not far from here, haven´t seen it yet but sounds pretty weird. People say they heard a gunshot sound and then the building just collapsed which sounds slightly suspicious to me, but then I´m not a detective or anything. Anyway just thought I´d let you know that I haven´t been crushed or anything!

This isn´t relevant at all, but had a really awkward moment earlier today. I was drying myself in the privacy of my room when the cleaner walked in and for some reason my automatic reaction was to give a thumbs up. Felt like a right prune.

Visited Christ yesterday which was immense! Got some of the best views of the trip so far, I will show you them in a bit. Then went to the Botanical gardens today, saw some beautiful plants and trees, plus my first taste of tropical wildlife!! Caught a glimpse of some monkeys hopping around the trees, tried to catch them on camera but if I show you you´d probably think they were stray coconuts or something as my attempts weren´t largely successful.

I´ll keep you up to date on Ilha Grande and the development of my plans. Plus I´ll be uploading photos later.

Speak to you soon and have a great week!