A Mancunian goes to the desert

After Bogotá I decided to head south to San Agustin, but decided to spend the night in el desierto de tatacoa along the way, promised amazing night sky views at the local observatory and wonderful scenery.

The ride there was long leaving Bogotá at 9, arriving in the desert at 630, after an hours wait in neiva for enough people for the colectivo and paying the colectivo driver yo take me out into the desert. The desert is surprisingly active at night, with a big crowd round the observatory, the night sky was overcast, but some stars could be seen through the gaps. Resolving to wake up early and see the stars when the clouds had cleared, I went to bed early.

I woke up at 5 to the sound of rain. Yes rain in the desert. For the next 6 hours the desert experienced heavy rain, light drizzle, heavy drizzle, light rain, and all the many varieties of rain known well by the residents of Manchester (but about 15 degrees warmer which is a lot more pleasant!)

Embarking on a tour of the desert, with our guide Jorge, and Edgar and Cecilia, a kind Colombian couple who offered the use of there car.  The desert has some truly spectacular landscapes. Finishing the tour was a nice outdoor pool from a natural spring. After jumping in I discovered a truth, everything in the desert has a price! After paying for use of the pool, and returning to the hostel, I had to bargain for a ride to town on the back of our guides motorbike (10000 pesos for a 4km ride, 6000 pesos for the 45km ride from neiva to villaveija, they really gouge the tourists in the desert). Before heading off on the bumpy ride to San Agustin.

Bogota part 2: the city and around

The city of Bogotá is pretty huge, bit after a lesson on the transport system by Anyela I was ready to tackle the city. Bogotá is a really vibrant city full of culture.

Highlights of the city are the museum of gold, full of truly astonishing amounts of gold, the museum is full of gold artefacts over 3 floors, but the final exhibit is a large room with the walls covered with gold artefacts, really spectacular.

There were another 3 walls of this

The various churches in Bogotá really highlight the wealth of the country with countless spectacular artefacts, especially the 5kg of gold plus 4000 emeralds and loads of other gems, one among many astounding objects in the various churches.

Ridiculous amounts of wealth

The history of Colombia as shown in the many museums was also very interesting, especially the ubiquitous simon bolivar , whose statues were seemingly everywhere!

One of many busts and statues of el liberator

Outside of the city, the catedral de sal, a salt mine converted into a cathedral was amazing. The stations of the cross carved into the rock as we went down were beautiful, but paled in comparison to the beauty of the cathedral under the earth.

the salt cathedral

Bogota part 1:casa de anyela

Arriving in Bogotá I was welcomed by the friendly faces of Anyela and her brother Dario. After a quick stop at her families house in the city we were off to the countryside and a horde of relatives to celebrate the new year.

My Spanish was soon exposed as very limited, and I embarked on a crash course in Spanish led by Anyela's two nieces Sofia and Mariana, who were both puzzled by this stranger who couldn't speak properly.

The new years celebrations were a lot of fun, erecting the tents to sleep in before the festivities started I demonstrated a gringos ability to attract mosquitoes from miles around, but was then treated to a masterclass in bug killing as an electrified tennis racket was used with deadly effect to eliminate all bugs.

Some of my professoras

Colombian new years celebrations seem to revolve around two things food and fireworks. Over the two days i was there copious amounts of delicious food was produced, especially nice was cerdo, a suckling pig stuffed with rice and vegetables.

New year is seen in by the burning of an effigy constructed from old clothes, similar to a guy. I was surprised when helping to build it when a fair amount of flash powder (you light it and it goes bang), was added to the old clothes, but was even more surprised when they started stuffing the guy with fireworks too! The new year was seen in throwing a list of bad things from the year before (I'm looking at you thesis writing) into the fire, accompanied by a firework salute (fireworks held in peoples hands fired into the night), with the firework stuffed guy on the fire. Pretty sure that would never be allowed in the UK! Anyway it was great fun, and no one injured themselves.

The next week in Bogotá was filled with trips to awesome places, in another post, but was thoroughly improved by the hospitality of Anyela's family, and the Spanish lessons they provided. And of course the food!

A highlight was the BBQ on my final day, with seemingly half a cow and a chicken on the BBQ, putting the British BBQ to shame. Served with salad and potatoes, which were definitively tastier than any other potato I have ever had.  And of course the juice! Fresh fruit juice is a massive luxury that I am determined to take full advantage of in my time in south america!

BBQ!

Rio!

When booking my trip I had planned to fly straight to Colombia before heading down the west coast of South America, however flights conspired such that I would be going via Rio de Janeiro, and I could not pass up that opportunity.  My connecting flight to Bogotá was in 2 days to see the city.

My first challenge was finding somewhere to stay in the astonishingly busy city of Rio, as hordes of people arrived from around the world for the new years celebrations.  As a result most hostels were either booked, astonishingly expensive (80 pounds for a night in a hostel dorm) or required you to stay for the duration of the new year festivities.  Thankfully one hostel was available which was a lot cheaper than everywhere else, and did not require staying for the duration, Lapa hostel.  Reviews of the hostel were mixed, some with glowing reviews, and others claiming it was basically in the ghetto, with robberies in the area common.  With some trepidation I signed up for a 3 day stay, and I am glad I did!

Lapa hostel is on the edge of the lapa district, a known party hot spot, and though it bordered some dodgy areas, the hostel itself was perfectly safe.  The hostel mainly catered for a brazillian crowd, with few foreigners, since my Portuguese is non existent, I had to rely on sign language, and the english of the hostel staff and some of the guest to get by.  Everyone was very friendly, and I was soon accompanying a group of brazillians on a walk up Pao de acucar, or sugar loaf mountain.  This walk is definitely not for the faint of heart (though it pales in comparison to the walk up corcovado, photos of which convinced me not to attempt it!), involving quite a lot of clambering up steep paths, but it is not particularly strenuous.  The view from half way up was well worth it, but you can no longer purchase tickets half way up for the cable car to the top (and the reported 3 hours queues at the bottom put me off doing that!) so I never got to the top, but the view from half way up was well worth it (and free!).  Following my walk up sugar loaf, I went for some excellent food at a local Brazilian restaurant (paid for by the gram) followed by an entertaining evening relaxing with the locals.

Sugar Loaf from morro da urcar

Day 2, I decided to join the free walking tour of central rio, an excellent tour of central rio with friendly local guides, culminating in an excellent brazilian restaurant where we ate feijoda, a traditional brazillian dish of black beans, rice and pork, we were served an astonishing amount of this, and we were all left completely stuffed.

After the walking tour (which took much longer than expected), I ambitiously tried to cover the two main attractions of rio, the cristo redentor, and copacabana.  Warned that the train to the top was likely to result in massive queues, and the climb to the top was daunting enough that company was advised, I decided to try the bus, unfortunately this was not the easiest to find, and I ended up arriving 2 minutes after the last bus departed!

The beautiful theatre building

And for twice the price, the much uglier town hall, the joys of graft

Cristo Redentor, as close as I got but still impressive

I decided to give the christ a miss, and headed straight to the beach! Copacabana was extremely busy filled with implausibly beautiful locals, and the odd gringo turning into a lobster.  After a dance around a local scamster trying to get some money out of me (if your shoe magically sprouts a yellow stain, be wary of men conveniently appearing with shampoo!), I wandered down the beach, it really is astonishingly beautiful, but there were far to many people for my taste. I ventured back into the city and despite being really full, was drawn to sample seemingly a common occurence in Brazil... strawberrys on pizza.  This still baffles me having tasted it, it is actually quite nice, but I cannot see it spreading beyond Brazil anytime soon!

Copacabana

After an action packed few days, and still slightly jet lagged, I headed back to the hostel and turned in ready for my early start to head to Bogotá the next day.

The plan

Welcome to my travel blog, where I will attempt to chronicle my adventures on my round the world trip (mainly for myself, but feel free to follow along).  The plan is this, depart United Kingdom 28th December 2013, return 25th September 2014, older and hopefully wiser, with many adventures along the way.

My perhaps overambitious initial itinerary covers 16 countries in South America, Oceania and Asia.  We will see how many of these countries I actually visit!

Part I South America 2 months until the end of February
Brazil
Colombia
Ecuador
Peru
Bolivia
Chile

Part II Oceania 1.5 months until the middle of april
New Zealand
Australia

Part III Asia 5.5 months until September
Japan
China
Malaysia
Thailand
Laos
Cambodia
Vietnam
and India