Bueno's Aires, day 7

the day begins as it has for the last 5, get up, have a ciggarette, go

for coffee, now of I seem to be getting my fix for coffee back, that

and all the green tea i bough has been drank, no worries though, i

prefer the coffee. And with it being just a hop skip and a jump to

the cofe its easy peasy.

Now that the coffee has been drank and the body cleaned, and yes that

shower felt wonderful, i like the hot water in plentiful supply. the

search is beginning without having to spend a small fortune to get to

cuzco to see Macchu Picchu and to Quito in time to catch my flight

home. this is where the magic of travel agents comes into play.

The travel agents worked there majic all right, but weren't able to

come up with anything better than i could find, in all to do machu

picchu and get to quito would run about 1.5k...thats alot, so i will

suffer, (not really) through a couple more days in buenos aires and

enjoy what the city has left to offer me.

Being that i still haven't eaten its time for lunch, so einav and I

headed to the cafe a block from the hostels that the israeli's have

labled the olds...it seems the name in spanish has a meaning of the

young (i think), and so the waiters that work there are all old, thus

the knickame.

After working through the travel plans that didn't quite pan out i

decided to wait a day and figure things out tomorrow. In the mean

time Einav has invited me to join him for dinner. He is making

homemade hummus, now this should be good.

after taking a nap after lunch it was time to get ready for dinner, of

course the portions here are huge, so i was still trying to work my

way through the lunch that was sitting heavy on my stomach. Oncce it

finally came time to eat, i was good, not necessarily hungry again,

but ready to eat, that seems to be the common theme since i arrived

here, the meal portions are so huge that you just waddle from one meal

to the other, this is not the kind of place to go if your on a diet!

after dinner it was getting late, and i had a self perscribed busy day

ahead of me, trying to work through travel arrangements to get to

quito, as well as attempting to work something into the trip that

hasn't been seen yet, not limited to the countries that i wasn't gonna

be able to see, so far i'm gonna have to try again for Guyana,

Paraguay, Bolivia, and Chile, so 8 of the 13 is what i was able to

make it through, not quite 75%, but well worth the effort, especially

after its all said and done, potentially 9 days in Buenos aires.

junk bonanza's all day long

Woke up with motivation today, got a whole day to make up for being lazy...

the irish lad was already up, his football team was playing, and he wasn't about to miss it, i saw the start, but not wanting to fall into the same lux as yesterday i went and got some coffee, its been getting easy to do this, i changed things up today, dos cafe con leche, to go...still not sure how to say "to go"...

Once te coffee's were put to rest it was time to try to catch the buenos aires bus, this is a big touristy thing, its a hop on hop off style of tour, it has 12 stops, and to ride from start to finish it takes 2.5 hours. With the congress very close to the hostel i decided to catch the bus there, i waited on one side of the street and watched the bus drive by, stop, at a red light, and continue on to the other side, where it stopped, with me running across the de mayo park to watch it drive away as it was only stopped again at a red light....for crying out loud, its a hop on hop off bus, why are people not getting off. and here i thought i was a lazy person.

screw it, in the process of waiting i happened to be shat on by a pigeon, as this happened, a nice couple in no other terms accosted me. they were tourists as well, but were much more concerned than I that i had bird crap all down the back of me...now this doesn't bother me, mostly because, its not touching me, its not in my hair or on my skin, and its not in a place where it could get all over me....in there concern they managed to attempt to rip my jacket off to wipe it off, the gentleman was pouring water on me and trying to towel me off on my shorts, and in the process grabbing my pockets, all the while i'm thinking jesus they are attempting to rob me and doing a damn good job at being persistent about it. as i worked my way out of their dabbing and pulling i checked my pockets, camera is still there, money is still there, ok, these might actually be honest people whom are just trying to help, as i am now away from their doting i tell them thank you while backing away and begin to walk the other way...nice people, maybe just a little to helpful to this gringo.

so now that i've missed the bus twice, well not really missed, just wasn't able to catch it, i decided to hell with it, i know what i'd like to see and florida street is one of them....florida street is a pedistrian walkway that ends at a park, i walked it from beginning to end, of course seeing the damn buenos aires bus two more times, once a the pink palace (no not the velvet touch), and another at the end of florida street, of course i tried to catch it at the pink palace, but the red light just wouldn't hold, again no one got off the damn thing.

once through florida street without buying anything i began to make my way to recoletta (sp), this is the famous cemetary with a park on the other side with an open market with stalls selling all kinds of junk, and some food.

making my way into the cemetary was actually a challenge, of course not as hard as actually getting out of it, now that i think about it, thats probably the way it was designed, that you weren't really meant to leave. Inside the masoleums were massive, ornate, and put st. louis 1 and 2 to shame. Not that having a pirate and maria laveoux isn't something to be bragging about, but these were just huge, and of course the main highlight of the cemetary is Evita, yep, the movie with madonna was based on a real person, and she does have a masoleum, actually its a family crypt, and standing outside it is this little old lady, i don't think she is family, just her biggest fan ever, and this women was creating a queue for people to see the tomb, and directing them in their picture taking, even taking the picture for those that were there alone. it was quite the site, as no one really wanted to argue with this little old lady...the keeper of evita i guess.

after the cemetary, which took a while to get through, and almost as long to get out of, i'm not kidding , this place was insanely huge, and the structures inside are so massive you loose any sense of direction moving down the narrow walkways from one to the next, and the tombs getting bigger each step of the way.

Now that I've made my way outside it was time to see what the park had to offer, i wandered the stalls up and down to see if i could find anything that i really needed, which of course the answer was a big fat resounding NO. So i decided to look for something for other people which i wasn't able to find, so i decided that it was getting late, i should begin making my way back, as the weather called for rain, i was wearing a rain jacket (good thing considering the bombing pigeons), fate was tempted but did not answer and it stayed dry all the way back.

now that i was back and for certain i had visted the outdoor "fair" that had been recommended i was content that i had made up for the lazy day previously and could go to bed satisfied. that was not to be, i ran into jose when i got back and he asked me if i went to lacoleta (sp), my answer was "huh?", damn, i missed it, in fact i didn't have the slightest idea of where it was. as he wasn't doing anything i invited him along, i also pitched him on the fact that he's a smart kid and should look at using his talent for languages and knowledge of the city for good...it seems he does have aspirations, that kid is gonna go far...hopefully he uses his talents for good...

once down in lacolita we walked around the old cobblestone streets, the buildings had the appearence of being much older than the ones on avenue de mayo, or it could be that they aren't kept up as much, we passed one, it was the same building where half looked brand new and the other half looked like it was ready to fall over.

we walked around a bit, saw the drums and tango dancing, man those chica's can move there hips, walked through most of the stalls that were selling, yep you guessed it, junk, and were packing up. It ws getting dark, so the long walk home was begun. i told jose i'd buy him dinner for walking with me down there and he took me to this great place just a few blocks from the hostel. He had this i think it was a breaded veal chop with ham marinara and cheese with fries, and i had a t-bone steak, huge steak, and fries. the cost of my steak was 28 peso's, 6US dollars, and the steak was cooked to perfection, a nice medium, man i could get all my steaks to come out like the ones i've had here thats all i would eat, they practically melt in your mouth.

on the walk back home, reminding you that we were only about two blocks away, we saw a man getting out of a taxi in front of his hotel get robbed by a moto grab job. as we turned the corner we heard the commotion, watched and saw a man jump out of the taxi as a motorbike pulled up, i'll be godamned, stupid, of course the man should have gotten out of the other side of the taxi closer to the door of the hotel, but we all live and learn.

now that i'm back its time to relax, get some sleep, figure out when i'm getting out, if i am, although something tells me it will be one more day in ba, as i need to have laundry done again...yep, thats the excuse that is winning the race at this point.

A lazy saturday...i really pissed the day away, started by getting up late, then getting sucked into two socceer games, and of course being sport i don't know anything about i went all dullock and asked about a dozens stupid questions. I had a lot of plans today, i was relly anticipating going to the oblesik and watching a free concert in the park, that didn't happen, what did happen is a 1/4 chicken, fries and a liter of quilmo, damn quilmo...

I will admit though there are lot of beautiful women in BA and i managed to see a whole bunch of them while eating and sipping beer. Only drawback is i have to work twice as hard tomorrow to make up for lost time.

i did manage to go out to dinner and have an anchovy pizza, very tasty, i ordered the grande, knowing full well there was no chance in hell i would be able to eat a, large anchovy pizza by myself, i did it to be nice, Jose and the irishman (not sure of his name) had made several comments that they were flat broke, well jose i understand, but i felt sorry for the blokes and took pity on them and got the large, needless to say those two managed to suck down all 6 pizza's faster than i could get a cigarette lit.

Now you might be saying, ohhh your too generous philip, you shouldn't have done that....screw it, it was 24 peso's (6 dollars) for a large pizza, with shitloads of cheese and some great meaty, salty anchovies, it was worth it, hot n ready's eat your heart out, you've got nothing on these.

So after the pizza, another litre of beer, and watching the last 1/2 of ong bak, the thai movie about the fighting, thats right a movie in thai with spanish subtitles, neither languages i can use to get my way out of a wet paper bag...i was completely lost. the action was good though, so it made it entertaining.

Now its off to bed to figure out what to do with my day tomorrow, i have a lot of time to make up for and a lot of things to do that i still want to see, its been 5 days in BA, i can't believe i've spent so much time here, and to top it off, i'm not even motivated to find a way out. we'll see what sunday brings, i'm all paid up to leave monday morning, but i don't think its going to be a problem to stay.

BA to Colonia to BA

the alarm went off a 6 this morning, way too damn early, good thing i had the backup set for 6:15...

Got grogggily out of bed and checked the buquebus website on the ferry schedules for today, darn, they were all booked for teh 830 rapido ferry, just my luck, i get to sleep for another hour.

got up again, got ready and headed to the corner for coffee, its now 9am so i've got a few hours before i need to get to the ferry terminal to catch the 1230 ferry to Colonia uraguay. after getting my cafe con leche (expresso with cream) i started to make my way down avenue de mayo, fully expecting to just hail a cab to take me there, but to also enjoy the sights of the city on a bright and sunny friday morning. after passing the large blvd there was a side street that was all pedistrian and had locals set up with knick knacks and junk on blankets for sale. I took advantage of the time i had to peruse the junk and of course didn't buy anything and continued on walking, to what i think was the financial district, surrounded by large buildings and bank after bank i saw that the buildings ended at one point, meaning there was either a ghetto or water on the otherside.

I was lucky, there was water, when i took the last corner there standing in front of me was the buquebus terminal, not this place makes most airline terminals look like shit. it was large, clean, open air, and the waiting areas were very clean with confortable seats. If this was a clue as to what was to come with the ferry, i was in for a very pleasant suprise.

While waiting for tickets i met a nice american couple from florida, they were on holiday and were enjoying buenos aires as much as I was.

After puchasing tickets, getting checked in, i still had a couple hours, the walk to the terminal didn't take nearly as long as i thought it would so i had some time to kill, while i was getting ready to step out, i decided that breakfast was in order, so a large cofee and a couple of empanada's was just what i needed. While waiting i ran into a couple from chicago. Matt and (sorry can't remember her name), a software salesman and nurse in the chicago area. we began talking and headed into the cafeteria together, enjoying good conversation on some of the places we had been, some of the things we had seen, and of course our feelings and thoughts on buenos aires.

I was very pleased that they were allowing me to tag along with them, it was nice to have some people to talk to, especially after travelling solo.

Once on the ferry we saw that there was also a cafeteria, and a duty free shop, no shit...a duty free shop on a 1 hour ferry, what will they think of next.

Once in colonia it was a nice sunny friday. the city itself is a tourist attraction, there is not much else to do there. streets lined with old buildings and cafe's stretching to the street. Uraguay is a pennisula, so there is water surrounding everything, and in colonia it was no different.

Once we got into the city Matt was determined to rent a golf cart, repeating over and over its only 35 five dollars....Matt's girlfriend, the sensible one of the group at this point reminded him that much beer would be involved today so the while it was a good idea now, later it might not be the best of idea's.

we stopped at a small cafe, ordered a couple of uraguain (sp) cervasa's (two 1 litre bottles i think) some empanada's and enjoyed the sun and the view of the sea behind us. there was a couple of dogs here and there, and te german shepard that was following us decided to ditch us for someone who was actually going to give him food, no kidding, once we hit the main street form the port this dog followed us for almost 10 blocks.

while we were enjoying the beers, a datchusand was hanging around the tables, a nice little brown dog, we shared a little with him, nice calm little dog.

the beers were gone, and we were ready to explore, i unfortunately did not allow myself a lot of time, opting for the 430 return, while matt and company were heading back at 830.

after exploring a few more blocks i headed back to the ferry terminal, not realizing thats its beena while since i last drank and was feeling a little drunk, not a bad place to be, but one that i would continue on for the remainder of the evening.

Back in BA i told myself that i'm going to catch a cab from the terminal to the hostel...that did not happen, after reading that it was wise to walk a cople blocks from the "tourist" areas to catch a cab so as not to get taken advantage of i started walking, and before i knew it i was back at avenue de mayoo and said to hell with it, if i'm this far i might as well walk all the way home...it was an enjoyable walk, the air was not too cold and it the drunk i was having made it move a little bit faster.

making it safely back home with the carton of cigarettes i picked up in the duty free, camel light naturals, i sat down, got things put back away and decided that dinner was the appropriate next step. knowing that there was a resturaunt on the corner i headed the 2 minutes it takes to get on the elevator and walk in there front door, there i ordered another steak, and it was tasty and a bottle of wine....

With the steak gone and the wine bottle empty it was time to head back.

i had one hell of a drunk on so that meant it was time for bed...tomorrow ehvid is going to take me somewhere, i don't remember where but i think to one of the outdoor markets. I also need to ask him about river platte football tickets, matt had mentioned that they were trying to go to that game, and with sunday possibly being my last day in bueno's aires i think that would be a nice way to spend it.

chow....

BA Dias 3

Buenos Aires day 3

so i've taken a shine to Buenos aires, Arvid and his hostel is a great place to base out of, simply the best location i could think of for exploring the city. The downside to all of this is that i could really get used to big city living, not that i want to...i keep getting drawn back to jackson for a reason, but, i liked new york, and BA is just as hospitable, not as fake as LA, if only my spanish were better, things might be a heck of a lot different.

Today was a relaxing day, lounging around, a couple walks to just simply get lost, my map reading skills are improving, not that they were bad before, but i'm getting all those skills i learned in scouting back, and thats a good thing, hopefully the cry of the eagle scout "where the hell am I" will no longer be my mantra when looking at a map. this city is easy to get lost in, just take a couple turns and you'll find yourself someplace new, duck into a couple shops take a look around and bada bing your wherever the day takes you. I did find myself today walking in circles, which i'm not exactly fond of, i likke to see new things and passing the sme place over and over again just isn't my kind of way to explore. So after that walk i came back to the hostel, finished off the rest of my steak with the bread i had bought, and took a nap to re-energize and go out and do it again.

The second time around always seems to have better success. i found my self almost to the pier which isn't that far of a walk, considering i'm tempted to take the ferry to Uraguay tomorrow and that is a good place to know how to find as that is where the ferry's leave from...go figure.

i had a bit of an experience attempting to order coffee, but the girl behind the counter was quite helpful, i should become the national charades champion after all the travelling i've done so far. here when you order a coffee, expresso style they give you a small glass of soda water to accompany it. Apparently this is to allow the coffee to not be so strong in your "blood". Not sure i get this, as i drink way too much coffee as it stands and maybe drinking a little more soda water would be a good thing. Although i think i make up for it based on the amount of soda water i drink when i go to the bars.

its coming down to decision time, i have 9 days left in this excursion, do i drop a shit load of money into flights to see all the countries i haven't been to to get the 13 i wanted, or do i say fuck it and hang out in bueno's aires for a couple mroe days, go up to the falls at the paraguay, argentine, brazil border and see one of the great wonders of the world and then fly to cuzco to see machu pichu and then spend the last two days in quito before coming home.

decisions, decions...who knows whats gonna happen till tomorrow, which i'm usre is gonna be the ferry over to uraguay for a short afternoon then back again...of course this is what i wanted to do today, but with the beef overload from dinner last night i'm gonna take it easy today which is what i ended up doing.

Exploring Buenos Aires

I bet there could have been a rock band in the room with me and i would have never heard them...I slept like a breast fed baby.

My stomach was growling after the first two cups of tea so it was time to go explore, more importantly, i had to find two things, breakfast and a bar of soap.

so dressed i got, and out the door i went. I decided that cause i had gone right the night before on my short walk, today i would go left, i rounded the corner and walked some of the side streets, passing by shops selling shoes, power tools, plumbing supplies, pharmacies, little bodega's selling snacks and soda's, but what i was really looking for was a market.

while i continued on i passed by a shop selling fruit outside, looking in I saw they sold more than just fruit and veggies and ventured in to see what i could come up with, i found at the meat counter some already pre-packaged cubes of meat and cheese and some small loaves of bread, bingo, i found my breakfast, with a bottle of water to compliment it i was half way done with my search this morning. Continuing on through the store i found the soap and shampoo isle, i decided on just a bar of soap, as shampoo probably wouldn't be able to make it on a plane had i decided to get on another one before the flight home.

with my tasty meats and cheeses, bottle of water, and bar of soap i headed off back to the hostel to get that much needed shower. Of course now coming out of the shop i realized on important missed step, in my search for the shop i hadn't really paid much attention to the route i took to get there. oh well, i had my breakfast, what better way to see the city than to wander with some food and enjoy it while i walked.

later in the afternoon it was time to take in some of the sights and check out this resturaunt that the hostel owner had recommended, La cholita. i headed out and saw the capital building, some of the great architecture the city had to offer, the pink palace, or the govenors palace, the oblesik, the two main drags and then headed over to la cholita for dinner.

la Cholita is a steak place, one thing argentinians are known for is there meat, they like there beef and they like a lot of it. for dinner i had an apetizer, a beer, the bife de como (not really sure what cut it was), all i know is that it was huge, and good, and it came with frittes (fries). after only getting through half my steak i decided it was getting dark and time to head back, or should i say waddle back, All in all the meal cost me 60ARS or about 15 dollars

but on the way i needed to pick up a couple provisions, tea and bread, as i know had leftovers to have for breakfast i wanted some tea to drink in the mornings, as well as break to make a sandwich with. SSo a stop at the Disco (thats the name of the grocery store) for the break tea and a 1.5 litre of water for 12 peso's (3 USD) i was ready to climb the five flights of stairs and die into a couch.

All in all it was a good day. Maybe tomorrow i'll take the ferry over to Uraguay.

Bunos Aires, Argentina

Hola buenos aires

immigrationin buenos aires had a bit of a sticker shock to it, it appears as though our politial relations are such that the argentians feel it necessary to charge americans an additional 140, where as everyone else gets a free pass. lets not discount the australians and canadians that have to pay a fee as well.

once the fee was paid it was lickety split to the immigration queue, which i was now the last one in line for...and the stamps went quickly, no problems now that i had given them my moola. and the visa is good for 5 or 10 years so i'm even happier about that now.

Once out of the immigration queue it was time to find someplace to stay and of course a way to get there, not sure if i got hosed on the taxi, but it was simple and no dealing with the driver so i paid hte airport taxi 128ARS (argentinian peso's about 4:1) or roughly 32 US. Before i arrived i decided to research hostels in the area of downtown, and found one called casa de papa, it said it was right downtown, private rooms, and a shared bath, so i gave the driver the address, he plugged it into the GPS, and off we were 30 minutes later he dropped me off on the wrong side of the street and i was in downtown buenos aires, looking at the capital building thinking damn, am i in new york...it really has that feel to it.

i crossed the street and found the address, went inside to find that i had to either take an elevator made before steam engines or climb 5 flights of stairs, stairs it is, and i still haven't taken the elevator.

once to the fourth floor i had my choice of two doors, neither of which were marked, i choose the door on the right, fail...the gentleman kindly looked at the sheet of paper i handed him with the address and pointed across the hall. Once inside I felt like i was in a museum, 15 foot ceilings, french doors to every room and to the balconies that overlook the main street with views of the capital and hardwod floor throughout. a pretty swanky place if you ask me. all for 30 a night.

once i got settled in it was food or a nap, as i had been going since cayenne the day before i decided on sleep, made the bed, opened the french doors to the balcony and reveled in the fresh air and awesome view, and of course stayed two steps back from the railing as my vertigo was beginning to hit when i looked over for more than a minute. I laid down and thought, damn, this place is nice i could get to liking buenos aires.

I must have been lying down for about an hour when i heard this awful racket, it was big bass drums, and a drumline that couldn't keep in sync for nothing. It was either that or road construction. I got up to find out what the racket was and when i looked out the window i saw a protest of about 200 people marching towards the capital, Big banners, all somewhat wearing the same color shirts and walking down the main street, about four lanes worth, all the traffic had been cordoned off so no to disturb them, and away they marched with their awful music.

After the excitement of the protest and the two to follow concluded, it was back to my nap. I slept for a couple hours, and got up with the determination to enjoy the rest of the sunny day and also to go find food. I took off for a walk around my general vicinity and once it started to get dark, i headed back to the hostel for a good nights sleep.

All in all a very nice first day, i'm looking forward to seeing more of buenos aires tomorrow.

Brazil (What little i Saw)

blowing through Brasil

so i managed to see brasil in a matter of hours, how cool, well, not really, as what i was able to see was the Belem and Sao Paulo airport. And as an excuse to not see brasil i used that katie eventually wants to go there, so I hope she's not yanking my chain, cause i'm gonna save the best parts for her.

I might a real nice polish kid on the plane to belem, he was studying at university in paris, and on holiday in guinea, heading off to sao paulo to visit some friends. He was a nice kid, and made for some great conversation on the flight. As it happens we were both flying from belem to sao paulo, so that atleast allowed us to continue the conversation until boarding our seperate planes.

The thing about belem that suprised me first and foremost is how many flights they have running out of there, the airport was huge, i almost think bigger than what i saw in sao paulo, and they were running flights non stop, my flight to sao paulo left at 02:25, and there were several flights leaving every hour, now belem is not a city I had heard of before, of course theres a lot of those, and these flighs were running everywhere.

Now just landing in belem, the first thing i needed to do was secure a ticket to either buenos aires or montevideo, so off to the TAM ticket counter to see what i could find, there was a line 10 deep with three tellers working, it was a mess, and after midnight at that. At the first window, i asked right off the bat if she spoke english, no she said, but pointed to the girl next to her, cool beans, just what i needed, so i waited for her to finish and conducted my business...as it happened there was a 225 flight to sao paulo, and an 830 flight to buenos aires....bingo, bookem chica...and i still had time for a cigarette and coffee before heading to the gate, as i was flying domestic it made it easy to not have to hit immigration before going to the gate, so as a reward, i had two cigarettes, yeah me!

to boot, it seemed to be my lucky day, the plane to sao paulo wasn't full, so i was able to have a window seat, all to my self, three seats to sprawl out over. as soon as that plane it the air, on the first ding, which was not the fasten sea belt sign, i unbuckled and spread out, and i'm pretty sure i slept and snored the entire way there...

Once i was in sao paulo it was another wait of about 2 hours, and of course not really knowing where i was going i just started mosying to wherever, actually i was looking for an exit so i inadvertently took the queue for domestic transfers. Once i realized i was on the wrong side of the airport, cause i could see through the glass divider to the international side and saw the monitors, i made my way back and of course was able to find an exit for a smoke before continuing on to immigration to head to buenos aires. In the airport there was a lot of things to buy, i settled on a carton of dunhills and was considering a pair of sandals but at 19 US they were a bit overpriced, i'm too used to my 5$ sandals in the philippines so nada on the sandals this time, besides its going to be cold the remainder of the places i'm visiting so its best to just keep the shoes on my feet.

Once on the plane i had the distinct misfortune to be sitting between pukenstein and the leaner. the guy sitting to my left slurped with every sip of whatever the hell he was drinking each time, then he would clear his nose by snorting his snot, and to top it all off every other sip of whatever the hell he was drinking, as he hit the stewardess button at least 3 times for something else to drink, he would rub his hands together and snort for the double whammy. And then of course cause he had so much shit to drink, and he wasn't drinking alcohol, he yaks 30 minutes before the plane lands, and doesn't go to the bathroom to clean himself off, so he's continuing to snort, breathe a little heavy and got shit stuck in his mustache...what a treat, he made the leaner seem like travelling with family, this guy just creeped into your personal space by leaning over to see what was on my seat video monitor...oh happy days

hopefully landing very soon in bueno's aires....

French Guinea Take 2

French Guinea

So the french have me trapped...I'm surrounded with no way out, so thats what i do, look for a way out. I hire a taxi to take me to the airport to find a ticket out. Much to my chagrin, theres no escaping, unless of course i want to go to paris, or one of the french islands in the caribbean, but i just escaped the caribbean and i don't want to go back.

i take the bull by the horns and buy a ticket to belem, brasil, i figure once there i an get my way south to either sao paulo, or further, like montevideo, or buenos aires.

The sucky part about all this is that i'm still stuck in french guinea, where as on sunday everything was closed, today, some shops are opening and its a little bit more lively, more lively in the sense that there are now flies buzzing around the dead dog on the side of the road. For lunch i decide that i'm going to eat at the same place i ate yesterday, as i've discovered that my french is better than my portugese (which is nil) and not as good as my spanish. I can read signs on the wall, of course the ones with pictures are a hell of a lot easer, but speaking it leaves me at a total disadvantage.

If i had to compare, i'd say that the french i've met while traveling have been quite the nice bunch of people, no way should this be correlated back to their countryfolk who only travel to french speaking destinations, they are in fact much like the koreans, believing that their food, their language and their lifestyle are by far above everyones, and should in fact be adopted by everyone who is not yet come to see their light or drink there cool aid.

so bad in fact that the morning reception girl made an attempt at english, the evening girl simply shrugged her shoulders and in effect told me to talk to the hand...gee thanks, i'm gonna recommend all my english speaking friends who decide to visit this over priced shithole to come and stay here. even though they do have a lock on the market for one of the cheapest places in town at 43E a night.

i did get to see two episodes of the show prisoner with Ian Mckellan, the down side to that was that they were both overdubbed in french and i only caught a few bits and peices here and there of what was being said.


So after a long day of nothing in a place where there is really nothing to do, i called i quits and had a cab take me to the airport (at 40E mind you) what a waste of money if you ask me.

Next stop Brasil

French Guinea

after a solid nights sleep at the Amice guesthouse (170SRD) i inquired about another nights stay, this guesthouse must be particularly popular as it was full. So with no option to stay again i figured i'd head off to french guinea, the taxi arrived packed with a family of four, a husband, wife, mother in law, and daughter. it took about 3 hours to get to the suriname border, for only 50sRD it wasn't that bad of a price. once through immigration we had to take these small boats, they fit about 10 people each with luggage, more like long dug out canoes with outboard motors on them to take us across the river to the french side. Of course they charge 5Euro's a person for the trip.

Immigration itself was a guy in an air conditioned room stamping passports and asking if you were going to come back soon, my only response to him was, sure, maybe.

the french side seemed to be a bit more confusing, once immigration was passed. there it was a guy in a booth stamping passports, no problem there, but this is where i first got the impression that the french and the koreans are not much different. They don't seem to like anyone else, and they are determined that there language is the only language, even in the tourist industry.

Once the boats loaded, it was like kismit, the sky opened up and it just started to pour, and that rain continued for close to a half hour, of just a terrential downpour. i did m3eet a nice gentleman who offered to give me a ride to a taxi stand, where minibuses were waiting to head to cayenne, i jumped at the opprotunity as it was raining and i didn't feel like getting completely drenched.

The mini bus costs were 35 Euro's for the trip to cayenne, or 40 to be dropped at your door.

the ride took around 5 hours, and i managed to sleep most of the way, which was good, as we were packed into this minibuss three per seat with two siting with the driver. The two next to me were both indian, and english speaking, so that made for some mild conversation.

checking in at the hotel was easy, i ended up choosing the Ket Tai hotel at 43 Euro's as opposed to the best western which would probably be much higher, considering the price for the room really didn't equal the space given by comparison to the rest of rooms i've had so far.

It was a long day of buses and taxi's, not to mention crossing a river with 10 people on a toothpick and dealing with the french.

tomorrow should be better, maybe i can get to brasil, we'll see..

Suriname

After getting settled into the Airport Inn in Trididad i got some good shuteye, I got a good nights sleep, got up, had a few cups of coffee and a fews bananana's. I got everything booked into paramaribo, got a guest house booked, the Amice Guesthouse, and was ready to see whatever i could on the island.

At around 11 the guesthouse owner took off to take her son to "lessons", that left me all alone with the maid/housekeeper. She was absolutely no help, not able to help me get a taxi, get out of there or anything of the like. Thats ok though, as i was tempted to fly over to the island of tobago, there were plenty of flights leaving that day, unfortunately as was the precedent i had found with caribbean airlines, there were none coming back, so as far as i could figure the wanted you to get there, but really didn't give a shit if you got back.

i got a quite a few updates done while i was there waiting, so it wasn't a complete loss of the day. I finally got out of there at around 4 and headed to the airport, as there wasn't really much else to do with the day, and going to see the beach was not a high priority, or a priority at all. Once at the airport i quickly acquired a newspaper and found some food this local chicken place which was quite good, and they had this hot sauce they called "pepper" that was burn your nostril hair hot. mighty tasty...

after reading the USA today from cover to cover and finishing my chicken and fries i headed out for what would be one of my many cigarettes for the evening. While outside i ran into a french girl living in guinea named Caroline (and damn it all of i didn't have neil diamond in my head all the rest of the night), a teacher to be exact, she spoke decent english and was easy to carry on a conversation with, she was coming back from a holiday in guatemala with frends from france, and heading to paramaribo like me. We talked a little about french guinea, unfortunately she was of no help, not able to recommend any hotels or guesthouses, so again i was on my own, working off what i had found before i left as well as wiki travel which i am lucky is an offline application on my ipod.

at around 7 we were allowed to check in, it was painless and easy, and all that hoopla the agent told me yesterday about travelling to surinam without a return ticket was all bullshit, as long as you have a visa, they don't care, you paid your money and paid for the ticket, they don't care. On the way to the gate, after clearing immigration, which by the way doesn't stamp you out, my stomach growled a little bit more, so off to the nearest shop to get some treats and water, i ended up with some coconut fruitcake, it was tasty, a snickers bar and a bottle of water.

I easily found a seat at the gate and was going to take full advantage of the free wifi in the airport when the couple behind me, Mara and Sam traveling with thier two children struck up a conversation with me, it started from them telling their son and daughter that if they didn't behave they were going back to new york...i followed that up it never works, kids know your bluffing, especially when your in a foreign country, they know to call your bluff then.

We talked about enw york, bollywood movies and traveling around, India, northern s. america, and where our plans were taking us next, it seems as though they were heading back to guyana (the place of there birth) with their children to visit with relatives. In my mind of course i was cursing them, as they were on one of the flights that i had tried to get on, i didn't let them know that though.

the flight itself was not sold out so there was lots of extra room, i had an isle seat and the gentlemen on the window was a swiss bloke making his way from canada to the southern part of south america, in effect doing all of the americas, he was taking a year, started in January and is ending in december. He was staying in northamerica via Couch surfing, which is an online network of people offering out there couches to strangers, it can be couches, spare bedrooms, futons, a hammock, and that is how he stayed all through canada and the US, he said it doesn't work quite that well in central and south america, but i thought it was a novel way to stay for free.

Finally we landed in paramaribo, we were the last flight of the night, obviously as it was 1AM by the time we were on the ground, the ground of which had no landing strip lights....THERE WERE NO LIGHTS, looking out the window all you saw was darkness, then all of a sudden you feel the wheels touch down. seriously there were no lights.

Once on the ground we cleared immigration, and the taxi was waiting, i had to go back into the airport cause i forgot to exchange money, then like the doofus i am, i think i exchanged too much, gonna had to see if the guy at B&s is heading back anytime soon to buy some of this off of me. I ended up sharing the taxi with the swiss guy who didn't have a place to stay, unfortunately when he got there it was completely booked. the room was nice, it had a balcony and tea and coffee service, i'm pretty sure it catered mostly to europeans, as the welcome guide was in dutch, english and french, (surinam being a former dutch colony leads me down that path).

Finally got to bed around 2.30, its gonna be a long day tomorrow trying to get to french guinea and onto brasil.

Stalemate in Trinidad

Got up super early to head to trinidad, it was a quick ride to the airport from NP's, Luis is a good transport man for Nelson, the consummate professional. Got checked in and through immigration with no hassle, did get a little confused in the airport looking to find where i needed to pay the exit tax, once i found it it was smooth sailing, got my receipt and into the queue.

With the stamp out i headed to the boarding area, making a b-line to the first coffee shop, it was way to early to be working with out any java in me, got the grande, which was more like a small dixie cup, the kind you would use in the bathroom for kids to rinse after brusing their teeth, needless to say it was an expresso shot with leche (milk) so it tasted good and went down smooth.

Having arrived at the airport almost 3 hours early, seeing as how they close check in an hour and a half before the planes leave, it was a necessary evil not knowing how the immigration queues would be. It was a little chaotic, with all the announcements coming over in spanish, then coming over in barely audible english, i found it hard to determain when they were actually boarding for my flight, and why there were so many people at the gate for the small tubo prop that would take us to trinidad.

The flight it self was non eventful, personally i don't like tubo props at all, they remind me of the flights i took when i was at philmont from colorado springs into santa fe, those were always really bumby and not at all fun.

Once in trinidad i had three chances to get to either guyana or suriname. it seems as though caribbean airlines is content with massively over booking there flights into guyana, every single one of there flights over the next two months is oversold....my reaction of course was "seriously...every single flight is over booked?" that of course didn't get the reaction from the gate agent that i expected. So after spending 10 hours in the trinidad airport going on standby again and again, i find out from the gate agent that she will not sell me a ticket one way to paramaribo suriname. That they will not let me on the plane if all i have is a one way ticket...i'm thinking bullship, as there website would very gladly sell me that ticket.

so at 10 it was no luck with anything so i had to find a hotel near the airport to make it back, i wasn't about to go all the way to port of spain to have to make it back again in the morning, so i found a place called the airport in, and as luck would have it they had a room, for 80US of course, that puts my knickers into a bunch and really takes a bite into my hotel budget for this leg of the trip...

Now i'm just worried that i'm not going to be able to make it back into south america for a decent amount of money, that i'm going to be stuck in the caribbean, not at all what i want to be, seeign as i have the visa's i need for s. america i don't want that to go to waste, but if this is any precursor to how things are going to be going once i get moving again, i'm in for a hell of a lot of trouble.

So a good nights sleep i think is what i need, a beer would work well too, but i don't think that the proprietors of this establishment are going to accommodate me there.

Worst case scenerio is i have to skip guyana, or just do a border run, and have to buy a rt ticket into suriname and not use the return portion, i just hope that isn't the case, cause that would really chap my ass to have to wast money on something as stupid as that.

Just getting excited that i get to get up in the morning and do this all over again, yeah for me! hopefully things go much better tomorrow. And did i mention that the hotels/guest houses internet is not working...grrr.

Home to Emperor Chavez, Day 2

First full day in Venezuela was good...Nelson has done a good job of setting things up to be homey. As for exploring, most of my day was spent searching for a way out, not that i was dying to escape, i just didn't want to come to a stand still and loose time, Venezuela wasn't a multi day stopping point on this journey, Now that I'm into day two, i'm liking it here, all the hoopla about not being safe is for the birds, i've been out and about with absolutely no problems.

To recap what i've done so far, I spent Tuesday searching for flights to Guyana, why i didn't I prepare and do this before is not my style. Its a little interesting not being prepared, not somehting i like, but interesting all the same. After searching for a plane ticket, it was coming up duds getting out of port of spain. So Nelson recommended a place in the mall across the street that served a great breakfast, when i got there though, it was closed, so i spent some time walking through this mall, it was quite nice, open air and full of all kinds of shoe stores, thats a theme i see walking around expecially on the blvd. is shoe stores galore.

after the walkabout at the mall across the street, i decided the next logical step was for a nap...good choice if I do say so myself. Once up i decided it was actually time to do some exploring, if i was going to be in Caracas for another day i might as well get out and see the city, the closest place to go and explore was the blvd, a pedestrian only walkway full of shops and resturaunts, it goes all the way to the financial district to the east, its a comfortable walk, there are street performers out and about, as well as muscians doing there thing. after heading all the way down to the financial distric and back, and then going west for some time i decided cause it was now dark that i should head back to the hotel....so that the naysayers will understand, I WAS COMPLETELY SAFE, NO ONE BOTHERED ME, AND NO APPEARED TO GIVE A SHIT WHO I WAS OR WHERE I WAS FROM.

Once back at nelson's place, i decided the night was still young, and caught a flick and hit the hay, all said, i was in bed by 11PM with no regrets.

Wednesday morning is now here, and all be damned if i didn't sleep in till 8, which means i now have the migraine from hell to start my day.

first priority of the day is securing transportation to Guyana, now this is proving to be quite the difficult problem, flights are open to trinidad and tobago, but getting out of port of spain and getting on to Georgetown is really pissing me off. So to get at least half way there i booked the flight to port of spain, and will attempt to fly standby to georgetown, we'll see how well that works seeing as all flights until sunday are booked. i did catcha bonus, by Nelson booking the ticket i managed to save about 50 US on the total cost of the flight, yeah me!

Now that thats done, its time to actually get out and see caracas. nelson put together some walking tours of caracas, theres about 10 of them, some are for the artsy, some are not, the ones i did were recommended to actually see the day in the lift of the venezuelans. The tour started with buying a subway ticket (not as hard as i thought), and taking the train 4 stops, easy, now having ridden the metro in hong kong, singapore, manila, KL, and places in the states, i felt confident with being able to do it.

Getting off at my stop it was walking to the Parque de Este, this i just walked around, its more like a zoo, i'm not that big on zoo's so i just moved on to the next item which was the Altamira Plaza, this was an open park with some kind of waterfall, and the obliske (sp), with walking continuing on till i hit the San Ignacio mall, this place is huge, i mean huge, its the largest shopping center in s. America, and it goes on forever, very large building, it goes up 4 floors and just keeps on going, lots of cafe's on the first floor, so i stopped for a coffee before continuing on, now those that know me know i'm not much for shopping malls, but the people watching was quite nice, lots of lovely chica's walking around thats for sure!

after tooling through the mall i headed back to the subway station, now i couldn't translate Nelson's directions from the mall to the metro so i said to hell with it and walked back to the metro i knew i had seen and headed back to Nelson's place.

Once back the hot water pressure was fixed, i got a nice shower and time for updating. Its around 5PM, and there are two new guests from the UK, i'm gonna hit them up to see if they want to go to dinner, if not, i'll go out on my own again, theres plenty of places to eat right across the street that i can munch on.

Im off tomorrow to trinidad and Tobago.

Land of Chavez Day 1

Immigration was a breeze, its nice being on the last flight of the day and having border patrol who just want to get the hell out of there.

Waiting for me after customs was Louis, Nelson's driver, he was right there waiting, well not exactly, he was expecting immigration to gake approx 30 minutes and was wandering around, but no biggie, i just spotted the guy with the sign wiht my name on it and bada bing we were out. Suprisingly though, only 7 of the probably 50 touts approached me, i think saying nyet really really loud made them back off.

The first impression of Caracas, garbage....it hits you like a ton of bricks when you get out of the airport, it seems as though chavez in his infinite wisdom instead of having garbage collected on routes on specific days has decreed there will be drop points for garbage, so now all throughout the city there are dumpsters overflowing with all kinds of trash that is sitting for a week at a time in some cases, and of course it has to be 80 degrees here year round so heaven forbid the trash doesn't start to stink, and boy does it ever.

the ride into caracas took about 30 minutes, maybe less, i wasn't counting i was too busy learning that 34 litres of gas (8.5 gallons) costs a dollar!, yeah a dollar, and a litre of water cost, you guessed it a dollar. With the amount of tinting on the window, the lights of the barrio's in the mountains had a really neat glow, almost like a greenish moss covering the hillside and glowing, obviously it was much different once i rolled down the window and in the day...

Once arriving at nelson's place, yeah thats the name of where i stayed, its a guy named nelson who basically has a rental apartment, as well as a couple bedrooms in his place that he rents to weary travelers, nice room, clean, and he's a super swell guy. When i got to nelson's we did the obligatory hello's, he showed me to my room, handed me a set of keys (more keys than i care back in the states), exchanged a 100 bucks (which he gave me to the tourist rate for), and we talked for damn near close to an hour about politics, venezuela, his life back in Kansas city, did i forget to mention he speaks better english than me, and was raised in the bread basket of america.

I took advantage of the late hour getting to bed and the comfortable arrangements and slept in till 9 am. once i got up it was the mission to continue the search for the ticket to Guyana, after finding that it was getting extremely difficult, this is with both Nelson and I searching, i took nelson's advice and turned it over to his travel agent, now the waiting begins, but on the plus side, i can now use his "tourist" discount to get a cheaper rate on the ticket. I'm certainly crossing my finders to see what happens. Of course if this works out to my liking, i'll have a 10 hour layover in trinidad and tobago, which will be so hard having to wait on the beach for 8 hours......sucks to be me doesn't it!

Bogota, Columbia (9 August 2010)

Landing in Bogota was good, the mountains surrounding the city gave it a nice glow. Once off the plane it was a mad dash to immigration...it was odd to see all the people pratically running to the queue. Once i arrived, i could easily see why they wanted to make it quickly. The line were awful, and moved very slow, slower than the US to be honest. Once up to the counter the immigration officer was talking very fast of course in spanish, i am in colombia after all. Once out it was a b-line to the taxi queue where i gave them the hotel address and jumped in a cab and was off.

Check in at the hotel was smooth, a quick questionnaire regarding my personal info, and of course a complimentary cervasa, nice for just getting off a couple planes and sitting for so long.

The hotel room was nice, soft bed, fell asleep watching the stepford wives in English, thats always a nice start.

Was up at 7, wide awake and ready to go, got around, went down and got breakfast and was off to the US embassy at 9. a quick cab ride and i was there. I've only been to one embassy overseas before, and that was the one in Saigon. Very easy to navigate, and quite efficient...bogota on the other hand was a bit confusing. Once in the signage pretty much disappears, so i queued into the first line i saw, it looked like the one i needed, but alas it was not. The majority of the people there were doing visa applications to come to the US. And that was the line i was in. after 25 minutes, a nice lady in a red vest approached me and asked me what i was waiting for, and after identifying that i was in fact not there for a visa to come to the US, she guided me along to the place i needed to go. of course there were no signs stating that that was in fact the way i needed to go.

Once inside i got my paperwork all filled out and submitted for my additional pages, once i was done i found out that the US has changed all of there fee's, to be precise, they are now charging for additional passport pages, 80 dollars to be exact. When did we become such greedy bastards? .

the pisser of it all is that the visit to the embassy has now shot my day, cause i have to go back to the embassy to retrieve my passport at 3, so after 2 hours to start. I needed the pages so it was a necessary evil, but i'm disappointed i didn't get to see more of Colombia.

Next Stop Caracas and Nelson's Place...

Heading to Bogota

The adventure begins, a non eventful flight to ATL, in fact the ride to the airport was more thrilling, mum volunteered to take me, of course I had to drive...

the flight was smooth, slept for the first 45 minutes of it, then played the onboard trivia game, entering the first game 7 questions in and placing fourth, then dominating the next two games...Dullock Rocks!

Getting excited to land in Bogota, the flight from the boarding area looks as though its going to be packed, thats gonna be cool, i always enjoy sitting next to someone interesting, maybe i'll be able to practice whatever little spanish i know on some unsuspecting person, thats right, pity them, cause if i do its going to be gruesome.

I love it when a plan comes together

so far the check list is coming along nice;

Plane Tickets - CHECK

Suriname Visa - CHECK

Brazil Visa - IN PROCESS

Bolicia Visa - DON'T NEED IT, GONNA DO IT ON ARRIVAL

Paraguay Visa - This one might be tough, getting the Brazil back on the 28th, and that only leaves 7 Business days to complete, still researching on the likelihood of getting one on arrival, or potentially in Buenos Aires (same day service is all the time i could afford to that)

I'm getting excited, and looking forward to the adventure this ones gonna turn out to be...

Preliminary Planning

The time has come to take off and see new places.....AGAIN.

Now that Asia has been crossed off the list, its time to head south. This time its South America, and I'm gonna attempt to do all of it in 21 Days. Tickets have been bought, and now its time to work through the hotels, hostels, buses and trains, and even a couple boats.

The starting point is going to be Bogotá, Colombia and the ending point is Quito, Ecuador. Definite must see's on this one is going to be Machu Picchu, Rio, Paramiribo, and Cayenne.....and if time allows Trinidad and tobago, and possibly jumping north into Panama (but thats beginning to sound more like a pipe dream).

The Country list is looking as such;

Colombia

Venezuela

Guyana

Suriname

French Guiana

Brazil

Uruguay

Argentina

Paraguay

Chile

Bolivia

Peru

Ecuador