Home Sweet Home

Home Sweet Home ...

..... after around 24 hours of travelling from Rio De Janeiro to Santiago via Sao Paolo, then Santiago to Sydney via Auckland and a final quick hop from Sydney to Melbourne, we arrived home safe and sound this morning Thurs 15/1 at 10:30 am.

The welcoming committee (Ellen's friends) were equipped with party hats and those blower things that make rasberry sounds .... thanks guys, a nice welcome back to home turf .... I (Chris) sit here at 9 pm in the evening, every one else having succombed, desperately trying to hold off the desire to sleep to complete this one last blog entry ....

What can you say - six weeks of just stunning experiences in another continent of this amazingly diverse planet .... the key highlights of our trip would be something like ....

 1. Galapogas - stunning natural beauty and wildlife - you can see why Charles Darwin was captivated and amazed

 2. Cusco & surrounds - a lovely small city with beautiful architecture and lots of picturesque surrounding countryside

3. Machu Picchu - breathtaking in itself for what a civilisation could achieve hundreds of years ago

4. The Amazon basin - what can you say, the lungs of the planet and alive from dawn to dusk

5. The Bolivian high plains - possibly the highlight of the trip (or a close second to Galapogas) - the salt flats, the canyons, the geysers, the landscape - stunning natural beauty

6. San Pedro at Atatcama - sort of an extension of the high plans, but in Chile and deserving of mention in its own right - the El Tatio geysers and Moon Valley were individual highlights

7. Iguazu Falls - much more touristy but also leave you speechless - especially when you get dunked under the second biggest waterfall at Iguazu

Well, that about winds up the blog ... words cannot really add further to what we have alread talked about.

If a picture is worth a thousand words, we are not even sure how many photos we have .... Somewhere in the order of ten thousand we think ... 54 Gb on the storage module !!!

If you are interested, feel free to catch up with us for a look at some more pics .... or in due course the multimedia slide show will be available, although this will probably take many weeks to complete .... Thanks again to everyone who took interest in our travel blog and posted comments ... the trip is complete, but feel free to keep posting messages for another few days ....

Ciao !

Chris, Julie, Ellen, Tessa

15/1/2009

Rio de Janeiro

Day 36 Saturday 10th January 2009 Iguazu to Rio de Janeiro

 Short morning flight out of Iguazu on the Brazilian side (back across the border) for our flight to Rio ... In the afternoon, just wandered around for a short walk ... sorry any Rio fans - not impressed ... Rio is big, people everywhere, is noisy, hot and the Copocabana area smells ... And it is most disconcerting to walk the streets and see street kids just out cold on the doorways and on the gutters in the middle of the day ... This blog section will be short - interesting to come and see the main features of Rio ... but too many people, not enough space, too much poverty ...

Day 37 Sunday 11th January 2009 Rio de Janeiro, Corcovado & Sugar Loaf

The tourist tour day ... spent lots of time again stopping at hotels to pick up people ... big bus, took lots of time. In the morning up the mountain to Christ the Redeemer ... nice cable car ride up the mountain, but at the top you can hardly move ... you have to push through the crowd to the edge to find a viewing point. In the afternoon, took the cable cars to the top of Sugar Loaf at the end of the Copacabana beach .... spectacular views of Rio, you can see how big it is and you can see how much smog and haze there is ...

Day 38 Monday 12th January 2009 Rio de Janeiro

Rest day before leaving for home ... trying to update blog - sorry about the lack of photos yet ...

Day 39 Depart Rio de Janeiro Tuesday 13th January 2008

Home time - see you all soon !!!

Iguasu Falls

Day 34 Thursday 8th January 2009 (Ellen's Birthday) Buenos Aires/Iguasu - Brazilian Side

Happy Birthday to you, Happy Birthday to you, Happy Birthday dear Ellen, Happy Birthday to yooouuuu ... Ellen is 17 today ... In the morning we flew out of BA for a short flight to Iguasu City, still on the Argentinian side of the falls ... The recommended viewing of the falls is to start on the Brazilian side, so we actually had to cross into Brazil just for a few hours and then come back ... this comprised almost 2 hours of extra time sitting in a bus while the tour guides processed 40 people across the border ... not great use of time. Of course, the first viewing of the Iguasu falls is stunning ... like any falls, you hear first - and with the amount of water coming of these falls the sound is deafening up close.

On the Brazilian side, you approach along walkways on the bank, so are looking up at the biggest single waterfall at Iguasu, the Devils Throat.(Not: Unfortunately where are at an Internet cafe that is completely locked down so the machines will not read our photo storage module - we will upload photos when we can). From the bottom of the main falls, you then catch a small lift up to a platform that is level with the top of the falls, giving another stunning view across the top.

Day 35 Friday 9th January 2009 Iguazu - Argentinian Side

Today was the big Kahuna - a full day tour on the Argentinian side of the falls ... and wow ... From the Argentinian side, there are trails up high and down low along the river ... the upper trail leads out over the river above the falls and leads to a viewing platform right in the middle of the river at the top of the Devils Throat ... the view is just stunning ... other trails then lead you around to prime viewings spots of the smaller falls, which are all spectcular in their own right.

The lower trails lead around most of the same falls to them them from a different persective ... We were offered an optional extra to have a boat ride on the river ... not cheap but given we were near the end of our trip and the budget had survived ... we took the plunge, so to speak. Our guide explained we would get a little wet, so rubber bags were provided to protect cameras etc ... but we were fully clothed. Stage one of the boat ride was for the driver to hold in the middle of the river for pictures of the various falls from the river view ... the guide said these would be the best pictures ... however, the amount of spray made the view very clouded ... we thought the bank viewing spots offered better photography.

After pics, and with cameras stowed, we expected to be take up very close to the falls .... errr, not so ... the boat is driven all the way into the second biggest fall at Iguasu and you get to experience the biggest soaking you have ever had from the tons of water pouring over the boat. And we were all sitting right at the front, so copped the full drenching ! And this was not just once, but the boat is drive in and out several times .... No doubt they do not drive into the biggest fall as that would be too dangerous ... but the second biggest was enough ... you have never been so wet in your life ... but its hot so you dry off in a hour or so. We then rounded off the boat ride with a trip down a few rapids below the falls ... what a buzz ...

All in all, a spectacular place .... lots of people, very touristy, but still well worth the effort to get there.

Buenos Aires

Day 31 Monday 5th January 2009 San Pedro de Atacama to Buenos Aires

A travelling day today as we leave the Atacama desert and jump on a plane again for the first time in 15 days ... A long stopover in Santiago airport was not too bad, before continuing on to Buenos Aires ... and for the first time in many days back to temperatures above 20 C !

Day 32 Tuesday 6th January 2009 Buenos Aires

Buenos Aires is huge ... 14 million people in one massive city, around a third of the countries total population. This meant that our city tour today was more of a bus tour to wave at the various landmarks pointed out as we drove past ... well, not completely accurate, but that´s what it seemed like. In the evening we attended a "Tango show", expecting to have an educational experience on where the tango came from, as well as seeing some expert dancing. While there was some dancing, a large chunk of the show (about an hour) was consumed by a local (assuming famous) opera singer who spent the entire time singing and speaking (extensively) in Portugese - not a great way to keep the tourists engaged !

And our consensus feeling was that after days on end of marvelling at natures offerings of scenery and interest ... what humans manage to offer comes a pretty woeful second ... we must have just got carried away with the natural beauty of the high plains across the western half of South America.

Day 33 Wednesday 7th January 2009 Buenos Aires

Another day event out to an Argentinian Gauho (cowboy) ranch ... expecting to see a bit about how a local horse/cattle ranch operates ... again a little disappointing. Seems just more set up as a comforatable tourist event - big nosh up with the biggest bbq you have ever seen, a bit more singing and dancing (all in Portugese again), a bit of a horse show which was just a few riders snagging rings on a stick while riding flat out ... and that was about it. Again, we were expecting a little more interest and education ... but the focus just seemed to be light entertainment for tourists.

The good news is that tomorrow we leave civilisation again ... off to the Iguasu Falls on the Argentine / Brazil border ... let´s see if nature can restore our interest once more !