Hotel La Naval Cartagena

... day to get to Panama City. I was gonna fly from there to Colombia but a lot of people reccomended taking a yacht so decided on that. Eventually I managed to find a suitable one which was leaving on the 11th giving me 2 nights in Panama City.

Panama City was a pretty cool place and stayed at a good hostel so got to meet a lot of people. Its a shame I didn't get to see the rest of the country but as I really wanted to get in to South America i'll just ...

... feel instantly out for the count. We canŽt finish conversations, make decisions, or do actually anything because the heat is so so draining on our brains. Only after suffering through the buckets of sweat and forcing ourselves to walk around for quite awhile to we get somewhat accustomed to it. The ATM machines, supermarkets, shoe stores, and womenŽs clothing stores are all air conditioned so we are able to find some salvation (you ...

... Cartagena tomorrow. There are some nice beaches and islands near here to visit, but the next town im moving too is a beach place with scuba diving, so no point doubling up and wasting money going to another beach, plus all the beaches people rave about here always tend to disappoint me. Australian beaches are so good!

Went out for some dinner and had a few quiet drinks at the hostel, nothing too exciting, as Im off early tomorrow morning to continue the Colombian adventure!

... us pictures of them, and from the looks of it, he might as well as told us he wanted to take us to Cancun.
We stayed at an inexpensive hotel called Hotel Las Vegas within the old colonial walls. There's actually another Hotel Las Vegas in Santa Marta which we stayed at later. The hotel was clean, had A/C, clean towels and international television. Hey, the television comes in handy. We watched some Friends during ...

... Sara.. It was unbelievable! Soooo warm.. and because it was now also raining on us and our beautiful island, made the water feel even warmer!
Sadly the rain did mar the day. We were forced under tents to each lunch with the rain dripping on our heads.. but hey.. it could have been a LOT worse! It could have been London rain!

We stayed in Cartagena for another day and walked the streets, completely soaking up this wonderful atmosphere. Was very 'Romancing the ...

... and seemed a viable day trip. It wasnŽt. First up, the book has just plain WRONG information such as where to catch the bus from. Fortunately we checked and found out the correct location. The bus to the station took FOREVER and when we arrived weŽd missed the direct bus to where we were going. We then negotiated an inflated price for us to go all around the houses and get there another way. We did eventually get to the side of a road somewhere from which it was a ...

... more prominent relatively well-off tourists. It's the kind of place where we feel dressed down all of the time. Us: We spent the first few nights in Getsemani in a decent enough hostel. It is always around 30 degrees here, and the most difficult task during the day is trying to beat the heat. We spent these days familiarizing ourselves with the city as we awaited the arrival of Guy and Francoise (Pierre-Paul's family). They chose this ...

... is original.


A day like this and my opinion of Peru has gone down the toilet. The spoiled child of South America, the Spanish gave you your good architecture, an American uncovered Macchu Pichu and handed you a tourism industry on a silver platter, but still you moan about the world like an adolescent whilst failing to clean your own bedroom.


Trujillo does offer a ray of hope in this mental abyss I have slipped into. By the time we are released from our last ...

... plantations and wax palms. We had a great hike through the countryside with a lovely Swiss couple we met at our hostel, made even better by the gum boots we rented before we set out through the mud (having learned our lesson in Pasto). We also had an impromptu training session with the Ventanilla youth running league, who fell into step with us one day as we ...

... It took me a couple of visits to fully appreciate it, the shapes and colours of so many of the buildings is overwhelming at first. Again will try and post some pics soon. Hasta luego snowmonkeys.