Dan & Rach's World Trip

Turned up in a pretty Western looking city. Argentina is so different to Peru and Bolivia - the first thing we noticed is that they actually finish building their houses and put plaster on the walls! There were also modern cars on the road!

Nothing much out of the ordinary here. As in San Pedro all the things to do are much of a muchness of what we did in Bolivia though not as impressive or adventurous and much more expensive. So all we did was go and have our first Argentinian Steak - wow wow wow. Easily the best bit of meat I have had. The restaurant greeted us with a complimentary glass of champagne (I was wearing a vest so felt well out of place) and we had an Argie bottle of wine (Deago Maradona has his own wine here in Argentina!)

Just before buying our tickets to Buenos Aires, we clocked a newspaper headline accompanied by pictures of rioting and decided to check it out. It was happening in Buenos Aires because Bush is in town for the Free Trade Americas meeting. To make things worse, we discovered that they`d petrol bombed what seems to be the only McDonalds in South America. We were so close to ending our 8 week Mc`Donals famine that we could almost taste it! God damn it. So we made a late change to our plans and opted to head for Mendoza(Argentina´s wine capital) instead. Easily the best bus we have been on, much better than the UK, the seats are massive and recline all the way - even at the back where we were since booking our tickets late.

As soon as we hit the roads in Chile we realised that at last we had made it to a 1st world country (road markings and signs and everything! including tarmac!) Got stopped at the border and had our bags searched for food and our shoes decontaminated for foot and mouth!

Turned up at this tourist town in the desert. Tried to book a bus out the next day to head straight to Argentina only to be told we couldn´t go for another 4 days. Oh well we spent 4 days eating the best food we have had for 6 weeks. Although the place is so much more expensive than Bolivia the food turned up on beautiful white plates ´drizzled´ with various sauces complimented with napkins and proper cutlery, such a change from the usual restaurant standard. The other noticable thing about changing countries from Bolivia to Chile is that the toilets come with toilet paper and flush!! In the evenings the restaurants have massive fires to heat the places so all our clothes now smell of smoke. It was lovely though.

Whilst we were there in the desert we hired bikes and with sandboards attached to our backs road into the Death Valley to go sandboarding. We were a tad disappointed though as the sand is so damn rough, you have to wax the board at the start of each run and as soon as the wax rubs off (which was approximately 5m down the slope!) the board grinds to a halt and you fall over! The only way to do it is point straight down the slope, don´t turn and go as far as you can till the wax has gone, then hope you go a bit further with the momentum you have built up. Also obviously there are no lifts so you have to walk up the massive sand hills each time - knackering. Wicked scenery but all in all I`d rather be snowboarding.

We went swimming and sunbathing in the local 'oasis'. This was an hours walk away in the desert sun to the local camping ground where they had a swimming pool. In usual South American stylee it was built in the 60s and we lay on cobbled stones round a pool that was chipped and cracked. Rach got burnt and I got a funny tummy from the water (I did however drink beer round a pool so for a moment it felt like a bit of a european holiday)

Went back, ate and drank then ate and drank some more till friday´s bus - we don`t really have many responsibilities here!

Got a bus to Uyuni. Another awful Bolivian bus. This one featured a massive dog on it (yes there was a women with her dog on the seat next to her while other locals were standing room only!?). As usual after all the seats were full the driver drove round the town and picked up people to fill the aisle and spill onto the seats. I had someone virtually sitting on my lap (well definately my arm rest) and another women on the floor between the seats! To top it off our mates had their bag nicked which contained his passport and 600 quid camera! We went to the police station and in my Spanish I got them to reluctantly fill out a police claim which he did on a typewriter -I haven`t seen one of these for years outside of an antique store. You can guess he didn´t really think we would see it again. It has made us more careful as we were getting quite relaxed about security.

Uyuni is a town in the middle of the desert where from one edge of town you can see all the way down the street to the other end! Only stayed one night cos it gets bloody freezing after sunset, ate in the only pizza place and booked a tour to go and see the vast salt lakes and desert of south west Bolivia. Easily the best highlight of our trip so far.

The 3 day tour was by a jeep over the massive salt planes, deserts and mountains. The place is amazing, scenes like nothing else on this planet, infact in wasn`t too dissimilar to how you`d imagine the surface of the moon or other planets. You also felt completely deserted seeing only faint dust tracks in the distance of other 4x4 landrovers speeding over the sand. Rach took so many awesome photos. However we stayed in some pretty basic accomodation where it dropped to -10 celsius overnight as we were at about 5000m above sea level and in the desert!

Brought wine with us so spent the evenings huddled around a candle with mates drinking wine and playing travel scrabble (does anybody know if tofus is the plural of tofu - this would resolve an argument?) We drank Chillian wine as Bolivian wine tastes like ribena crossed with cheap vodka.

Met a couple who were on another jeep. They had run across a jeep stranded in the middle of the desert because the driver was so out of his head on cocane that the tourists had taken the keys off him. He had then in response taken the HT lead out of the jeep so they were having a standoff at 10pm in the desert about what to do. Thankfully the other jeep rescued the tourists and left the driver with the car. The police came and picked him up the next day. Note - the favourite in the Bolivian prsediential race to be concluded in November wants to legalise the growing of coca plants, won´t that make Bolivia even more fun!

Didn`t wash for days as there was only cold cold water but made it to the Bolivian border and crossed into Chile - our mates had to turn back as with no passports they are on their way back to the British embassy for help.

Arrived in the town no problems. A complete change to Potosi, as it was heaving. First thing I did was to have a hot dog from a street vendor - probably not a good idea because I was nearly sick again and went straight to bed.

Woke up the next day without any altitude problems so we explored the town. Lovely city with white stone buildings and Spanish red roofs. Actually a Bolivian city that looked finished! We soon found the backpacker hangout ´Joy Ride Cafe´ which sold absolutely spot on Coronation Chicken sandwiches and wicked home brew! We bummed around for a day then went on a mountain bike tour to an area called the 7 waterfalls. Rach isn´t much of a biker so we were sold on this trip because they said that once you got out of town it was pretty much flat and then the last bit was all down hill leaving a 30 minute walk to the waterfalls. They lied, unless 'flat' in Spanish translates to 'steep rolling hills' all the way and '30 min walk' really means 'scramble up cliffs, at one stage we had to climb a vertical face to reach our destination!? Rach was knackered so ended up leaving her bike at the waterfall place and getting a lift back by car. (Being the man I rode all the way - it was pretty fun actually). The waterfall place was amazing, although instead of the crystal clear blue water we`d been led to expect it was a cold and brown lagoon as it had been raining! We still braved the water and went swimming though.

We also visited the local cement quary where they have discovered huge dinosuar tracks. It is a really important discovery, but this being Bolivia, the company just keeps on blasting the rock so the tracks are getting destroyed slowly (it will cost 8 million to preserve but no one has yet come up with the money) slightly geeky but the photos look good of me by a T-Rex footprint.

We stayed in Sucre an extra day because our friend had hurt her back and spent all day in bed and couldn´t face a standard Bolivian bus journey. We used the time to have a romantic meal in the Swiss Restauarnt - had a fondue and the best Roshtie (Ruth, Spelling?) of our lives.

We spent the mornig after the flight in the airport waiting for some friends on another flight to catch up with us at midday. This gave me the opportunity to go to Burger King at the airport! This was the first fast food I have had since getting to South America so a pretty big moment for me. Rach had trouble eating it because of her teeth so had to cut the Whopper up with a plastic knife and fork!

We then spent the afternoon in the "100% Fake English Bar" in the centre of La Paz. They had the Portsmouth Game on (we bloody lost) but I did get to drink PG tips (5 cups although with dodgy milk) and eat beans on toast(not heinz though)! Unfortuately this made me even more homesick.

That evening we got a night bus straight out to Potosi. We had gone for the most expensive ticket we could find to get a bus with a toilet, but no, as soon as we got onboard we were told it was out of order - ahhhhhh. Another 12 hours having to ask the driver to stop at the side of the road and having to wee whilst trying to fend off stray packs of dogs.

Arrived in Potosi on Sunday morning so it was pretty dead and we spent the afternoon wandering and reading. However it was bloody cold as Potosi is the highest city in the world, nearly 5000m! However to top it all off, about midnight that night I woke up sweating, then shivering etc etc etc. Yes, you´ve guessed it I got altitude sickness again! We had flown straight in from the jungle and it only takes a couple of days for the body to readjust to sea level, so even though I was on the pills I was in bed all day. Missed the trip to the Silver mine and couldn´t eat.

However we had planned to leave the town at 4pm that day, so Rach had to pack my bag and wrap me up warm and then help me out into the cold to a taxi. It was quicker and only a couple of quid more expensive to go by taxi the 3 hours to the next town of Sucre so I held onto my guts and suffered a pretty bad journey. Worst of all because I have the best Spanish I had to try and make conversation with the driver to ensure he didn´t fall asleep at the wheel when all I wanted to do was sleep (I think I was pretty lucky to make it through the night!)