Cali

An overnighter from Medellin, Cali is famous for Salsa and more partying but at this stage I'd had too much of a good thing so I went to the zoo and read a book instead.

Who said this travelling stuff is all just rock and roll?

Medellin

Enough hiking, it was time to head downhill to Medelin and party (the week's breather after Bogota was enough). That is what Medellin is famous for (well other than a public transport cable car & Botero) and by God do they enjoy themselves.

The main entertainment area (Zona Rosa) is based around the Parque de Lleras and it is a non-stop conveyor belt of entertainment. Bars, Pubs, Restaurants, Karaoke, Clubs, Salsa joints. You name it they got it.

And never one to shirk a challenge I tried them all and loved every minute. Only problem is I have to decide when to go back...

Bogota

At 2850 meters, Bogota is higher than a stoned kitten and I only planned to stay a couple of days.


7 days later and a couple of hundred dollars lighter I had to drag myself to the bus station to leave.


Bogota is just one of those cities that has everything - interesting sights like the museum of Gold (no freebies), taking the funicular up to Monserrate and looking down over the urban sprawl or just strolling round the old town in the Candelaria.
It also boasts more nightlife than a sane man can handle and to boot the people of Bogota are some of the friendliest out there. After only a couple of weeks, I was developing a massive soft spot for Colombia.

Cartagena

Cartagena is called the pearl of south america and it is easy to see why. The old town is picture book, replete with cobblestoned streets, leafy balconies and shaded squares. Colonial style on steriods.
It was a perfect place to regain the land legs, wash everything and get fed again.

Panama City

Twas the night bus from hell - windy mountain road, lights off at 8pm and no iPod. So the Irish Trio were left betting on the outside temperature gauge (an ever present LED display at the front of the bus) and how low it would go. I won with a risky bet of 20c. For good measure we threw in a Mexican wave for every hour we completed. Then it was on to the name game and a couple of rounds of trivia. By the time we got sleepy at 2am the driver pulled in and decided it was time for dinner. Nothing for it so we procured a small bottle of rum to take the edge off and propel us into the arms of morpheus. The plan didn't work as by the time we were back on board we were giggling like school girls as we smuggled our contraband onboard in plastic cups. Another round or two of drunken trivia and we finally got to sleep around 4am.

Which was indeed perfect timing as the bus arrived in Panama City at 4.30am. We took a taxi to a recommended hostel only to find that reception didn't open till 8am. So we scoured the (very dodgy) vicinity to find anywhere open. As luck would have it there was a Panamanian version of KFC open so we huddled in, ordered some coffee and started to play shithead. What we didn't know was that this venerable establishment was also the central meeting point for all transvestites in the city. So by 5am it resembled a Thai disco, with more large adam's apples than you could shake a stick at. We managed to kill the 4 hours only to find that the hostel had no room when it opened up.

So into a taxi and onto hostel recommendation nummero dos. After a while finding the general area our hopes soared as we found the building. But they were soon to be dashed after finding that the hostel had closed down months ago. Slight aside: Avoid the Rough Guide to Central America like the plague. Next we just asked the taxi driver to take us somewhere cheap and central, which he did a fine job of.

Panama City is fun and the Panamanians are extremely friendly (even by high Central America standards), so we spent a couple of days here soaking up the atmosphere of the Calle Uruguay and the Casco Viejo which is definitely one of the most up and coming places I have seen, with nearly every building being renovated.

At the end of Central America with the impeneterable Darien Gap between Panama and Colombia we searched for a yacht that would take us to Cartagena. The search was quick and we found a lovely 50 footer that was leaving in 2 days. Onward ho.

Photos here

Leon, Nicaragua

Another herculian effort saw me visit 3 countries in one day, leaving Alegria at 7am and reaching Leon at 5pm after passing through Honduras on the way. Only four busses, one minivan and a cycle rickshaw were needed to complete the journey.
Leon is one of Nicaragua's colonial towns and has some great nightlife. It is a student town and quite touristy, but they manage to mix extremely well, which is quite uncommon. Normally bars are either full of gringos or locals but in Leon the two coexist peacefully, the wonders of alcohol making univeral understanding a piece of cake.
The other item of note in Leon is a volcano close to town with slopes covered in fine ash/rock, which makes it quite suitable for sliding down on your ass. Cerro Negro is also a new volcano, arising out of the ground only a hundred or so years ago. The hike up is tough, but the views are amazing. With all photos taken and sights absorbed it was time to suit up in a Beastie Boys ¨Intergalactic¨ painters outfit, complete with googles and locate my arse on a piece of plywood with some metal nailed to the base. Then all I had to do was point the contraption down the 41 degree slopes of the mountain and let gravity do the rest. 54 seconds later and covered in volcano bits I arrived at the bottom and promtly crashed harmlessly into a boulder.

Photos

Santa Ana

El Salvador's second city, Santa Ana is as quiet as a second city comes. It still has many dirt roads and the market is like something out of the Congo. But on a recommendation I settled into Casa Frolaz. It's a private house turned into 3 roomed hostel and the owner - Javier, is a famous Salvadorenan artist not to mention cook, historian, story teller and general all around nice guy.

In fact most evenings we just ended up in Javier's lovely back garden, drinking beer and discussing everything from Obama to the state of El Salvador's football team to the world economy to the price of property and gang warfare in San Salvador. The only thing to spoil the fun were Javier's mammoth (and I mean mammoth) Avocados that would fall intermittently from the tree above our heads.


Killer Avocado.

On the last day I took a bus up past the lovely Lake Coatepeque to Cerro Verde. At 11am they run a tour up either Volcano Santa Ana (the highest mountain in El Salvador), which is a leisurely 1 hour stroll or up Volcano Itzalco, a 4 hour clamber up one of the world's newest volcanoes. 250 years ago Itzalco did not even exist. Then it just shot up in the geological equivalent of teenage growing pains, grumbling, scaring people and spouting lava everywhere.

It was my lucky day and it was to be Itzalco. There had been some robberies on the volcanoes a couple of years back, so myself and an American couple had 2 policemen and a guide to accompany us. Struck me as odd though why bandidos would choose people hiking on a volcano to rob. Surely people don't carry the crown jewels and a 1000 dollars in cash whilst climbing? Whatever.

We started off, rather depressingly, descending 900 steps through a rainforest only to come out and stare up agog at this picture perfect gray volcano monster. We made the top slowly, where a mixture of clouds and fumeroles covered us in cold and hot steam. We surfed the way back down, followed all the time by 2 vultures who had their eyes on the rather chubby, looking like she was going to collapse American girl. Then it was the 900 steps back up again, where I lost the couple and hung on to the lead policeman who was as fit as a ferret at 37 years of age. We made it back up ridiculously quickly, and I found out the reason why. At 2pm on the dot the heaven's broke. But I was already tucked away in the comedor having some pupusas and drinking coffee. The couple arrived half an hour later, not looking too happy.

Photos

San Salvador

El Salvador fills many with visions of war, gangs and general chaos. But from the very first encounter with the border guards (female, she said the Spanish equivalent of "Hello Luv") onwards, El Salvador has been without doubt the friendliest place in Central America. Also in its favour it has the least amount of tourists in the region. In fact I spent Saturday afternoon moseying around San Salvador's bustling city center and did not see a single gringo. Which made me a bit of a novelty as when I chose a tiny comedor in the main plaza for a hamburger and a Pilsener (more plus points for El Salvador, the beer is great and it costs a dollar a bottle), I attracted a small, but fascinated crowd as the Matron D´ clucked around me and kept providing fresh refreshments any time I looked thirsty. I left a couple of hours later, sated and inebriated and 5 dollars lighter for the pleasure.

San S. also has some lovely suburbs (where I stayed), well tended and clean, with an array of bars and restaurants. I headed to El Arfa Irlandes ("The Irish Harp" for those with translation diffuckilties) in the evening, yet again to be the only Gringo there. Well, except for the owner that was. I expected to have the red carpet rolled out, but it turns out the owner is actually German. So there I was in the suburbs of San Salvador in an Irish bar chatting in German as salsa played in the background.

As Vinney would say, the needle on the "Oddometer" was definitely in the red zone that night.

Oaxaca and beyond

The hostel of choice in Oaxaca was La Villada Inn, which just puts all other hostels to shame. Run by two extremely friendly brothers and their entire family (Dad was the maintenance man, mom was the chef de cuisine and cousins were the cleaners and cooks), it was spotless, had a large swimming pool, views to die for and my cabana was massive with a double bed and a hammock outside. All this for 15 dollars.

Oaxaca itself is beautiful, a shady Zocalo (town square) is surrounded by small streets and markets selling everything from whole chickens (alive or dead), the latest fashions (stonewashed denim), gold, silver, various unidentified fish, bags of grasshoppers or just a taco or two (grasshoppers optional).

On the second day I took a tour out to see some of the surrounding landscape, which has at least 57 different types of cactus, the tree (El Tule) with the widest trunk in the world (fact!), a petrified waterfall - Hierve el Agua (Actually I don´t know what it was scared of) with hot springs, some Mayan ruins at Mitla and a tour of a Mescal factory. For the second day in a row I was being deliberately starved and when we eventually stopped for lunch at 4pm I would have gladly had some more tripe tacos.

The Mescal (which is similar to Tequila but is made from a different Agave plant, but of course you knew this already) factory was of course the high point of the trip, as indeed there were lots of samples, which my 3 Australian cohorts and myself took liberal helpings of (a German couple were abstaining and a Swiss couple took 1 sip, say no more). I can highly recommend the "Mezcal nautral viagra", which is distilled with 14 types of herbs. I certainly woke up the next morning with a slight hangover and a smile on my face.

Some photos of Oaxaca here

Welcome to Oaxaca

The bus ride from Mexico City to Oaxaca was a measly 6 hours, which is truly local in the whole scheme of international bus travel. Seats reclined, air conditioning works. A veritable paradise. The only thing I didn´t figure on was that bus didn´t actually stop for lunch like most other long distance busses I have travelled on. So 4 hours in, the chap beside me was watching rather bemusedly as I stuck 4 pieces of chewing gum in my mouth at once, hoping to suck any kind of nutrional content out of them to stop me from fainting onto his shoulder. This torture by famine was not helped by the fact that the driver had stuck on a DVD called "The Orphanage", which for 2pm and on a bus packed with kids was rather a disasterous choice. Well actually the kids were all fine but I was curled up in a ball peeking out from behind my fingers.

I survived the "Starvation Bus" as I fondly call it and reeled downtown and into the nearest Taco stand where I proceeded to wolf down 10 of the old ladies finest tacos. I didn´t understand the word she used for the content (well she didn´t say pollo or carne) but it was something beginning with T. On my way to the hostel I was running through all possibilities and came to the slightly stomach bending conclusion, that yes indeed, I had just had some yummy Tripe Tacos...

Day 1: Mexico City

About to land in Mexico city, the on board map/information display goes 3000m, 2500m, 2200m and then bang, we land. Bit of a shock really when you are used to landing somewhere close to the 0m mark... Composure regained and fingers pried from the armrest I removed my rucksack from it´s resting place, slung it over my shoulder and wandered out to face Mexico.

I can´t deny I like Mexico City, sure it´s dirty, probably dangerous, vastly overpopulated (22 million and couting, actually I´m not sure if anyone is counting as the city sprawls that much), but you can´t deny the streets are alive with cooking, dancing, shouting and absolute liveliness. Music blares from all corners, the general kind of happy happy Mexican music which must obviate the need for Prozac here. I can imagine The Smiths and The Cure are not popular here.

During a stroll through the leafy Chapultepec Park, the small differences to "normality" start to appear.
* Big fat hairy blokes loafing about wearing t-shirts with "Bimbo" written on them: Bimbo makes bread and sponsors a local football team, but I prefer the dumb broad reference.
* Wrestling masks on sale everwhere: If you have seen Nacho Libre you´ll understand. I thought at first that Powerrangers were massive over here, but no, it is in fact one of Mexico´s national passions - Wrestling.
* An army band practising in the shade: Unfortunately for the orchestra, every time someone hit a bum note the culprit was called forward and whacked on the back by the conductor with a massive cane. Just would not happen in the oh-so-PC world we know.

Other than that the Mexican way of life is great. Corona is 70 cents, called "Mexican Water" (incidentally I discovered that Cockroaches are imaginatively called "Mexican Water Beetles") and is consumed liberally throughout the day. Food wise, it is paradise - as a chili fan the fact that every meal comes served with a bowl of green and red chili sauces is great. Even breakfast. Oh yes, scrambled eggs with tortillas and chili - the breakfast of champions.

Rio

While standing in line at Rio airport I realised there were some familiar faces in front of me. I reckoned it was probably some people I had met in Rio, but as I got closer and my glazed eyes managed to focus I realised with a shock that it was the 3 Irish boys from Laos / Bolivia. Yep, 11 months after meeting them for the first time in Vang Vieng, where we were jumping out of trees in to a crystal clear lake, we were now in Rio airport dressed sensibly and all on our respective ways home. We had 2 hours to take off and we exchanged civilised stories. We gradually realised that something was missing and started nervously looking at each other until someone broke the silence and meekly ventured "Beer?". After 51.7 weeks on the road we weren't going to say no. So 4 beers each and a couple of unbelievable stories later an air hostess (or whatever their PC name is these days) comes into the bar and tells us that the plane is waiting. We stagger on to the 747 with the lads trying to persuade the rather good looking hostess to come home to Ireland with us all. She politely declines and a few minutes later we are accelerating down the runway leaving a year of fun, frolics and life changing experiences evaporating behind us in a jet stream.

Rio - The world's greatest city?

Did I tell you that this is one of the world´s greatest cities??
I think it has actually just soared into the top spot in the "Places I want to live" list, knocking Barcelona off the top spot and sending Sydney, Nelson and Buenos Aires further down the list. I just cruised down to the beach yesterday evening for sunset and there were thousands of people just hanging out, BBQing, drinking, volleyballing, rollerblading, surfing, bodyboarding, sleeping, snogging, caipoeiring, singing, dancing and basically just having fun. I think having a beach increases a city´s liveability index by about 100%. Add to that the background of forests, lagoons, granite peaks and islands, add a shot of the great food and amazing juices, sprinkle liberally with Rio´s Joie de Vivre and stir it all together for instant happiness.

I reckon I will be the first gringo to visit Rio and not "do the Christ" as they say, i.e. visit the Christ the Redeemer statue on top of the hill. Rio has an uncanny knack of throwing up low flying clouds from nowhere, so the statue becomes completely invisible in minutes. Today´s plan of sightseeing was nipped in the bud by an errant cumulus so I went surfing instead... Maybe tomorrow, but hey I feel like a local and as we all know, locals never do any sightseeing in their own city. Either that or it means that I have to come back someday...

Rio #2

After 46 hour bus jaunt from Natal (more about that at some stage) I have arrived in Rio to sit out my last 3 days. Weird Weird Weird.

By the way: There are no presents for any of you in my rucksack so don´t even think about it. No Hard rock cafe Sydney t-shirts / bottles of Thai sauces / Llama foeti / mini christ the redeemer statues (that glow in the dark) / hammocks / key chains / stick of brighton rock.

Right, who is buying me a pint first of all?

Salvador

As soon as you arrive in Salvador you know there is something special about the city - there is an electric vibe rising up from the streets from the moment you step off the [twentyfuckingseven hour] bus. music emanates from every car, van, bus, house, restaurant, bar and hotel. The sounds of samba, salsa, reggae, bossanova and frevo fill the air. The first night I took a stroll around the pelourinho (old city), just following my ears to the closest music source. It turned out to be an all female drum ensemble - Dida. The girls ranged in age from 8-15 and they were all amazing drummers. They played their hearts out for ages, all the time with infectious grins on their faces. I reckon my arm would have fallen off after about 5 minutes. During one piece all the girls had to come to the front to do a little dance around their drum. To be honest I have never seen such self confidence in a 10 year old before. They danced around their drum, jumped up on the the drum, posed, did some cartwheels and generally strutted their stuff. I think any western girl that age would have been mortified to be put in front of so many people to dance, but no, these girls lapped up the attention.

That was basically the sum of Salvador - sleep late (cos there was no going to bed early with all the music being played), read a little, wait for sundown, grab a beer and head out to the nearest music venue. Most of the drum bands would do a procession through the cobbled streets, so it had a bit of a mini-carneval feel to it all. I will never forget one night the procession stopped outside a barber´s shop where a man was getting a haircut. The barber proceed to dance around the man, taking a snip out of his hair everytime the bass drum sounded. The victim customer took it all in his stride and was even bopping around in his chair a bit. I didn´t wait for the end product, but it was definitely a hair cut with soul.

In between times there were always some blokes in the squares around town practising Capoeira. Some not so good - pissed blokes pretending to fight, but some were breathtaking, kicking each other and missing each other´s heads by milimeters & miliseconds. One guy was even doing some backflips over his opponent. Salvador is a wonderful place, music in the air, street parties every night, beaches, cheap accomodation, great food & men pretending to kick the shit out of each other. Now why can´t we have that back home?

Rio de Janeiro - The start of a love affair?

Before I arrived in Rio I decided I was going to stay in Ipanema. I had visions of myself sitting on the beach, guitar in hand, crooning to the local beauties as they sauntered by. Rio was having none of it and as I arrived there was a rainstorm that would have put Atlantis 2 miles further underwater. I walked into my hostel of choice and said "Hi". There was a guy on the sofa and beer in hand he countered "Soft fucking day, huh?" in a distinctive Cork accent. I smiled, he grinned, we started drinking, we bonded.

The hostel was in a small cul-de-sac with two other hostels beside us and our place turned into a bit of a party central due, in no short measure, to the corkmans & my thirst and my (by now) honed DJing capabilities on the hostel´s stereo. Everyone seemed to be either starting a world trip or were in the final days of their journey before heading home. So the conversations were either of the "Hi, where you from?", "How long are you travelling?", "Wow, where have you been?", "Tell me about x" (For how much I cherish these conversations, see: Traveller Trumps), or of the far more preferable "I don´t care what you do or where you've been, lets talk shite and have a drink" variety.

The week shaped up as follows:
Thursday: No party party
Friday: Lapa street party
Saturday: Salsa party
Sunday: Favela Funk party
Monday: New liver party
Tuesday: Beach

With that I packed my bags and got on the bus to Salvador de Bahia on Wednesday morning.

ps. After 1 week I still know nothing more about the Corkman´s life and times other than his name.

Sao Paulo

I flew from Lima to Sao Paulo (a flight so ridiculously expensive that it cost nearly a quarter of my round the world ticket price) arriving at perky hour of 3.30 am. After 3 hours killing time in the arrivals hall, counting roof tiles, watching flies fight and trying to understand what was happening in the film on TV, I got the first bus downtown and headed to the first hotel I could find to sleep.

Sao Paulo is South America´s most populous city with a population ranging anywhere from 10 to 30 million, depending on who counted, where they went to count and if they were stabbed to death while counting. It is Brazil´s industry hub and has a reputation for violence. I found it to be a great place, full of life, brilliant restaurants, great bars and the best nightlife this side of Buenos Aires.

One night I got invited to a party in a young Japanese/Brazilian textile magnates house. It was in one of the swankiest areas of town, had a swimming pool, a chessboard carpet complete with 1 meter high, 20kg pieces in the hall, two grand pianos in the dining room, a room with just a [very well-stocked ] bar and some barstools in it, a kitchen the size of my old apartment with 4 fridges, a bathroom you could have gone curling in and this was only downstairs. I got back to my hotel at 6am, slinking past the Conceirge who just grinned at me the whole time.

Lima

Not much changed between Huacachina and Lima. Hostel with bar. Ended up DJing. Didn´t get out much. Didn´t see a single sight. Had a brilliant time.

La Paz

Bolivia has the world´s highest everything (except maybe mountain), so it is of no surprise to find out that La Paz is the world´s highest capital at just over 3700m. After spending the last 10 days at higher altitudes, La Paz is a doddle. Although I nearly fainted as I saw the military take to the streets one morning for a brisk jog... Uphill.

So for your amusement, some pictures of:
Chile
Argentina
and
Uruguay

Santa Cruz, Bolivia

After checking into room number 168 of my travels it was time to get down to the real pleasures of travelling. Getting some of and understanding the local money. Finding and deciphering the local delicacies. Getting washing done. Planning the next journey etc. etc. Fun and games, huh?

For a change in my daily activities I decided it was time for a hair cut. The last one had been sometime in New Zealand and I was starting to look like a unshaven Llama.

I picked the most old fashioned barbers I could find, where the men were all decked out in white coats and looked like they had been cutting hair for centuries. Actually I'm sure one of them HAD been cutting hair for centuries. I luckily got a young ´un (mid thirties). He sat me down in one of those old fashioned reclining chairs. The games commenced.

¨Grble gusutla mmmmhrum usted?¨ he says in a Bolivian mumble.

I'm prepared and reckon he´s asking "How would you like it cut sir".

Now, not being a TOTAL fool, I had rehearsed this one and already knew the words. "Here", "There", "Short" "More" and "A little". I pointed to the back and sides and said "Aqui corto".
He nodded dutifully. "Y aqui un poco mas corto", I continued, pointing to the top. He gave me a reassuring nod and I breathed a sigh of relief. Job done. Piece of piss compared to Vietnam where I had to resort to Extreme Sign language.

He started by getting out what looked like one of those old perfume sprayers - a round looking thing with a nozzle and a rubber hose attached with a ball on the end to be squeezed. I reckoned I must have the good old traveller´s smell and he wanted to neutralise my odours first...
I was wrong, as I soon found out when he removed a lighter from his pocket, squeezed the ball and proceeded to set fire to the liquid coming out of the contraption. A flame the size of my arm shot out and nearly singed my eyebrows. Yes, this weird looking thing was a portable flame-thrower. Some light was shone on the matter when he took all his scissors out of the cupboard and char-grilled every one of them with this weapon of medium destruction.

Eyebrows intact he started to chop. It was all going wonderfully well until towards the end when he started to give me a right parting and brushed my hair back. I thought he was just doing some clever barber stuff (I mean he had seen me come in and seen the way I normally wear my hair?), so I left him go. Mistake.

Before I knew it, he had the blowdryer set to stun and was turning my lovely locks into something that would have made even the Fonz blush. I was stunned, too frightened to scream out "Stop". Before too long it was all over, my reflection stared back at me and I had to grin. I thought the ordeal was all over, but no, the barber of Seville Santa Cruz had it in for me and in the blink of an eye he whipped out a can of super, super, mega, extra strong hair spray and sprayed enough of it in my hair to turn it into lacquer. I was transformed into an extra from Grease. It was so hard that meteorites would have bounced off my bonce.

I paid my money, even gave him a tip (sucker), ran home in case I happened to meet anybody I knew in downtown Santa Cruz and sat sobbing under the shower for 20 minutes. I vowed to use sign language the next time.

Colonia / Montevideo / Salto, Uruguay

Uruguay is cut off to the south by the Rio de la plata, the Rio Uruguay to the west, the Atlantic to the east and the arsehole of Brazil to the north. It has no mountains, valleys, special wildlife, amazing cities, cultural treasures or some such to make your trip worthwhile. It is simply a country which screams "Don´t visit me"... What a perfect reason to go.

And within a couple of hours we were already enjoying it. Colonia is where the cheap & slow ferry from Buenos Aries drops you off. It is a beautiful old cobbled-stoned town with lovely village greens and lots of character.

Montevideo was next, the capital of Uruguay. We arrived on a Friday evening and we started to question ourselves whether this was the capital or whether we had just landed in Sleepyville (Pop.: 72). All we needed was tumbleweed to blow down the long avenues to convince us of the fact. But no, this was the capital and after 2 and a half days there, it didn't get any busier. Even on Monday morning. We went out to an Italian restaurant on Saturday night. A gorgeous place, great music, amazing service etc., three starters, three exquisite main courses, coffees, water and three bottles of wine (I know, we were not in form) and the bill came to less than 40 Euros. My kind of town. After that we checked out Montevideoen Montevidish The night life of Montevideo and were pleasantly surprised. Cool bars, helpful barmen and really friendly locals. One really strange thing was that the Uruguayans more or less all speak decent to excellent English, whereas it is practically unknown in Chile and Argentina. Must be the school system or the fact that they know they are in the arsehole of nowhere and that learning another language is a good plan...

Salto in the northwest of Uruguay is basically famous for its hot springs which are indeed hot, but the town itself is about as exciting as a wet weekend in Vladivostok. So the next day it was off across the border to the even more exciting Concordia, before getting a bus up to the world famous Iguazu falls.

Buenos Aires

We left Malarque looking like we had been in a street brawl, I hobbled along and the girls had knees as if they had crawled up Croagh Patrick on all fours. We took an overnighter to Buenos Aires and arrived bright eyed and bushy tailed the next morning. We then had to wait at least an hour before we got a taxi which gave me enough time to ponder on the fact that Argentina has an inordinate amount of French cars on the road. All the taxis are old Renault 19s which have a small boot at the best of times but the fact that they have all been converted to LPG means that there is also a huge tank in the boot and it leaves about enough luggage room for a medium sized postage stamp and a packet of polo mints.

Buenos Aires is beautiful, as European as it gets. Cafes, restaurants, lots of parks, wide avenues and very stylish inhabitants. Quite similar to Paris in many ways. It had been hyped up by many people, including My Cousin Vinney (congratulations on the new website by the way), but as I am not such a piss head as him I didn't spend that much time partying, so after 4 days it was time to pack my dishevelled rucksack and head to Uruguay.

Santiago, Chile

Morning to you all. Here are some pics of
New Zealand.
Having too much fun to write at the moment. See you later.

Auckland

Oh well, 2 months and I've scuba dived with stingrays, boarded down giant sand dunes, ridden a mountain luge, jumped out of a plane, swum with dolphins, hiked for 3 days, climbed up a glacier, mountain biked in the snow, bungeed, drunk in the most southerly pub in the world and witnessed England get beaten twice in succession.

New Zealand is truly heaven.

Off to Chile in a couple of hours... Hasta luego amigos.

Wellington

Home of the Welly boot and also a contender for the "Worlds quietest capital" crown, Wellington is wet and windy like an incontinent cow. My three t-shirts, a short sleeved shirt and one fleece jumper inventory had to be stocked up a bit in the winter woolies department as it is cold enough to freeze the cahones off a Kiwi here. Wellington is very pleasant all the same, with lots of cafes, bars and restaurants dotted around the tiny inner city. To the west are the suburbs which are situated on a hill overlooking the whole city and the harbour off to the east. Actually reminds me of Zurich a bit.

Off to the South Island on the ferry tomorrow.

Auckland, New Zealand

"Welcome to New Zealand: Adrenaline Junkie Heaven" was written on the greeting billboard in Auckland. Not quite your "Guinness is good for you" in Dublin, but quite catchy all the same. Within about 2 hours of walking around the city I was also completely convinced that this is one of the truest slogans ever written, Auckland must be the only city in the world where:

* You can climb UP the harbour bridge (complete with funky uniforms and tether lines)
* Bungy Jump OFF the harbour bridge
* Climb UP the communication tower (280m up in the sky, the first 240 of which are done in the elevator, the next 40 are done by climbing the service ladder)
* Jump OFF the communication tower
* Be shot INTO the air on a reverse bungy in the middle of a downtown carpark

Absolutely insane. Whereever you look around there are people jumping off things. Lemming heaven.

Sydney

I left Melbourne in an alcohol haze that would have left even Led Zeppelin dazed and confused. I also left minus my mobile phone and with a sizeable cut to my bottom lip...
I now know that I left my phone in a taxi somewhere but my lip damage remains a mystery. I have to tell people that I fell in the shower, but that's the oldest and worst excuse in the book. Only marginally better than "I have absolutely no idea...".

Melbourne was great, didn't see that much, but after scooting around 15,000km it was nice just to sit on my arse for a couple of days and chill out. Thanks to my great host Amy, who showed me the sights and sounds of Melbourne - including the Neighbour's cul-de-sac and the school Kylie used to attend (ok, it was beside a bottle shop, so we were driving by anyway). It's also her fault that I got so hammered on Saturday night :)

Last couple of days in Oz, before I head off down the yellow brick road to Auckland.

Melbourne

You can leave your birthday commiserations below. And donate to my hangover relief fund.

Sydney, Australia

My flight of the bumble bee tour continues, arriving in Sydney with no plans, no guidebook and generally no clue.

The Australian immigration form proved to be harder than advanced calculus:
"Home address", er, eh, well I don't really have one, but here's me mum's one.
"Occupation", hmm, well after considering "Lighthouse cleaner", "Hero" and "Man" I chickened out and wrote "Student"
"Intended place of stay in Australia", for f**k's sakes I don't have a bloody clue. I write down "Sydney" and realise that they also want the name of the state. I then realise how bad my Australian geography is and write "Queensland?".
I feel like a 12 year old kid that has just failed a spelling contest because he couldn't spell "arse".

I arrive downtown Sydney @ 7am and my first impressions are:
White people. High prices. TV. Lots of signs prohibiting things. Screaming kids. Miniskirts. Rain. Prams. Fat people.

Welcome back to the first world. I think I am suffering from reverse culture shock.

Rangoon Yangon, Burma Myanmar

Burma worked its way into my favourite countries list within about 12 hours of arrival. The reasons being varied but some of the highlights were certainly:

* The taxi driver at the airport accepted 3 dollars and a tiny bar of chocolate instead of the usual 4 dollar fare into town.

* Within 3 hours of landing I was teaching english to 12 teenagers and about 43 monks. Some of the class then proceeded to invite me out for lunch and paid for everything.

* Going to a tea shop whose owner is called "Daisy" and is a blonde haired, burmese, muslim (picture that if you possibly can). She promptly invited us back for dinner at her house. The dinner was great and was shared with a bemused Slovenian couple (being the first Slovenians I have ever met, I am not sure if this is perhaps a national trait).

* By 23:30 I was sitting in a bar drinking Myanmar beer and talking to an ex-merchant navy man called Tarzan (75 years old) who had been around the world about 15 times and spoke fluent english.

Burma is similar to Malaysia in the fact that there are lots of Indians, a good few Chinese and a fair few "natives". It was also a colony of the great British Empire which leaves them with fantastic un-asian heirlooms like the imperial system and 3-pin plug sockets.

Singapore

I arrived ready to hate Singapore. For its cleanliness, its bureaucracy and its general anti-asianess but after 36 hours in the place I left with rather a good impression.

Sure it is 3 times the price of Thailand, the people are nowhere near as friendly as in the rest of Asia, but it is a nice place to live. The trains run on time, there are traffic lights, the police aren't corrupt, the food is great, there is good nightlife etc. A sort of Stockholm in the sun... But you do notice the lack of spirit (for lack of a better word) in the place. A couple of years ago the government even started an infamous "Lets take having fun seriously" campaign.

There are signs everywhere forbidding this that or t'other. In the underground station you are not allowed to:
1) Rollerblade
2) Skateboard
3) Skate-Scooter
4) Study
5) Have pets
6) Eat or Drink
7) Have a Durian (smelly tropical fruit)
8) Bring flammable goods
9) Smoke (well ok)

each with a different fine attached.

So if you are caught on a skateboard walking your pooch, eating a Big Mac, having a smoke, with some liquid gas in your pocket and a Durian balanced on your head then you are up the Khyber.

The Taxis also have a great fare system. Basic tarif etc., but extra charges if you
a) Start at the airport (5 dollar surcharge)
b) Get in at rush hour, 7am - 9:30 am, 5pm - 8pm (1 dollar surcharge)
c) Get in in the city centre (1 dollar surcharge)
d) Get in after 23:30 (23:30-23:44: 10% extra, 23:45-23:59: 20% extra, 0:00 to 0:59: 35% extra and after 01:00 a whopping 50% extra. So ordering a taxi 1 minute too late can be quite costly)
e) Order a taxi in advance (2 dollar surcharge)
f) Put luggage in the boot! (1 dollar surcharge)

Ordering a helicopter is probably cheaper then ordering a taxi into the city center after 1am.

Had dinner in rather a nice place with a friend of the family who I hadn't seen in about 15 years, which is actually a good period of time not to see people (see Cousin Vinney) as you know there is no point trying to "catch up" with what has happened in the interim. Instead you are left with a great "here and now" conversation with maybe a bit of background info. Anyway she paid which dented my male ego but saved me from remortgaging my mother.

Flight from Singa-BKK with AirAsia (the Ryanair of Asia, just with prettier flight attendants) for 40 Euros. The route had only opened 3 days beforehand!

Ain't Karma Grand?

Kuala Lumpur (KL)

I have a vague suspicion that the Malaysians have a slight penis envy problem. Let me explain.
KL is full of skyscrapers; absolutely chockers. There is no need for them - they have the space, we are not talking Manhattan here. They could easily extend the city limits by 30km and build smaller buildings, but no the Malaysians like their skyscrapers. In fact so much so that:
The worlds fourth largest telecommunications tower is in KL - Menara Tower
The worlds largest free standing flagpole (ooh, er, missus and all that) is in KL
The worlds largest skyscraper is in KL - Petronas Towers

Q.E.D?

Other than that KL is nothing to get excited about... The food is really rather good and the alcohol is expensive enough to scare any Irishman into Detox. Which is exactly what I need, that and a hot shower which I had last night for the first time since Vietnam, which according to my Blog was the 31st December. First hot shower of 2004!

Phnom Penh (revisited)

7 hour bus ride from Battenbang to Phnom Penh and we arrive at 4pm, go lakeside to get a room and head down to the central market to buy some raw silk (I think Mike is getting some kinky underwear made up in Sweden). Four and a half minutes later and we are finished. I have done the sights so I ask what Mike wants to do - "Let's shoot some guns" he says, with an evil grin on his face. So we hop on a moped together, prooving that the chinese know how to build things that can take the strain of 180 kilos of westerner and 50 kilos of Cambodian driver. He takes us out past the airport and on to a military base, the sentries just waving us through. You arrive at a shooting range where on the side of a large (used) bomb, a cheerful "Welcome" is written, very inviting. You are then presented with a weapons "menu". I chose a side of AK-47 and Mike chose a large helping of Makarov handgun.

You get to fire an entire clip of 30 rounds with the AK and all I can say is wow. I am always going to be a pacifist, but get one of those things in your hand and you really do get the Rambo gene screaming inside you. The target was about 30 meters away and after I finished they gave me the paper target. Fuck, I was good - 30 bullets, 27 hits and 22 in the small target area. Dad, you would have been proud. Photo to follow. Mike did the James Bond thing and gave the helpless target a good hiding. He liked it so much he did it twice.

You can also throw grenades there, fire shotguns, shoot Uzis and even a bloody rocket launcher! 10 dollars extra and you get to shoot a chicken. We politely declined.

Back to town for a lakeside sunset beer or 3, dinner at Friends and another night of debauched drinking and night-owlery in one of the world's coolest capitals.

Phnom Penh

Happy f**king new year!

Hotter than Satan's armpit here. 31 degrees and it's 7pm. Had a great new year - went to a restaurant called "Friends" for dinner where street children are trained to become waiters and cooks and are basically taken off the street and given a job. They were excellent (put your water down and 1.4 seconds later it was refilled) and the food marvellous (water-lilly salad with chilli-beef). After that on to the Heart of Darkness, Cambodia's most [in]famous nightclub. There used to be quite a few shootings there in the 90s. Somehow got home just about sunrise riding on the back of a moped doing 60kmh through the empty streets of Phnom Penh.
My 2 day hangover from New Year has started to subside and was able to get out of bed today and see some stuff.
The happy tour I took involved S21 - The ex-school where the Khmer Rouge tortured and killed anyone they wanted and The Killing Fields - Where the bodies of the detained were thrown into mass graves. With Nazi like precision, the Khmer Rouge catalogued everybody they detained, the tortures they were subjected to and the date of their execution. Gruesome is not the word. Particularly shocking is a picture of a prison guard bashing a 6 month old baby against a tree. Another prime example of Man's inhumanity to man if you needed anymore proof.

Phnom penh is otherwise a bit wild westish, dirt streets, guards with AK47s slung across their shoulders etc., but set in the middle of gorgeous french colonial villas.

Off to the 8th wonder of the world tomorrow - Angkor

Saigon

Day 4 (I think) in Saigon and it is like Hanoi on steroids, more people (ca. 5 million) more bikes (ca. 10 million), more pollution, more skyscrapers, just more of everything.

The only touristy thing here is the War remnants museum (formerly called "The American War crimes museum", recently changed to be a bit more PC) which was tough on an empty stomach at 8am - photos of agent orange victims, napalm victims, mine victims, the massacre of women & children in My Lai etc. There are still new UXO (unexploded Ordnance) victims in Vietnam every week and this is 30 years after the war ended.
The other big attraction is the Cu Chi tunnels, which the Viet Cong started building in the 40s (against the French) and by the end of the Vietnam American war there were literally hundreds of kilometers of tunnels all over Vietnam. You could actually travel underground from Saigon to the Cambodian border (ca. 150km). They are brilliantly designed - the entrances are only about 40 cm by 20 cm (remarkably, I managed to get in), the air holes were built into ant hills, so that when it rained the water didn't flow down, the kitchens had three sucessive smoke chambers so that the smoke was only barely visible when it reached the surface and there was an emergency exit which went underground into a river.
Basically the Viet Cong used brain & manpower to defeat the vastly better armed Americans - unexploded B52 bombs were reused to make homemade bullets, old tyres were used to make shoes and every bit of metal they could find was used to make fiendish booby-traps in every size & shape imaginable.

Other than that Saigon is just a place to sit at a Cafe, drink coffee and watch the world go by.

Off to Cambodia tomorrow for new year in Phnom Penh.

Hanoi, Vietnam

There are some terrible stereotypes about Vietnam, things such as they eat dog, that the women are gorgeous and that they are excellent con-men. As with all stereotypes, it is all completely true. 10 minutes after arriving in downtown Hanoi, two bicycles went by, each with two dogs in bamboo cages... There is a vague possibility that the bike owners were transporting their favourite pets across town, but I think not. At a cafe this morning, there was "hot fried dog" on the menu, which is not to be confused with "fried hot-dog", one is fried pooch with lots of chillies and the other is something you eat downtown Cleveland after the baseball game... I asked the hotel manager (girl, gorgeous) about it and she told me it was a delicacy and is always eaten on business occasions. I ironically asked if they also ate cat. She smiled, shook her head and said "oh no... it is much too expensive...". Fine.
The girls are disgracefully attractive, enough to make any red-blooded man get whiplash as they whiz by on their mopeds. They also have a more european fashion sense, so skirts and high-heels will be seen more often then elsewhere in Asia. Must stop now. Cold shower. Think of Margret Thatcher.
Although semi-communist, haggling is ingrained in the culture here, but as opposed to Turkey or Morocco where the seller will start with a price that is between 2 to 5 times the standard price, the Vietnamese will start with a price that can be up to 50 times the final price. Great fun, but it takes about 2 hours to settle on a price for a motorbike ride across town, which is also better than any Disneyland ride. Imagine 5000 mopeds all driving on the same road, where there is only space for about 500. Now imagine no traffic lights (or at least no adherance to their meaning) and now imagine sitting on the back of a moped which is dicing through all this traffic at 50kmh.

It is certainly a complete culture shock after three super-relaxed weeks in Laos. Vientiane international airport was also highly amusing - the department of civil aviation sits beside the runway, there are chicken coops beside the terminal building and a sum total of 3 gates. It knocks Luxembourg off the top spot in my "Cutest airport" list.

Joke of the day: Nguyen is romping around with a dog on the street, then his mum calls out to him "Hey Nguyen, stop playing with your food"... Well it was funny when I first thought of it.

Off to Halong Bay tomorrow for three days on a boat.

Vientiane

I haven't been to Ulan Baator yet, but I am taking a bet that Vientiane is one of the sleepiest capital cities in the world. Berne is also up there, but people still seem to do stuff there, here everybody snoozes, drinks beerlao and swats flies from their faces. I had the pleasure of going to a Lao nightclub on Saturday, quite funny being the tallest person among 500 people. There is still a slight curfew here, so we were all thrown out of the disco at midnight... Most disappointing.

Off to Pakse tonight, 10 hour bus ride - excellent, I was getting too comfortable here. Then on to Si Phan Don which is called the four thousand islands and is the widest point of the Mekong (14km across). It is also famous for the ugly-assed Mekong Dolphin of which there are only 80 left in the wild, so chances are I won't see one. Thanks to the Cambodian fishermen who had more grenades then fishing nets after the civil war.

Flying in over Hanoi (always wanted to say that) on Saturday night. The bus ride is only 23 and a half (not 24!) hours which is far too short to be a real bus journey.

Petrol Station bar

There's a Shell petrol station here near the Khao San road. Once it closes at 8pm, two Japanese vans arrive and park on both side of the forecourts. They open up their sides, spit out some tables and chairs and hey presto, "Instant Bar". The side of the van folds down to reveal a well sorted drink selection and the driver can mix a mean Mojito. That's what I call entrepreneurialism. Must be an Asian word.

Yeah, smoking is naturally allowed!

Oh yeah and they world's most luxurious cinema is also in Bangkok: Grand Egv
The seats are better than Singapore Airlines first class, a complementary drink before the film and there is waiter service at your seat. About the only thing missing is a free blowjob foot massage.

Bangkok, yeah still!

Report 1:

One of those common sentences you hear when people return from holidays is:
"it's more expensive than we thought" or "the prices are like back home" or not as bad "it's getting more expensive all the time!". I had heard the latter about Thailand from various people who seemed to come here quite regularly, so I was a bit apprehensive about my budget when I arrived here...
4 days later and I am laughing so much I could burst a lung.

For the uninitiated:
1 beer in a bar (the most important item of course): 1 Euro 20
So you are saying already, wow , dirt cheap! Indeed, but the hillarious thing is that beer is very expensive here due to high taxes. Now for the funny stuff...
1 bottle of water: 10 cents
Any delicious dinner from a street vendor: 20 - 50 cents
Taxi across Bangkok (about 8 KM): 1 Euro
Entrance to museum etc.: 40 Cents

It just goes on... I've been to "cheap" places before (Portugal (back then), Morocco, Turkey etc.), but I have never seen such a quantum price change before. So a day going to some temples (with a taxi), drinking water, having two meals and rounding the night off with 3 beers will set you back about 7 Euros.

The Thais are changing, becoming dare I say it "westernised", with the old favourites like McDonalds, KFC and Burger King are already here. Even the new guard of Dunkin' donuts, Starbucks and Haagen Dazs are turning up. Sure great, you can't stop globalisation, but the weird thing is that they have western prices - 1 single scoop of Haagen Dazs ice cream costs 2 Euros! Without any toppings !! Your choice: 10 plates of rocking Thai food or a sloppy scoop of Macadamia Nut Brittle. Even a Big Mac costs about a Euro (i've been doing my research :) ). The big problem, like any aspiring culture, is that it is COOL to eat at McDs or been seen at Starbucks so the kids are all hanging out like good teenagers around the world eating fries etc. rather than getting some good Pad Thai and a whole coconut to drink (10 cents). As a result people will have to earn more to pay for these western luxuries. ergo prices will rise etc. etc. I think that is called economics or something... Am I getting too deep? Stop me if I am.

The other side effect of eating fries & coke rather than vegetable curry & freshly squeezed pineapple juice is that future Thai generations will probably gain weight like grizzlys in salmon season. As they are, they must be the most perfectly proportioned race on the planet. Not quite European height, but they are taller than the Japanese and since I arrived I have seen a total of about 5 fat (not obese) Thais. The rest (especially the women) all look like they regularly go to the gym without looking muscular... Sorry must calm down...

Story so far:
King's temple, Wat Pho (40 meter long reclining gold buddah), Skytrain, Siam Square, Thanon Silom (Patpong is overrated), Jim Thompson's house, Thai boxing match and one of the highlights was taking public transport, ok it was a canal boat and it had a motor the size of a bathroom (half the size of the boat) and it went down this tiny canal at a speed that would ban it for under 13s at Disneyland. All that fun for 10 cents. They only stop for about 10 seconds at each stop / port so you have to be ready to jump or you will be drinking tasty brown canal water very quickly.

Spent this afternoon chilling with some beers at the hotel pool. Two middle-aged Scottish ladies discussing the meaning of life slightly soured the otherwise blissful experience.

Off to Chiang Mai tomorrow evening.

Bangkok

9pm, 30oC (in the shade), Green curry for dinner (out of this world), cool beers coming up. Slight sunburn. Lovin' it :)