TravelStream™ news feed for member stevepaule on TravelPod's free travel blogs service http://www.travelpod.com/syndication/rss/stevepaule en-us Copyright ©2009 TravelPod.com Sun, 28 Sep 2008 16:01:18 -0400 http://www.travelpod.com http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/stevepaule/1/1220442900/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/stevepaule/1/1220442900/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/stevepaule/1/1220442900/tpod.html Sun, 28 Sep 2008 16:01:18 -0400 Gap year travels

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Angeles, Luzon, Philippines

The main reason I went to the Philippines was to attend the 'Lucas Paldas', first year anniversary of my grandfather's death. It was more of a celebration rather than a solemn affair, attracting many more visitors than expected, so it was an occassion involving lots of food, drink, kareoke and live music. I haven't got any pictures of it, only of bits and bobs during my time there. One of them was a canal boat trip from where we lived in the countryside towards the sea where they sell lots of seafish.

Driving in the Philippines was crazy - the other drivers squeeze into any gap they can, don't have any rules on the road etc. What was most scary is that you're allowed to overtake in the other lane where there is oncoing traffic. So sometimes you'd get a huge truck in your lane driving straight towards you at great speed and only moving back into the other lane at the last second. Everything was opposite - the drivers side in the car, the side you drive on in the road, the fact that flashing your lights at someone means 'get out of my way' as opposed to 'give way'. Since one half of my family is in the countryside, whilst the other in a city about 30miles away, driving was very convenient because there's plenty of us cousins together. My cousin is getting married in December and we did a lot of shopping/preparations for the wedding like getting invites, wedding dress fittings, shoes... I'm glad I'm not a woman.

It was good to catch up with relatives and generally chill out after backpacking for so long. There's much more to the Philippines but I won't cover it in this blog, but because it won't be long till I go there again, you'll get a proper blog entry next time =D
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Bangkok, Thailand

I wanted to find out more about Thai culture - I've seen the thai boxing side down in southern thailand and seen some of the finest beaches, but little of things like temples and people. I've heard to see Thailand properly you'd have to go up north, but with so little time I decided to stay in Bangkok for a few days.

I stayed in the nice area of Sukhumvit, the location was ideal as transport to the sights were easy and it was in the safest and untouristy parts of Bangkok. It is served by the BTS Skytrain, a monorail type thing that links Sukhumvit with the centre of the city. The weather's been great, only been caught in the rain once! I tried all different types of transport - the monorail, the tube, walking, river boat, canal boat and tuktuk. The canal boat was the most interesting as tourists generally don't use it and I realised why - you get splashed by nasty dirty canal water during the ride!

I spent a lot of time exploring the different areas of Bangkok. It's a great place for shopping. Quite a contrast - you'd find large modern shopping malls with designer labels and dirt cheap street markets only just a few blocks from each other. I found a huge computer mall which was paradise for any technology fanatics. It was really interesting exploring the different markets - some were obviously geared towards tourists but I got lost a few times and came across some where it was pure locals. The one problem I did have was that everyone mistook me for a Thai, speaking to me in Thai and being surprised when I tell them I'm from England. You know you're in a proper local market when nobody speaks English, I managed to ask for a meal by pointing at random things and nodding.. good thing I'm not fussy. The night market wasn't all that - just like the day market but during the night. The weekend market was amazing - thousands and thousands of people and stalls, over such a big area and selling absolutely anything and everything - clothes, plants, food, live animals, art, furniture - you name it, you'll find it. Outside one of the malls, I came across some kind of big 'Indie' event, full of Richard-like skinny jeans people, mostly teens in college uniform and they set up a long line of mini shops on the floor, selling stuff they created, the designs were pretty good and original. I also visited the infamous Khao San Road and it is as it's known - a high concentration of tourists and overpriced goods.. though I was impressed at the quality of the fake UK drivers licenses that I was offered.

The food was good, and very cheap. Meals wouldn't be more than a pound and would be very tasty. I only ate in a restaurant once, which was alright, but I much prefer the street food. I attempted to try as many different things as I could, my favorites include pad thai, mango and sticky rice, tom yum soup and red curry. The road to my hostel was full of food stalls, and one of them supposedly is the pad thai cooking champion, with the framed awards and newspaper clippings up on his stall.. and I must say, he did cook a mighty pad thai. I got the chance to try some odd things too, including fried insects/frogs and crocodile meat, both of which were different to anything I've encountered before. Just walking around the city is exhausting, and luckily in Bangkok you're never too far away from a food stall - the Thai's love to eat. I snacked on great stuff like fresh fruit (watermelon/jackfruit/pinapple/papaya), grilled treats like squid, fish balls or BBQ meat - basically you can get everything and anything on a stick. Thai's also like their food real spicy. My stomach stayed strong and I had no problems despite eating all the random stuff I did!

One of the more interesting off-the-beaten-track places I visited was the Siriraz Hospital, located in the old city, near all the temples. It was a fully functional hospital, but also hosted several medical-related museums. The main visitors seemed to be Thai high school students as it's not highly advertised as a tourist attraction. A couple of the museums featured preserved dead bodies/body parts so if you've ever been to the Gunther von Hagens exhibition, Body Worlds, you might share the interest with me. The difference with these museums was the specimens looked less like plastic figures, but much more realistic and grusome. The Anatomical museum featured a nice collection of dissected body parts, very visually good for educational purposes, and a collection of embryos, from a one-week zygote (with microscope to view it) to a 9 month old baby. I didn't take any photographs out of respect for the dead people, but others have a look at another photographer's shots if you're brave enough to have a look here. The forensic museum had other cool exhibits, including body parts that have resulted from violent crimes or from traffic accidents. I spent most of the day at the hospital looking at the museums, it was well worth it... I learnt a lot and found an unusual interest for it all. Other cool exhibits include a tribute to HRH the king of Thailand (whom Thai's worship like crazy - you even see graffiti that says long live the king everywhere) who seems to have done a lot of good work for his country, one about parasites and the different worms/bacteria you get and its journey from dodgy food to entering your system and coming out in ringworms/diahorrea, and one dedicated to the Tsunami, as Thailand was badly hit by it.

The temples were beautiful structures and I got to visit the main ones. Often I saw reconstruction of the art work all over the walls, At Wat Pho I got my fortune told, which was interesting but I'm skeptical with all of that so I tried not to give anything away but he could read me like a book which was freaky.

To be continued..
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Phuket, Thailand

Rain poured down, though the hot humid air hitting the skin of my face was a refreshing contrast to the previous sub zero temperatures. Glad to be in a country where english isn't the first language, I thought I'd have a go at learning some phrases, starting with numbers. Bangkok airport was wayyy better than I had expected, so it was ok that I had to stay during the night for my morning flight to Phuket.

Having dabbled in a bit of muay thai when I was younger, I decided that I wanted to spend some time training in Thailand. Muay Thai is Thailand's national sport. It differs from western kickboxing as elbows and knees are legal and fights feature only groin protection. I wasn't too keen on going to Phuket as it's "too touristy" but the gym was recommended to me. There are some gyms that I have been advised not to go to, as they can have 60+ tourists who aren't very serious in their training and are more just there for sex tourism and the trainers are just in it for the money. The gym I'm at is totally different - all the trainers are previous champions with years of fighting experience, and really make the effort to teach you their techniques and point out mistakes. The students training here are pretty long term, so are at the camp for months or even years, and many are training for fights or intend to fight.. so yeah they're pretty serious about it. I'm renting accommodation at the camp, and its real good - cable tv, fridge, aircon, daily maid service, so luxurious compared to what I've been used to, and for the same price, less than 4 quid a night. Most people rent mopeds to get around, but considering my budget (and safety) I've rented out a normal bicycle which gets me where I need to. The camp is in between two beaches - Rawai and Nai Harn, both are only a 10 minute cycle away and not as touristy as other beaches in phuket.

The first two days were hell. The previous two months in south america involved little exercise, plenty of food and plenty of beer.. so the training was a big shock to my system. I was also used to cold weather, and although its rainy season here - its still humid and very hot. I'm literally sweating buckets whilst training, and go through at least 3 litres of water a day. Each training session three hours and involves shadow boxing, one on one pad work with a trainer, bag work, weight training, and either clinching or sparring. The training is hardcore and intense, although we do get a fair amount of 'breaks' which involves doing situps or pushups. They say that a month at a Thai gym is equivalent to a year back home, and I can definitely see why. A typical day consists of wake up at 6, do some skipping before morning training, go back shower grab something to eat, then lots of free time to sleep/watch tv/go to the beach/internet/ etc. then afternoon training at 4pm, then get something to eat, then just relax before an early night. Sunday is a well deserved rest day to do whatever (though for most people its recovering from a heavy saturday night as well as the week's training).

It took a few days before I started getting the hang of things, and I'm really enjoying it. The training here is very different to back home, what was hardest was trying to relearn the techniques as everything I knew from back home was 'wrong' and it took a while to remove old habits... everything from stance, kicking angles, if you should be on tip toes, if you should pull toes back or forward etc. was done in a different way. Saying that, I guess it's the particular preference for the style of how to do things, as I often found differences between the trainers themselves.. which can sometimes be frustrating.

On Saturday it was great seeing our resident Thai fighter, Dee, fighting live on channel 3. It was a great 5-round fight and it was great seeing someone that I saw train every day at our gym in action on television. I didn't understand any of the thai commentry, except the occasional mention of our gym's name. We all sat around the TV in the gym in support of Dee and wached him deservedly win.

The following Friday I went to Bangla Stadium in Patong to watch two guys from our camp have their fights. I hadn't been to Patong but it was immediately obvious that this is the proper touristy side of Phuket and I appreciated how different it was in the part of Phuket that the gym is located - in the middle of nowhere, no distractions, and nowhere near as touristy. From our gym, Joe, my roomate from San Francisco and Jackie, the Korean Champion, were fighting against local Thais and there were 6 other fights between Thais from other gyms. The first couple of fights were between young'uns around 9 years old, but damn they were good. One of them vomited during the fight, all you see is his gumshield shoot out of his mouth followed by a load of sick.. but he got back up again and continued the fight (but didn't win). In another match, the clinching got so hardcore that one guy was clinched so hard that he went over the ringside and fell out of the ring. It was an entertaining night, Jackie and Joe won their fights by technical knockout (TKO). The fighting was quite raw since the Thai rules allow elbows and knees, but it definitely seemed more for sport rather than a late night brawl outside a bar. What I was most impressed with was the face that the competitors were such good sports, touching gloves and even hugging after a fight, unlike the kind of agression or grudge you might see in other fights. We sat in the stands where the view was better, while most people sat ringside, and the stands were full of Thais, most were gambling on the fights, they all had weird hand signals to each other when placing bets with each other.. and the odds seem to been constantly changing as the fights went on. Traditional thai music was played by a band during the fights, which gave the fights some kind of authenticity.

I was definitely getting into shape after two weeks at the camp, though training everyday with little time to recover in between meant I had my fair share of aches and pains, especially in the little minor muscles. The camp is great for everything - cardio, conditioning and technique.. a lot of students at the camp were training for fights and some even had a fighting career going for them. We also have some of Korea's top fighers training at our gym and they are real good - and friendly too.

Apparently Tuesday night is the best fight night for muay thai, so I was back at Bangla stadium, and damn right it was much better than the last I went to. The fights seemed more fairly matched and had a lot of action going on. I also really wanted to watch our Korean fighter, Woo Young, who has fought (and won) 11 times in Thailand already - with 11 knockouts! Unfortunately he got caught by left elbow and lost by KO round 2... and his injury didn't look pretty. On the way home from Patong, Mark's moped had a flat tyre so I ended up running a bit of the way back to the gym and hitching a ride with some Russians, which was definitely an experience in itself.
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Ko Phi Phi, Thailand

I figured I had to visit a touristy beach place while I was there. Ko Phi Phi is a group of islands in southern Thailand, in between Phuket and Krabi. The speedboat was only an hour away, and the day trip included visiting three islands, snorkelling, food and drink. First stop was Maya Bay - nice from far, but far from nice! Famous for being where some of 'The Beach' was filmed, (which is a decent film actually), it's all Leonardo Di Caprio's fault that this hidden paradise is not hidden any longer and features way too many tourists, quite spoiling the point of it. None of the tourists seemed to venture the rest of the island though, so it was cool exploring a little, but the main beach was just too packed and ruined the scenery... and this is meant to be low season!
Next stop was some kind of viking cave thing, which apparently had historic picutures carved into it or something like that, wasn't terribly interesting. Monkey beach was up next, which was just a group of boats up by the trees feeding sea monkeys bananas. The monkeys were quite cool, bit different from other monkeys I've seen.. though obviously used to humans and being a tourist attraction - though I can't blame them - why would you ever turn down free food?

The boat stopped in some random place where we could do some snorkelling. It was quite deep and there were loads of fish about - especially because people were feeding them bread (again why turn down free food!) It was ok, but only really saw one type green coloured fish. Somewhere round there was meant to be where one of the scenes from one of the James Bond films was filmed.

The main island, Phi Phi Don, was where we stopped for lunch. It was a buffet - with some really good seafood, chicken and a good variety. Walked around that island a bit.. reminded me of Peru, it was stall after stall of souvenir shops and tour agencies. It was a nice place though, clear water with sandy beaches.

We stayed 2 hours at Khai Island, the next one, and thank god they saved the best till last. It was a small little island, lots of sand and coral. There wasn't many tourists around and it was just beautiful how it was surrounded by open water... and since it wasn't big at all, it hasn't been spoiled by tourist shops or modern spas, just a few huts that sold drinks. Did some swimming, which was cool as schools of fish would go by as you swim and you can see them since the water is so clear. Only thing was that the floor was full of shells and corals, which my feet didn't appreciate. Snorkelled around the corals a bit, and that was cool.. seeing different types of fish and just in their natural habitat, eating off algae on the rocks.
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Hong Kong, China

It's fun to stay at the YMCA! coming soon
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Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

In a way, I was glad to be back in 'civilisation' - Sydney is much like london but much more compact and by the sea! It also meant that things were expensive, hence only staying a few days. I booked a bed in a hostel which was in a room called 'The Church' - as it was a 28-bed dorm! It was located in chinatown, and it seemed that most things were only a walk away, so I spent the first day exploring a little. I had problems withdrawing money from ATM machines as my card had been blocked, despite me giving plenty of notice that I was travelling abroad, but I was able to go to the counter at a bank and get money out manually. I met up with my mate ewan who was staying in Kings Cross and it was good catching up and he'd been in Sydney before so was able to show me whats good. We went to the supermarket and bought some food to cook back at his hostel. I thought I'd try kangaroo marinated in BBQ sauce.. it was ok, but I wasn't overly impressed. Apparently its 'good for the environment' to eat kangaroo according to the label, as there are so many of them in Australia and its really low in fat and high in protein. That night was a heavy night at a backpackers bar in town, but I was annoyed that when I got back to my hostel.. someone else was sleeping in my bed! So they transferred me to a 4-bed dorm free of charge that night, though I decided to move to Ewan's hostel the next day as it was cheaper and seemed better.

I didn't do too much in Sydney, just chilled out and did lots of exploring / walking about Sydney and going out at night. I went to Sydney aquarium which was cool, saw all sorts of sharks, penguines, seals, and all sorts of tropical fish from the great barrier reef (including nemo). Also went up the Oz tower at night, where there was a good view of Sydney, though again not overly impressive. I also went to see the harbour bridge and Sydney Opera house, which I was really interested in. The tour of the opera house told me about its history, how it was such an engineering masterpiece and how the architect's design was made a reality through elliptical geometry. It took way longer and cost tons more than expected, and its maintainance is paid for by the government because it doesn't actually make a profit. We saw most of the performance studios during this tour, which seemed cool but had lots of acoustic problems due to how the building is shaped. Overall, it was no wonder it was Sydney's main performance venue. I decided I wanted to watch the opera since I've never been before.. and managed to get a 'standing ticket' for only $40, which I was told had a better view than the cheapest $99 seated tickets at the back. In the end, it wasn't packed out and the door lady so kindly let me sit down - in a $160 seat I think! It was the oipening night of Lucia di Lammermoor, it's set in old Scotland and is about a woman who's in love with some guy from the enemy family (a bit like romeo and juliet) but her brother is making her marry some next guy. It was in italian, but there were surtitles so people could understand what was going on. The singing was beautiful, their voices amazing... holding such high notes with a lot of power and passion into it. A lot of people were all dressed up to go to the opera and it was a great atmosphere, giving them a well deserved standing ovaition at the end.. it was an engaging three-hour performance which was over before I knew it. I also checked out Sydney's two main streets - Pitt St and George Steet.. which will take you from one side of Sydney to another. Paddy's market was cool, just a load of stalls that sold cheap stuff really.
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Santiago, Chile

Since it's winter, crossing the border from Mendoza to Santiago isn't as straightforward. Due to heavy snow, the road between the two cities, which goes over the andes, is often closed. It was a dangerous game for me, as I had a flight to catch on Saturday but I was lucky that it was open the day I wanted to go. I was told it would only take 6 hours, so leave at 9 and arrive at 3. However I didn't get in till about 7pm... the delay was due to the big queue at the border.

The views of the landscape from the bus were amazing - snow capped mountains, lakes and ski slopes. At the border it was immediate that Chile was a much more developed country - even from the general appearance of the Chileans, and the fact that all our bags got x-rayed. The Chile Peso is quite ridiculous - just under 1000 pesos to the pound, one would think things would be cheap but actually far from it. I reserved a spot at the same hostel that the group were going to finish at, just to see them again and I was told it was a top hostel. I liked the fact that I was able to take the subway and walk to the hostel, (thanks to being organised and doing some research for once) paying only 10% of the taxi price which was well tempting. The hostel was indeed quite cool, and since I only had a couple of days in Santiago, I decided to hit the slopes the very next day.

Snowboarding
I've never gone skiing or snowboarding before (cos its wayy too expensive back home) so I thought snowboarding the andes would be an interesting start. I was often told that snowboarding was much harder to start off with, and that my first day is not going to be fun. I sorted out the ski clothing hire that night (forgetting the 1hour time difference between Chile and Argy) and set off to a ski resort called Valle Nevada. For about 60 quid I got all my equipment hire, transfers, lift pass and a two hour snowboarding lesson.. It was about 45 minutes to the resort, the wiggly roads up the mountains made me a bit giddy at first, maybe the altitude was kicking in again! The resort's ski and snowboard school was really good, without the lesson I would have really struggled (even more than I did with the lesson). The lesson was translated into English too (just for me) and it seems that the majority of people on the slopes were locals from Chile. I was starting to get the hang of things on the little beginners hill were we had the lesson. It's kind of like when you first drive a car, 30mph seems oh-so-fast, it was a good feeling. Eventually I got the confidence to try the whole "green" trail which was marked as for beginners, so I left the beginners area and did the trail. The trail was nothing like the beginners area, I was on my arse every 20 seconds. Fall down, get back up and try again. And again. And again. I could do the heel thing, and the toes thing, but not both simultaneously which meant I'd fall every so often. Also, my ability to turn and/or stop was non-existent, sometimes I'd just throw myself into the snow just to stop myself crashing into people. It was funny seeing really small kids zooming past me at such speed, whilst I was sitting on my arse in the snow. Soon enough it was 3pm and I thought I'd get the lift up to the top of the beginners trail, and if I thought it was too high for me I'd just take the lift back down. My legs trembled a bit on the chairlift, remembering my slight fear of heights but I reassured myself that I wouldn't have to snowboard down and I'd just get the lift.
What I didn't realise was that it was indeed really really high and it's not possible to get the lift back down, only up. So I had to snowboard down. For me, on my first day, it was quite steep and had lots of turns.. but I also had the problem of needing to get back to the bus for 4:30. I had about an hour to do it, which would have been plenty of time for someone with experience, but since I was on my arse every 20 seconds this seemed impossible. Trying to get back in time, I tried to get down as fast as my ability could, though falling a good few times. I arrived at the lift back up to where the bus was at 4:45 and I was hoping that they hadn't left yet.. and to my luck I caught them as they were about to leave, but said I'll make it up to them by starting off the kareoke, sober. (Which was more than fine with me!) All in all, although I was hating it at the time, it was a great day and maybe next time I can improve with practice. Again, the scenery was amazing, and the snow powdery.

Meeting the group.
It was great to see the rest of the group again on my return from the slopes, and I spent the rest of the evening catching up with them and hearing on what I missed out of the last week. We all had the hostel's asado and went to the bar for the kareoke night. The microphone wasn't working unfortunately so we all just sang along without it.. it was quite empty in there at first so me and matt went around the hostel and tried to persuade everyone to come along. The highlight of that evening though, was the magician. I'd never really seen a magician in real life from up close before, but boyyy this guy was impressive.. very darren brown/david blaine stylee. He started off with some card tricks that I thought you could probably learn out of a book, but they soon got more complicated and seemed impossible. The best bit though, was when he was trying to give me a "gift" which was a piece of string, then he lit the string with a lighter and it turned into a watch. I was like ooo hes giving me a watch! Then I looked at my wrist and my watch was gone - the watch was mine! I never really take my watch off - I struggle to take it off myself, and one would think I would have noticed if it was gone and so would the 15 or so others stood next to and around me watching intently.. must have been magic! What was even more impressive, was when he asked someone to pick any random card in their head and not tell anyone. The magician would then shuffle the deck and put it on the table, saying that the card the dude picked is facing the other way in the pack. The dude would then tell everyone what card he was thinking of, then pick the deck up and that card would be the one facing the wrong way. Seems impossible - he must have somehow made the guy pick that card subnciously. We headed out to Bellavista to check out the nightlife.. it was alright but had an early night as quite tired.

Toursity Santiago
Full of skyrises, modern cars and expensive food, if it wasn't for the snowcapped mountain backdrop, plazas and spanish speaking people, it's hard to tell where you are. Santiago should be in Europe. As far as South America goes, it is the most developed place by a long run. A day walking around central Santiago was more than enough, seeing government buildings, statues, churches, museums etc.. There are also quite a few parks and malls, just like in any other modern city I guess, but I didn't have time to venture onto those parts. It was quite interesting reading in my lonely planet guide about how Chile has become so developed, and it would be good to find out more about its political history and more about activists such as Che Guaverra.
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Mendoza, Cuyo, Argentina

Back down south again, west of Buenos Aires is Mendoza, a city not too big nor too small. I failed to walk to the hostel from the bus station and gave into the temptation of getting a taxi, I wasn't even half way and the taxi was dirt cheap, so I was happy. The hostel seemed decent, but the prices of their tours and activities were quite expensive. I spent the afternoon walking around the city, trying to get my bearings and finding cool things. I came across some travel agencys etc. and the prices for the same tours/activities was much cheaper. Because the next day was Sunday, I figured most places in town would be closed (their opening hours seemed to imply that) and decided to do an activity - rafting and canopy. On another note, in Mendoza they practice siesta much more than in Buenos Aires. Most (if not all) places in Mendoza's opening hours are as follows: 9am - 1pm and 4:30pm - 8:30 pm.. so thats nearly 4 hour lunch break.. to go home and sleep. Lucky for them! but it meant that there was little to do between 1 and 4pm! SO anyway, I booked the stuff for the next day, discovered the use of skype at the net cafe (my skype name is steve.paule if anyone wants to add me) and ate dinner at some funky cafe/snack bar place. I got the cheapest thing ever (i was used to bolivian prices so thought everything was too expensive) which was quite tasty and enough to keep me happy that evening. All the chairs in there were facing the tv, it was quite funny. I discovered lomitos, which are smaller versions of lomos which are like burgers but the meat is actually a cut of meat rather than mushed up mince meat.. tasty and natural. I went back to the hostel and had an early night as I was going to have an early start.

THe rest coming soon
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Salta, Northern Argentina, Argentina

Bolivian roads are really cool - just dirt tracks really, so the ride was often bumpy, but amazing views. At one point we drove down a dried up riverbed, which was cool. I decided to leave the group in Salta, a week early, so I got a chance to sit in the cab up front again and I went snap happy with views from the truck. We went through a lot of red-rock country, it was much like what you see in westerns.. red rock and cactuses, I was expecting cowboys to be riding up in their horses but none could be seen. That night we camped in a cool freecamp near Tupiza, it was by the river and had a football pitch. We played a bit of ball games before it got dark, and I got to have a go at cutting the wood in half with an axe, which I hadn't done before, and I was useless.

The border crossing into Argentina was the most complicated I'd gone through so far.. a longish queue and having to take bags off the truck which didn't get searched anyway. You could see the difference as soon as you got into Argentina - the people are much paler and look european, the roads and sidewalks are proper and its obviously more developed. We got to the campsite which featured a massive pool, and I mean MASSIVE, but it didn't have any water in it. It was my last night with the group, and we went into Salta's main square for drinks and dinner. We went for steak, it was reeally good steak, and had an argentinian type called "bife de [something]". Since Argentinian wines are so highly regarded, I drank wine that night.. and since I never really drink wine, I drank it like beer.. and you can guess the rest.. lets just say I gave a generous tip to the toilet cleaner for his trouble. So yeah that was a good night and it was a late start the next day as the group weren't leaving till midday.

I managed to get to the bus station and sort out a ticket to Mendoza for 10pm that evening, giving me the whole day to explore salta and saving me the price of a night in a hostel. I went to the hypermarket with the group and helped them shop for supplies, then said my goodbyes and started exploring Salta, leaving my backpack in storage at the bus station. I walked by a few plazas, and first visited the top of some hill thing via the telefonica (cable cars) and got a good view of Salta and the valley. A shame the weather was cloudy, but it was good. There were lots of stalls selling a variety of things, Salta seemed to be less-touristy and full of all sorts of argentinians, both rich and poor. There didn't seem to be too much to do in terms of things to see and do, I managed to visit the museum of contempory arts (not allowed to take photos in there) amongst other random things like churches and shops. I got to the bus station nice and early and before you know it I was in Mendoza (after a 20+ hour drive).
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/stevepaule/1/1216645620/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/stevepaule/1/1216645620/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/stevepaule/1/1216645620/tpod.html Mon, 21 Jul 2008 11:26:39 -0400 Gap year travels

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Uyuni, Bolivia

There was some great scenery on the way to Uyuni, and we passed a place robbed by Butch Cassidy. The town itself doesn't seem to have any tall buildings, and our hostel was full of tourists coming to see the salt flats. We had a group meal at Minuteman Pizza, and my pizza was so big I couldn't finish it. At this point I still hadn't pooed in days so tried the chocolate laxative as recommended as 'gentle' by some woman in the death road office. Not sure that this was the best idea considering we were spending the whole of the next day at the WHITE salt flats! Turns out it was gentle and I managed to let some out in the morning, but by the afternoon it was the opposite extreme and it was timed perfectly where there were toilets. Better out than in I say, I just needed to get it all out of my system. I'm not complaining because it's my fault I try all the street food etc so I'm bound to be eating stuff my body cant handle - worth it though, I love street sausage sandwiches (chorizo) and the random juices.

We were picked up by some cool 4x4s and driven towards the salt flats. First stop was the train cemetery, where we got to take pics and climb on corroded rusty old trains and get pics on the train tracks. We then headed towards the salt flats, stopping by at a salt museum thing and learning how they process the salt in the salt flats and bag them up for household use. These salt flats are biggest in the world, over 10,000 sq km, bigger than Switzerland, it used to be a big lake a long long time ago but now is just salt. Apparently it's 10m deep of salt then theres water underneath. It was unlike anything I've seen before.. looks like snow but its salt (tastes like salt too!) We saw houses made out of salt too, apparently not even mixed with anything, seems like strong and sturdy stuff.

Its really hard to judge distance on the salt flats.. we were driving for ages and didn't seem like we were going anywhere. The island we were driving to seemed so close, yet it was so far. Since its hard to judge distance, it was possible to take cool photos.. some are on other people's cameras so I'll put them up as soon as I can steal them, but have a look at my ones as a teaser. We went to one of the islands which was full of cactuses, one that was 1000 years old! We trekked to the top of the island where the view of the salt flats was really cool. Because the sun was shining, it wasn't too cold during the day, but at night you see temperatures lower than -20degrees. I was chatting to the guide, Cynthia, for a while, and that was cool.. she was telling me she'd never seen the sea and she had a one year old and she lives with her family, did a linguistic degree etc etc.. totally different to the life I live.

We managed to catch sunset on the salt flats.. (romantic?!) as soon as the sun went down the skies started turning reddish/purple which was cool, then it started to go freezing! Overall (apart from the shits) it was a great day out in the salt flats
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