New Videos!

Okay, I know its like a year too late, but I finally posted the videos I made from our South America trip. I made little compilations of pictures and videos of our trip all the way up to Brazil. The rest will probably never get finished, so here is what I have. If anyone sees this, I hope you enjoy it...

Brazil

Uruguay

Argentina

Bolivia the first time around

Peru the first time around

Machu Picchu

Our South American traves are nearly complete, we just checked off the often considered most important tourist atraction of South America. Machu Picchu, discover about 100 years ago draws thousands of tourists per day. The "dry season" begins in June, so we waited till the end of our trip to see these spectacular Inca Ruins. June 1st, we woke up at 3 AM to dark cloudsand drizzle, Murphy's Law.
We started hiking from Aguas Calientes, it was Erik and me plus Brian from Virginia, Tomer from Israel, and Jaime and Crystal from Vancouver. Our early wake up and vertical hike turned out to be well worth the effort as we were ther first people to the entry gate. We arrived about 5 AM only to find out that the park doesn't open until 6. We tried to bribe the security guard but it didn't work. The important thing was that we were "Number One!" Every time the rain and mist got us down we chanted "We're Number One!"
Truthfully we were bummed at first about the rain, but it really turned out to be an amazing day. I personally got to lead the procession of tourists into the park. It was so misty though, that we ended up walking the opposite direction from the ruins. I was within 10 feet of the first ruins and couldn't even make them out. After a quick look at the map, we changed course. The mist started to clear slightly and we had our first glimpse of the famous Machu Picchu from the classic post card location. The mist and rain added a magical touch to the whole valley, so we weren't disappointed.
Picture after picture, we took in the scene. Since we got there so early and stayed allday we got to see every different type of weather and lighting situation. What a cool site. We took a nap in the sun, hiked around, just sat and stared, the day went by quickly.
The company was pleasant too. We entertained ourselves constantly remembering the fact that we were "number one!" and making sure the other lesser tourists knew it. It was fun and memorable.
Tomorrow we are off to Lima to finish off the trip. The Peruvians are having another Presidential election on Sunday so hopefully that does not effect our travel. We'll be home Tuesday afternoon, see you all soon!

Off to Peru again...

Last night we spent our last night in La Paz, sad times. La Paz is a great town. We got some ice cream for old times sake. We watched X Men III, then we checked out this free concert they were having in the middle of downtown. It was super fun. Erik and I dressed up in our Bolivian garb and still stuck out like marshmellows in chocolate. It was funny, I never realized just how short the Bolivian people are as a whole, until we had to fight our way through the crowds. Everybody saw us, I think we were the only Gringos that braved the affair. They all wanted to practice there best English phrases on us, like "what's your name" and "where you from". They also really enjoyed giving us some of there drinks, which was warm watered down whiskey. It was really cold out, so they heat it up. Anyway it was a nice last night. The next morning, today, we hopped on a direct bus to Cusco, Peru. 12 hours later and we were in Gringoville, Peru. Tomorrow its time to join the masses and see the many Incan Ruins.

We are back in La Paz. We did the Chorro Trek and then went to Rurrenabaque. Internet was scarce. Thats why its been so long since you heard from me. We decided to fly back to La Paz because the bus ride there was horrid. The bus ride is 17 hours on a dirt bumpy road, plus you go up ¨the worlds most dangerous road¨ on the way back. The air plane flight was less than an hour.

The Chorro Trek was beautiful, but I got sick, so I couldnt enjoy it too well. I must have eatten something bad. It took a few days and I was feeling fine again, but it came on right on the first night of our hike. The total trail takes you from 4800 meters all the way to 1200 meters. I think it was about 54km. We did three nights 4 days. The trail takes you down an ancinet Inca trail, and past some Inca ruins. The views are spectacular. The last night you come to a place where a Japanese man moved to back in the 40`s. He keeps a Japanese garden, even today in his old age, he is out there picking away at the garden. The view up the canyon from the garden was one of the most magnificent. We could see the way we had come with snow covered peaks looming in the distance. I really wish I could have better enjoyed it. Both Erik and I got blisters, I think our feet got soft from wearing only sandals for the last month and a half. Erik had to carry my pack some of the way just so we could even go any where. One of the days we hired a porter to carry most of our stuff. We only did that about half the day, since the old man wasnt doing to well on the uphills. I thought he might die on some of the hills. I felt like dying too though. We made it to the bottom though.
Then we spent a night in Coroico and hopped a bus to Rurrenabaque the next day. The bus was really bad. We were in the second to last row, which for some reason had half the leg room of every other row. Both Erik and I had to sit sideways for 15 hours on a rough dirt road. But we made it as always. Our motto now is, "it could be worse".
We arrived in Rurre about 6AM and signed up for a Pampas tour right away. We left about 10 and headed to the river. After a three hour Landcruiser ride we got on a boat. From there the tour really starts. We had 8 people in our group. We saw tons of alligators and crocodiles. Capibara (the worlds largest rodent, R.O.U.S.´for those of you Princess Bride fans), squirel monkeys which jumped all over us to get bananas (not too eco friendly, but fun. We also held the crocs and an anaconda). We hunted and found an anaconda, only about 1.5 meters longm but neat. Frogs and birds were also plentiful. We also fished for piraña and ate them for dinner. Pretty cool over all. Then we got back and headed to the jungle for another three days. We had a native guide who showed us all of the cool trees and plants. Ones with water, poison, milk, medicine. One was the tree they make malaria pills from. We saw enormous mahogany trees. Not too many animals however. Some alligators, capibara, birds, and from a distance some boars. We also ate termites that tasted slightly like mint. One night we decided to go fishing. The guide told us we would catch neyr large fish. The sizes ranged from 10 to 50 kilos, depending on how much he wanted to eggagerate. He caught two small 10" fish to use as bait, and we headed for the river. The river is called Tuichi, it flows eventually to the Amazon. The whole area where we were is the Amazon Basin. Anyway we fished for a few hjours and caught nothing. We came back that night, when the "real big ones" are out. The primitive fishing method involves a rather large line wrapped around a block of wood. The guide likes to be the one to throw the line outm but then he gives it to his tourists to hold. We found out why, the hard way. I have caught fish with a line wrapped around a can before, and I know that even a small fish can pull pretty hard when all you have is a line in your hand. I decided that if the fish were really as big as he descibed them, I did not want to be holding the line. I let Erik and James (our British companion) hold the two lines. I think it was more of an intuition thing, I did not really forsee what would happen. We sat for sometime, then sudenly Erik almost lost his hand. The line he was holding got snagged on a passing whale or some other such creature. In a matter of seconds he had dropped the line with a loud yelp. His had got cut pretty deep. ill try to get pictures up when i can, of everything.
Overall the experience was very memorable. Now we are back in La Paz. Its time to do some shopping and head to Cusco and the famous Macchu Picchu. I think we only have about 10 days left, so we will be home before you know it.

Bolivia once again...

Okay, so I have been doing a poor job of keeping this sight updated. But here is a breif rundown on the last few days.
We left Rio about a week ago, took a 21 hout bus to Campo Grande. From there we caught another can´t remember how long bus to Bonito. Bonito is a town that seems to live off tourism. They have a river that is very clear and has lots of fish to see. We opted for the cheap public swimming hole. We rented bikes and rode the 10km which turned out to be like 5km to the river. There we were going to rent snorkeling gear, but the water was pretty chilli and there apeared to be only on type of fish. The fish reminded me of carp at a dock, scavengers looking for anything you`ll throw their way. We tossed bits of cookies and other things and they gobbled them up. Then we layed pieces of cookie on the ledge of the steps and they got brave enough to stick their heads out to grab them. So I took a ritz cracker and held in my hand over the water, one fished aimed with his sofficticated underwater eyes at the cracker and ended up biting my finger. He has tons of little teeth that actually left a pretty good cut that bled for a while. That was about the extent of our adventure. We also ate aligator too.

We decided after talking with other tourists to skip the famous Pantanal tour. The animals seem to be in hiding this time of year. So we headed for Corumba on the border of Bolivia. There we had a military escorted visit of an old Fortress on the Rio Paraguai.
We crossed the border the next day.
There had been quite a lot of political issues going on in Bolivia, so we didn´t quite know what to expect. The border was open now so we crossed. The infamous ¨death train¨to Santa Cruz was shut down so we had to opt for the "Extreme death bus" to Santa Cruz. This bus ride was one to remember. We hoped on with a few other gringos and a lot of Bolivians, for a 20 ride. 95% of the way was dirt road. There were people standing, sitting, and laying down in the aisle. My legs are just too long for that kind of bus. As I became accustomed to the uncomfortable feeling the ride got easier to endure. I has a few feelings of panic in the beginning. You know when you feel like freaking out, but you just catch yourself in time to calm yourself down. Well needless to say we made it.
Santa Cruz is a town in the middle of Nowhere, Bolivia, that has had an enormous rise in population in the last few decades. Coincidentally the rise in cocaine sales from that area has risen also.
The town plaza (which every town in Latin America has, no matter how small or inaccesible the town is. Its always situated in front of the Cathedral) was one of the most modern and well layed out I have seen. I am continually jealous of the Bolivians and Peruvians because they have all sorts of Toyota trucks and Landcruisers that we can´t buy in the states.

After one days rest, a few good empanadas, and some great ice cream, it was back to life on the road.
From what we have heard, the bus companies here are refusing to pay taxes, so the bus terminals are all closed down, with military police guards. The Floatas (nice big busses) are not opperating, but there are people infront of the terminals selling tickets to where ever you want to go. So we took a bus to Cochabamba, 12 hours turned into 17 or so hours. In the middle of the night we had a traffic jamb. It seems as though they are doing construction on a mountain pass, but there is no one there to direct traffic. Picture a bunch on busses and big rigs driving up a hill on a narrow one lane road (thats only one lane at times, not one in each direction) and coming upon a bunch of the same sort of vehicles coming the other direction. ¿What do you do? Well I´ll tell you what they do here. They stop and honk, then honk some more, when that doesnt solve anything they just start squeezing by. Some how we made it. At times we were dead stopped for hours, but we made it. In Cochabamba we hopped directly onto a Micro bus to La Paz. After 24 hours of safe travel we made our way to a hostel with one of the nicest rooms we have had yet.
Now I am writing from an interbet place in La Paz. Erik and I have been looking for backpacking gear today. Although we have everything we need at home, we did not bring it with. The rainy season is over now, but that means its cold. We plan to do a 3 day trek called the Chorro Trek tomorrow or the next day. Then we are going to the Amazon basin to see all of the wonders it has to offer.
After that, its off to Peru to Macchu Picchu. We have not reserved a tour in advance because of the extreme cost, but we hope to do a longer back route trek that should be do able with out advance reservation.
I will update more as i can.
Chris

Rio!

Well we finally made it to Rio. We got in late at night so we took a cab straight to a hostel we had heard about in Copacabana. It´s night so we haven´t seen much, just Christ the Redeemer with his outspread arms watching over the city.
We hope to go to a soccer game either tomorrow or Sunday. We have heard that it is quite an experience. Besides that, hopefully some more surfing and sun bathing!

Iguazu Falls

imgp2182
Originally uploaded by chrswbrwn.

Iguazu Falls

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Campo Mourao

Here we are in Campo Mourao at the Calvary Bible College visiting Tom.


They put us to work, slaving away cleaning their dirty dishes!
No, not really, we volunteered to help out. It was the least we could do to say thank you for their hospitality. They gave us a great place to stay, awesome food, and some good fellowship.
It was a very enjoyable visit. I recommend coming for a visit, anyone who knows Tom!
This is Tom and his girlfriend Luciana. She´s super cool and is helping him learn Portuguese too!

Brazil

Uruguay

Brasil!

A quick update for now...We finally made it into Brasil after a lot of run around and a very pricey visa.
We headed straight up the coast from Uruaguay to Florianopolis were we caught a local bus to Barra do Lagoa on Ihla Santa Catarina.
We spent 5 nights hanging out on the beach and surfing. The weather and water we beautiful. So far this is one of the top places in the world to try to find a way to stay and live in my opinion.

We caught a 16 hour bus to Foz do Iguaçu to see the enourmous world famous waterfalls. Currently I am writing this from an internet place on the Argentine side of the falls. We saw the Brzilian side today and will check out the Argentine side tomorrow. We all agreed it is nice to be back in Argentina. The food is great here, especially the steak and the red wine. Also I have never felt so happy to hear spanish! Portuguese is similar to spanish, but it still makes things a lot more difficult to get around!

Salta to Buenos Aires

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17 Hour bus ride to Buenos Aires, but we were riding in style (Full Cama). This was the lear jet of buses. Leather seats, only 3 across.

Salar de Uyuni

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Flamenco!

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We went to a Flamenco dancing show last night. We got great seats right in front of thew stage. The lady who runs the place told us we were in for a treat, as the star dancer was the best in Argentina. She wasn´t kiding, the dancing was great and the band as well.
The lead singer sat on one of those boxes with a thin laminated sheet on the front which he banged like a drum. On either side of him was a guitarist and a bassist. The dancer danced about every other song and clapped during the others. It is a very intense dance and quite a treat to see. The foot work is what amazed me the most, as he stopped his heel or his toe or both to keep a drum like rythmn. Hopefully the sound will come through well on the videos.

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Argentina

Bolivia

Peru Map

The red is the approximate route we have traveled thus far.

Argentina

One of these days we will get this site in order.

Erik and I are currently in Buenos Aires, Argentina.
We made our way south from Uyuni, Bolivia.
We did a three day two night tour of the Salar de Uyuni and surrounding area. When we get the pics up you will see why its so cool. First we went to a salt flat where the earth and air melted together at the horizon. It really was quite an amazing place. In some places there was standing water, in other not, but as you looked across the entire plain, it looked uniform.
They mine salt there, so that is the main attraction. They have a Salt Hotel, and everything else you can imagine made out of salt. Tourist beware, a cup made out of salt does not work well for pratical purposes...
The rest of ourtrip cosisted of lakes of different colors, desert of all sorts, and snow topped mountains.
We explored the area in a old Land Cruiser FJ 62. The driver Mario, our cook Eva, and six Gringos in the back. Our company consisted of Two Irish girls, Rebecca and Wendy; an English girl, Teresa; and an Israelie guy, Matan. We had many good long hours in that jeep as we traversed the deserts of southwestern Bolivia.
I´ll spare you all the details, and just throw in a few highlights. We saw a few ostriches and llama like creatures from the car. There was a green lake and a red lake, and various other colored lakes. Most of them had flamingos in them.
On the last morning we got going at 5 because we had a long day ahead of us. It was cold and dark. We got to some geysers just as the sun was coming up. We were at about 15,000 feet, the highest I think both of us have ever been.
We rode down to some hot springs, that were not quite hot enough for me, but nice none the less.
The rest of the day included about 15 hours total in the cruiser, then a 10 hour train ride to the border, at some point the day changed. Next we hopped on an eight hour bus ride to Salta, Argentina.
We spent one night in Salta, then headed for the Big Apple.
A briliant 17 hour bus ride, first class, got us to Buenos Aires at 8 AM.
Now we have been in BA for the last few days and will be leaving on a boat to Uruguay Friday morning.

Isla Taquile

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Isla Del Sol

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Lake Titikaka

This is our amigo William. We stayed at his house on the Isla Amantani in Lago Titikaka.

I´m a giant here! Rooar!!


Erik trying to call home from the floating Islands

Fixed the Videos

I think I got the videos fixed so they dont play automatically. That should make the sight a little less annoying!

Still having trouble with connection speeds. Maybe in Buenos Aires, the Big Apple!

Argentina?

I think we re going...more to come. :)

La Paz

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We´re in La Paz, Bolivia at the moment. It has been hard to find internet that is fast enough to upload pictures and video. But when we find it, rest assured we will post fun stuff!

We arrived last night late from Copacabana on Lago Titikaka. We have been traveling with a fun new crew of people. (There is power, and bargaining ability in numbers). We met two New Yorkers, a Canadian girl, and two British guys on Isla del Sol and have traveled conglommerantly ever since. Today we explored La Paz, the highest capital city in the world. We found some great places to eat. We had empanadas on a street corner, then headed for the Brazilian embassy to take care of visa stuff, but they were closed. Its Sunday we discovered. When you are traveling its hard to keep track of days. We got to see the citizens of La Paz as they left Sunday morning mass, getting sprinkled with "holy water".
We also had great super gyros from a greek food place. Next on the menu was ice cream! I love Ice cream in Latin countries, fruit ice cream. Piña, coco, y fresa! Alright.

After that we attened our first South American soccer match. it was the La Paz "Strongest" verses the Potosi team. There were not a ton of people in attendance, but it was fun none the less. Go Tigres!

Erik and I also did some shopping today to prepare for the cold wether. We both have a new Alpaca wardrob. Pics soon to follow.

One more thing!

Click on a photo at the right where it says Flickr and you can see others, bye! We are off to Puno and Titicaca!

Also sorry about all of the videos playing at once, but after they play through one time you can click play individually again.

Politics in Peru

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There is a Presidential election coming up in April, so people from different parties were demonstrating while we were in Arequipa. It was fun to see. At one point the two groups started shouting back and forth, but no violence.

Plaza in Arequipa

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Another one of Donkeys

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Bus from Arequipa to Chivay

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5 hour bus ride to Chivay from Arequipa. This one acctually had some leg room for me. All of the other buses so far I have had to curl one knee under and stick the other leg out in the aisle.

Donkeys on the trail

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Cañon del Colca

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The Cañon del Colca is the second depest canyon in the world. I guess there was some debate about it for a while, but they detemined that the canyon next door is like 100 meters deeper. We met an Austrian couple - Christian and Agnes on our way to the canyon and decided to travel with them. They had a map and knew more about what to do. We hiked for down about 1200 meters into the canyon to a town called San Juan de Chuccho. We spent the night there for $1.50 each and another $1.50 for dinner. I was starting to feel a little sick, but made it through our time there okay. I think it is pretty typical to get your first sickness out of the way in the first week. We have both felt it, but its just getting used to a different culture and their foods. As I write this I am starting to feel a lot better. But I did go buy some snickers, chips ahoy and good old Nutella just to feel at home. We have a 5 1/2 hour bus ride to Puno on Lake Titicaca later this afternoon.

Back to the Cañon, Erik is going to put up pictures and our descriptions might get redundant, but you can get two prespectives.

We hiked the next morining to the upper part of the the canyon on the opposite side we entered to a large ( for the canyon) town called Tapay. This video shows the central Cathedral and its plaza. Its really amazing these people have built all of this in a canyon that is not accessable by road.

They pack everything in on donkeys. I have two videos of the trail I will put up that show the donkeys on the trail.

Taxi in Arequipa

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This is a typical taxi ride in Peru. The streets get a little crowded, but its fun. This day we were in a hurry to catch the bus to Chivay. We got there at 11 for our 11 AM bus, but then it didn't leave till 11:45. This has happened more than once already. We rush for the bus and then its not even there. Typical of South America, but you always have to be ready for that one bus that leaves early.

From Lima to Arequipa

Que tal?

The Hotel Espana was very unique, oh yeah, thats where we stayed in Lima. We arrived at 1am in the morning and went to bed. The insesant horns woke us up around 9am and we started our day. Right outside or our room was a small jungle of planets that draped almost to the floor where the tortoises and cats would hide and play. That morning a British dude was leaving, a Californian guy was sick and layed in bed, two French girls were out and about, a Canadian girl was packing to leave in the night, and an Austalian guy left. It was quite the hub. Here is the room . . .

Here is a picture of the entrance way. It used to be an old and large mansion.

We walked around the city exchanging money, buying a travel murse (male purse) for me, Erik, and going to the super market to get water. It was warm and humid. We walked around all the plazas and headed back.

Here is just one site in Lima, Peru . . . with Chris is it too.

Hannah, the Canadian girl, was back at the hostel talking with Adam so Chris and started asking questions. Hannah had traveled for 6 months. Adam was one month into his 6 months of traveling. That seems to be a magic number.

We played cards at the hostel and a Belgan guy joined us. He was also just finishing his 6 months. His name was Koen but pronounced much more Euro than you just did in your head. Think a "ooa" sound but with your lips all pickered. All us guys went to Chinese food for dinner. Hannah had to catch her flight. . . . Oh, this is funny. It was so warm that when we played cards in the outside patio cafe we Californians had our shirts off; all the Euros had pants and shirts on. Sometimes long sleeves. We Caly folk are casual.

The next day we walked to the bus station for our trip to Arequipa. Bus ride numero uno. It was going to be 16 hours. Here is what my seat looked like . . .

The drive was long with 3 movies in Spanish: Armegedon, the plane movie with Jodie Foster where she freaks out for 2 hours, and Hotel Rwanda. It actually was helpful in recognizing words and practicing your listening skills.

We stopped for dinner and other than that only to pick up other travelers. It was hot, humid, and muggy in the bus. The Peruvians do not like heat but apparently not as much as a breeze. They closed all the windows in the bus whenever it was moving. So 17 hours later we arrived at 8:30am the next day which happens to be today, Thursday, March . . . um, whatever.

We hopped a taxi to the center of town where we eventually found a nice hostel. No dormatory here. Not that we did not want one, they just did not have one and the double room was only 4 soles more than the hostel in Lima.

Got in and walked around . . .

Here is the Plaza de Armas which reminded me of Italy. It had restuarants and shops along the outside and a fountain with pigeons.

We got to experience a politcal rally with signs, burning stuff, and a paper machet devil to convince people to vote for el presidente.

The rally eventually combined into all political parties rally in a circle around the plaza yelling and shouting and marching and driving and honking. It was quite the experience.

We left the mayhem and headed to a park where we would have been able to see the distant volcanoe but it was too overcast.

Here I am over looking some terraced farms with the base of the volcanoe in the back ground. The peak is almost 6000 meters.

Around the park there were other rallies going on but not for politics, for food.


My time is running out. Until next time.

Hasta luego! from Arequipa, Peru.

LAX-ATLANTA-LIMA

We arrived late Monday evening in Lima, hopped abord the Urbanito. Its a little transport that took us right to the doorstep of the hostel we had picked out in the guide. We got in late so we went right to bed. The Hotel España seems to have been an old mansion or hotel back in antiquity, not it has a lot of old statues and paintings and large rooms and courtyards.

It's almost here!

I have been so busy trying to get ready for the trip that I haven't even thought much about it, but it's time. One more day and we are off.
Soon there will be no more worries, I hope :)