The Last Hora

We took some time out of our hectic scheduals to unwind in a tiny town Huakachina, on an oasis in the middle of 100km2 of dessert. Then it was off to "poor man's Galapagos". As we approached the islands off the coast of Peru, they appeared to be black. Yet as we drew closer the amazing site of millions of birds covering every inch of the rocky formations unfolded before us. Most incredibly and unlikely was the site of penguins! Yet another shoking site tucked away on small beaches of the islands, were hundreds of sea lion lounging and barking loudly or playing in the water. We then made our last stop of the trip off the coast of Venezuela at a group of small sandy keys, Los Roques. This national park holds some of the pretiest beaches in all the world surrounded by crystal clear waters and a huge ammount of coral reef. The sun and fun was breathtakingly beautiful and the perfect end (if there must be one) to our great gringo journey.

Machu Picchu

We found ourselves on the coldest part of journey, La Paz, Bolivia. We went form sea level and 32C to 4000m and as Talia puts it "f`n cold". Despite enjoying the Bolivian people and culture, our trip was winding down so we crossed the border into Peru to visit Lake Titicaca. A short boat ride from Puno floats an island made completely from reeds. We went out to visit the Uros people who built these islands to escape the Inca empire and now live a unique lifestyle. Their houses, boats and everything including the groud itself is made from the reeds of Lake Titicaca. Next it was up the road to Peru`s historic and touristic centre, Cuzco. It is home to the most famous of all Inca ruins, Machu Picchu and is the most visited spot in South America. As we travelled through the Sacred Valley from Cuzco to Machu Picchu, the mountains were scattered with remnants of the Inca civillization. At 5:30 am we accended through the clouds, arriving at Machu Picchu with only a handful of others to have this mystic place to ourselves. We began to tour the ruins through the mist, only seeing what lay directly infront of us. As the morning mist lifted, the beauty and majesty of the ancient city unfolded before our eyes. The city is perched high up between dramatic green peaks towering over plunging valleys to a river flowing almost completely around the site hundreds of metres below. Looking down upon the city and its surrounding beauty, it was obvious why the Incas chose this secluded and wonderous site.
Adios amigos

(more pictures to come)

Bye, Bye Brazil

Carnival ended and we went is search of sleep. Little did we know that even in the little beach towns the celebrations continued long after the festival officially ended and sleep is not to be had. We stayed in the town of Praia de Forte where there is a major sea turtle conservation project. We visited the turtle station and saw every species of sea turtle, including babies with shells the size of a quarter to turtles a monsterous 2 metres long. They were weird, clumsy, prehistoric and cute. After, it was off to the "ciudade marvalloso", Rio. Rio de Jeneiro is on the Atlantic ocean with tropical islands in the distance. It has wide, white sand beaches and is backed by a huge lush forest, green hills and mountains. Next to Vancouver, it really is the most beautiful city in the world. We soaked up the city scene and people watched by strolling the famous Copacabana and Ipanima beaches, were we stumbled upon a fashion show on the beach with a live samba percussion band. There is just no getting away from the music in Brazil. We also went up the largest mountain in Rio to see the famous "Christ the Redeemer" who watches over the city from high above. As we got to the top, clouds began to roll in and completely engulf the giant statue. We stood directly infront of it without being able to see it. The experience turned magical as the clouds parted for a few seconds and we gasped as Jesus appeared to float out of the clouds as if coming down from heaven. This was the end of an amazing month and-a-half in Brazil. The weather so good, the people so nice and the culture and music so rich.

Tchau for now.

Carnival

We continued to bum the beach, visiting Porto de Gahinhas where we swam out to the reef and over a field of SEA URCHINS, to snorkel in jade coloured tide pools teaming with fish (Talia was brave to go but vowed ´never again´). Next it was off to Praia de Frances for a literal crash course in surfing. With only a couple hours, no instruction, incorect boards for learning and a lack of athletisism, most of the waves we caught were on our bellies. We did manage to come close to standing a few times and the thrill left us wanting more while the bruises left us in pain, so we headed down the coast to Salvador and Carnival!
We arrived the day before the giant festival began and the found an apartment close to the action. The city was ready for action with capoeira demonstrations, decorations, percussion parades and an air of excitment everywhere you looked. The first night of Carnival was magical. We found ourselves invited on top of a bloco, an 18 wheeler truck dressed up as a moving stage that rolled through the streets of Salvador with hords of people dancing infront, behind, beside and hanging out of their apartments cheering us along. In a crowd of millions, we were among the fortunate few to experience Carnival as a part of the show, complete with band T-shirts. We partied and rocked with our Reggae band for hours. We provided the dancing and waiving to the onlookers fo the parade root, while the band provided the beer etc. and the warning when to duck as we passed under telephone wires and street lamps. The parade root round trip that would take an hour to walk on a normal day, took us 5hrs on the bloco and as the sun came up we dismounted the truck a few blocks from our apartment. AWESOME!!!
For night 2 of Carnival, we were "popcorn" in the masses. We entered the parade and found ourselves in a feverish intense pandamonium. It took only minutes for the police to pick us out of the crowd and drag us out. They explained to us that we were in the wrong part of town for a foreigner and guided us to a taxi bound for Barra, where tourist were more welcome. In Barra which looked more like the pictures we had seen than the menacing and dangerous Capo Grande, we walked against the grain of the parade, seeing all the blocos with their different musics and costumes. The energy was palatable, and before long we were bouncing through the parade to samba beats, singing and waiving our hands. Againg we returned home a sunrise with filthy feet and another unforgetable experience under our belts. The days inbetween the long nights were just as exciting as the streets were filled with small samba groups parading through the smaller streets. Everywhere you looked was music and costumes and fun. Mostly Brazilians young and old and a few tourists gathered in the streets to sing and dance. Everytime you felt exhausted, the energy of the festival picked you back up to dance some more. Viva Brazil!

Flipping for Brazil

From Manaus we made a quick stop in Belem, at the mouthof the Amazon, and Sao Luis, known for it´s tile facades on many of the historical buildings. Feeling a little beach deprived we booked it to the coast for some beautiful Brazillian beaches. Weheaded straight to Praia de Pipa, a posh little beach town with beachy bays filled with gold sparkly sand, all kinds of blue surf, andbacked by huge cliffs, sand dunes and Atlantic rainforest. We took our first dip in the Atlantic ocean and soaked up the hot Brazillian sun for days. We climbed over rocks to explore every beach around, as well as an ecological park on the cliffs overlooking the ocean. As we strolled through the park we came to a beautiful lookout point. We were thrilled to see tons of sea turtles in the rocky ocean below taking a quick breather. We could see them perfectly from the enormous cliff through the clear waters as they surfaced and paddled their white flippers and bums back down. We continued on and were amazed to see marmosets jumping through the trees above. We had spent 3 days in the jungle hoping to see these adorable creatures not seeing a single one and now just off the beach the trees were full of them. Only as big as your foot with a long striped tail these curious monkeys kept our attention jumping quickly through the branches all around us. Nick even gave a couple of them a drink of water from the cap of his water bottle. It was so cute to see their entire faces plunged into the bottle cap.

One trip to the beach proved to be especially rewarding when as we had just chosen the perfect place to jump into the ocean a pod of dolphins appeared before us. We dove right in with them and watched as they jumped, flipped and spun on their backs in front of us. We swam within a few feet of these beauties and were able to see them up close and watch their faces as they caught fish. Exhausted fomr trying to follow the dolphins we swam back to shore and watched from there. It was an exciting beginning to our coastal tour of Brazil!

Jungle Boogie

Our long, long journey from the coast of Venezuela down to Brazil brought us through one of the world´s great landscapes. We lucked out and caught a ride with a tour guide through the Grand Sabana, home to the unique Tepuis, huge flat-topped mountains with endemic flora and which sometimes giveway to giant waterfalls, such as Angel Falls the world´s highest. Our driver was nice enough to stop along the way for us to see some of these beautiful falls that seemed to drop from out of nowhere.

Our crossing into Brazil proved to be infinitely harder as our Portuguese amounts to virtually nada. We found ourselves stranded at the border with no promise of a bus to come. We thanked the Brazillian Gods for sending saints in the form of young socialists. The University students returning from a forum on social justice swooped us up and carried us safely the 18 hours to Manaus and in the name of socialism they would not accept a cent. Some of our new socailist friends took it upon themselves to become our personal tour guides. They took us out for an Amazonian style breakfast of tapioca pancakes and throughout the day had us try a variety of local fruit juices (some good, some... interesting). Right away the Brazillian spirit was apparent and we felt more welcome in Manaus then most other places. We enjoyed Manaus and took in 2 free concerts at the Parisian style opera house where the decour was matched by the magnificent sound.

We took off from the modern world and escaped into the Amazon jungle. By boat we explored the channles of the Amazon river where we were met by our guide who took us deeper into the ungle to set up camp for the night. This was not car camping! Armed with only machetes we cut trees into a small structure, a table, candle holders, and a fire and spit. We slept in hammocks under the stars surrounded by the wild of the Amazon. We awoke the next morning, on Nick´s B-day in the jungle, to the loud, eerie sounds of Uacari monkeys sadly just out of sight. Our expectations for more monkey madness were dissapointingly not met as we had only 1 very brief encounter with brown capuchins :(. We did have an amazing day though. We explored the jungle as our guide explained the various uses of the vegetation. We made rubber from the milk of a rubber tree, ate bark which prevents malaria, enjoyed fresh Brazil nuts from the tree, met the vicks plant (as in Vick´s vapour rub), and learned about plants and trees that cure bronchitis, diabetes, arthritis, "traveller´s stomach" (Talia had first hand experience that this actually works), and much more.

After lunch we set out by boat for some Pirahna fishing for dinner. Luck was with us as both grey and pink dolphins played in the water in front of our boat as we fished. After a hard day of fishing, well just over an hour, we through caution to the wind and took a dip in the rejuvinating waters of the Amazon river while dolphins surfaced around us. Nightime brought with it discovery channel style alligator catching. We crept up in boats shining flashlights in the tall grass in search of the reflection of little eys staring back at us. Our local guide plunged his hand into the water bringing up little alligators (so cute). We also visited some families living along the river to learn about how they survive making use of their surrounding environment. Our time in the jungle was short and despite our love for the Amazon we had to head back to the city.

Tchau for now.

(Pictures to come - more computer problems)

I saw a fish this big

We got to a tiny highway town(Tucacas) to take our boat tour through Parque National Morrocoy. Morrocoy is a stretch of cayes and islets running about 30kms along the coast of the Caribbean. As we approached our first park destination, the sky filled with large birds of prey, pelicans and numerous others above the mangrove forests. With the trees and sky full of such large birds of all sorts, it seemed as though we had entered a prehistoric land. After a short stay, the boat wound through the mangrove to find us a secluded beach that seemed to appear in the forest out of nowhere. We ate and drank coconut from the trees and snokeled the coral before our next destination was scheduled. This next stop was one of the most picturesque beaches we´ve seen to date. Huge turquoise waves splashed onto the white sand that lined palm trees to our right and junglelous cliffs to our left. The stay there was short but memorable. We were torn form away after a quick swim for our final destination. As the boat hummed along the water, the jungle and mountains of the mainland were in breathtaking view to one side while the beaches of the cayes laid tranquily on the other. Our final arrival was at the largest islet in the park which housed both sheltered turquoise waters and wavier dark blue waters on each side. We laid on the beach, swam and had some fantastic snokeling before the sunset put an end to our magical tour. The weather was anything but cooperative, as rain fell in small bursts a few times and the clouds never fully parted. One could only imaging the glory of this place in blue sky and sunshine. Nevertheless, Morrocoy proved an amazing beauty that captivated us.
Adios for now!

Need Agua!

The border crossing from Colombia to Venezuela turned out easier than we imagined, thanks in part to a small bribe the entire bus put together to speed up the process. Our firststop was in Corro, Venezuela's first capital before Caracas and now a colnial town home to many of Venezuela's oldest religious artifacts. We visited Venezuela's oldest church as well as it's oldest synagogue, which had floors of sand. We also syumbled upon a free concert one night of what was supposedly Venezuela's best orchestra. Coro lies just off the Peninsula de Paraguana, which holds a number of different unique ecosystems. We took a landrover out of the city and after just 5 minutes we were struck by the immeditae change from shrubbery total desert. We parked, took off our shoes and began playing in the enormous sandbox. Pillowy soft sand spread for miles in every direction. Hills and valleys of sand dunes were exhausting to climb with the sun beaming down on us. We felt as though we were suddenly in the middle of the Sahara.

As we took off from the dunes we came across a lagun with a pink haze looming near the shore. As we got closer we could see that it was a group of flamingos feeding on shrimp. From desert we drove through arrid mountains filled with cacti as we headed for a hike in the nearby rainforest. The province of Falcon, Venezuela is one of the 3 regions where the amazing red Cardinal is found and luckily we spotted a few. The rainforest was followed by a dip in the rough waters of the beach at the very tip of the Penninsula, where in the distance Aruba could be seen. For such a small Penninsula it held an amazing amount of diversity.
Hasta luego!