Immediately after my last post both Nicole and I were stricken by the most sever dose of food poisoning that either of us can remember. I had left Nicole at the hotel to go to the internet as she had been feeling a bit off colour and by the time I returned she was already throwing up and I wasn´t far behind. Needless to say we had a great night taking turns running for the bathroom and I am sure the other people sharing our hotel enjoyed the sound-effects which continued until after 2am. The next day we were both shattered and ditched our crappy hostel for a nice hotel around the corner so we could recuperate in comfort – and besides the bathroom smelt bad…… Best we can figure is the culprit was a bottle of orange juice we had shared that afternoon. It was the only thing we had both drunk or eaten. Apparently a while ago in South Aussie there was a case of salmonella in OJ which nailed enough people to get into the news.
The day after, with our stomachs mostly under control we headed out of Tafi del Valle for the town of Cachi via the ruins of the Indian city of Quilmers. There were some nicely restored dry stone walls with plenty of giant cactus for scenery and was an interesting enough place to poke around. Cachi was a nice enough small town, but the only place in Argentina so far that I have had a bad steak. It was tough enough that even the local stray dog had trouble chewing it up….
The drive from Cachi to Salta was amazing, again. We crossed through a high pass from absolute total desert and dropped into a valley of dense rainforest. It is just crazy how quickly the country can change. One side of a mountain can get 2500mm of rain per year, the other side gets 25mm.
Salta initially didn´t do much for us. We greatly preferred Mendoza with its leafy avenues, but there were still some nice parks and plazas in Salta and it grew on us a bit after we had a look around. The Tren de los Nubes (train to the clouds) which Mike and Kylie took whilst they were here only ran once a week on a Saturday so, after some confused conversation with a tour guide, we decided just to drive the route ourselves. The train goes up into the mountains toward the Chile border to La Polerilla Viaduct at an altitude of 4200m, and then come back again along the same route. We opted to drive a loop following the train to the Viaduct but then head further north past a large salt lake and down to the town of Purmamarca. Not knowing what a viaduct actually was we were a bit surprised to find it is just a train bridge. At 60m high it was a decent enough bridge, but it was just a bridge. I guess if they called it a bridge then illiterate people like us wouldn´t drive for hours to look at it. In any case the drive itself was worth the effort for the amazing scenery and I was able to set a new personal altitude record at 4200m. By the way, walking up a 60m hill at 4200m is actually pretty damn hard work. Guess that is no surprise for those of you who were recently hiking in the Himalayas but was a bit of surprise for us non-mountain men.
The Salinas Grande was a bit underwhelming and didn´t inspire us to stop the car, but the mountain pass that followed was probably the best we had seen, topping out at 4170m. Some of the other passes we had been up slowly wound their way up a wide valley so you didn´t really feel high. This time we went almost straight up with astounding views, crossed over the top and we greeted by an even more amazing view before dropping straight back down nearly 2000m. You really understand how high you are when you drive down down down for ages only to find that you are still well above the highest point in Australia!
We had a great room in Purmamarca with a nice view of the ¨hill of 7 colours¨. The Andes are like nothing I have ever seen, or even imagined. They are almost completely devoid of vegetation in most places, with the exception of giant cactus, but the soil/rock changes colour almost everywhere you look. The place is just massive piles of multicolored dirt eroded into all sorts of crazy shapes. It is like a massive moonscape on acid and a geologists paradise.
Farewelling Purmamarca we had one final drive up the world heritage listed Quebrda de Humahuaca valley. Whist it was a lovely drive, it wasn´t any more impressive than many other areas we had recently driven through. With that we turned our back on the Andes for now and pointed the car across the Chaco aiming for Correntes on the mighty Rio Parana.
The Chaco is a vast low plain of semi-arid looking scrub stretching across most of northern Argentina. There are only a few dodgy towns spread over hundreds of km, so accommodation options were limited. Darkness found us in the town of Monte Quemado about half way across and looking for a room of the night. There was a hotel sign on the highway with an address in town, which would have been much more useful if combined with some street signs. After dodging a few pigs and navigating the muddy streets, including a lake in the main street which threatened to swamp our little car, we found our way to the salubrious establishment complete with large drunk, partially clothed, inbred lurking in reception. I was starting to feel like we had walked into a scene from Deliverance. Somewhere over the faint banjo music I heard a pig squeal…. After settling into our uncomfortable overpriced hotel room we went for another drive around town to give the locals something to stare at, but it hadn´t got any better although maybe there were a few more nervous looking pigs about. That evening we were serenaded to sleep by the sounds of someone vomiting up their dinner, 15 beers and most likely a few vital organs outside our room about 1am. At 0830 the next day the hotel helpfully turned off the air conditioner for us and then someone tried to enter the room. We decided it was time to head off before we ended up bound and gagged in a basement and I can promise you that the best view of Monte Quemado is in your rear vision mirror.
Having narrowly escaped being made to squeal like a pig we arrived in Corrientes keen for some civilisation. Corrientes is on the Rio Parana which is a damn big river and apparently home to some good sized Dorado too, which I am keen to catch. Unfortunately accommodation was hard to come by once again and we found ourselves in a pretty crappy hotel a bit out of town. Anyway, it kept the rain off – and there was plenty of that. Following our 9am wake up call, which we had mistakenly ordered the previous afternoon with our dodgy Spanish, we staggered downstairs to find the lobby flooded and our car sitting in a lake which used to be a road. Luckily it wasn´t too deep for our little car and we managed to make our way out of town dodging fallen trees and powerlines. Seemed it had been quite a night.
Heading down the river we settled on the town of La Paz, about 400km south of Corrientes, where we are now. La Paz is a pretty nice town and we have a good hotel next to the plaza for a reasonable price so life is looking up. Despite it being closed season for Dorado at the moment I have managed to line up a charter for tomorrow, although the river is in full flood so I am not overly hopeful of catching much. Anyway, we´ll have a crack and see what happens. Stay tuned and I´ll let you know how we go.
Sunday, November 29, 2009
More piccies
I´m not sure what this statue was commemorating, but it looked like fun....
Nicole and the Hill of 7 Colours
The La Polerilla Viaduct
Big mountain
Calingaster Valley
Calingaster Valley
Plaza Españia, Mendoza
One corner of Iguassu Falls - it is hard to take a photo of 275 seperate waterfalls at once without a helicopter
Iguassu againSaturday, November 21, 2009
Iguazu and the Andes
What can you say about Iguazu falls? I´ve never seen anything like it. The water was up a bit while we were there and it was amazing. If you haven´t been there, then it is definately something you should visit. We spent a day on the Brazil side and another on the Argentine side including a boat ride up the river to the base of the falls. There are boardwalks constructed across some of the falls, which don´t do much for the view but get you right into the action (and soaked) which was pretty cool.
From Iguazu we flew to Buenos Aires, grabbed a hire car for a few weeks and headed west for 800km to Medoza. We spent a couple of nights in Mendoza, visiting vinyards and sampling some of the local poison, which was actually pretty good. I also had my first Argentine steak - and they are fantastic. The steak here really is as good as people say. My Argentine steak diet is set to take up where my African fried chicken diet left off.... Tucking a few bottles of Mendoza´s finest red under our arm we decided to head up into the moutains proper to try and spot Aconcagua, the highest peak outside the Himalayas at 6962m.
On the way up we were flagged down by the police and “booked” for overtaking a truck on double yellow lines. Apparently we had to follow him back to town and pay a US$300 fine into a bank account (his no doubt). Initally I thought he only wanted 30 pesos (about $8) and was happy to hand that over – he looked pretty excited when I got my wallet out straight away, but his face fell when I started pulling out 5 peso notes. Nicole helpfully translated that he wanted US$300, not 30 pesos! I suggested we go back to the police station rather than the bank, but he wasn´t so keen on that idea. Then I suggested maybe we go the British Consulate for translation services and he was even less keen on that idea, but was still keen on getting some money out of me. After 15 minutes of haggling we managed to agree on a $US50 “on the spot fine” by which time I was getting a bit concerned – but being a bit flustered and with my crap spanish I ended up giving him $100 by mistake. Nicole helpfully informed my of my error when I got back in the car, but the copper looked happy although he was probably wondering why I argued for so long then gave him $100 anyway. It wasn´t until we were driving off that we realised that from their vantage point on the mountain they probably did see me overtake a truck on double yellow down the bottom of the hill, until then I had actually thought he was just making the whole thing up to extort some money.
With that fun behind us, and my wallet a bit lighter, we headed up the to the Chile Border at 3300m and higher than I have ever been (outside of an aircraft anyway). Unfortunately it was an overcast day, with a howling wind (about 100km/hr by my estimate - we had dust overtaking the car at 60km/hr the next day and it was a gentle breeze by comparison) and a bit of (stinging) snow. Not the best day for looking at mountains. It was still pretty impressive and definately the biggest mountains I have ever laid eyes on. The next day was a pearler though as we drove north through the Calingaster Valley. The clouds had gone and it was crystal clear giving us a fantastic view of the Andes proper to the west and the foothills (think +3000m just for the foothills - for comparison Kosciuszko is 2230m) to the east. As we headed north the peak of Aconcagua climbed above the horizon behind us until it stood (literally) miles above the rest. The curios thing with moutains is that you need some distance to see how high they really are as close up the foothills shield them and they don´t look so big. We had lunch by ourselves down by a river in the town of Belen with an uninterupped view of a lengthy stretch of the Andes including 7 peaks over 5000m and 2 over 6500m directly in front of us. We must have sat there for an hour just staring at the view.
The following day we decided to try our luck at another high pass going up to the Chile Border, this time the Agua Negra Pass which topped out at 4700m. Driving up the road there was a conspicious absence of traffic, although there were no signs tellings us to keep out (that we could understand anyway) and all the guard posts were unmanned. There was a work crew in the pass and we had a quick chat with them but saw no other traffic. As time was getting away from us we stopped at the 4000m mark, took a few photos in the snow and then headed back down, still not seeing anyone else on the road. When we got to the bottom the boom gate was shut at the guard house and they were quite interested to know where we had been. I don´t know what they were trying to ask but in the end they seemed happy to let us go on our way without even asking for a bribe.
We have spent the last couple of days still heading north for Salta and are currently in the small town of Tafi del Valle. Our plan is for a few days in and around Salta before heading across to Resistencia on the Rio Parana, which is Dorado fishing country, and then spend a few days making our way down the river back to Buenos Aires whilst I hopefully catch a few Dorado.
From Iguazu we flew to Buenos Aires, grabbed a hire car for a few weeks and headed west for 800km to Medoza. We spent a couple of nights in Mendoza, visiting vinyards and sampling some of the local poison, which was actually pretty good. I also had my first Argentine steak - and they are fantastic. The steak here really is as good as people say. My Argentine steak diet is set to take up where my African fried chicken diet left off.... Tucking a few bottles of Mendoza´s finest red under our arm we decided to head up into the moutains proper to try and spot Aconcagua, the highest peak outside the Himalayas at 6962m.
On the way up we were flagged down by the police and “booked” for overtaking a truck on double yellow lines. Apparently we had to follow him back to town and pay a US$300 fine into a bank account (his no doubt). Initally I thought he only wanted 30 pesos (about $8) and was happy to hand that over – he looked pretty excited when I got my wallet out straight away, but his face fell when I started pulling out 5 peso notes. Nicole helpfully translated that he wanted US$300, not 30 pesos! I suggested we go back to the police station rather than the bank, but he wasn´t so keen on that idea. Then I suggested maybe we go the British Consulate for translation services and he was even less keen on that idea, but was still keen on getting some money out of me. After 15 minutes of haggling we managed to agree on a $US50 “on the spot fine” by which time I was getting a bit concerned – but being a bit flustered and with my crap spanish I ended up giving him $100 by mistake. Nicole helpfully informed my of my error when I got back in the car, but the copper looked happy although he was probably wondering why I argued for so long then gave him $100 anyway. It wasn´t until we were driving off that we realised that from their vantage point on the mountain they probably did see me overtake a truck on double yellow down the bottom of the hill, until then I had actually thought he was just making the whole thing up to extort some money.
With that fun behind us, and my wallet a bit lighter, we headed up the to the Chile Border at 3300m and higher than I have ever been (outside of an aircraft anyway). Unfortunately it was an overcast day, with a howling wind (about 100km/hr by my estimate - we had dust overtaking the car at 60km/hr the next day and it was a gentle breeze by comparison) and a bit of (stinging) snow. Not the best day for looking at mountains. It was still pretty impressive and definately the biggest mountains I have ever laid eyes on. The next day was a pearler though as we drove north through the Calingaster Valley. The clouds had gone and it was crystal clear giving us a fantastic view of the Andes proper to the west and the foothills (think +3000m just for the foothills - for comparison Kosciuszko is 2230m) to the east. As we headed north the peak of Aconcagua climbed above the horizon behind us until it stood (literally) miles above the rest. The curios thing with moutains is that you need some distance to see how high they really are as close up the foothills shield them and they don´t look so big. We had lunch by ourselves down by a river in the town of Belen with an uninterupped view of a lengthy stretch of the Andes including 7 peaks over 5000m and 2 over 6500m directly in front of us. We must have sat there for an hour just staring at the view.
The following day we decided to try our luck at another high pass going up to the Chile Border, this time the Agua Negra Pass which topped out at 4700m. Driving up the road there was a conspicious absence of traffic, although there were no signs tellings us to keep out (that we could understand anyway) and all the guard posts were unmanned. There was a work crew in the pass and we had a quick chat with them but saw no other traffic. As time was getting away from us we stopped at the 4000m mark, took a few photos in the snow and then headed back down, still not seeing anyone else on the road. When we got to the bottom the boom gate was shut at the guard house and they were quite interested to know where we had been. I don´t know what they were trying to ask but in the end they seemed happy to let us go on our way without even asking for a bribe.
We have spent the last couple of days still heading north for Salta and are currently in the small town of Tafi del Valle. Our plan is for a few days in and around Salta before heading across to Resistencia on the Rio Parana, which is Dorado fishing country, and then spend a few days making our way down the river back to Buenos Aires whilst I hopefully catch a few Dorado.
Thursday, November 12, 2009
New Franchise Opportunity
I spotted this in Brazil yesterday and thought it would be a great franchise for Australia. Literally translated it means Druggie Panda. Isn´t it great, the pale face, dark rimmed eyes and happy vacant expression. What better mascot for a drug store......Wednesday, November 11, 2009
The Pantanal
Arriving in Cuiaba in the middle of the night, we were immediately accosted by a guide waiting at the airport for some clients and directed to a somewhat dingy hotel in the center of town. Apart from a few ants in the bed it was ok, and while the aircon sounded like a bucket of bolts in a washing machine it did manage the odd puff of cool air to combat the good tropical weather. Once again we were able to organise a tour without difficulty – a day in Chapada to the north and then 5 days in the Pantanal proper to the south. Chapada is a small town on a plateau about 100km north of Cuiaba. The plateau is a sandstone escarpment which looks just like Kakadu. Even the savanna plants here look familiar – so similar to home. The weather wasn´t really kind, but we did manage to visit a few waterfalls the first day before the rain set in. It was still kind of cool driving back down off the plateau in the mist and fog with the low clouds stilling on top of the escarpment.
In the Panatanal we had two nights in the (locally) famous Pousada Piuval which was a pretty nice farm stay sort of deal and then another 2 nights at Pousada Canto do Arancua. There are three things you are apparently required to do in the Pantanal, boat rides, horse rides and hiking. Most of you will know that I am no great equestrian and after three hours sitting on a horse I had blisters on my butt and it felt more like the horse had been riding me than the other way around. I guess that is why I own a quad bike, not a horse. It amazes me that after all this time people have been riding horse no-one has invented a more comfortable way to sit on them! I suppose it is sort of peaceful wondering along on a horse though, but that isn´t enough to make up for the next week of pain. Nicole didn´t seem to suffer to the same degree that I did, but then her horse didn´t wake up for the first hour of the ride and wouldn´t break into a trot if you set it on fire, whilst I thought it would be a good idea to make mine run. It wasn´t.
The most surprising thing about the pantanal was the birds – everywhere and of every description. The place really is an ornithologist’s wet dream (it is a flood plain after all...). The apparently endangered Hyacinth Macaw were quite easy to find plus toucans, raptors, storks etc etc. I have taken a shine to toucans, no doubt due to my long exposure to fruitloops adds as a child featuring a happy toucan encouraging you to harass your parents to the point of insanity to buy you fruit loops. Aside from the birds we also spotted plenty of capybara (an oversized guinea pig), tapir, big hairy spiders, giant river otters and there are spectacled caiman everywhere. It was an eerie experience for a top end lad to walk along the edge of a pool completely chockers with hundreds of caiman. The spectacled caiman is too small to worry a person, but many years of conditioning tells me that there must have been a 5m salty mixed up in that lot somewhere! Our guide was surprised to know that you can´t stroll among the crocs in the top end and that they do actually eat people occasionally. We also did the obligatory piranha fishing sessions, and Nicole did catch more than me on one occasion which she still hasn´t let me forget. We also got nailed by a good storm whilst in the boat and definitely got our money´s worth out of the dry bag and our wet weather gear.
Anyway, we are back in Cuiaba now on our way to Iguazu falls this evening. It has been raining quite a lot down there apparently so we are hoping the water is low enough to allow us to do the boat ride to the base of the falls. We just have another two flights to look forward to first, sure to be a joy with my still bruised and blistered butt.......
In the Panatanal we had two nights in the (locally) famous Pousada Piuval which was a pretty nice farm stay sort of deal and then another 2 nights at Pousada Canto do Arancua. There are three things you are apparently required to do in the Pantanal, boat rides, horse rides and hiking. Most of you will know that I am no great equestrian and after three hours sitting on a horse I had blisters on my butt and it felt more like the horse had been riding me than the other way around. I guess that is why I own a quad bike, not a horse. It amazes me that after all this time people have been riding horse no-one has invented a more comfortable way to sit on them! I suppose it is sort of peaceful wondering along on a horse though, but that isn´t enough to make up for the next week of pain. Nicole didn´t seem to suffer to the same degree that I did, but then her horse didn´t wake up for the first hour of the ride and wouldn´t break into a trot if you set it on fire, whilst I thought it would be a good idea to make mine run. It wasn´t.
The most surprising thing about the pantanal was the birds – everywhere and of every description. The place really is an ornithologist’s wet dream (it is a flood plain after all...). The apparently endangered Hyacinth Macaw were quite easy to find plus toucans, raptors, storks etc etc. I have taken a shine to toucans, no doubt due to my long exposure to fruitloops adds as a child featuring a happy toucan encouraging you to harass your parents to the point of insanity to buy you fruit loops. Aside from the birds we also spotted plenty of capybara (an oversized guinea pig), tapir, big hairy spiders, giant river otters and there are spectacled caiman everywhere. It was an eerie experience for a top end lad to walk along the edge of a pool completely chockers with hundreds of caiman. The spectacled caiman is too small to worry a person, but many years of conditioning tells me that there must have been a 5m salty mixed up in that lot somewhere! Our guide was surprised to know that you can´t stroll among the crocs in the top end and that they do actually eat people occasionally. We also did the obligatory piranha fishing sessions, and Nicole did catch more than me on one occasion which she still hasn´t let me forget. We also got nailed by a good storm whilst in the boat and definitely got our money´s worth out of the dry bag and our wet weather gear.
Anyway, we are back in Cuiaba now on our way to Iguazu falls this evening. It has been raining quite a lot down there apparently so we are hoping the water is low enough to allow us to do the boat ride to the base of the falls. We just have another two flights to look forward to first, sure to be a joy with my still bruised and blistered butt.......
Pantanal Piccies
Giant River Otters
Nicole on the afternoon she didn´t catch more fish than me.....
Capybara
Hyacinth Macaws
Nicole and her valiant steed
Crikey!!
Chapada, but could be Litchfield....Monday, November 2, 2009
The mighty jungle
Our one day in Rio was pretty busy with the obligatory visit to Christo Redemptor on Corcovado Mountain with a great view across the city. We had lunch in a nice beachfront restaurant before returning to Copacabana beach for Caparina´s at sunset. Our flight to Manaus was 4 hours, plus another hour sitting on the runway in Rio getting us here at the cheery hour of 4am. We crawled out of bed about midday and set out to book a jungle trip before dinner at a Brazilian bbq restaurant with all you can eat meat.....
Our jungle expedition began with a boat trip across the Rio Negro to the ´meeting of the waters`. The point where the black water of the Rio Negro meets the coffee coloured water of the Rio Solimoes and becomes the Amazon River proper. The result is the world´s largest colour change which made my casting finger itchy! We then headed up the Solimoes a bit before getting in a combi van (yes they still make them over here!) and heading south on the central amazonas highway past the smouldering remnants of the rainforest which were soon to become cow paddocks, before another boat transfer to our `jungle` lodge. I was just starting to wonder when we would get to the rainforest proper when we pulled up at a farm, perhaps for supplies, before we left civilisation behind. As it turned out, this was our ´jungle´lodge. A floating restaurant with accommodation up the bank above, but sitting in a field surrounded by cows and looking across the river at another field with yet more cows at the entrance to Juma Lake.
In the jungle, the (once) mighty jungle,
The cow sleeps tonight.....
You get the picture. It was actually quite a nice spot, just not what we had imagined. On the plus side you could swim in the river which was a nice change from the Top End where it isn´t such a good idea.
Despite our initial disappointment there is always a silver lining - this time it was fishing. We did a lot of fishing, catching Peacock Bass, Jacunda, Aruana, Traira and of course piranha. Unfortunately I didn´t get any large bass, but we caught plenty of smaller ones up to about 2kg. I didn´t manage to land a black piranha, but did feed them several lures. Despite the confidence of my guide that rubber lures wouldn´t work I caught quite a few fish on snap-backs. The underwater razor gang made short work of squidgies though, with them having about the same life expectancy as a cup-cake at a fat kids picnic. We also spent a couple of nights camping in the jungle (there was some around between the farms) in hammocks which was pretty cool and gave us to opportunity to explore a bit more of the lake and get a visit from a troupe of howler monkeys. These critters make the most ungodly noise, like a bunch of budding ghouls competing for a key role in a zombie movie.
Once again the worldwide law of tour guides held true – and our guide was a world class tosser of which I have never seen the like. Apparently, aside from being a guide for Steve Irwin, BBC and National Geographic, he was; a pro fisherman, a medical student, a physio student, a paramedic, worked in the mines, was in the military (and had been offered work by Blackwater as a mercenary), in search and rescue, an aid worker, a motocross rider, a boat tour operator and spoke 6 languages (of which we only witnessed Portuguese and English). I probably forgot a few in there but you get the picture. Unfortunately he spent so long telling everyone how good he was that there wasn´t really much time for pointing out wildlife or things of interest. We also had a young Swiss fellow along who was a kung fu exponent and made sure everyone knew by variously meditating on the front of the boat (with a cigarette hanging out of his mouth), practicing his techniques on unsuspecting trees during our jungle walk and during the long slow boat trips upriver. Sadly he left early, I think mostly because Nicole was nasty to him.
Anyway, we are now back in Manaus having survived our 6 days in the Amazon `jungle´. Tomorrow we head for Cuiaba for a week in the Pantanal.
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