While in Argentina, the four of us feel we have been responsible for the death of about 20 cows, and provided the annual income for at least 2 wineries, each. Every meal now permits us to sample and judge some of Argentina’s finest wines and cow as true experts. Our personal favourite is a nice glass of Cabernet Sauvignon, accompanied by a large slab of cow buttock, cooked to perfection (very rare, possibly still alive) obviously;the Argentinians have a reputation to uphold! Followed by (more a personal preferance of mine (Lydia)) a sachet of Dulce de Leche, theived from Hostal Inn!

Let us explan this wonderous phenomonon (sp -3. see me). Dulce de Leche is effectively boiled condensed milk, to a beautiful state, somewhere between caramel and fudge. it is a common breakfast condement amongst the locals, and forms a major part of most sweets found on your standard Argentine menu. Our theory of this incredible abundance of sweet ambrosia is due to the immense stock of cows required to feed such a carniverous nation, who must while their bovine days away, lactating till their hearts content, hence producing a mass surplus of dairy, which must be consumed, lest a major economic crisis ensues; supply and demand, aren’t you proud Daddy!

Excuse us now, as we depart for our last supper in BA, guess what……..

 Password: photos

  So we all got up bright and early on thursday morning, had a hearty breakfast and made our way over to the sandboarding place. There was a guy and girl on our trip from Canada which was nice, all of us girls and the girl from canada were complete beginners in sandboarding (and snow boarding which is really similar) so we were all in the same boat!! We met our instructor called Christian who had some very cool dreadlocks, and the photographer called Diago and set off in the bus to the dunes we were going to be sandboarding down!!

   When we got there we were all given our boards, I was the only person who was gooffy (meaning I stand up with my right foot first) so everytime I went down the dune I faced a different way to everyone else! To start with we had to make the mammoth walk to the top of the dunes, it was very tiring but luckily we all came prepared with massive bottles of water! When we got to the top we all looked down either side of the dune and realised that one side was a fair bit steeper and longer than the other, thankfully we started and practiced on the slightly smaller and slower slope first!!

   Our first few attempts down the slope were a bit wobbly, especially for Lydia who didnt actually manage to go down the slope once without wiping out!!After going down the smaller slope a few more times we were allowed to attempt the bigger and faster slope!!The bigger slope was so much more fun and noticeably faster, I dont think any of us managed to get down the slope without falling over atleast once, luckily though the sand was a very comfortable surface to land on!!It took Lydia a few more attempts down the practice slope before she attempted the main slope, though unfortunately her attempts didnt end in success as she didnt manage to get down without wiping out!!

   Altogether we were sandboarding for about 2 hours. We all enjoyed it so much, and even though Lydia didnt actually manage to get down the slope once without wiping out I think she enjoyed it the most!!We got back to San Pedro safely though we were all covered in alot of sand!!

We rose early-ish, and had one of the best brekkies I have ever had, amazing banana pancakes! and headed off to Fatima’s office. We sat outside for a goodly time before our 4×4 turned up, a rather vintage looking Toyota land cruiser, but pretty standard kit by the looks of all the other companies. We loaded up mochillas on t’roof, met our travelling buddies; happy poncho man, a nice lady from Ecuador and a couple (although we weren’t quite sure what the relationship was) from the Czeck Republic, genuine happy campers!

So we were off! First stop was a rather spooky train graveyard, and then it wasn’t long until we were on the Salt! Quite a strange experiance, as it looked exactly like snow, but when we got out, it was completely solid. We had a few more stops at the ’Salt mountains’ and the illegal salt hotel, naughty naughty, then on to La Isla de Pescada, where we had lunch, and had plenty of opportunity for all the standard picture taking, abusing the medium of perspective! After lunch, we left the salt, and had a long-ish drive to our hotel for the night, another salt hotel, but we were assured this one was legal, and after a belated, but very warming dinner, accompanied by a rather interesting musical delight from the local children, we donned as much clothing as we could, and went to bed.

Second day, we rose at a reasionable hour to be greeted by a standard continental breakfast, lots of hot drinks (wonderful!), then packed up the truck again ready for our longest day of driving.  Our first stop was at an active volcano, a good chance for some rock climing, then back in the van. Not for long, as it turned out, as our driver decided to add a bit of excitement to the journey, and burst a tyre.  Thankfully we had a spare; always prepared, these Bolivians!  So as the men were left to deal with such matters, we went in search of a suitable little girls room. Unfortunately, the thing about the Salt Flats, is they are terribly, well, flat, so some amazing teamwork and extemperisation came into play; two as a barrier from the rest of the group, as the other did whatever was required. By the time we were done, the new tyre was in place, and we were on the road again, headed towards El Arbol de Piedra, a collection or rather intriguing rock formations formed by the sands of time. We then headed to our last stop of the day, a salt lagoon full of flamingoes! Who knows why, the biology boggles, but another excellent luncheon later, and we were off to our second hostal, within the Beautiful natural park, right next to Laguna Rojo, literally a red lake, caused by minerals in the water. A freezing night was remedied by some good round the fire singing, and a bottle of rum or two, before we settled into our coldest night by far.

Day three we rose at a ridiculous hour, so we could catch the sunrise at the hot geysers, which were terribly impressive at that hour, I must say, and then we were off for brekkie at some hot springs. Being absolutely freezing, stripping down to a bikini was really the last thing we wanted to do, but we braved the chillsome weather, and after an epic dash down to the pool (surrounded by ice!), we hopped in, and thawed out instantly in the relatively boiling pool! Feeling much better, and with a warm tingly feeling inside, we headed off on our last drive to the Chilean boarder, where our bus was waiting to bring us to San Pedro, and after some of the most intense boarder conterol any of us have encountered thus far, we arrived home and dry(and not so chilly) in Chile!

This is Tom writing his first post on the blog. I have been travelling with Sophie, Moo and Lydia for about 2 weeks(ish) and they have allowed me to write the blog for the mine tour we did as I was the one who actually wanted to do it.

We arrived in Potosi and went pretty much straight on the tour which involved going to the miners market where we bought dynamite and drinks for the miners who ranged in age from about 13 to 58.  We also got to see how the minerals were seperated from the rock and mud which was quite interesting.

The main part of the tour was heading down the mines which was truly amazing and eye opening. I am glad I am not a miner in the Potosi mines because the dust in the air made it hard to breathe even near the entrance and being 6´3 I hit my head on the roof, alot.  The tunnels which the miners had to work in were so small we had to crawl through them and it was hard enough without the 30kg sacks the miners had to carry. On the 3rd level we stopped for a bit to ask our guides questions and just get a feel what it is like for the miners (who were actually working deeper in the mountain) due to the lack of oxygen and temperature range. We all felt pretty faint and I nealry threw up, a few times.

Again, I can say we all never want to underground again never mind work in a mine and we are all glad we did the tour as it was a real eye opener to see the conditions these people have to work in to make even the smallest amount of money. All I can say is I´m glad we´re going to uni in September. Not working in the mines.

 Anyway, got a bus to catch to Uyuni.

Speak soon

Tom, Sophie, Moo & Lydia

By 7:30 the next day we were in a cafe getting our briefing for the day. We started with an hour bus ride stopping to drop off all our details in case our bus fell off the cliff. At a hight of 4570m we were given our full supension bikes with brakes as powerful as a motor bike, a helmet and protective clothing. The start was fairly easy on tarmac and we were reaching speeds of up to 50-60 km per hour. We had only been going a few minuites when we were stopped to look at the remains of a truck at the bottoem of the cliff.  At the begining of the death road we were given a snack, our bikes were checked and we were told a few scary stories about accidents on the road. The road was bumpy and narrow with a 400m steep drop off the edge. To add to the fear we were told to ride on the side of the cliff incase a truck came up, luckely we met no traffic coming up. Our guides stopped us offten to tell us stories about trucks going off and cycelists who had died by being stupid or going with companys with dodgy bikes. A bus followed us down with spare kit and first aid making you feel a little safer. The road took us form 4570m to 1200m so it was nice to be able to have some extra oxygen and the change in sceenary was pretty incredible. Our guides took photos and videos of us going round scary corners and through the waterfalls. At the end of the day we reached a small village in the rainforest, where we were given a really good meal and looked at the photos. T-shirts were given out saying…I survived the worlds most dangerous road. yet there was still the trip back up to survive. Although a new, safer road has recently opened our driver took us back up the same route but we were the only vechical on that road.

 It was a scary experiance but deffinaetly one of the best we have had so far! It is deffinatly not an activity that you want to cut corners on and if you are going to do it we recomend Gravity.

The next day we looked round the markets and watched a bizzarre ceremony in which the Bolivians bless their cars. Us girls spent our last day in Copacabana visiting the Isle del Sol. We took a two hour boat ride accross the lake then walked for three hours accross the island before getting the boat back. We met up with Tom to climb up a hill that took us to over 4000m to watch the sunset over the lake.

       After brunch we decided that we would be cultural and go and visit the Juanita Girl museum. The tour was supposed to include a video about the inca´s and juanita girl and then a guided tour around the museum, however the video decided not to work so we just got the tour which was really interesting, and at the end we got to see the actual mummy called juanita girl, she is the only inca mummy that is still completely preserved due to the fact she was found burried in ice!!After the guide we managed to get ourselves a free showing of the video for later in the day which we were happy about!!

     After the museum we just wondered around the plaza watching the images being made and went up and visited an artists sale which had some really nice things, though they were fairly expensive and probably would have pushed our budgets. We then went back to the place we had brunch and had a late lunch, then headed back to the museum and watched the video which was very good though a little creepy at times!!

     In the evening we found ourselves a perfect viewing spot for the festival procession in one of the cafes along the balcony!!The procession was pretty impressive , they had built during the day a massive stage which was used for the huge service they held for all the viewers. I think pretty much all the habitants of Arequipa turned up to watch the procession, at the end a massive float went round the whole plaza driving over the top of all the images that had been created during the day.

    After the procession we had an interesting meal (mainly due to the slightly strange english translations) and then quickly went to meet up with Iggy who has been volunteering in Arequipa at a school!It was really good to catch up with Iggy and he gave us a very good guided tour of the bars and kebab shops in Arequipa, and the night ended on a high with us being true gringo´s doing some classic ballads at a karioke bar!!It was a night we won´t forget.

     All in all we really enjoyed our time in Arequipa!!