Just Couches and Decor, Windermere Rd, Durban

...just stole R3755 off Robyn and I! 'Just Thieves' rather! A few weeks ago we bought (and paid a 50% deposit on) a really nice lounge suite off a friendly Scottish lady at Just Couches in Windermere road Durban. They said it would take two to three weeks to be made and delivered. Exciting times, being our first house and all that and furniture was the final piece in the puzzle for us before we move in.

Well two to three weeks later and umpteen messages left on their phone we decided to pay them a visit. Turns out, according to their neighbours, they have 'disappeared overseas and owe a lot of people a lot of money'!

If Nicola Hughes is around, please let me know whats up? Where the heck have you gone? (You can leave a comment at the bottom of this post). Aside from the money I'm really distraught at not having that awesome little lounge suite you were making for us. Not the best thing to happen to you after 5 years of living abroad. Oh well...

New Years at the Dam

Okay so its taken me over two months to put anything up here and thats probably because these days I'm never in one of any number of places for more than 24 hours at a time.

For New Years, we spent three days up at Badgers fiance Cally's parents house, nestled away on a dairy farm about 30km's from Mooi River. The house sits on the shores of a quaint dam and is surrounded by picturesque rolling hills and pine forests.

After being away for so long it was a great opportunity to catch up with everyone in such a relaxed environment. We spent a lot of time flyfishing on the dam, with compulsory beers, and even though I didn't catch a single fish, that was probably the highlight for me. Or maybe it was Andy and I beating Tont and Campo in the best of three pool match up? I don't know, everything was a highlight, the braais, the french cricket, the hackey sack, the 30 seconds, the shooter pool, the braaing but mostly the company.

South America wrapped up...

We've been back in South Africa for a month now and whilst its been busy and great fun it has also given us enough time to sit back and reflect on the last 4.5 years in the UK and particularly the final 2 months in South America.

Whilst 'constructing' the recent blog posts in South America I was often rushed for time and/or hampered by limited resources - a dud machine, painfully slow internet access, faulty USB ports etc etc. So I've had a look through Robyn's pics, which I often aluded to, and here is a small collection of them that I definitely would've published had I not been in such a hurry. Enjoy.

Where it began, Copacabana beach, Rio, complete with hardcore stud in the background

What do you do when the truck breaks down one evening? Find somewhere that sells cold beer.

Caiman in the Pantanal

One of the world's largest storks and emblem of the Pantanal - The Jabiru

The Red-breasted Toucan

The '2008' butterfly at the Iguazu Falls

Stick insect

Amantani Granny and Grandson

'Teething problems' at a Potosi internet cafe

Two Aymara women trying to catch a glimpse of the President of Bolivia doing his rounds in Potosi

Class photo in the Plaza de Armas, Cusco, Peru

Me and a Black-chested Buzzard Eagle in Colca, Peru

The 'Rest of the World' versus England, Puerta Inca, Peru. We lost this one 3-2, but won our first encounter in Brazil 5-4, leaving it one apiece in the series.

A bird flew into our left engine on takeoff forcing an emergency landing and an extra day in Lima.

Lima

Plaza Mayor

Robyn trying to figure out where Parque 7 de Junio is. We never found it.

Miraflores surf

It´s big. It´s grey. It´s flat. It´s noisy. And its our final stop. Phew! We need a holiday!

Islas Ballestas

The ´Candelabra´

´Humble´ Penguins

There´s something Alfred Hitchcockish about this pic

Pelican having none of it

Sea lion chilling

Millions of birds

´The poor mans Galapagos islands´ apparently. The Galapagos Islands must be heck of an impressive. We took a ride about 10km offshore to the spectacle that is the Ballestas Islands. Something I had been looking forward to for quite some time. And they did not disappoint.

They´re a small group of islands literally infested with all types of sea birds and sea life. Pelicans, petrels, penguins, gulls, vultures(yes!). The first thing that hits you upon arrival (other than the sheer spectacle of umpteen flocks of different types of birds circling and passing the islands simultaneously. It´s like the bird equivalent of Heathrow airport) is the smell. Bird poo. Guano. Apparently so much of it that it helped Peru out of a recession in the mid 1900´s as some clever dick discovered that guano was the secret and vital ingredient in a certain type of fertilizer. Nice work.

Sandboarding in Huacachina

Looking like a plonker

Robyn dropping in

These dune buggies were CRAZY and probably even more of a rush than the sandboarding!

The final dune was nice and steep

And finally, a sunset pic on this blog!

The Nazca lines

The hands

Spider

Hummingbird

The Astronaut

Surreal landscape

Many of you will find it hard to believe (thankfully I have photographic evidence) but the other day I wilingly climbed into a six seater plane (picture a station wagon with wings) for a flight over the one of South America´s great mysteries, the Nazca lines. What you will find even harder to believe is that I really enjoyed it, despite the incredible bumpiness and over-eager pilot!

The Nazca lines span a large area and are a series of animal figures and geometric shapes etched out of the arid, stony ground. They were created by ´clearing away the brush and hard stones of the plain to reveal the fine dust beneath´. No one is completely sure why they were made but it is thought ´they were probably a kind of agricultural calendar to help regulate the planting and harvesting of crops´. When you have a look at the above pics, try to remember that they were thought to have been done between 500 and 800 AD. Don´t ask me how they knew about spacemen and stuff...

Many thanks to ´The Rough Guide to South America´ for the above information.

Ah, the ocean!

Loads of surf potential and no one for miles...

A typical lunch on the road

I´m not sure how far we´ve travelled but it must be over 10,000km. After that amount of time it´s always a pleasure to see the sea again. But it´s the first time I´ve seen the Pacific Ocean and I can proudly report that I had an epic bodysurfing session two nights ago.

Colca Canyon

This crazy animal hopped across the rocks in front of us. It´s a mixture between a rabbit and a dassie and I forget what they´re called but I´ll get back to you.

Nevado Mismi, apparently

It seems I´ve been bandying about ´The World´s Greatest´, ´World´s Most Dangerous´ etc a hell of a lot lately. I´m about to do it again. Apparently Colca Canyon is the world´s DEEPEST canyon. It is twice as deep as the Grand Canyon and at its deepest is 3300m from top to bottom. It runs 450km from where we were to the Pacific ocean in the west.

It is an unbelievable sight. It was such a shame that we didn´t get to explore it more, but here you have it. And if that wasn´t enough, we were also lucky enough to view three Condors riding the thermals at a place called Cruz del Condor. One of the Condors glided past a few metres away and I swear it was like a small plane. Standing 1 metre 20cm and with a wingspan of 3m they must be one of the biggest birds around. Awesome.

Another little bonus of our trip out to Colca Canyon was getting to see Nevado Mismi in the distance. The Nevado Mismi mountain is the unofficial source of the Amazon river.

The ´White City´of Arequipa

Arequipa´s Plaza de Armas

El Misti volcano rises 5600m above the city of Arequipa, this pic is of El Misti, from behind

From Cusco we made our way south to the ´White City´ of Arequipa, Peru´s second largest city and home to more than a million people. It´s called the ´White City´ as many of the town´s buildings are made of ´sillar´ stone, extracted from the vast amount of surrounding volcanic rock. To be honest we didn´t have that much time to explore here unfortunately, as it was more of a base for us to explore the nearby Colca Canyon, but what I can tell you is that their main square is supposedly one of the most beautiful in Peru. I´ll vouch for that. It´s sort of like walking through the set of ´From Dusk ´til Dawn´ with loads of arches, fountains, palm trees and white stone and hardcore looking Peruvians...

I love this pic...

The Inca Trail

At the top of ´Dead Woman´s Pass, the highest point of the Classic trail

Sunset on Day 2

The alternative view of Machu Picchu on Day 3

View from Wina Picchu

On the day that the Boks hammered the English at Twickenham, we headed from Cusco to kilometre 82 to start the famous ´Classic´ Inca trail, four days in total and three nights camping en route in the surrounding mountains.

For the majority of the people in our group the Inca trail was the major attraction that drew them to South America. For us, it was and it wasn´t, but what I can say is that it exceeded our expectations by some distance. I think I was expecting an incredibly touristy, over crowded, paved walk to a site that maybe wasn´t as impressive in real life as it was in photos. I was partially right, it is quite crowded but not uncomfortably crowded, except for maybe Machu Picchu itself. There were plenty of ocassions when I was on my own, immersed in my own thoughts, admiring the scenery with no one around me for some distance, and to me that is the essence of hiking.

One thing that I´m sure everyone will say after completing the Inca trail is that the Porters are LEGENDS. All we had to carry was our day packs on our backs. Thats it. The Porters on avg carry 20kg of luggage each (ranging from tents, pots, pans, matresses, our duffel bags) on their backs whilst quickly jogging ahead of the group to set up various tents and have the next meal ready and prepared upon our arrival. Incredible. And the food was amazing.

The biggest highlight of our trip along the Inca trail was on day three, when our guide took us on a massive éxpeditional´ detour of the trail itself to view some ruins that have only recently been unearthed. Then to the top of a mountain pass that overlooked Machu Picchu itself. The views were spectacular and it was great to see such an incredible site from an equally unique perspective.

We arrived through the sun gate early on the 4th day to one of the most amazing views I´ve ever seen. Thanks to a massive storm the night before the weather was perfect, brilliant blue skies and not a breathe of wind. It was surreal and thoroughly rewarding after having hiked for three days to see it. I can´t imagine what it would be like just to get a train there and not do the trail but it certainly wouldn´t be the same.

Brad, I hiked up Wina Picchu, as you recommended. I have never done anything so scary in my whole life! Wina Picchu (Huayna Picchu) is the ´Sugar-loaf´ shaped mountain that stands tall behind the ruins and really is the symbol of Machu Picchu itself. What perhaps didn´t help, was that on the way up it appeared that someone had fallen off the mountain, as there was a rescue in operation, a rope hanging over the edge amongst some very worried looking people. That and the fact that we had to rush up there because we had to get our bus and train back to Cusco in a few hours time, conspired to make me a shiverring wreck by the time I reached the top, and even then I didn´t go to the very top. Nevertheless it was a great experience and the views were more than worth it.

Cusco - The Inca capital

Cathedral in Plaza des Armas

Plaza des Armas from an overlooking mountain

This girl followed us halfway down the mountain, resulting in this pic!

Homestay on Amantani

The view from ´our´ balcony

The view from ´Pacha Tata´ towards Taquile island

Shy ´Mama´

Part of our time around Lake Titicaca and Puno involved a one night homestay with a local family on the island of Amantani, 38km into the massive lake. We were quite keen for this but in the end it was slightly disappointing. I think a lot depends on the family you stay with and whilst our family were perfectly friendly, unfortuantely our ´mama´was slightly reserved and neither of us felt particularly at home in her company. I think what may be the case, is that many new families have signed up for this ´homestay´ deal and see dollar signs before the cultural experience. Fair enough.

Nonetheless we had a really good time over the 24 hours on the island. I befriended a really cool donkey, lasted about 3 minutes of a football match against a rival tour company (due to being 4100m above sea level) and we both enjoyed a fantastic sunset atop mount ´Pacha Tata´ or ´father earth´. At about 19h00 that evening, after a tasty dinner, we were dressed up in traditional clothes and attended a fun dance in the local hall with all the other people and their ´mamas´. Again though, this was great, BUT our mama didn´t seem too interested and by the time the evening abruptly came to an end, she didn´t seemed to pleased when I cracked open another beer, which I eventually had to abandon to avoid any unhappiness.

Without doubt, and I won´t go into too much detail here, probably the funniest moment of the entire trip happened at about 2am that morning when both Robyn and I woke up in desperate need of the loo (no. 1) and we had to use the supplied bedpan. I doubt any of you have used a bedpan recently, but it is a heck of a lot more difficult than you would imagine, especially when you start getting the giggles and it´s almost filled to the brim!

The floating reed Islands of Uros on Lake Titicaca

Colourful La Paz

One of the many street markets

Outside the most notorious prison in the world, San Pedro, chatting to the only other South African we´ve met the whole trip, a former inmate (trafficking) from Jhb

La Paz´s buses are too cool for school

The main square in central La Paz, Plaza de San Francisco (I think)

The World´s Most Dangerous Road

Starting up above the clouds...

...many of the drops are over 1km straight down

Remarkably, trucks still use this road. I have a superb video clip of these trucks negotiating a hair-pin bend about 3cm wider than the width of the trucks themselves

Looking fierce in our gear

AKA - Death Road. I´m not sure which was scarier, cycling down this ridiculously dangerous road or the trip back to La Paz in the van, up what I would rate as the second most dangerous road in the world. The driver was a complete maniac, over-taking on blind rises, taking photos and changing cds while repeatedly veering perilously close to the edge of the cliff, over 1000m straight down. I had to restrain myself from throttling him when we finally got back, but in the end I was just too happy to say that I had survived the worlds two most dangerous roads.