From Chile to Argentina

I ended up in the Northern desert of chile, in a small resort village called San Pedro de la Atacama. It was a super cute little village with amazing scenery surrounding it. We stayed for 2 days, than headed to Salta, Argentina. This country is amazing! It is very European, but dirt cheap. I had an hour massage for only 7 dollars! The steak is amazing..and also very cheap. The wine is very amazing...also very cheap...and I have been drinking as much as I can! My English friend, Jo, and I went on a one day trekk through the Argentinian jungle..unfortunately it is was a bit rainy, so we didnt get the best view from the top...picture above. On the way back down the mountain we actually had to change our path because a bunch of cows were in the way and would not move!
We also did a half day horseback ride through the valley. My horse was a bit of a loose canon.....never knew what is was going to do and it kept stopping to eat! It was fun though anyway. We also spent last night enjoying the nightlife. The party here doesnt start until about 3am...needless to say we got back to the hostel quite early in the morning. The lack of sleep and hangover was well worth it though!
I am heading to a small town called cafayate next to enjoy their vinyards and much more wine...

Pictures of the salt flats

Pictures:
1. Salt flats...two of the many funny pictures you can take
2. The red lake that changes color with the wind
3. Laguna verde: can see the whole reflection of the mountain in the water

Salt flats of Bolivia

I arrived in Uyuni after a very long 11 hour night bus from La Paz. Myself and some friends from La Paz found a tour company to take us out on the three day tour that day. The first day is spent on the salt flats, which are unreal! All you can see is white for miles and miles. We spent most of the day taking stupid pictures on the salt. Our first night was spent in the salt hotel....a hotel made of salt. The walls, the floors, the beds, the tables, the chairs....It was actually very comfortable. The second day was a lot of driving on Bolivian ´roads´. More like salt, sand or rock paths. We went to many different amazing lakes. Most of which had flamingos...unfortunately, they were a bit camera shy. The coolest lake was the red one. The color actually changes with the wind! The second night was spent in a crappy little hostel in the middle of nowhere, about 4200 meters altitidue and really cold...below zero temps! The whole group slept in almost all our clothes, hats and scarves! Not as comfortable as the salt hotel! The third day was spent at the geysers and hotsprings. We got dropped off at the Chilean border and headed to San Pedro de la Atacama, which is the driest desert in the world.
Pictures to follow...

The amazon basin: pampas

I spent 4 days in the amazon basin, starting in Rurrenabaque. It was amazing....super hot and humid (which is a great change from the cold of la paz and everywhere I have been lately!). We headed out in a jeep than a boat to the jungle lodge which was actually quite nice. Everything was lined with mosquito nets and had nets for over the beds. The boat ride down was unreal....there were litterally crocs everwhere....you couldnt drive more than 5 seconds without seeing one, if not five crocs (and not too far away!). We also saw a bundle of little monkeys on the ride, which invaded our boat to get the bananas!(that is not me in the picture) We were able to go anaconda hunting twice... yes that is a picture of me with an anaconda around my neck...but only a small one, about 1 meter. The biggest we saw was 3 meters and as thick as my calfs. We also went fishing for piranas..i was quite good and caught three! We swam with pink dolfins, and the crocs were litterally like 5 meters away....bit scary! The flight down to the amazon was on a little 20 seater plane...was pretty neat. The ride back however was on a very little 4 seater plane (in the picture), with a very unpressurized cabin (not so easy on the head and ears!). It was crazy, because we were sat right behind the pilot! Bit scary in the turbulence though becuase you feel every little bump. So I am back in La Paz now, and arrived back to police with riot gear everywhere....apparently there are some protests (not surprisingly) and a possible bus strike about to happen. I book my bus ticket out of here and to Uyuni for the salt flats..hoping not to get stuck...

44 km of the worlds most dangerous road

So I made it down the worlds most dangerous ride via bike. The ride was almost 70 kms in total, but unbelievable. The first 20 kms was on pavement, going downhill and around hairpin turns...and yes you must go fast. The second part is almost 5 kms of uphill...which is damn hard at about 4000 meters. Than you hit the worlds most dangerous road. I do now understand why it has this name. The first part of the road is barely wide enough to fit one vehicle and on a cliffs edge..A hummer would NOT fit ( picture above of the road). There are human traffic lights for this part of the ride. Than you hit the dusty section...clouds of white thivk dust block any view of the road you may have had, and you get very dirty. The entire road is covered with huge rocks which doesnt make the ride so comfortable...thank God for double suspension bikes! (which definitely helped a lot). You also must bike under a waterfall and over two small rivers....which are on the road! Overall the ride was amazing and I thanked God for my life at the end. The drive back up the road....must worse than the ride down!! Blind corners everywhere, without enough room on the road to pass another vehicle...must rely on the horn!
La Paz is an amazing city...probably one of the cleanest I have seen. There are markets everywhere and everything is soooooo cheap. I hit multiple markets today including the witches market....the picture above is from it....the oddest things youve ever seen. Yes those are llama fetuses!!! I also hit the black market which has enything you could imagine...sinks, toilets, clothes, food, makeup.....unreal and super cheap.
I am off to Pampas tommarow, which is around the jungle/amazon, for four days. Im taking the plane and NOT the worlds most dangerous road to get there!

Island adventures

Puno is a little city close to the border of Bolivia and is right on lake Titicaca, at 3800 meters. Really really high! So i spent two nights in the city and got to see an amazing parade of peruvian dancers. I than took off for an island excursion. We visited 3 islands and stayed with a peruvian family over night. The fist islands were the famous floating reed islands. They were amazing and the people were so nice. We even got to have a taste sample of the reed, which is part of their daily diet. Not as good as you may think! The second two islands were beautiful, with breathtaking views of the lake. We did quite a bit of hiking, and it is definitely hard at this altitiude. The homestay family dressed us up in their clothing (yes, i know I look ridiculous!) and made us dance to tradition music. This is also not such an easy task at about 4000 meters above sea level...but definitely a great time. After puno I spent hours on a bus and crossed the border to Bolivia....now I am in La Paz, and waiting to bike ride the world´s most dangerous road (AKA road of death) tommarow....:)

Pictures from cusco and around

The pics...
1. Market is pisac...huge and crazy!
2. Take a guess....That is the mountain that made me sick in the background...quite high and steep
3. Peruvian ladies spinning
4. Plaza de armas in cusco

Trouble in paradise

hola, sorry no pics, the computer is being difficult. So I made it to cusco from Lima, via airplane which was sooo nice! (More nice to off the bus!) Cusco is a very beautiful city, but very expensive especially for here. I was able to visit all the ruin sites around the city and made a day trip to the sacred valley which is beautiful. I spent a day in machupicchu that went like this: Train at 6am. Arrived to dancing and music and confetti. Had to re-pay for my ticket because my travel agent screwed up and gave me the wrong tickets (with a promise to reemburse me). Took the bus up to the site. Had a short tour of the site. Climbed waynapichu (which has about a million and one steps that go staight up). Took in the amazing veiw. Started walking down and vomitted, off the side of the mountain in front of other people (very embarrasing). Walked through machupicchu to catch the bus back down. Got back down and vomitted again. Took the four very uncomfortable train back to cusco. Was stupid and broke my camera...was my fault. Got back to hostal and was unable to reach my travel agent fopr my reembursement.
well....I was able to fix my camera for only 230 soles...which is about 70 usd. alot. But it works. I finally got ahold of my travel guy, had to fight a bit..but finally came to a deal with regards to thr money, not in my favor. But I was not able to do anything else.
My last day in cusco was nice...I met up with friends who I had met previously. We had some beer and pisco sours!