Peru - Lima, Iquitos and the Amazon!!

Our flight from Caracas to Lima was delayed by nearly 2 hours, as there was some last minute baggage check by the government. We had already boarded the plane so we had to wait in our seats for the flight to leave. We were sitting at the back of the plane and unfortunately the aircon was broken, and they had a heater pumping hot air next to my seat, so it was boiling. After about an hour we complained and the air hostess moved us to the front of the plane where it was blissfully cool. As our flight was delayed by 2 hours it was around midnight by the time we landed in Lima, and around 1h00 by the time we got to the hostel.
We were shown to our room and passed out soon after.

We had 1 day in Lima before catching our flight out to Iquitos, so we got a taxi from outside the hostel into Centro to have a look around. I have to say that my first impressions of Lima were not great. The area around the airport that our hostel was in was pretty run down, and we drove through some well dodgy areas before getting to Centro. Thankfully Centro itself was better so we felt safe walking around town. We went to the Plaza de Armas (every city seems to have one and the army puts on a parade their on Sunday) and got some lunch, then walked to another square and took some pictures.. On the way we managed to find a supermarket to pick up some dinner for back at the hostel. At this point it was rush hour and the sun was starting to set, so we thought we had better get a taxi back to the hostel before it got too dark, seeing as the areas between us and the hostel were dodgy. So we hailed a taxi and gave them the hostels card with the address on it (includes small map) and asked them how much to take us there. The taxi driver took ages scrutinising the card and then said he didn’t know where the place was! So we hailed another taxi and the next one took a look and then just said No he didn’t want to take us there, maybe he didn’t want to leave centro at rush hour to head out to the airport side. So with bated breath we hailed a third taxi and tried him. Thankfully he conceded to taking us to our hostel! I mean really, do they want our business or not? We were starting to get worried about how we were going to get back. The one strange thing I noticed about Lima is that all the buildings appear to be unfinished. There are usually some walls without a roof on the top of a building, or some metal rods sticking out the top, as though they are about to build another level. I don’t know why this is the case for nearly all the buildings, perhaps some sort of loophole that allows them to dodge their rates and taxes I don’t know. So that was pretty much Lima part 1 for us.

The following morning we took a taxi to the airport and flew out to Iquitos, which is the launching point for a lot of trips down the Amazon. We had prebooked into a small lodge for 5 nights called Muyuna, which was around 3 hours upriver from Iquitos itself. However we were staying 1 night in Iquitos before going to the lodge, as they wanted to collect us at 9h00 and we hadn’t fancied a 6h00 flight out of Lima to make the pickup. On coming out of Iquitos airport we were met by a load of Motokars and some normal cars, so with all our luggage we chose a normal car taxi and went to the Flying Dog hostel. My first impression of Iquitos was that the roads are manic and filled with hundreds of these Motokars which seems to be an Iquitos speciality. A motokar is like a motorbike that has been converted in to a 3 wheeler with a cart at the back that can carry 2 passengers. I guess as Iquitos is inaccessible by road (rivers all around it), it means that there are less cars available (more difficult to get them in by boat) and this had lead to more motokars instead. Our taxi driver was chatting away in Spanish, and I told him that we don’t speak any Spanish (no hablo espanol) but this didn’t make the slightest bit of difference. He seemed to have taken it upon himself to be our tour guide, pointing out areas of interest on the way to the hostel, although we didn’t understand much of what he said. Along the way he handed us a brochure for an amazon tour company and we tried to explain that we had already prebooked a lodge, but he didn’t speak any English. He promptly proceeded to call someone on his mobile and I didn’t realise he was calling the tour company. When we arrived at our hostel, a guy arrived on a moped at the same time and introduced himself as being from the tour company. The taxi driver had told him that we wanted to take a tour lol. We explained that we already had a booking and left them behind. Once we checked into the hostel we came outside and saw a river just across the way, which we assumed was the Amazon and we took a couple of quick snaps. However we later found out that it was a tributary rather than the Amazon itself. We stopped for some lunch at Dawn of the Amazon, and had a strange experience with a local teenage boy (probably a street child), who asked us for money and when we said no, promptly decided to stand nearby and stare at us throughout our meal. The waitress at the restaurant asked him to stop, so he moved across the road and then continued to turn around and stare at us from there. I think he was a few cans short of a six pack! We then went to an internet café (slowest yet as on dial up) to check the last email from the lodge and whether we needed to buy anything in particular to take along with us - nothing like a bit of last minute shopping. Turned out we needed to take some wellies (or rubber boots as they called them) and some long sleeves, preferably white tops to keep the bugs off. Whilst walking around we saw a man wearing a cayman’s claw that had been fashioned in to a necklace - gross and illegal- and we saw them selling bottles full of eggs on the stalls, and they certainly weren’t chickens eggs, so we saw some illegal trade of animal parts / products in Iquitos, which is a shame.

We then decided to take our lives in to our own hands and catch a motokar (when in Rome) to the Belen outdoor market to look for some wellies / long sleeve tops. Belen is a village built right next to the river, and apparently when the water is high then the houses float. The motokar taxi took us to the far side of the market so that we could walk back towards the hostel, and we ended up being dropped on the food side of the market which was a bit of an eye opener. There was tonnes of meat / chicken on open tables, uncovered with flies buzzing around / and on them, and piles of rubbish in between the tables. Very grim. So we kept on walking until we got to the clothing side of the market, but alas all they had were strapless / short sleeved tops. I guess because its always 30 plus degrees Celsius there, so there isn’t usually a great demand for long sleeved tops. So we walked back to the hostel along the main road, and were surprised to find that all the shops in Iquitos stock the same strapless party tops and not much else, not one decent outdoor shop in sight, which is rather odd considering that a lot of tourists take amazon trips from there. I was also surprised to find that Iquitos itself is pretty run down. I would have thought that with the amount of money coming in to Iquitos via the tourists, that a certain amount would make its way back into the upkeep of the town but apparently not. We killed a bit of time reading in the hammocks at the hostel, and I managed to fall out of one hammock (it was broken / lopsided) and grazed my elbow a bit, but nothing too bad.

The following morning we packed our bags and Mario from Muyuna Lodge collected us from the hostel on foot (fluent English speaker hooray). Apparently there was a military parade going on (it was a Sunday), so the police had closed off most of the roads. Fortunately it wasn’t a long walk to the tour office with our bags. Mario gave us a bit more information about the lodge we had booked in to, and I was surprised to learn that the lodge didn’t have any electricity and was lit by lamps at night. This also translated in to no hot water (cold showers each day) and of course, no internet connection. Although I hadn’t expected internet in the middle of the amazon jungle, I had hoped for perhaps a generator for some lecky and at a push some hot water. We waited a half an hour or so in the tour office, and then a Muyuna bus arrived for our short transfer to the river pickup point. There we walked down a short incline with our luggage to a small covered speedboat. The sides were open (no windows) and Steve almost chucked one of our bags straight through in to the water lol.

It wasn’t long before we got our first glimpse of the Amazon itself, and it was an impressive site. Boy is that a lot of water, and it is brown water although apparently its all the mud and minerals etc that the river picks up on its course, rather than being dirty. Our boat transfer was around 3 hours in all and Steve claims he saw the top of a pink dolphin on our way. About 2 hours in we stopped somewhere along the riverside for 5 mins for the driver to check the gas level, and he said there were toilets there for us to use as well. Now I have never heard the word ‘toilet’ used so loosely in all my life. There was a cubicle door of sorts, and when I opened the door it was basically 2 wooden planks hanging out over the river and you were meant to go straight in to the river! There was also a local man there that was trying to sell us some sort of round fruit in a big bowl, by showing us a rather explicit pornographic photo that he had wedged in to the fruit. Well at least I think he was trying to sell us the fruit, its hard to say as he was babbling away in Spanish. We just stepped away from the vehicle with a polite No Gracias! Then just before we reached the lodge we transferred to a smaller open topped boat, as the water level was apparently too low to take the speedboat all the way in to the lodge (it is the dry season on the Amazon right now). However the guys had come prepared and gave us some brollys to keep the sun off. I should probably mention that it was stinking hot and humid (around 35 degrees plus) pretty much every day we were there and the heat was a bit overwhelming. However going upriver we were surrounded by jungle trees lining either side, and saw a couple of local people in dug out canoes - very cool. There was also an Iguana on the riverbank that scuttled off in to some Maize crops as we went past in the boat, and that was only a hint of the wildlife yet to come.

I must say my first impressions of Muyuna Lodge on arrival were fantastic, this is a lot more upmarket than we’d anticipated after hearing there would be no electricity. Moises, our guide for the full 6 days, met us at the river when we arrived and took us up to the lodge to talk us through how things work. The lodge had some lovely little grass roofed bungalows overlooking the river and a communal restaurant were they made all the meals. Frankly it reminded me a lot of a safari camp in South Africa.

The format for our days at the lodge basically looked like this:
06h00: Wake up and meet Moises at 06h15 for a pre breakfast boat trip down the river for bird / animal spotting. The good thing about this time of day is that there are plenty of birds around and it is a bit cooler.
07h00: Come back and eat a three course breakfast;
08h00: Excursion of our choice, returns around 11h00. Cold shower to cool down.
11h30: Eat a three course lunch;
15h00: Excursion of our choice, returns around 17h00. Cold shower to cool down.
19h00: Three course dinner
20h00: Night time trip down the river, or in to the jungle with torches.
21h00: Get back to lodge and collapse in a heap.

As we had 5 nights at the lodge we had a fair amount of time and managed to get out on the following excursions (in between the three course yummy meals):-
- Piranha fishing;
- Trip to see pre historic birds (or Watson birds);
- Day trip to see pink dolphins and swim in the Amazon;
- Trip to see the giant lilly pads;
- Long walks in to the jungle in the day time;
- Walk in the jungle at night to see the nocturnal animals;
- Boat trips down river in the daytime and the night time spotting animals;
- Canoe trip down the river (Steve has the blisters to prove it);
- Stop at a local villagers house to meet them and buy some souvenirs (necklace of lucky beads).

Although it was the dry season we did have rain one night, so we had to stay in that night and decided to play Uno to keep ourselves amused. Steve had won the first 5 games in a row and thought it was in the bag, however I asked to play to the best of 10, and then went on to win the next 5 games in a row, so the 11th game was the decider and I managed to win that game, so I am now the official Uno champion of Peru! Lol I revelled in my victory. Steve on the other hand is the official fishing champion of Peru as he caught a load of fish including a large Oscar (very tasty) and was a far more successful fisher-person than me. Basically the staff cook whatever you catch and you can eat if for dinner that night. I can tell you that Piranha is actually a very tasty fish, although it does have a lot of bones in it so you have to try and eat around them.

Our guide Moises was fantastic and managed to spot animals that we would never have seen on our own. Whilst walking in the jungle we managed to see a number of different kinds of monkeys (kapuchen, squirrel monkey, noisy night monkey etc), 2 different types of tarantula, a number of sloths, a coral snake, a pygmy rattle snake, a scorpion, a family of tiny long nosed bats, some night fishing bats, another iguana, and not to mention the hundreds of different kinds of birds, butterflies, insects and other spiders.

Not only could our guide tell us about the animals, but he was also an expert on the plants and insects in the jungle. There was one vine that he cut open, that water runs out of and the local people use to get a drink, so we tried some of that (tasted just like clean fresh water). He also offered us some ‘jungle candy’, which William, an English tourist in our group (there were only 4 of us in the group) decided to try, we weren’t that brave. Basically the fruit of the palm tree has a couple of nuts in it. One type of insect lays its eggs inside and the grubs grow inside and live on the nuts. Moises cracked open the palm fruit with his panga (which he used to clear parts of the jungle as we walked along) and took out 2 fairly fat white grubs. He popped one in his mouth and gave the other one to William which he bravely ate. Moises also showed us a tree that produces cotton, and it lies all over the ground around the bottom of the tree. The amazing thing is that Moises knew the sound that every bird and animal makes in the jungle, and he would whistle to the birds and they would answer him back. He would also find the monkeys based on their sounds. We did see a couple of jaguar tracks in the mud, but unfortunately (or fortunately) we didn’t see one in the flesh.

The piranha fishing was pretty exciting, and Steve and I both enjoyed it. We had a simple fishing rod made of a flexible tree branch with a line and hook on it, and you could feel the fish nibbling on the line as soon as you got it in the water. I have a feeling that fishing in the Amazon is a bit easier than fishing in the UK as there are just so many fish in the river to catch.

The amazon really is a bird watchers paradise and we saw so many different kinds of birds its hard to remember all the names. However a lot were fishing birds like Herons and Kingfishers, and we also saw a number of hawks and eagles along the river every day. There were so many catfish in the river by the lodge, that we could see them making circles in the surface of the water as they came up to breath.

We got really lucky the night before we were going to leave the lodge, as we went out on the boat at night spotting wildlife with the big searchlight, and Moises managed to catch a cayman. This was our third time out on the boat trying to catch one, and it wasn’t looking good as he’d already tried twice and the cayman had dived under the water and disappeared when we got close. However on our way back to the lodge, just before we got back, he spotted another cayman (their eyes glow red in the beam of the light, when they are above the water) and he managed to catch it. Fantastic. Surprisingly it didn’t thrash about much once he got it out of the water. He offered to hand us the cayman and when we felt its skin it was surprisingly soft and warmer than we expected. That river water is pretty warm even at night.

Swimming in the Amazon was also an experience we will never forget. Moises assured us that the local people swim / drink the river water every day and we had nothing to fear from the anacondas, piranhas and cayman as featured attacking people in all the Hollywood movies, so in we went. The water was relatively warm and its just as well the creatures didn’t attack as you couldn’t see your hand a foot below the surface of the brown water!

I feel I should also mention that the insects in the jungle bite first and ask questions later! Basically pretty much every animal and insect bites (has large teeth) and is either poisonous or trying to get a piece of you. Besides the scorching heat, which pretty much soaks you about 10 minutes after you get out of the cold shower, the only downside about the jungle is the biting insects. Even though it was really hot, whenever we went in to the jungle we wore welly boots, long pants and a long sleeve top and applied insect repellant before going in and then during the walks. Regardless a visible cloud of misquitos followed each one of us around in the jungle, and at times it really did feel like you were under attack. I also managed to get a bad bite on the leg from a nasty horse fly while we were canoeing, so I am nursing the bites on my legs at the moment which are a bit nasty. There were loads of horse flies on the boats and after I got bitten (and realised they do bite you and were not just normal flies), I killed 20 of the evil little buggers, so in the end they messed with the wrong chica! Steve managed to get off more lightly with his mosquito bites as his skin hasn’t reacted the way that mine has. Ive got the tube of gerrmoline working overtime. We have been and continue to take our Malarone tablets for the malaria though, so hopefully that’s one thing we shouldn’t have to worry about. I think before we went in to the jungle I had a pretty romantic idea about what it would be like, however once you actually get in there and the insects start biting you, you realise that without the guide you would be lost / eaten alive within 2 days or less, and the jungle really isn’t a very hospitable place for humans (five hours at a time is enough for anyone before you want to get back to the bungalow with its mosquito nets)!

So after an amazing five nights and numerous excursions and animal sightings, we then caught the boat transfers back to Iquitos. On our way in to the dock we did see a number of large vessels containing large pieces of chopped trees, which reminded us that the amazon is being cut down, despite us being sheltered from the issue completely at the lodge where we were staying. We got the transfers straight back to the airport in Iquitos, to wait for our flight back to Lima.

Last night we slept in a hostel in Miraflores (the touristy bit of Lima) and today we went to see a Lima (pre Inca civilasation) pyramid, which was very interesting. We then took a taxi to the Cruz del Sur office in Centro, to collect our bus tickets for Cusco. We had already booked and paid for the tickets on line and printed out the voucher, which we handed to the lady, and asked for our bileto (tickets). However they clearly were not set up for dealing with this type of request and the woman proceeded to call someone else on her mobile to talk her through how to process the voucher and print us our tickets. In the end we got the tickets and the address of the bus embarque point, so tomorrow at 14h00 we will catch the night bus to Cusco. Its one of those 20 hour night buses, so weve got our books at the ready, and will need to get some snacks for the road tomorrow morning. We have booked some cama VIP seats though, so hopefully we will be relatively comfortable and be able to get some sleep this time.

So one more night here in Lima, and then we are on our way to Cusco. Our next stop is the Inca Trail, which I have some mixed feelings about. On the one hand I’m super excited about seeing Machu Pichu which I know will be impressive, and on the other hand I know its going to be a really hard push to hike for 4 days, never mind at altitude. Fingers crossed we will both make it all the way to the sun gate! We do have 5 days to try and acclimatise in Cusco before we start walking on the 4th September - wish us luck for the big hike!

I think that’s all for now, love to all at home and don’t forget to email us your news.
Kirst x

Venezuela - Isla Margarita

After a very frustrating time at the ATM in the Santiago airport (it would only allow us to withdraw £20 worth of Chilean pesos at a time, and the bank had rather unhelpfully blocked Steves card AGAIN), we managed to exchange some money for USD at the exchange window (they wouldnt take cards only cash grrr), and then after a nail bitingly long security queue (bloody school children on tour), we JUST made our flight to Caracas with some USD in hand. We had read that you need to take USD's in to Venezuela, as you can exchange them for around 7 to 1 bolivares, instead of the 3 to 1 'official' rate you will get when withdrawing cash from a local ATM.

Then after a mad dash between the international and domestic terminals, all the while avoiding currency exchange touts that wanted our hard won USD at a bad rate, we made it to the Isla Margarita with about 50 venezuelan bolivares on us (after paying departure taxes). We had, perhaps naively thought that we would be able to exchange USD for bolivares on arrival on the Isla Margarita. However when we did land around 9pm at night, the only Cambio was closed, and there was a distinct lack of currency exchange touts in the smaller airport. So off we went looking for an ATM so that we could withdraw bolivares (bad rate but needs must), in order to get a taxi to our hostel (50 bolivares wasnt going to be enough). Mind you we only needed enough bolivares to get to the hostel, where they had promised to exchange more USD for us at a decent rate.

So we found a row of about 6 ATMs in the airport and thought, yippee, no problems here. However the first 2 ATMs were not working at all (black monitors). The third was a Venezuelan only bank, and the remaining ATMs all had signs saying they were temporarily out of order - oh bugger. So to sum up we are in the airport at around 9h30pm without enough local currency to get to the hostel, which is by no means close enough to hike it..slight panic. So off we went to the taxi rank to ask whether they would accept payment in USD, which thankfully they were more than happy to do.

So after an eventful journey we eventually arrived at the Hotel Patrick in Juan Griego and managed to get a late dinner (fish and chips of course) before retiring for the night, exhausted. The hostel was run by an Irish character who was very helpful and made us feel at home, and the hostel had a great living area with a bar, pool table and hammocks.

The following morning we got our first sight of Juan Griego, a small fishing village, with the beach full of fishing boats, and the odd fish head (it was a working fishing village, not just a couple of boats for the benefit of the tourists), and the water was full of hundreds of pelicans. An amazing sight, I dont think Id ever seen a real live pelican before, nevermind hundreds of them perching on fishing boats and bobbing around in the water / diving for fish. The only catch was that you couldnt really swim on that beach because of all the fishing boats, so we got a taxi 10 minutes away to the nearest swimming beach called Playa Caribe. Now its worth mentioning at this point that there are some interesting cars passing for taxis on this island. We have been in old Fords straight out of the 1970's with doors that only open on one side, and where the inside door panelling has all come away! Cuba eat your heart out!

Also, after the freezing cold of Chile, the heat of Venezuela was very welcome, and it has been 30 plus degrees here every day, and pretty humid to boot, apparently its the rainy season, although its hardly rained here at all.

We spent the next couple of days lying around on various nearby beaches, eating seafood for lunch and dinner (fresh prawns, calamari and fish all plentiful here), until it was time for us to move across to the East side of the island. Oh, and I should mention the sunsets as Juan Griego does have some stunners. We had pre booked in to another hostel (Villa Del Sol) in Playa El Agua, so that we could have a look at the East side of the island too.

This turned out to be a Godsend, the hostel was fantastic (well more like a hotel), with tv's, fridges and working air conditioning in the rooms, and a daily cleaning service, not to mention the free breakfasts and Wifi, and the private balcony with hammock, overlooking the pool! Playa El Agua is clearly the more touristy side of the island and is more developed with hotels, and lots of other gringos! The beaches on the Juan Griego (West) side of the island were full of local Venezuelan families on holiday that kept looking at me as though I was the whitest human they had ever seen. It was only after leaving the Juan Griego side of the island that we realised how different Playa El Agua is.

Playa El Agua was a long white sandy beach that was only a five minute walk from the hostel, and the hostel provided us with free tordo's (sun shade with loungers) - score! Que another 4 days lying around on the beach and catching a few rays. Steve is currently a lovely golden bronze colour and I am a lovely lobster red, which is now starting to peel (well no change since the last time I hit the sun then).

The only other thing worth mentioning about the Isla Margarita is that there are people walking along the beach with armfuls of freshwater pearls, which they sell at the price of a string of fake pearls in London. So of course, I had to get some of those. We also took a taxi through to Polymar on one day, for a look around their shopping centre. I was pleased to find another Subway and a McDonalds (Subway are everywhere Jemma, but not as good as Fenchurch street as they didnt have a toaster, and I didnt understand what salads they were offering in Spanish). They also had a pearl shop, again selling freshwater pearls on the cheap, so I bought a bracelet...I am now officially all pearled up- hooray! I remember Julie saying that Venezuela was great for buying pearls and now I know why! We also spent some time walking around that shopping centre trying to find some Havianas (flip flops) but alas they dont seem to import them from Brazil, so we ended up with Ipanemas instead (pretty much the same only made of recycled rubber).

The Monday before we left we were booked in for a snorkelling trip with Magic Tours. So we got up early and although it was raining we trundled down to the beach to the Magic tours office at 08h30. However when we got there, there was no one around, so we waited about 10 minutes, and true to South American time, eventually a woman slowly gets out of a stopped car and makes her way over to the door. She seemed surprised to see us waiting there in the rain (despite our previous booking), and when we said 'snorkelling', quickly made a call on her mobile, and then told us it was postponed until 'Manana' due to the rain. Anyway we made good use of the time later that day booking the next leg of our journey (a lodge in the Amazon for a week, and later a nightbus from Lima to Cusco).

Yesterday morning we headed back down to Magic tours for the snorkelling trip, and this time a mini bus arrived to collect us. Despite us choosing 'English' as our preferred language on the tour sheet, the driver didnt speak one word of English and ushered us in to the waiting mini bus for the transfer with a hand signal. There were 3 other english speaking tourists in the bus so we got talking to them. Then when we got to the beach, the bus driver split us up (the three of them on one boat) and then took Steve and I over to another boat and had a conversation with a boat guy in spanish, and then walked away and left us there without a word - lovely. I was just starting to wonder if we'd been sold to the highest bidder when a bus load of other tourists arrived to join our party. We then got ushered on to a boat (still not a word of English), which required us to walk out till we were waist deep in the water.

Once on the boat, we were relieved to find someone that at last spoke some english, that turned out to be a dive instructor. The majority of the boat were actually going diving and 5 of us were going snorkelling. So off we went to the nearby Coche Islands (thankfully no BFH breakdown), where we got off at a sort of house, and they fed the pelicans to give us a bit of a show, while the divers got in to their gear. Then we were ready to set off again and the boat took us to the first snorkelling spot just around the corner. We saw a load of fish, although the coral wasnt great there, including some cuttlefish (changing to a blue colour). Then after the snorkelling, back to the house where they had been barbequeing (braaing) for our lunch.

I could have sworn it was chicken, but when we asked the guide he said we were eating braaied pelican and promised he wasnt pulling our leg. So pelican pretty much tastes like chicken. After a tasty lunch we went on to the second dive spot were we saw loads more fish and some big coral moving with the sea. I also spotted a black eel and an orange starfish, so was pleased with that. So all in all it made for a good day out, although the english speaking guide was really for the divers, so we didnt have anyone on the boat talking to us snorkellers after all - bit odd. Was great to do a bit of snorkelling again, as we hadn't done that in a while, and the water was very clear and warm, so we just floated along most of the time.

Anyhow tonight is our last night on the island, so we went for a big steak dinner at one of the few restaurants (the beach shuts down at night, strangely, all the tourists seem to eat in their own hotels from what we can gather). Tomorrow we head for the airport, and 2 flights later we should be in Lima. Then we've got 2 nights in Lima before we fly up to Iquitos for our one week Amazon trip. Ive just looked at the weather in Iquitos and it varies between around 21 degrees and 33 degrees year round, so its going to be another scorcher. We start taking the Malarone tablets tomorrow for the Malaria too.

I am looking forward to the boat ride down the Amazon and the excursions they have planned from the lodge, as it is sure to be one of the highlights of our trip. With any luck we will see some of the famous pink river dolphins, fingers crossed. I think thats about all for now.

Take care and love to all at home.
Kirst x

Chile - San Pedro de Atacama and Santiago Part 2

So we got a flight up to San Pedro de Atacama for a few days, to check out the 'driest desert in the world' and get a short break from the cold in Santiago. We had an interesting time booking the flights on the LAN website actually as its entirely written in Spanish (thank God for Google translate).

We had planned to get a Tur Bus from Calama (nearest airport to San Pedro) to San Pedro itself and then find our hostel, the bus ride is about 1.5 hours. However when we landed at Calama airport it was really small (one room to collect your bags, hire a rental car, or book a hotel at a desk) and we couldnt see any taxis to take us to Tur Bus in Calama, so we ended up taking the easy route and paid for a Licancabur transfer. The transfer bus dropped us right at our hostel in San Pedro, which meant no further messing about buying bus tickets and waiting for buses to leave.

San Pedro is a very small town with one main road (Caracoles) that is actually a dry dirt road (reddy desert sand) and has a square (paved woohoo) and a couple of roads running off of that. The following day we decided to hire a couple of mountain bikes from the hostel, and map in hand we set off into the nearby desert for a look around. We stopped at a sort of monument (Quitor) to climb up a rocky hill and see the views. The views of the surrounding mountains where amazing. What the map failed to mention was that we would need to cross a river three times to get where we were headed - devils gorge.

Basically we kept cycling along a rather bumpy unpaved dirt road, until we hit a river, tried cycling around looking for a footbridge and didnt find one. Then we saw a couple of local kids getting their shoes and socks off and walking their bikes over the shallow bit of the river, so when in rome...now I must mention that although the winter sun in the desert is very warm (shorts and t shirts) the river water was absolutely icy (pins and needles in the legs after 5 quick steps across). Then plaas - style we got back on the bikes and cycled on shoeless until our feet dried, before putting our shoes back on again. Repeat x 2 before we got to Devils Gorge, which was pretty cool - you can cycle through the middle of the narrow sheer cliffs of the reddy desert mountains.

That night we took a tour bus to do some star gazing with Space (thanks Sue H). Basically we went out in to the dessert to a hilarious french mans home (who has been an astronomer for manys a year) where he told us about the stars, galaxy etc, and let us look through the 6 telescopes he had set up in his back yard. He was very informative, but more than this he was hilariously funny and had us all in stitches. At one point someone asked him how long a red star would still be around before it would burn out, and he compared it to this - When you see a very old person on the street, you know they are going to die soon, but you dont know if its going to be in a few days, a few months, or a few years...you do know they wont be around in 20 years...and its the same with red stars...lol. We also got to see Saturn through one of his telescopes, rings and all, which was well cool and he made up all a nice hot chocky afterwards - it is freezing in the desert at night. Despite the sunburn I managed to pick up on the bicycle during the day (I put the factor 50 on my face and neck, but neglected a couple of spots on my arms and they flared up red, nothing new there then). Saying that it was a relief to feel the warmth of the sun again during the day, after wearing the thermals and fleeces since Uruguay.

One day we also booked ourselves on to a tour to see the Valley of the Moon and Death Valley. We saw some awesome views of the desert on that tour, and got to watch the sunset over the desert sitting on a rocky outcrop - stunning. I could see some passing resemblance to what I understand the surface of the moon to look like (not that Ive been to the moon), but it was a pretty barren wasteland out there, with a couple of spiky rocks sticking up here and there.

The next day we took a breather and read our books in the hammocks in the garden at the back of the hostel. During the day in town (well I say town, what I mean is the main road), Steve actually managed to bump in to a couple of guys from our gap tour (passing the same way), so we arranged to meet them for dinner that night and had a great time catching up over dinner and then having a couple of drinks around the open fire in the middle of the restaurant. That is all the rage in San pedro - the restaurants have open roofs (or loosely covered with grass mats) and they each have an open fire at night.

The next day we had to get up at 3h30 am (thats right AM and we all know Im not a morning person), so that the transfer could collect us at 4am and take us to the geysers. Now you must understand that it was minus 14 degrees celsius when we arrived at the geysers (apparently it has to be cold to get the full affect) and we were at 4100 metres above sea level. As the sun started to rise above the surrounding mountains the scene really was beautiful, with all the steam coming up out of the many geysers around us. I did seem to get a touch of the old altitude sickness though, slight headache / dizzy feeling and running nose, and they gave me a cup of cocoa tea...hopefully the time in Cusco before the Inca Trail in Sept will allow me to acclimatise! On the way back the bus stopped at a small settlement (like 5 houses in the desert) so that we could have Llama kebabs, and I can tell you those llamas are not only cute and fluffy, they are also very tasty!

The following morning we were up at 6h30 am for the transfer back to the airport and we've flown back to Santiago for a couple of days, waiting for our flight out to Venezuela. It was great to arrive in a city and actually know your way around for a change, as weve been here before, we knew exactly where to get the airport bus, and where to get off / how to walk up to the hostel. We are back in Don Santiagos for a few nights and its very homely here - cool hostel with funky paintings on the purple walls!

Today we took a bus 1.5 hours to Valparaiso, a neighbouring port town which we had heard very mixed opinions on. I can see why some people dont like it, as its not really aimed at tourists, and has a lot of graffiti about and a bit of a grimy feel. However we did find a kind of railway that took us up the side of the mountain and got some great views over the port (there is no beach) and the different coloured houses on the cliffs. Tonight we are going to see a local Chilean band called Conmocion around the corner from the hostel, which promises to be a lively, jumping up and down affair.

Tomorrow we are thinking of heading to a photo exhibit (nice to have some downtime and not have to rush around as we've done the tourist bit here already). Anne K this note is for you - they cannot make a good cup of tea in Chile! I've tried ordering te con leche in a number of different cafes/restaurants (including Starbucks) and they all make tea with milk the same way here - they give you a cup of boiling milk, with a teabag in it...ie no water. yuck! So I've taken to buying my own teabags, sugar and milk and brewing up in the hostel (I cant go months without a cuppa!)

We have decided to head straight to the beach in Venezuela in the hope of some sun, so we've booked a flight from Caracas to the Isla Margarita and will be spending 10 days there (time to purchase some Havianas I reckon). We're off to the island on Monday - woohoo, so more about that later.

Hope all is well at home...and I must get the pics off my camera sometime soon!
Love Kirst x

Chile - Santiago part 1

So we got a bus to Santiago (the capital of Chile) and had one last night with the gap tour group in this big city. Marcel (second gap tour leader) took us to a favourite bar of his called The Clinic, which is actually named after a magazine that I gather runs some sort of lefty political commentary. The bar was pretty funky and the walls were covered with The Clinic magazine covers, and emblazoned with large motos in Spanish that we couldn’t understand. However it had a good vibe about the place so we had a couple of Vodca Collins and then ordered in some food.

One thing I forgot to mention while we were in Buenos Aires, and I really noticed again in Santiago, is that a lot of people still smoke in South America. Unlike the UK there is no ban against smoking indoors, so when our dinner arrived we were eating it next to people that were chain smoking (yuck). The smoking in bars also has the unpleasant side affect of burning eyes and a sore throat, which I suppose makes you drink more, and we had to launder the set of clothes we were wearing the following day as they literally reeked of smoke. Its been a while now since the smoking ban in London and Id forgotten just how unpleasant the side affects are for non smokers.

Anyway other than the smoking crowd it was a nice bar, and had some funky lampshades covered in womens underwear. From there we took a taxi a short distance to another place that had a live band playing, and then a DJ later on, so we had a bit of a boogie. Another footnote here is that the South Americans all seem to love their cheesy eighties music. The taxis and clubs and some restaurants weve been in have played anything from Rod stewardt, to Madonna to Rick Astley and it’s a bit like being in a time warp!
So the music on the dance floor was sometimes a bit retro, but we had a good night before flagging a taxi back to the hotel around 3h30.

The following morning we had to be up bright and early (okay maybe just early after not getting much sleep) to claim our free breakfast (no cheese and ham here yay), get packed, say our goodbyes to the gap group and check out of the hotel. It was sad saying goodbye to the people that weve been travelling with for the past month, but also exciting to be heading off on our own and hopefully taking the foot off the gas a bit. Whilst the built in company, the sites and the ease of travel (having your route, hotels and buses all booked for you makes travelling a doddle) were great, the pace was a bit hectic for me. After a maximum of three nights in each place it feels like we need a holiday from our holiday, if you know what I mean.

So with this in mind we’d booked ourselves in to a hostel in Santiago for 3 nights, so after checking out of the hotel, we walked the 20 minutes to the new hostel carrying all our gear. If we’d known we were pretty much walking along the metro line at the time (and how cheap the metro tickets are) we probably would have taken the Metro instead. It was around this time we decided that we really needed to sort out our Cuban tourist cards (for the upcoming Cuban trip), as Santiago is the last major city, likely to have a Cuban embassy on our route. We took the metro back in to the centre of town and went in to a LAN (airline) agency, where we had to take a number and wait to be called up for attention (bit odd, how busy does this airline get?). Our opening remark was Hola, Hablas Ingles? To which the man replied ‘No’ with all seriousness, and we both had a nervous chuckle at that. Fortunately he understood a little more than he could speak and let us know that the agency didn’t handle any visas, but pointed us in the direction of a travel agent a few blocks away. So off we went to the travel agent, and asked if anyone spoke any English, which fortunately one lady did, though she explained that they only sell Cuban visas as part of a package (e.g. flights and visa or accommodation and visa), so we took her card as a fallback option, and left it at that.

The following day we braved the Metro, which was surprisingly easy to use (asking for 2 billeto sufficed) and headed for the Cuban embassy. This time we really thought that our lack of Spanish might be a problem, but the woman handling our visas was rather pleased to have a pair of English speaking tourists there (what a novelty) and said she wanted to practise her English. She was very sweet, and when we asked how long the visas would be valid for, she said 30 years, and then corrected herself with 30 days lol. We taught her the word ‘return’ and she said that she would ‘return’ our passports the following day, so after surprisingly little in the way of questioning (we didn’t actually need the flight or accommodation information we’d printed out in preparation via an internet cafe), off we went.

The following day we headed back to the Metro station and attempted to buy 2 Tarjeta Bip (Bip cards), that are like Oyster cards that you can charge up to use on the Metro and buses. We asked the woman behind the glass window for two cards and to charge each one with 2000 pesos, (our Spanish and/ or gesturing is improving daily) and she started about the business of loading one card. At this point we handed her the 4000 pesos through the window and she started asking us for more money by showing us the total of 6500 on a calculator. So we promptly remembered the word Cancelar, but apparently it was too late for one card as it had already been charged up, so we ended up paying the extra for one card and cancelling the second card. We figured out from the receipt that there is a 1250 peso charge for issuing the card itself. Oh well I am now the proud owner of one Tarjeta Bip card!

Then we headed back to the Cuban embassy to fetch our passports. We had to press a little button on the wall outside, for them to open the gates and let us in. Steve pushed the button and said ‘Collecting passports’ and the Spanish woman on the other end made Spanish noises that she didn’t understand us, so I tried ‘Collectionnar Passporte’ and that seemed to do the trick - now I ask you are these two phrases really all that different. I think it was the fake Spanish accent that swung it! So passports and Cuban tourist cards in hand, we high fived our way out of there, feeling very pleased with ourselves.
It’s a wonder what the power of the internet (to get the Cuban embassy address and opening hours) and a little English / Spanish translation dictionary can get you.

Having arranged the Cuban tourist card independently, we are now free to choose our own casa particular accommodation in Cuba, rather than being forced to take one of the more expensive hotels on offer through a travel agent package. Anyway Cuban tourist cards in hand, we were then free to explore Santiago a little, so we headed back in to Centro and had a walk around. Took some pictures in the square (Plaza de Armas where the Tourist Information people ride around on Segways!) and visited the Pre Colombian museum to see the little Mapucho, Inca and other sculptures there which was pretty good. We had a laugh trying to find the entrance to that museum, which was hidden behind some sort of renovation works, and almost ended up in an adult theatre instead, which for some reason had 2 Pre colombian museum signs on either side of it, even though we were nowhere near the diverted entrance.

As we had some more time in Santiago we also headed up their funicular (railway) to see the views out over Santiago. Just when we were beginning to think we were special, we overheard 4 other south Africans talking at the top and realised we were not the only South Africans in the village! The funicular was in a student area, so we managed to find a tasty yet economical lunch (roast chicken and chips special) before the rain started coming down. It is Winter here after all (apparently the coldest in 50 years), and Lord knows we are looking forward to a bit of sunshine in Venezuela when we get there.

We also decided to try and see a movie while we were in a big city, so we headed to the Hoyts movie theatre in Centro. I was hoping to see Eclipse but it had already finished screening. After queing for ages and looking up the word for movie in Spanish, we got to the front and asked if there were any movies showing in English, in answer to which she pointed at 2 names behind her on the board, and we chose one at random - The Sorcerers Apprentice starring Nicholas Cage. Now whilst we are usually both Nicholas Cage fans, we came out of this movie in firm agreement that the sorcerers apprentice is one of the worst movies ever made, so take our advice and avoid that one at all costs. However it was nice to sit in a movie theatre, listen to a movie in English and get a little bit of normality while we were in Santiago. We could almost believe we were around the corner from the flat in London watching the movie, well after the Spanish trailers anyway.

One night in the hostel we met a couple of other English speaking travellers from Ohio, Ireland and Wales, who were very into their music, so we sat around on couches and compared bands in London with those in Ohio and Ireland. The notepad came in handy as we were able to look people up on Utube and show them a couple of songs (Springbok Nude Girls went down a treat). We had a fun night, as the two guys from Ohio used to be in a band, and one could sing while the other played guitar (which someone found lying around the hostel) so they played us a couple of songs and they were really good.

The last night in the hostel they arranged for a braai, and there were a new group of people, who gave us some tips on travelling in Peru and Thailand which were pretty useful, so we are starting to understand the benefits of staying in hostels and chatting to other travellers now that we are travelling on our own.

The following day we got up early, got packed and walked down to the Los Heroes metro station, to get the airport bus to Santiago airport (runs every 15 mins, very efficient and pretty cheap). Then we got a flight to Calama, which is the nearest airport to San Pedro de Atacama. We did a bit of reading online the night before about transferring from Calama airport to San pedro, and thought we would be taking a Tur Bus from Calama. However when we got off the plane in the tiny airport, we couldn’t see any taxis to Calama, so we ended up paying for a transfer with Licanbur instead, which after 1.5 hours dropped us neatly at our hostel in San Pedro (more expensive, but easier and quicker).

We have 5 nights in San Pedro de Atacama before we head back to Santiago, and then we have a couple of nights booked in Santiago again before we head up to Venezuela.

More on San Pedro de Atacama later.

Love to all at home.
Kirsty