Contents

Note: Click on the photos to see them full size.

Cheryl in front of the Floralis Generica in Buenos Aires. It is a mechanical sculpture that opens during the day and closes at night.

Click on the month below to link to the entries shown.

November
Planning the trip

December
Santiago, Chile (our first visit)
Itinery Update

January
28th Bolivia
22nd The Nasca Lines - Peru
19th The Inca Trail and Machu Picchu - Peru
13th Itinery Update
10th Our Host Family - Peru
10th Ollantaytambo - Peru
10th Pisaq - Peru
7th Para nuestros amigos latinos
2nd Homestay in Cusco - Peru

Sara, Abel and Raisa from our beautiful host family in Cusco, Peru

February
19th Tierra del Fuego - Argentina
11th While we were waiting... (Puerto Varas, Chiloe, etc) - Chile
7th Itinery Update
5th Slipping down Pablo Neruda's thin country - Chile

March
29th Noticia Especial (lo siento por el castellano

malo)
(Climbing Villarrica volcano) - Chile
27th Forest Trekking near Pucon, Chile
21st Bariloche - Switzerland in the Andes - Argentina
21st The Welsh in Argentina
21st Point Tombo - Argentina
21st Valdes Peninsula - Argentina
14th Itinery Update
12th The Perito Moreno glacier - Argentina
12th Firz Roy and Cerro Torre - Argentina
11th Don´t mention the war - Argentina
8th Torres del Paine - Trekking in Chile

Laurie admiring the iceburgs in Largo Grey on the ten day trekking circuit of Torres del Paine National Park in Chile.

April
24th Hello work, we're back from the Andes - Brisbane
18th Chile again and again and again...
14th The First Class bus to Mendoza - Argentina
11th Itinery Update
11th Posturing over the Falkland Islands - Argentina
11th More Buenos Aires - Argentina
3rd Buenos Aires - Argentina
1st Ascent of Villarrica Volcano - Chile

Hello work, we're back from the Andes.

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Our first sight of Australian soil was the sand of Moreton Island which forms the Eastern side of Brisbane's Moreton bay


Our dear friends welcome us home at Brisbane airport. (L to R: Cheryl, Robyn, Michael, Ethan and Lyneece)


Michael and Ethan at the airport

24 April 2006

Today was our first day back at work after four months of wonderful experiences and something new to see every day. What a change to be back to the old routine again although I must say that it is enjoyable to return to the simple pleasures of life such as cooking your own meals and sleeping in your own bed. Our good friends were there at the airport to welcome us home and Robyn even had a little sign in Spanish for Ethan asking if we missed him (which we did of course).

All the dire warnings we were given about South America turned out to be unfounded as we did not have any nasty incidents in four months of travel. And what a special feeling to now have a second family in Cusco. Thanks Peru, Bolivia, Chile and Argentina, it was great!

Chile again and again and again...

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We thought this might be Aconcagua when we saw it but it wasn´t


This was not Aconcagua either!


At last, Aconcagua 6,959m the highest mountain on the continent of South America


About to enter the road tunnel that took us under the highest section of the Andes. No, this was not Aconcagua either...


The Archbishop caught red-handed trying to set fire to the Cathedral on Easter Sunday


None of your mundane pipe organs here, the choir was supported by a concert orchestra


There were TV cameras and floodlights everywhere


Cheryl and me sun-bathing in downtown Santiago


At last we see the beautiful mountains above Santiago

For the fifth time we entered Chile on Saturday and what a journey it was from Mendoza, Argentina across the Andes to Santiago, Chile. The scenery was spectacular as we followed a river valley with huge desert mountains in all shades of red, yellow and orange. Then some snow appeared on the higher peaks and we were wondering which one was Aconcagua which at 6,959m is the highest mountain on the continent. The road slowly went higher and higher until there was snow on the ground we were passing, then at the highest point we disappeared into a long tunnel which tooks us to the Eastern side of the mountains. We are now old hands at the customs and immigration checks at these border crossings and it all went very smoothly, even the obligatory Chilean sniffer dog seemed bored with the smell of our bags. After passing a ski resort just over the border the road dropped dramatically down an almost endless series of hairpin bends into a deep valley that had hydro electric power stations every 10 or so kilometres. This is certainly another of great road journeys of the world.

Santiago is feeling very comfortable to us now and we laugh at the memories of ourselves the first time we were here. The city even turned on some good weather for us, the pollution levels were low and for the first time we saw the snow capped mountains that overlook the city. As it was Easter Sunday we trotted along to the Cathedral for midday mass. They do not do things by half here with the mass being said by Cardinal Francisco Javier Errazuriz the Archbishop of Santiago, the choir supported by a full orchestra and the whole thing televised. I have to admit that I am not one for listening to hymns but the sound of that choir and orchestra and the incredible acoustics in the cathedral sent tingles through me. We thought the holiday was winding down when we left Mendoza however South America continues to surprise us right up to the last minute.

The First Class bus to Mendoza

The First Class seat is shown in the middle of the image above taken from the Andesmar web site.

Long distance bus travel is very common here in South America and they have modern buses that often travel overnight to provide a cheap alternative to air travel. We have used overnight buses twice in Peru and four times in Argentina. On those trips we had Semi cama or Cama seats. (Cama is spanish for bed.) For our trip from Buenos Aires to Mendoza we tried the ultimate, the First Class bus with a full bed for AUD70 per person. The company we used was Andesmar and the seats in the bus were spaced far enough apart for the back to fully recline into a flat position. There was a little padded ¨ironing board¨ that could be positioned level with the seat to support your legs and voila, a full flat bed was formed. It worked much better than any aircraft seat I have ever tried to sleep in.

All these overnight buses have a steward or hostess and serve dinner and breakfast on the journey. The quality of the food varies enormously from company to company. Our first class Andesmar bus started the journey with a game of bingo and amazingly I won! The prize was a bottle of Mendoza red wine which we are going to drink today when we have a picnic in the huge park here in Mendoza. For dinner we had a big salad followed by hot roast beef with a glass of red wine and fruit salad for desert. It was delicious and at least as good as what you get on aeroplanes. Then we watched a movie and finally champagne was brought around for a nightcap before drifting off to sleep on our cosy beds. In the morning coffee and croissants were served and by 11am we were pulling into the bus station at Mendoza.

Itinery Update 10 April

We are heading home next week so the adventure is all but over. To cross the country back to Santiago we will be taking another overnight bus journey to Mendoza and this time it is a First Class seat so that should be interesting. After a few days there it is on to Santiago to catch the plane out on 17 April and land in Australia a couple of days later.

Wed 12 Apr, Overnight bus to Mendoza, Argentina
Thu 15 Apr, Day bus to Santiago - Stay at El Patio Suizo two nights
Mon 17 Apr, LAN Airlines S.A. QF 0322, Depart 11:15pm Santiago to Auckland
Wed 19 Apr, Qantas QF 0116, Depart 6:30am Auckland to Arrive Brisbane 8:05am

Posturing over the Falkland Islands

The Falkland Islands (or Malvinas as they are known in Spanish) are in the news here. If you have been following this blog you will remember an earlier post on 11 March with a photo of a sign proclaiming Argentinian sovereignty over the Falklands. Argentina recently approached the United Nations about re-opening talks with the UK about the Falklands. However, as you can see in the this article in an english language version of a local paper, Britain is not interested!

There was another article in yesterday´s paper about the Falklands. It was an interview with the Argentine diplomat to the United Nations in the 1960´s and 70´s Lucio Garcia Del Solar. That article was in spanish so I just about wore out the dictionary looking up words but from what I could gather old Lucio reckons that Argentina would have the Falklands by now if the military dictatorship government did not start the 1982 war. Apparently in the sixties there was a lot of anti-colonial sentiment against the British and the United Nations resolution 2065 was passed which proclaimed that Britian and Argentina were to commence talks to reach an agreement. Lucio said that at that time Britain had no further interest in the strategic location of the Falklands in the South Atlantic and it was only a matter of time before a voluntary hand over took place. Unfortunately, the military government had different ideas and ruined everything. Lucio´s opinion is that it will take a long time now but eventually a diplomatic solution will be reached.

More Buenos Aires

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There are frequent protests in Buenos Aires though they are usually peaceful. This one had a police escort. These people are Bolivian immigrants who are being exploited as cheap labour in sweat shops.


Living the high life in the elegant Tortonis Cafe


The evening Tango Show at Tortonis


Mausoleums at the incredible Recoleta cemetery


Evita´s body is now in this mausoleum at Recoleta. Ironically, in death she is surrounded by the upper classes who despised her working class background.


Another Tango show, this time at the famous El Viejo Almacen


Singer and accordianist at El Viajo Almacen tango show


Having lunch at Las Violetas restaurante/patisserie/confiteria


Stained glass windows at Las Violetas


Cheryl comes face to face with Eva Peron at the Evita muesum


Another protest on Sunday (or so we thought), it was at the university Law Faculty building and there had been student protests reported during the week because one of the nominees for the position of Chancellor served in the government of the military dictatorship in the 1970s. However, the next day we read in the newspaper that this was actually a large crowd of 50,000 Peruvians casting their vote for their countrys election. The riot police were out in force but nothing nasty happened as far as we know.


A corner of the Government Palace building

As you can see by the photos above we have been having a good look around Buenos Aires day and night. It is a very exciting city with heaps to see and do. The Tortonis Cafe was a surprise because we discovered that as well as the beautiful surroundings, they have a tango show every night for only AUD12.50 entrance. So we went along and it was great except for when the female performer started to pull people out of the audience to dance the tango with her and guess who got picked! That´s right, yours truely and I can´t dance a step of tango. To make it worse I was wearing my hiking boots as the only footwear I have is them and my runners. Anyway, it was all good fun even if it was at my expense...

There have been a few protests here, obviously the Argentinians believe in their democratic right to freedom of speech and assembly. Some protests are huge like the march by thousands of Bolivians who are being exploited. Others are tiny, one night we saw a group of only a dozen people marching towards the presidential palace with a police escort. They might of been small but they were loud because they had a mobile PA system that was blasting out their message and had us running from our hotel room to see what was going on. What a let down it was to see only a tiny group making all the noise!

Buenos Aires

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When Italian immigrants arrived in the area known as La Boca, they built communal housing with corregated iron walls. Many have been restored and are now tourist attractions.


¨Good on you Argentina!¨ Why isn´t the the Gold Coast highway set up like this?


Stained glass in the catherdal. The tomb of the liberator San Martin was also in this church.


We are constantly reminded that this is the city of the Tango. These performers were in the street.


Apartments in the inner suburbs. They go on like this for block after block after block.


A shopping centre Buenos Aires style. This was in the beautiful Edificio del Pacifico (¨Pacific Building¨ in english but it loses something in the translation don´t you think?).

This is the last destination on our trip, the city that Fangio, Maradona and Jorges Luis Borges call(ed) home. It´s size is overwhelming. The downtown area alone is about 24 blocks long by 17 blocks wide then surrounding that are all the inner-city suburbs that are full of tastefully designed apartment blocks, restaurants and more shops on tree lined streets. It all looks very European, especially when most taxis are Peugeots, the police cars are Volkswagens and the most popular cars are Renaults.

With the help of the subway system we are starting to find our way around, at AUD 0.35 per journey of any distance it is very cheap. Our first international hostel association accomodation turned out to be a real dive and we have now moved to a hotel in the city centre. The one advantage of the hostel was that it was in an interesting suburb called Palermo because of the Italian immigrants that first lived there and it still has some cobbled streets and lots of arty shops and good restaurants.

The buildings in the city are beautiful and there is a definate french influence. There are grand palaces, theatres, hotels and even some of the apartment blocks are impressive.

There have been a few protests in the streets here but they have been small so you don´t have to worry about us. In fact, this is a very safe and friendly city from what we have seen so far.

We plan to be here for another week and a half so we will put more of Buenos Aires on the blog as we get to see it.

Ascent of Villarrica Volcano

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¨What´s that? It´s the ice axe I hold in my hand to climb, not my banana...¨

(Sorry Peter, I couldn´t resist this caption)


Scott and Cheryl admire the view on the way up.


Our group having lunch on the crater rim.


Bloody Aussies, you can´t take them anywhere. Peter and Cheryl getting into the red wine.


Starting our descent past all the stragglers with other companies still on their way up.

With time running out and Buenos Aires still to see we were faced with a decision, do we go to see Iguasu Falls or do we stay longer in Pucon waiting for the good weather so we can do an alpine ascent of an active volcano? We no longer had time for both. Well, as Geoff Dengate says, it was a ¨no-brainer¨. At 2874m the Villarrica Volcano is high enough to have a permanent snow cover while low enough to not have to worry about altitude sickness. Its slopes are at a low enough angle to make it a technically easy climb with crampons and an ice axe, which meant that for the first time Cheryl and I could do an alpine ascent together.

Our guide, Miguel takes tourists up the mountain three or four times a week and is a ski instructor in the winter. Because of Miguel´s contacts we were the first party on the chairlift that took us up to the snow line and so we got a head start on the hoards that were climbing with other guiding companies. Our party was small with only five paying clients and Marcelo, a mate of Miguel, making a total of seven. Peter from Melbourne plus ourselves made a total of three Aussies while Ashley and Scott were from North America and are here cycling their way around the Andes.

Miguel helped us attach the Petzel twelve point crampons to our hiking boots and gave us a quick demonstration of how to self-arrest if a fall should send us sliding down the slope. There was no time to practise the technique, we just headed up with Miguel leading. He was an excellent guide and maintained a smooth, easy, steady pace while zig-zagging so we were never ascending at much more than 30 degrees.

Our route took us to the right of a small hanging glacier and when we crested a snow ridge we copped a blast from a stiff Westerly wind (but nothing like Torres del Paine). As we moved higher we would occasionally catch a lung full of the fumes that issued from the crater above. The sulphurous fumes form sulphuric acid when they contact water, so they are not the best thing to breath into your lungs. It made us cough when we caught some fumes.

Cheryl was going great with the crampons, even when crossing the steeper slopes, and I was really proud of her. Our little group was making good time and we led the way for all the others strung out far below us.

After three hours we reached the end of the snow just below the crater’s rim. Here the ground was all dirt and rock covered with a yellow sulphur dust. Miguel expertly read the winds and took us where the fumes were minimal. Soon we were in a position to look down the throat of the volcano but there was no lava to be seen, only the noxious fumes.

The view from the summit was incredible with the white cones of half a dozen other snow capped volcanoes visible. After an offering of some red wine to the mountain spirit we made our way around the rim. We did cop some bad fumes in one short section. This time it even made our eyes water.

The descent was quite easy as we were all feeling like experts with our crampons by then and the snow had been softened by the sun so it gave a little with each step and did not jar our knees. We all got back safely and the day finished over a few beers with Miguel back at the hostel.