My journey continues in a different place if you want to keep up with me you'll have to go to
www.moreinvisobel.blogspot.com (there is also a link at the side of the page)

Adios Amigos
Well all good things must come to and end and for me this is the end of my travels in South America. It's been an amazing life altering experience which I know is what you hear everyone say but it is true. Traveling gives you a new perspective, it shows you that no matter how different people act and look they are still people at the end of the day and that means that they are just like us. All the scenery and the experiences and the new food and the good and bad times mean alot less without the people you meet with whom you share these things. I've met some amazing people in my travels and one of the most surprising things has been the amont of single female travelers I've met, you all thought I was a bit mad going off to South America on my own without a word of spanish but the reality is that the world is full of crazies like me, Aitch, Cassandra, Sonia and many others I've met along the way. If this is crazy I hope never to see sanity again. The last six months have been the most hectic and exciting of my life, I've gained so much from my experiences, about 300 new friends, a floor to crash on in almost any country in the world, a new language, insight into 4 or 5 ancient cultures and a thirst for travel and adventure which I'm sure will never be fully quenched. Many people ask me what was the best place I've been to and that is a really difficult question to answer cause each place has it's own unique charm. I can't even think of many places I wouldn't want to go back to but I suppose the first choice for a revisit would be Rio, and then everywhere else I've been to.
My Final adventure here in Chile was my snowboarding trip the other day, it was practice for my life of New Zealand narliness on the sloaps of middle earth. Mount colorado, about an hour from the center of Santiago, was a great place to board, everytime I got to the top I'd gasp in awe of the most beautiful view ever of the Andes and the dwarfed Santiago in the midst of them. I only fell about 10 times (on each run) but I got going towards the end and was ok at by sundown. We watched the most magnificent sunset on the way down, wait till you see the photos, there are no words to describe this. When it was all over I turned back to see the steady stream of car headlights decending the zig zag road of the mountain like christmas lights on the big mountainous snowey christmas tree.
Thank you all for putting up with my badly spelt ramblings for the past six months and thanks for the feedback about the site it makes it all worth while to know people actually read it. This is only book one there's alot more sequals to come and the next one is set in New Zealand, my time machine awaits me in Santiago airport and I will be transported 2 days into the future to a different world and a new adventure. Hope to see you there!

Santiago, Chile
I arrived yesterday morning to Santiago on the 13 hr bus from Puerto Mont. I´ve heard from many travelers that Santiago is not great for backpackers and I´m out to prove them all wrong. I had a great first night out with Coleen, her daughter Jen and her friend Lucy. We ended up in the Irish bar where Lucy works "Flannerey´s". The genuine Irish publican was thrilled to have a genuine Irish girl in his establishment and especially one who was drunk enough to give a crowd moving (ie. many got up and left) rendition of U2´s "with or without you" in the Karioke.
Today I went to Valpariso for the day but really didn´t get to see much of it as it pissed out of the heavens relentlessly from the moment we arrived till well after we had left (a soft day thank God). So most of Valpariso was seen from the safety of my seat on the bus where the rain on the glass obscured everything into a sort of moving monet painting. Even so we did get to enjoy a good fish meal in "Marriscaria Isabel 3".
The people of Santiago are building a road along the river bed of the large smelly river that runs through the city, they´ve sort of channeled the river along the side of the new road. It all seems pretty crazy to me for a place that is prone to flooding (26 people died in Santiago´s floods last year) and the irony is that after todays heavy rains nature made rivers out of the citys roads while the city attempts to make roads out of natures rivers.

Puerto Mont, Chile
It´s hardly worth putting in a post about Puerto Monte cause it´s such a dull place, I´m only writing it cause I´ve already checked out of my hotel and I´ve another 8 hours before my bus leaves. I would go sightseeing but there´s nothing to see and it´s pissing rain, Puerto Mont is the identical twin of Bray, the pimple in the landscape of an otherwise pretty coastline. I wandered around looking for somewhere to eat yesterday with Coleen from NZ and I found myself looking out for the run down amusement arcades that can be found in Bray. It´s such a strange thing to find such a carbon copy of Bray, even down to the hill at the end of the promenade with the cross on top and the bandstands littering the promende with no sign of a band ever playing in them. I think my best option for the rest of the day is to hunt out ´The Porter House´ and station myself by the fire with a pint.

Bariloche
Well the last couple of days has been like travelling through the seasons for me, at the beginning of the week I was in the mid summer sunshine of Paraty and then the "wear a jumper in the evening" weather of Florinopolis and then on to the Autumnal windy chill of Montevideo and Buenas Aires. I left Bs As last night and traveled through the autumn, the scenery out my window was becoming more brown and orange and the rain was falling as I went to sleep. I woke up this morning as winter was decending on the Patagonian country side, stripping the cypress trees of their leaves so all that remained was lines of tall wispy skeletons deviding the fields. As the day wore on we drove deeper into winter until finally I reached the Patagonian oasis of Bariloche with it's icey lakes and snowey mountains. It's cold here, I only got an idea of how cold it would be when two people at the bus station asked me if I was going to ski in Bariloche. It's also beautiful, like I would imagine Switzerland to be, big lakes, fir trees and huge snow covered mountains, I'm staying in a wodden cabin type of hostel.

Back in Bs As again
Well Uruguay was nice but nothing majorly spectacular about it so I only stayed 2 days and then got the Sea Cat over to Buenas Aires. The V&S hostel is just as it was before, lots of fun, lots of movies and chilling out and usually a big crowd going out at night.

I`ve organised my photos a bit so now if you click "my photos" link at the side of the page it will bring you to my new invisobelphotos page.

Montevideo, Uruguay
I´m not exactly sure what brought me to Uruguay, well I do, it was the 18 and a half hour bus from Florianopolis but I don´t know why I decided to come here. Maybe I just wanted another passport stamp, but it´s sort of on to way to where I´m headed anyway. Darkness fell way before the bus crossed the border so I can´t tell you what the Uruguayan countryside looks like. Soon after crossing the border there was a storm on the distant horizon and I watched the lightening illuminate the sky and make silhouettes out of the previously invisible trees in the foreground. It was compelling viewing and I watched with my face pressed up against the glass for over an hour till I fell asleep like that. It had the feel of every horror movie, it was saying "Isobel go back to the warm sunny beaches, there´s nothing but rain and dingy hotels here". I realised on the bus that I havn´t spoken English in 3 or 4 days. I have only my book to keep me company, The old Patagonia express by Paul Thereaux, I´m beginning to hate Paul Thereaux nearly as much as he hates everything he writes about. He´s a cynical loner who hates travelling and only does it ´cause this hatred gives him something to write about, still it´s not really a bad book. Well I´m off in search of the tourist office, nobody seems to know where it is, I suppose they don´t get many tourists around here and my book seems to know about as much about Uruguay as I do.

Florianopolis, Brazil
Well I'm not actually in Florianopolis I'm in a small village 'Barra de Lagua" on the other side of the Ihla Santa Catheriina, but it's close enough. Surprisingly it's still sunny even though it's a fair bit further south, very cold at night though. It's a beautiful place with the longest sandy beach and great fish restaurants but it's off season so it's sort of like Rosslaire strand in the winter time, all empty summer houses and bored teenagers. I went into the city today and wandered around a bit, I saw lots of Capoeira which is a traditional Brazillian fighting\dance thing. It originates from the African slaves who came over here, they would teach the young people to fight but as they were forbidden to teach fighting they made it look like a dance and played music and chanted with it. All the young people now practice Capoeira, it looks very acrobatic I watched it for nearly an hour, they all stand in a circle and two go head to head in the middle and challengers jump in like cutting in on a dance. They never actually hit each other although sometimes it does get a bit heated and lead to real fighting.

Paraty, Brazil
Paraty is a nice historical, colonial town with four beautiful churches, none of which I've bothered to visit. It's enough to sit in the square listening to the chants and sermons (in Portuguese) blasted out over the loud speaker in the fasion of George Orwell's "1984" Big brother. I've met a lot of Swiss people here, one of whom, sarah, is travelling from England to the Antartic traveling overland by cycle, climbing mountains and sailing across the oceans using only natural power, it's amazing that she hasn't used busses, trains or planes. It's all to raise money and awareness for a charity, SOS childrens villages which you can read more about or donate to on her site which is worth checking out.
Today I went on a schooner trip around some Islands and beaches with the two other Swiss, Suzanne and Lucas, It was really nice and most of the time I spent sunbathing on the deck. It looks like the town is preparing for some sort of festival, perhaps Assension, and if it starts tomorrow I might hang around to see how it goes.

Ihla Grande didn't turn out to be a quiet as I thought it would be, the two bars on the square were fairly lively and the night of the boat trip I went to a bar with an English couple Madeline and James. The organiser of the boat trip, Aber, was there playing the triangle in the local 'mad mans' group. They were great and I'm sure if I was able to understand the lyrics they would have been the funniest songs I ever heard judging from the tone they were sung in the the uncontrolable laughter of the audience. As we arrived we were all handed an instrument, I'm not sure exactly what my instrument was called but I got quite good at it and I became a regular guest of the 'mad mans' group. On my last night Bahiana (the lady from the house who brought me tea) made a nice fairwell dinner of a traditional brazillian fish stew sort of thing, it was really great.
I'm in Paraty now and it's considerably quieter than Ihla Grande, there seems to be loads of nice fish restaurants and cafès though.

I finally got around to leaving Rio and I found my little Island where I can chillax away the next few days to my hearts content. The little Island is ironically called Ihla Grande (pronounced granj) but is about the size of Achill and remarkably similar apart from the lush rainforests and tropical beaches. I found a lovely little room to stay in about 10 mins from the town, there are 3 cats and the lady brings me tea and biscuits in the morning and evening. In the absence of Sonia I've had to learn how to speak Portuguese and it's going fine even though I'm sure most people can tell that I'm doing the 'Spanish with a Russian accent' thing. Yesterday I sat on the beach all day and it was bliss, a nice relaxing start. Today I got a ship, not unlike the Asgard only not quite as nice and a bit smaller, to the two laguns and a few beaches. I did a bit of snorkelling and got even more tanned so now I actually look Brazillian.
I forgot to mention how I was robbed in Rio, it was not as spectacular as it first sounds and is hardly worth writing about at all. I was lieing on the beach in Ipanema and my bag was snatched while I slept. I´m not in the habbit of carrying much important or valuable in the bag and as far as I was concerned the $13 inside is probably worth more to them than it is to me. The thing that annoyed me was that I really liked that bag, Mafe gave it to me and I knew that my lips would burn without the factor 25 lip balm inside (I couldn't buy new lipbalm without money, you see my dilemma). Anyway about an hour later the bag turned up by my feet where it had been flung back by the thoughtfull thieves of Rio, it still contained the lip balm and was just minus the $13. just goes to show that even the criminals of Brazil are sweet as honey and nice as pie.

I still here in Rio, I have changed my flights 'cause I was never realistically going to make it back to Santiago on time. I still spend my days on the beach and my nights on the town. The other night we went to a "Funk" party in a flavella. The flavellas are sort of like ghettos but the "funk" party is really friendly and there hardly ever any trouble at tehm. It was amazing to see Ie never seen anyone dance like that and all the kids from the flavellas dance like professionals. The Party in in a huge warehouse and the music and dancing is really unique, they even have a bastardized versoin of the "walls of Limerick" and I'm pretty sure it's never been danced like that in any self respecting ceili. Yesterday Sonia left us all in a blubbering ball of sobs as she returned to the UK, it was the saddest day of the year. Rio just won't be the same without her so I'm going to leave tomorrow and spend a couple of days recouperating on a tropical island with a jar of vitamin pills and a couple of books.

I´m still here in Rio and in the mind of never leaving, it´s the most beautiful city which is almost woven between the mountains and beaches that are so much part of it. By day our lives revolve around the beach, either Ipanema or Copacobana where I usually lie motionless in a hungover state with someone painting a henna tatoo on me while I sip the milk from a fresh coconut. The other more energetic and healthy type play volley ball or ´work out´ and it has to be said they are nice to watch. On every street corner there is a juice bar which generally is vital to get the day started. By night Rio really starts to come to life, the streets are dancing to the sounds of the afro latin choonz coming from every bar and the people are lively, happy, tall, tanned, beautiful and free. The crowd in my hostel are great, our room is a small dorm with 5 girls, we´ve a kitchen and bathroom and table and chairs and a little garden which makes it feel like our own little apartment, all the dorms are like that. each night things start off in the comon area of the hostel with everyone drinking and meeting the new arrivals. At about midnight we head for the bars or clubs where the party continues untill the early hours. Everyone heads down to the beach bars before sunrise to get their meat on a stick or corn on the cob and we stay there to watch the day begin. It´s always someones last day but generally they miss their bus or flight and then we´ve to do the same all over again next night to say farewell again.

More Photos

So now I have some time to write, and there's so much to fill in since Buenas Aires, it's been a non stop Phileas Fogg type journey since the amazing Shakira concert. Sonia and I got the over night bus to Iguassu falls and as we were on the border anyway we decided to cross over to Brazil. The Falls from the Brazillian side were beautiful but the best bit was meeting up with Sonias friend Carmen who is a flight instructor. She took us each up for a flight in a two seater plane and we flew over the Itaipu dam which is the biggest in the world. I got to fly the plane for a bit and it was so scary but great. The next day we went with our massive hangovers (after meeting up with Lizzie, Ciara N's sister the night before) to the Argentinian side of the falls which were much more spectacular than the Brazillian side. We went in a dingy along the river and saw alegators and turtles and loads of jungle. That night we got the overnight bus to Curitiba, slept for a couple of hours in a strange asylum type of hostel thing and then got a flight to Rio. Rio is amazing, our first night we went to the Friday night street party in Lapa and learned how to samba, I can see how carnival here would be amazing, this was just a normal Friday night and the atmosphere was like a carnival. There were food stalls and drink stalls and little capsules of honey alcohol (like mead) and music of all different types came out of every building along the street. Next night after going up in the cable car to see the sunset over Rio we went back for more samba in Lapa. Even though it wasn't street party night it was still great and there was probably just as many people there. We met up with some girls from Ipanema, and they were tall and thin and young and lovely just as the song describes. So today as the sun was blaring we decided to spend the day on Ipanema beach and it was beautiful. I can see why Brazillians are so happy, if there were beaches like this everywhere the whole world would be happy. Where to next and how to get to santiogo I have no idea.

Copacobana beach, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Ok this has to be really quick and there´s so much to say. What am I doing here on the wrong side of South America? How did I get here? what were the Iguassu falls like? why does Portuguese sound like spanish with a russian accent? how did I get to fly a plane last week? How was Shakira? How can I get over to Santiago for less than $100? so many questions and not enough time to answer any of them..untill next time.

Buenas Aires has followed the grand south American tradition of Ironically naming their capital cities. Calling a huge smog infested, poluted city Buenas Aires (good air) is just as crazy as calling the politically unstable frequently rioted in, thieves paradise city La Paz (the peace). Buenas Aires is for me the smell of sweet nuts roasting on every street corner, the taste of food so good it could be the mediteranian and the sound of tango music pouring out of every cafe in the Boca as the "tango man" drags me in to join the party with the result of me standing on everyones toes (that one lesson did nothing for me). The past few days here with Sonia and Adam (we are the 3 little clubbing puppies of Buenas Aires) have been wonderfull and tiring. I went to my first ever live football match, I know I`ve always said that I hate football with a passion due the the excessive amount of the colour green, well now I think I can call myself an avid fan of River Plate. The atmosphere was amazing, the Argentinians love their football, the stadium was an explosion of singing, jumping, rubbish throwing red and white fans. I screamed with the best of them at the top of my voice "Vamos vamos vamos River Plate" and learnt a whole dictionary worth of new spanish swear words to hurl with hatred at the refferee or opposing team member.
Most of the rest of my time in Buenas Aires has been spent shopping or clubbing till the small hours of the morning and tonight is to be the icing on the cake as we`ve got tickets for Shakira. It`s in the River stadium so the memories and atmosphere of the football match will be there to make it even better. Can`t wait, think I´d better get some sleep first.

Buenas Aires
Salta pretty much finished up as it started out, lots of eating and drinking and dancing, it was great and I met loads of really nice people. After Salta I spent a few days in Mendoza visiting the vinyards and quaffing copious amounts of wine accompanied by more of that great food. Last night I got the posh bus to BA with Sonia and Adam, and we have football matches, concerts and tango to look forward to.

We had a barbeque in the hostel last night, more lovely Argentinian meat, and lots of it, I think I ate a whole cow. The say you need the wine to help digest it so I drank a whole cows worth of wine too. So today I decided to go Paragliding with the 3 other Irish girls in the hostel and the Irish guy from the hostel round the corner, more Irish jumping off a cliff than you can shake a stick at. It was a really beautiful day so the view from up there in the sky was amazing, the valley of Salta surrounded by loads of green mountains. The paragliding was great, I got to go 2ce `cause the first time there weren`t enough thermals to keep me up for very long so we landed straight away. The second time there was a good bit of wind and we were spiraling away, it`s surprisingly relaxing.

Well here`s a really quick one. I`m still in Salta having a ball, it`s a beautiful cosmo city and the food is great, like discovering I have taste buds again. The crowd in the hostel are all so nice and every night we go out for a meal that is rapidly altering my top 10 meals of all time list, I think after 7 more meals I`ll have nothing but Argentina on the list. Today I climbed the mountain, I had to, all this great food will have me the size of Brazil by the end of the week if I don`t start to do something about it. All the good work was undone at the top when I felt the need to chillax for about 4 hours in a hammack with a large bottle of beer. well almost time for dinner so I`m off.

Salta, Argentina
Another day another stamp on the passport! I arrived in Salta thismorning and was surprised to find what looked like any European city. They have proper roads, footpaths, clean toilets and the hostel is really nice. I had breakfast with my roomate, Christine and there was real coffee, orange juice with bits and warm croissants, three months in south America can really make you appreciate the good things in life. After breakfast I called home for the first time in ages, it was great to speak to Dad again. We wandered around the easter market for a couple of hours after that and it was like Portabello (London) on a sunny day. This was followed by lunch on the terrace, watching the people go by, it felt like a day of decadance, I think I`m going to like Argentina.

Tupiza
All on my own again now as the others went up to Sucre on Tuesday and I decided to hang on in Potosi till wednesday and then endure the 8 hr night bus to Tupiza arriving at 4 in the morning. Tupiza is near to where Butch Cassidy and the sundance kid met their untimely demise. In honour of the two I took a 5 hour horse trek through the desert yesterday and it was real wild west territory, red rocked canyons and cactus everywhere. The best bit was galloping back along the rail road shouting like cowboys. Last night I watched Butch cassidy and the sundance kid in the hotel for the second time in 2 weeks, well worth a second viewing.

Click here to see photos of the Salt Flats and the Silver mines

Potosi
Saturday night was a great change from makeshift desert food as we went to Kactus Restaurant in Uyuni and has nice chilean wine, Llama steak and best of all heating! Our group had snowballed from 6 to 15 people including one Irish girl, they're like busses really I don`t see any for 3 months and then all of the sudden I meet 2 in one week. A great night was had by all. SO we got upearly yesterday morning to catch the rickety, shakey bus to Potosi, it broke down about every 15 mins making the journey through the desert an allday affair. All I could do when I arived was sleep. Another early start this morning to go to the silver mines. We first stopped off at the miners market to pick up gifts for the miners, it`s really crazy what is legal here. We bought coca leaves, coca cigarettes (for that real cocaine taste), pure alcohol 98% for the miners to fight of the thought of evil spirits and last but definitly not least Dynamite, to have a few explosions. The mines are a co-operative, so whatever a miner finds is his, there is no safety standards or precautions and they say that the average miner only lives for about 10 years after he enters the mine. The conditions there can only be described as medieval, with no modern tools just crude hand tools and lots of dynamite used indescriminately. All this for an average income of about $3 per day. All the same we had great fun climbing through tiny holes in the dark with our carbon head lamps and their naked flames. so I`ve spent today uploading som eof the photos and I`ll put in a link in a min.

Taking up from where I left off...... Cassandra and I got the train eventually from Ororo to Uyuni, the most beautiful train journey through the desert watching the most colourful sunsetin the distance, I glad we didn´t get the nightmare bus judging from Don and Aitches account of it. We arrived in Uyuni and it reminded me of a sort of wild west ghost town in the desert. I didn´t realise it would be soooooo cold, I suppose it´s nearly 4000m after all. I hooked up with a motely crew of 5 others from all over to do the 4 day tour of the salt flats, Caroline and Dave from England, Kirith from India, Yair from Israel and Adrian from South Carolina. They´re a great bunch to travel with, it was sad to say goodbye to Cassandra after 2 weeks, hopefully we meet again.
The tour of the Salt flats was amazing we started off with the locomotive graveyard, a bunch of abandoned steam trains in the middle of the desert (everything is in the middle of the desert here) It was really amazing to see the rusting carcases of something that would probably be put in a meuseum at home. We traveled that whole first day through the beautiful desert terrain, passing by the herds of Llama and deer, it seemed like we had been transported to another planet, the mountains were a million different colours. Our first night was spent in a strange mud village (again the middle of nowhere) and it was soo cold, even in all my clothes and 7 blankets. It was here that we saw our first night sky of the desert, where every star of the milky way can be seen so clearly and the sky seems to have no beginning and no end. The Second day we went to visit the lakes and the guysers and the thermal waters. The lakes were a surreal colour against the brown of the mountains and the desert and the guysers were like an angry boiling put of slurpy nud, wow! That second night was spent in a hostel on it´s own miles from anything, it was made of those adobe mud bricks and was also freezing cold, even colder than the first night. In the morning of the third day we went to Laguna blanca and took about a million photos of the flamingos, then on to Salvador Dali´s rocks and the tree of rock and a million more pictures. On our final night we rocked up to the scariest hostel which had a Llama carcus in the yard and meat curing on the lines, luckily we decided not to stay there and opted for the nice hostel on the other side of the village which had electricity (till 9.30) and toilet seats! still cold though. Our final day we woke at 3.30am to see the sunrise from the salt flats, they save the best for last. I´ve never seen or imagined anything like it, the crystalised salt for miles and miles as far as the horison. we saw the sunrise from where it´s covered in water so as far as you can see it´s just sky or reflection of sky and you can´t tell which is which. We then went to Isla de pascado, an Island in the salt covered in cactus, it was great to walk on the salt with the dog who didn´t know the world was any different from this. Our final stop was the the salt hotel which was like the ice hotel in Sweden only it´s made of salt (which looks the same anyway) they don´t have guests thought ´cause they never sorted out the drainage.
So after travelling for 4 days with one tape int eh 4x4 I never want to hear Tina Charles again, I´ve a sunburnt face, all my clothes are covered in dust and I splashed out an extra $2 for a room with a private bath. Now the lads are outside having a beer so I think´I´ll join them.

ok I`ve added more photo`s to my photo`s link, enjoy

Oruro
Just waiting around Oruro for the train to uyuni which the Lonely planet said was supposed to be at 11 but as with loads of stuff in the Lonely planet it`s wrong and the trains not till 3.30. So after all I didn`t have to wake up at 4 thismorning to leave La Paz but of course I only found that out when we arrived to the station in Oruro on time for the so called 11 o`clock train. I put more photo`s up yesterday but I don`t have them at the same link as the last ones so I`ll wait till I figure out how to do that before you can see them. I`m too tired to write this today I think I`ll just chat to Molly instead. I think this has to go down in history as the most boring post ever.

Back in loud smelly dirty La Paz again
SO we braved the road of death one more time to come back to La Paz, considering the fact that on average 2 busses per week go off the edge we were really taking our chances. We got a 4x4 back, kindly arranged by the American guy Eric who we met in the bar the night before. We were so glad of the safety of the 4x4 because there was a big storm the night before and between the landslides and bus wreckage there wasn´t so much left of the road of death to come back over, it took us about 7 hours to make the usually 3 hour journey. anyway we´re safe and sound and back in the riotland again.

I`ve added a sub blog of other peoples mail's there`s a link along the side if you`re interested, also I put a link to Brandee and Cassandras sites.

Coroico
I arrived in Coroico on Wednesday by taking a bus trip down the most dangerous road in the world (officially), it`s called the 'el camino del muertes' the road of death. I thought I was being a dare devil but the others had cycled down it the day before and it took them seven hours (see aitches mail ) . Coroico is worth the risk though, it`s a beautiful village in the middle of the most spectacular mountains. Our hotel Hotel Esmeralda is amazing perched on the mountain side, our balcony has a perfect view of the mountains in the evening that are all different shades of blue the further back they go until the snowcapped ones at the back. Cassandra, Omid and I decided to stay a few extra days, this is becoming a bit of a habit for us. Yesterday we spent the day sunning ourselves by the pool then when the sun went in we moved on the sauna followed by a big buffet dinner and a couple of bottles of good chilean wine. Then to top the whole day off we watched 'Butch Cassidy and the sundance kid' in the movie room (like a cinema only with couches) "let`s go some place like Bolivia and rob some banks". Thismorning we decided to relive some of the scenes from the movie by renting a couple of horses for a three hour rideout to the waterfalls, it was nice but raining most of the time and I think the guy mistook my 'quiero uno cabaillo tranquillo' for a 'quiero uno cabaillo muerto'. Thanks to the sauna after I`m not feeling so stiff now. So it`s back to La Paz for more riotious gunfire and the like, why can`t it all just be like Coroico.

La Paz
I`m still in La Paz and enjoying the life and madness of this city even if it is a little hard to breath between the smog and the altitude. Something seems to be happening here, I`m not quite sure what it is. I was told that all the social and political unrest had calmed down since the riots a couple of weeks ago but there has been some sort of mass protest every day since I`ve been here. One day the coca farmers the next the teachers and all the time there are loud cracks which we`re not sure are gunshots or fireworks. Yesterday was a bit strange, there were riot police on every street corner and we heard gunshots in the main government square (no mistaking them for fireworks this time). when I was walking back from the cinema last night with Josh and all the protestesters were in their bed we were directed away from the government building by an armed guard and we noticed that alot of the windows were broken. I`m going to make a second attempt to go to Coroico today as some roadblocks yesterday prevented me from catching my bus. Reading back on this it sounds like a crazy situation but the reality is that life in La Paz goes on as normal, it doesn`t seem to effect things as much as it would at home.

click here to see my photos

Thanks for the help waltzer, much apreciated!

And at last the moment you´ve all been waiting for...................some photo´s of my journey have been uploaded to the web. The only problem is that I don´t know how to put a link into blogger so I think you just have to copy and paste, Mom and Dad I will send you detailed instructions by e-mail on how to see the photos. If anybody does know how to put a link into blogger please don´t hesitate to send me a mail and let me know, maybe waltzer or Manzor can help me out here.

http://www.shutterfly.com/osi.jsp?i=67b0de21b33a5fa8a45b

enjoy!

La Paz, Bolivia
I arrived in Bolivia on Monday, I got the bus to Copacobana with Aitch and Casandra. Copacobana is a small town by lake Titikaka and stayed in a beautiful (but expensive at $6 per night) hostel called la Cupula. It was raining when I arrived in Copacobana and the rugged landscape by the lake reminded me of the west of Ireland. On Tuesday a group of about seven of us got the ferry over to the Isla del sol with the plan to stay there for the day and hike from north to south. The hike was really nice but you could feel the altitude (about 4,000m) so we were pretty wrecked when we got to the south, too wrecked to look for another place to stay when the woman from 'Imperio del Sol' was really rude to us. Casandra and I decided to stay another night on the Island because it was so peaceful and sunny there, of course we changed to a friendlier hostel (inti wayra). We could see the snow capped peaks of Chacaltaya from the Island and in the evening we sat on the roof of our hostel with Omid, Jane and Patrice drinking bad wine under the light of the milky way. We couldn`t bring ourselves to leave the Island the next morning as the sun was shining again and despite our lack of sun block and clean clothes we knew there were card games to be played and treks to be made. It was Saturday before Our newly formed family got around to leaving the Island to go to La Paz , all quite smelly due to the shortage of running water on Isla del Sol. We picked up Brandy (not the drink, the girl from California) in copacabana.
Now we`re in La Paz, from the highest Island in the world to the highest city in the world. It`s almost a step back to reality because on the island there was no tv, no newspapers, no radio and no war, here we are surrounded by full colour reminders that the world is not all as peaceful as Isla del sol. We are staying in the millenio hostel which is a nice family place with a kitchen and even a puppy to play with. Last night Omid cooked a great vegitarian curry and we drank more bad Bolivian wine, it seems like a nice relaxed place to stay for a couple of days.

Well it's been four days since I last wrote this thing and they have arguably been the best four days since I started out. We got the bus to Ollentaytambo on Thursday afternoon and then got the train to Aguas Callientes, my first train journey in South America but I didn't see much as it was getting dark. We stayed in the darkest, dampest, smelliest, flea ridden hostel in town and woke at 4 in the morning to climb Machu Piichu {say it really fast in a healium voice at regular intervals through out the day and it'll brighten up your life}. It was a steep climb and took just over an hour but the altitude isn't so high so it wasn't as difficult as Huarez. We got to Machu Piichu on time for sunrise on the day of the spring equinox and although it was too cloudy to see sunrise Machu Piichu is the most incredible thing I've ever seen. It is so breath taking, the Incas chose the most beautiful place for their city, words cannot describe the beauty of this place, even pictures can't do justice cause it's so peacefull and spiritual. I bumped into Aitch, Don and Cam up there, they had just completed the 4 day inca trail so I can imagine how rewarding a site Machu Piichu was for them. The hot springs in Aguas Callientes were so perfect after our hike back down the mountain. We were sitting in the hot springs surrounded by the most breath taking mountain views of the Andes, drinking clod beer with small rain drops cooling down our hot heads while we remembered what a great day we just had and forgot for a short while that the world was all going mad blowing itself up. We came back to Cusco on Saturday morning and this time got to see all teh beautiful views. There was ll sorts of maddness with the trains as there was a landslide on the track so loads of people were stuck in Aguas Calientes for an extra day. On Saturday afternoon I went up to Saqsihauman {pronounced sexy woman} The main fortress of the capital of the inca empire, it was amazing and there was a great view of the city of cusco up there. Yesterday we went to Pisaq and walked over the mountain from the ruins to the Pisaq market, which had everything including the best empanadas cooked in this huge big clay oven. Well I'm taking some chillaxation time now in Cusco and trying to decide where to go, what to do, who to go with next. I met another girl who has a blog and we both aggreed that the absence of a spell checker on this is ruining our street cred among the inteligencia.

I´m still in Cusco and really liking this town, last night we checked out the local night life and there was lots of salsa dancing and cuba libres, great fun. We´re also watchin closely the movements of the war, of all the different nationalities I´ve met here, I have yet to come accross a person who supports it. I´m staying in a place with a tv (hospadaje estrelito, nice friendly, free breakfast) so we have CNN and BBC world filling us in up to the minute, it´s hard to know what sort of byist opinion we´re geting but I still don´t aggree with the war.
Today we´re going to get a bus and train to Aguas Calientes which is the nearest village to Machupiichu and in the morning we´ll walk up to the ruins. I decided not to do the inca trail ´cause it´s pissing rain everyday and I think that 25 years living in Ireland is enough rain for anyone without adding to it a 4 day uphill trek at an altitude of about 4000m.

I didn?t manage to get a flight to Cusco yesterday which is just as well ?cause I realised it was st. Paddy?s day and had to go and find the nearest Irish pub to celebrate. We went to Murphys in Miraflores and had a green pint, there wasn?t really much happening there but it wasn?t a bad spot. We had a really nice night in the hostel with John?s great Veggie curry and a bottle of whiskey for Irish coffees all round. I had to get up at 5.30 thismorning to catch the flight to Cusco and my head was fairly groggy, I only got to bet about 4 hours before. One of the girls who works in the hostel dropped me to the airport and said that I?d always have a home in Lima if I came back, I think that the Peruvians are very like the Irish. I?m in Cusco now and as I suspected I?ve just missed Aitch and co. for the inca trail but I?m feeling too lazy to start it today anyway so I think I?ll hang around here for a few days. Cusco seems like a really nice place and th鲥 are lots of travellers around so it should be good craic.

Lima
I spent a few days in Huarez with Sam and Ben to do a bit of hiking. We climbed to 4,500m to a lake and there was snow near by. Most of the climb was just a trek but the altuitude made it really hard and I was fairly dizzy, the last bit was a rock climb and that was really hard, even harder getting back down again. It was all worth the effort though, it was a really nice day and I only got one blister. The people in Peru are really friendly, happy and welcoming, more so that anywhere else I've been to, the old women even share their fruit with us on the bus. I`m in Lima now, on the way in on the bus it looked like a rubbish dump. We`re staying in Miraflores which must be the posh area `cause it`s much cleaner and is almost like any big city. I`m going to try to get a flight to Cusco today to meet up with the montenita party posse if they havn`t gone ahead to do the inca trail without me.

Peru
I arrived in Peru two days ago on the night bus accompanied by the motley crew from the hostel in Vilcabamba. When we got to Puira some of us decided to continue on to Trujillo making our journey an epic 20 hours in total. The landscape we passed along the way was very different from what I saw in Ecuador. It was all desert and abandoned buildings, it reminded me of some sort of post-apocalyptic scene. I'm staying in Huanchaco, a small fishing village near Trujillo, they have great seafood here and really big surf. Yesterday I went on a culture day to see all the pre inca ruins in the area, some of them are pretty spectacular especially the temple of the moon and the city of Chan chan. They are made of this adobe clay stuff and the Chan chan place reminded me of the village in Starwars that Anakin Skywalker is from.

I have just spent the most glorious couple of days relaxing in Vilcabamba, I stayed in Las Ruinas de Quierna, thanks for the recomendation Aitch, it was more like a luxury hotel than a hostel. There was a Jacoozi, Sauna, steam room, pool and a big slap up meal in the evenings all included for $9 not to mention that the rooms all had a tv in them. Today I went on a four hour ride out around the mountains, the horses were really good and healthy and we were galloping around like a gang of cowboys and indians. It was great but my legs feel so sore now and I´m not looking forward to the 10 hour nighbus I´m about to take into Peru.

After many failed attempts I finally got to leave Montenita after the last party in Johny bamboos which went on till we got a lift out of there at 6 thismorning. Its easy to see how people get settled there, most of the local businesses are set up by backpackers who never got round to leaving.
Top 10 reasons for not being able to leave Montenita
1. You´re waiting too long for your burger in the funkey monkey and miss the bus.
2. When you do get to the bus on time its full and won´t let you on.
3. You take up surfing.
4. Somebody offers you a bar to run which involves free drink and free rent for as long as you want.
5. You can´t find your sandals.
6. You can´t find that one person you really want to say goodbye to.
7. Too hungover to face the busride.
8. You have run out of cash and only have $1.25 to get to Libertad to the bank machine and getting there and back will take the best part of a day.
9. You have found the best place ever to stay where you feel at home (Panguia guest house) and you don't want to face dirty smelly backpackers hostels just yet.
10. you have fallen in love with montenita .

So now I´m on Cuenca, all alone again but hopefully I´ll be able to catch up with H and the others over the next few days.

All the lads from the hostel in Quito came to Montenita to join us for carnival. We´re staying in a great beach house, I think we got the last available bed, floor or tent space in town. It's been the most amazing few days chilling out on the beach watching the surf competitions in the day and joining in the carnival at night, that goes on till the sun rises. we´re all living on a staple diet of funky monkey burgers, banana shakes and cuba libre (rum and coke). I wore my mexican wrestling mask out the other night and was armed with my water pistol and water balloons, they don´t dress up here for carnival but I think they´re going to start after seeing how well the mask went down.

I finally got around to leaving Quito with a girl called Helen from the hostel. We went to Banos and had an extreme sports day on wednesday, climbed a volcano, really hard climb, I thought the altitude would kill me. We ran half way down and mountain biked the rest, very scary stuff but great fun. Now I'm in Montenita cause we forgot to get off the bus as Riobamba and I´m nursing my wounds, I have a black toe. Have to be quick ´cause this is really expensive internet.

Still in Quito and loving it here. the hostel is beginning to feel like home and the people there are like a family. Every evening we all sit around the living room and watch a movie and sometimes we all chip in to make a barrel of rum punch. Yesterday I went around the old town, alot of guide books say to be carful of being robbed or attacked there so I didn´t bring any valuables. This was a good plan ´cause they would have got soaked in the massive water fight, the only fear of attack is from gangs of kids carrying water baloons and supersoakers. I bought a water pistol but it was a weak defence against the constant attacks, I even got covered in flour and this strange foamy red die, it´s so funny, everyone from little kids to old ladies in traditional ecuadorian costume join in. I´m a prime target for everyone I think there must be a rule where by you get double points for hitting a Gringa. I can´t believe things are already this crazy here and carnival doesn´t even start till friday, Id say it´s just going to be insane, I might go to the coast for it they say its even more fun there. I.m not sure I can handle more fun but I suppose I´ll have to try. There´s another rum an coke party at the hostel tonight, more mingling to be done.

Quito, Ecuador
It was really sad saying goodbye to Caty and Claire yesterday, I'll really miss the two of them and Mexico. I travelled almost the whole day, had to spend a couple of hours in Panama and my flight arrived into Quito at about 9.30 at night. By 11.30 I was already sambaing away with my third rum and coke in hand, still wearing the tracksuit bottoms I wore on the plane. I'm staying in a really friendly hostel called 'el centro del mundo' and there was a party already going on as I walked through the door, there was a big barrel of rum and coke to encourage mingling. There's a great carnival atmosphere in Quito and the whole city is involved in a three week water fight for carnival, we got a drive by supersoaking thismorning on our way to the market. I think I'm going to like it here.

Today is my last day in Mexico, from tomorrow I´ll be all alone, left to discover whatever they have to offer in South America. I can´t believe it has all flown by so fast and that the first leg of my journey is over. Mexico had more than I ever could have imagined, it´s a land of differences, from tropical rainforests to paradise beaches to massive cities. I could have stayed for a year and still not have seen everything but what I did see in my short visit was so awe inspiring that I think I´ll keep coming back here forever. Everything about Mexico is brilliant, the people, the food, the culture and the history. It was so easy to travel around, so easy to meet people and experience places and things that are worlds apart from where I began. It´s a bit scary heading to a new place on my own, but my theory is that the world is round and if you travel in circles you always end up back where you started, it´s what you see along the way that makes life more interesting.

We are in Tulum now, we only spent one night in Palenque. Palenque was beautiful, the ruins in the jungle were spectacular and we even saw the howler monkeys up close ´cause we went to the ruins really early in the morning. The place we were staying in was like some sort of hippy hell, we could smell the patchulia as our taxi pulled up. It was like some sort of hilliday camp for hippies, and you just know that half the 'chilled out' enlightened folk there are really merchant bankers at home. They drowned out the sound of the howler monkeys with their bongo drums and blocked out the sight of the fireflys dancing in the moonlight with their fire on a stick twirling hippy clown antics. Instead of good mexican food they served organic vegitarian slop, our cabana was like a mosquito infested hole in the ground. We got out of there as fast as we could and now we´re in tulum, a virtual paradise with white sand beaches and tourquise waters and hardly an incense stick in sight. Here we can really relax, that´s just what we plan to do for the next few days.

We've been in the jungle for the past 5 days, it was amazing. We went to the jungle on Saturday, we got a truck to txuclula and then a boat up the river for 2 hours to Emiliano Zapata and then treked for two hours to camp by the Laguna Miramar, it was so beautiful. We arrived in darkness the last half hour of trekking was done by maglite, going back that way yesterday I wonder how we made it alive it was trecherous enough in daylight. Getting there was like a test of endurance, we even came accross some Zapatistas and had to pay protection money to them. All the craziness was worth it for the four days of perfect bliss by the lagun, it was like paradise on earth, we slept to the constant roar of the howler monkeys and by day explored the lagun by boat playing on the little volcanic rock formations and basking in the sunshine, I could have stayed there forever. We camped for 4 nights by the lagun, we were with a mexican guy called Alehandro (he was our guide) and a Basque guy called Eneko, both tanned fit and gorgeous, and they were like our supermen, they saved our lives about fifty times and built us bonfires, cooked for us and basically kept us entertained. One night we went crocodile hunting in one of the canoes, we saw one but it wasn´t a very good view just the red eye glowing against the maglite. I accidentally stood on a crocodile egg, I feel evil. I'm now really tanned and skinny after hanging around the lagun in my bikini for 4 days. Yesterday we got a Truck (one of those open topped ones) from Zapata to Ocesingo, it was bassically 9 hours through a dirt track in the jungle, like white water rafting without the water, mostly I was standing up cause it was more comfortable than sitting on the sacks of corn. We made great friends with all the Mexicans on the truck teaching them English while they tought us their local mayan language, an experience I´ll never forget. We stayed in Ocesingo last night 'cause we couldn´t face another bus after the truck, I missed the jungle and the sounds of the howler monkeys but it was nice to have a real bed and a shower to wash the thick layer of dirt that was on us. We´re going to Palenque today and will be there for a day or two then on to Tulum where we´ll probably stay untill the end.

Chiapas
We're now in San Christobal de las casas, I've been sick for the past 2 days it`s so great to be feeling better again so I can enjoy this place. The mayan culture is still alive and well in Chiapas and the women go about their everyday life in colourfull traditional costumes with children strapped to their backs and large bundles on their heads. We`re meeting lots of great people at the hostel and really enjoying the pace of life here. Today we got a bus ( volkswagen combi van crammed full of indigenous people and livestock driven by suicidal, homicidal, mexican wannabe rally driver) to San Juan chamula, which is an Indian village in the mountains, well higher up in the mountains then. It`s a really strange place where the ancient Mayan culture and beliefs and the enforced catholicism merge with popular culture to result in something very unique. There were healings taking place in the 'church' and coca cola is held sacred 'cause the burp releases the evil spirits from within you. We`re going into the jungle tomorrow for a 5 day trek, I`m pretty sure I can`t update my blog from there so I'll let you know how it was when I get back.

Still in Oaxaca!
we're getting the night bus out of here tonight. I forgot to say how great Mazunte was the other day ´cause I was so tired. We went for only one day 'cause it was only 20 mins from Puerto Angel, if we didn´t have to get the bus back to Oaxaca to meet Claire we could have stayed there for ever. The place was so chilled out and everyone was so friendly, they were mostly backpakers like us who came for the day but never got around to leaving. A guy called Juan brought us along the cliffs to a place where everyone goes to watch the sunset over the pacific, he was right when he said we couldn't leave Mazunte without seeing it. We met up with Claire in Oaxaca on Sunday so now we have three in our little travelling group which is really nice. Last night we met two more Irish IT refugees Liam and Ivan (not the ones from SF). I think the economic down turn of 2002 has created a large community of Irish world travellers with a redundancy package in their back pockets. We went back to the bar where the great music was playing and it sort of became our local, everyone in there knew our names and we were even at a lock in there last night.
Well I'd better go and prepare myself for the 12 hour bus journey to Chiapas tonight.

This`ll be really quick `cause I`m wrecked tired after my first overnight bus trip. We got the bus back to Oaxaca last night, it looked like a cool retro 50`s bus like in American movies so we were thrilled. The novelty wore off after about 20 mins when it became obvious we weren`t going to get any sleep over the roaring engine, screaming kids, constantly chatting Mexicans (you`d think they`d get the day bus if they wanted to talk) and the bumpy windy road which had us thrown around like ragdolls. well we`re here now and I already miss the beach, at least I had a chance to work on my tan for a few days.

Havn´t been near a computer for the past few days cause we´ve been at the beach. We got the bus to Puerto Angel on Wednesday and it took 7 hours across windy roads over the mountains. It was really strange all the different landscapes and climates we passed on the way, first desert and then tropical forests and finally the beach. It´s like paradise here, Puerto Angel is a small fishing village with beautiful beaches all around. The first night we arrived we watched the fishermen bring in the tuna and then later on that night we ate it on the beach where their wives cooked it. We went to Zipolite on thursday and it´s a great beach with huts all along where you can rent a hammock for the night for 30 pesos. Yesterday we went on a boat around the whole area, we swam with turtles and went snorkling, there were loads of colourful fish and different types of coral to see. We´re going to Mazunte today and then we´ll get the night bus back to Oaxaca to meet Caty´s friend Claire. Sorry for not mailing anyone but the sun is shining and there´s an awefull lot of laying around doing nothing to be done, so Adios Amigos.

Just read over yesterday`s entry, I should use full stops more often. We were going to go to the beach today but I woke with a massive hangover so couldn`t face the 5 and a half hour busride. Only one of the blokes turned up last night, John from Dublin, he was sound and we all went to a great bar with a singer songwriter session was on and the beers were only 10 peso`s. We have discovered Mexico`s answer to Janice Joplin, if anyone knows any music producers come over to Oaxaca and sign her up. I shouldn`t have gone for that second Mescal though, I`m feeling the pain today. We decided to do something not too hard today so we went to see the fattest tree in the world. While there we met two extremely good looking Norwegians, after about 10 mins conversation we had to loose them `cause I was about to hang myself with the bordom, how can something so beautiful be so empty? I think I better go now `cause those malaria tabs are making me feel sick (I swear it`s not the mescal).

Today we went to Monte Alban, it´s really amazing, it´s a Zapotek Pyramid site on the top of a mountain with the most beautiful panoramic views. It was really peaceful up there it felt like the top of the world. Monte Alban is not as big or well touristy as Teotihaucan, it´s also less intimidating. We got the bus there but managed to get the wrong bus, the driver didn´t charge us I suppose they have a policy of the first two Gringas going free, anyway we had to walk about half an hour up the side of the mountain with an old German (possibly Pedophile) gentleman. Once we got rid of the German I managed to pick up 4 gringos at the top of the pyramid (fine fit lads who had cycled up the mountain) and we´re meeting them for beer in about an hour, should be fun.

We´re still in Oaxaca and it´s beginning to feel a bit like home, the internet cafe sort of smells like feet though. Thismorning we went ot the market in Tlaclula, it´s bout an hour´s bus ride away through the desert on the second class bus. The second class bus station was our first real glimse of mexico as third world country, it´s a sort of ´jump over the dead dog´place. Tlaclula was a small town completely converted into a market on sundays, it was kind of scary actually but there were loads of colourfully dress indigenous people who wouldn´t let me take their photo. There was alot of tack on sale but also a few hand crfts, not as nice or cheap as the ones in the market we found behind the church in Oaxaca. well I think it´s about time for a cerveza now.

Oaxaca
We left Mexico city on Thursday and stopped off in Teohaucan to stay in Don Luciano´s hotel for the night. The hotel was great and the mole poblana was the best ever. Now we´re in Oaxaca (woo-hack-ahh) and it´s really sunny. Oaxaca is a really nice town, there always seems to be something happening, there´s loads of native arts for sale and the center is really friendly and lively. We´re staying in posada margerita, it´s got lot´s of atmosphere and a lovely courtyard where we had breakfast thismorning. There´s a parrot in the courtyard but I don´t know if he says much other than the odd wolf whistle.

Just been in an Earthquake! it was like being on a ship, also the electricity went off. It didn´t seem like a very big earthquake but it lasted quite a long time, we dived for cover under the door frame. We can´t go downtown for our Cerveza now ´cause all the buildings have been evacuated and we won´t get through with all the people on the streets. We just heard on the news that the epicentre is on the Colima coast, they also felt it in Puebla, they´re on the phone now. Caty feels a bit sea-sick. The earthquake was 7.6 on the richter scale, I hope there wasn´t too much dammage. I saw the smoke come out of the volcano the other day natural disasters r us in Mexico.

Mexico City
Well I´m back in Mexico city again, just for a few days. We went to Mexican wrestling in Puebla last night, it was like nothing I´ve ever seen. The arena was like ´´Amores Perros´´ we were in behind a cage watching it. I even bought a mexican wrestling mask, we all wore them in the car on the way home, I wonder if that is against the law in Mexico.
Today we got the bus to Mexico city and it took an hour longer than it should have because there was some sort of accident, instead of waiting in traffic the bus turned off the road and drove accross the dusty fields to another road and went around another way to the station. One guy even got out of the bus to direct it around the trees. When we got to Mexico we went to Coyoacan and saw the Freida Kahlo Museum and had the Comida Corrida at a small restaurant.
The weather is colder than expected here but during the day it´s warm enough, I think it´ll get warmer as we head down south.
I´m off for Cervezas now.

Puebla
I´m still here in Peubla with Mafe and Barry, on Friday we spent the day in Cholula where we saw the pyramids, we were even inside one of them. Cholula is a nice town with a great night life, there seems to be alot of students around there. We spent last night in Atlixco where Edmundo has a summer house, it was really sunny and we tried to remove the transparent look from our legs and arms. I managed to undo all my good work by playing football with the boys and getting my legs covered in bruises, I knew there was a reason I hated that game. So far we´ve managed to fight off Montezuma´s revenge and we´ve been testing our belly´s to the limit by eating the hottest food. I´m sure he´ll come soon to make his point that the chilli is not a food to be messed with or taken lightly.

puebla
We took the 2 hour bus ride to Puebla yesterday afternoon and arrived just as the sun was setting behind the volcano. Puebla looks like a really beautiful city I can´t wait to explore it. The gastronomic tour of Mexico is going along very nicely we had Frajita´s last night (spelling?) followed by copious amounts of Sol. We´re staying with Mafe and Barry and should be here over the weekend.

Mexico city
Well I´ve arrived safe and sound, it was so great to be met at the airport by Paula. As we flew into Mexico city we saw the volcano looking over the hugest city I´ve ever seen. It reminded me of ´´Bladerunner´´, also the huge lit up billboards everywhere added to the bladerunner effect. Lucas and Paula took us for taco´s last night and they were the greatest taco´s I´ve ever had, I´m pretty sure I´ll be really fat after eating my way through mexico. We´re going to Puebla this afternoon to see Mafe and Barry and no doubt to test more culinary delights.

Well it’s hard to believe that in about 12 hours time I’ll be lugging my rucksack to Dublin airport and saying goodbye to Ireland for at least a year. I’m not freaking out just suffering from an infestation of butterflies in my tummy (lots of small hyperactive butterflies). I think I have everything ready, I think I’ve only packed what I need but my rucksack still seems huge. All the guide books and websites say that you should try to have a half empty sack because you’re going to want to pick up loads of stuff along the way, then they go on to list loads of stuff that you definitely need to bring. Even if I didn’t bring any clothes and just packed their so called essentials, I still wouldn’t have a half empty sack, I reckon they’ve never managed to successfully apply their own advice. I searched the whole village for a 2003 diary thismorning, the only one I could find was a useless horrible one that will probably fall apart in about 3 days. I bought it anyway even though I’ve seen better diary’s come free with bad quality girly mags. I’d better post this now ‘cause the butterfly situation is now beginning to reach epidemic proportions and I just know that if I keep going I’ll start waffling.

The next time you hear from me I’ll be somewhere else………….. let the fun begin!

Did you know that on this day in 1581, Francis Drake was knighted for
circumnavigating the globe? Kind of apt really, considering we're about to do something similar tomorrow.
Thanks for that bit of info Deag
And also thanks for this………….


"Roads?! Where we're going, we don't need roads!" - Dr. Emmet Brown

New years 2003
It’s less than two weeks now before I leave and I’m so excited trying to think of all I need to organise before I set off. Almost everytime I go somewhere I spend the first 30 mins of the journey remembering all the things I’ve forgotten ‘cause I packed in 5 mins with a hangover. I went to Brussels for a week before Christmas for some much needed chillaxation with Julie, Peiter and Natan. We watched kids movies, drank Baileys and played with Natan, it was bliss.
Christmas was really nice here at home, the whole Family were around, James made it back from Jersey just a couple of days before. I wonder where I’ll be next Christmas, my first ever away from my family!
For new years I went to Courtmacsharry near to Clonakilty with all the lads. We had two houses and there were about 30 of us there on New Years eve. I decided to stay the whole week ‘cause I didn’t have to go back for work or anything. It was one of those magical weeks that was made up of moments that I’ll laugh out loud about when I’m sitting alone on a bus someday. West Cork is so beautiful, if I had already started my travels (which I suppose in a way I have) I’d be writing home about how words can’t even begin to describe it. There were green fields and old granite ruins . The light was bright orange in the evening time which made every blink of an eye a Kodak moment but that’s nothing compared to the people who were there. Everyone got on so well and we continued on the tradition of the game ‘you’ll drink’ on New years day, this time with Jenga, the tears were rolling down my face with laughter. It’s nice to know that I don’t have to travel around the world to meet great people and see great places but I think I’ll see what I can find anyway.

Postcard from Rome (written upon my return)
I decided to go to Rome for Thanksgiving to surprise Julie and Pieter who planned to celebrate the occasion with a vacation given that Thanksgiving isn’t widely celebrated in Europe anyway. I’ve never celebrated Thanksgiving before but now I’ve celebrated it in a unique Italian way not familiar to most Americans. The last time I was in Rome I was with Julie and Claudia, a gypsy on the night train predicted that Julie would marry within the year. It seemed ironic that the next time all 3 of us would be together again is in the same place with Julies husband and child there with us. Natan was so much fun to have around, it seemed like he even remembered me although he was only 7 months old when I saw him last. We all stayed with Stefano, it was like we’d never been apart and the years that passed between our meetings, although full for each of us, made no difference to the bond we all had in Helsinki. I relived Claudia’s walking tour of Rome alone after all the others had gone back to Brussels and Milan. I even included the repeated circling of the Trevi fountain before actually finding it, and the very long hike to St. Peters Basilica making sure to have plenty of ice-cream stops along the way. I suppose it could be counted as one of the first stops of my world tour (unless I count London and Kilkenny) but the real non-stop travel starts on Jan 15th when I go to Mexico. I’m going to gatecrash the SF Christmas party tonight, I feel that it’s my duty, it just wouldn’t be the same without me there to cause the scandal.

The Search for Fiddlers three has ended. After so many years since the demise of Potters bar we have discovered the infamous trio (plus numerous friends and some tag along crooners). They’re to be found in a shed at the back of ‘The Wishing Well’ on a Monday night. Get there early for seats ‘cause they have a large following of French and Italian studenty types who’ve probably mistaken them for the Dubliners or the chieftans or maybe Robbie Williams and his band. We first heard Fiddlers three in ‘Potters Bar’ when it was well known for it’s Sunday afternoon trad sessions and the Sunday Jam, I’m sure they have a title of their own but we never called them anything but ‘Fiddlers Three’ due to the unusual occurrence of three fiddlers, there was also a bodhran, a whistler, a squeeze box, and whoever else happened to show on the night. ‘Potters Bar’ is now long gone, it’s called ‘The Missing Swan’ now (there’s a whole different story there) and it’s generally frequented by disturbingly young alcopop drinkers, needless to say we try our best to steer clear. We feared that fiddlers three may have suffered a similar demise but no, their rediscovery has brought back a glimmer of the old times to a Monday night. Now if we only knew how to get rid of all the beautiful and skinny French and Italian students it would really bring back the good old Potters days.

Dad asked if I’m finding it hard to fill in my time now that I’m unemployed, I think I found it harder to fill in my time when I was working. I just sat at the computer all day trying to look busy when the reality was that any work I was given to do was finished in about an hour or so, most of the rest of the time I was on Yahoo messenger or playing dynamite. I don’t know how I found the time to go to work before, I seem to be so busy all the time now, busy doing nothing. I suppose I have almost 2 years of exhibitions, museums, walks in the park and books to catch up on so I can’t see any problem filling in time. It seems that my visa’s are going to take about another 5 weeks so I’m here until after Christmas, it’ll be nice to spend Christmas with the Family I’m just worried about spending all my cash ‘cause Christmas is so expensive. I’ll just have to be really stingy for the next while. My brother Philip came home from Rotterdam, it’s like a half way house for the unemployed here now. We figured we could just set up our own Bar in the Front room, get a couple of crates of beer and listen to our own music. Even if it was just us without any visitors we’d probably still have a bigger crowd than some of the bars in Blackrock on any given weeknight. There’s even a couple of guitar’s and a bodhran there so we’d have live music sessions too, I’m sure Ma would give us a rendition of ‘she moves through the fair’ if we asked her nicely.

Day 2
So now I'm trying this out from an internet cafe, had to come here anyway to print some stuff out for Dad and I'm paying for 20 mins so I might as well test out uploading the blog, not that I have any doubt that it will work. I'm on my way to the dole office to become a part time bludger before I head off.
I went ot London last weekend with Jen, she won 2 tickets to this private gig by Robbie Williams which was on in Pinewood studios. It was really amazing I have a new found faith in the cocky ex-boyband type, even considering opening the closet door and declairing myself a true fan, then again it's nice and comfy in here, maybe some other time. Anyway watch out for it on BBC1 some Saturday at the end of November, it'll be called the Robbie williams show or something like that.
After all the excitement of the storms in London and missing the boat home etc. I decided to take a couple of days of relaxation down in Kilkenny, it's a great city (yes city, but I don't know how somewhere qualify's to be a city these days) it's mostly pubs, not the best for relaxation at all, anyway to cut a long story short (cause I have only about 1 min left) I came home even more wrecked than I started out.
right so time up,

Right so Lad's I'm back again (and she's catching on quick) note to self: check spelling before publishing where was I anyway.....oh yeah, I was telling you about my plans for world domination. As soon as i get some visa's sorted out i'm going to head off to Mexico where I'll hopefully meet up with the beautiful Bello Sisters, I'll also try to fit in some chilli eating, tequilla swigging craziness. Then I plan to go see some of south America and hopefully meet up with Monico in Rio some time around March (for Carnival). After that I'm heading to NZ and I think everyone will be there by then so I'll stay about 7 or 8 months and try to get some work. Next stop after NZ is OZ, seems to be some sort of ex smartforce support group over there so I'll fit in rather nicely. After that who knows what'll happen, we'll cross that bridge when we come to it.
I got a book from Mom for my birthday (well as you ask........yesterday, 25, thanks, I know I don't look a day over 19 so sweet of you to ask for ID) an it's the Rough Giude to Australia, got me all revved up and that's what has me starting this Blogging stuff.
Can we put photo's on this? anyone?...anyone?...anyone?.....Beuller?
I'll be off so,
no doubt I will awake in the middle of the night and post again, I can see this thing becoming an unhealthy addiction, the sooner I get restricted to the dingy confinements and expense of internet cafe's the beter for all involved.
now anyone heading over for a couple before last orders?

So here it goes, I'm trying this this thing out for the first time so bear with me if I make a right balls of it. Kieran suggested I should do it in the pub when he heard about my plans for world domination (well the young people are calling it travel these days, but we all know what it's really about). S'pose I could start with that, welll it goes a little sometihing like this...... I got redundancy from the company formerly known as Smartforce (am I even allowed say that or will I get sued) an I'm gonna spend all my cash on travelling the world. sorry about this but that'll have to do for now 'cause someone want's to use the phone- (that someone is me). I'll continue my sceal later.

Talk tcha later