South America #1 - Santiago, Crossing the Andes & Mendoza

And so to South America for the (unless anything crops up in the meantime, which I won´t rule out) last part of this big trip. I´ve long had something of a fascination with South America, so it´s great to be able to get back here for a decent amount of time and really see a few places. I went to Brazil for a mate´s wedding about 4 or 5 years ago and was blown away by it. I was only there for 2 weeks and only saw a few places, but it still grabbed me in a way that no other place had before.

My friend married a Brazlian girl in Florianopolis, south of Sao Paulo, and I was sitting in the back of a speedboat on his wedding day when we went wakeboarding, just looking around me and feeling kind of overwhelmed. People have said to me how much they liked NZ and how beautiful it was to them, and I was always a little flippant about it, knowing that NZ is beautiful without really understanding what they meant. Until the I saw the natural beauty of a little corner of Brazil. None of which is to say that I don´t find NZ beautiful, but familiarity breeds, well not exactly contempt in this case, but more like taking it for granted. Anyway, I had to come back, so here I am. I don´t have any specific plans for the next few months, other than I reckon I´ll love Argentina generally, and I´d like to see and do a few things like some glaciers in Chile, Machu Picchu, some time in Punte del Este in Uruguay (said to be the Ibiza of South America), Carnavale somewhere maybe in Brazil, a downhill bike ride in Bolivia, maybe Colombia, Equador and Angel Falls if it fits too. Other than that, she´s an open book, and here´s the first chapter.

November 18: Auckland - Santiago

I´m stoked to be spending the first 3 weeks of South America with my brother Ed, after which he´s off to Antarctica with our Mum for Christmas (as you do...) and I´ll wind my way back up north to wherever. As luck had it, we were on the same flight out of Auckland, to Chile´s capital.

Santiago sits around halfway up that long country, not on the coast but nestled between there and the Andes to the east. I wasn´t sure what to expect from Santiago, but it´s a great city. At around 4.5 million, there are as many people in this city alone as there are in NZ, but you wouldn´t think so when you walk around it. The streets are wide and have a very relaxed, European feel and look, the old mixing effortlessly with the new. You can see the Andes peeping out in the distance, through the haze, which makes them unimposing despite their size and scale.

The public transport system here is impressive, with the metro system easy to use, cheap, clean and arriving in what seemed like never more than a 2 minute wait. Bizarrely the metro trains run on tyres as well, so the carriages don´t rock from side to side so much like they sometimes do in London. In some cities you get the usual uninvited "services while stuck at traffic lights - people selling flowers, washing windscreens etc. Not here. No, they go for the acrobatic routine. Fantastic.



The people seem unhurried and are friendly towards tourists without being pushy or aggressive in any way. It´s said that this is the most welcoming of the South American capital cities, and it feels that way, which makes it the perfect place to fly in to from afar.

Our hostel was fantastic, not too expensive, well located and staffed by a group of Germans in Chile working and learning Spanish. At first I wondered why they would want to go to Chile, which is more expensive and maybe has less variety than Argentina, but on reflection I can easily see why. I don´t think Buenos Aires will be as friendly or relaxed as Santiago, but we´ll see. Ed´s mate Craig joined us on the 2nd day, and we´re all traveling together for about 3 weeks, mainly in Argentina. We were only in Santiago for 3 days, before heading to Argentina. On the basis of my time in Santiago, I´ll almost certainly get back there and elsewhere in Chile at some point when I´m flying solo.

On our first night, before Craig arrived, we sampled for our welcome drink a concoction called Pisco Sour, which is a citrus liquer of some sort and big in these parts. Kind of Margarita meets Fairy lemon washing up liquid, but very tasty. Then it was off for our first meal in South America with another dude at the hostel, YK. We went to an area called Bella Vista which is good for a feed and a drink, and sat ourselves down at a streetside cafe. For the price of a starter in London, I had a massive helping of steak with chips, sausage, onion and the (for me) obligatory 2 fried eggs. I was chowing down for a good 20 minutes and had long passed the point where eating for need becomes gratuitous eating, and I still couldn´t see much of my plate. If this is how the next 4 months are going to work out I´m going to need a doctor waiting for me at Heathrow.

The next day we went for a wander up one of the 2 main elevated walks in Santiago, Cerro San Cristobel. Well that´s not entirely true - we got a gondola 2km to the summit and got some great views of the city, and walked down. When we arrived back at the hostel Craig had checked in, so we cracked on with another Pisco Sour or 2 then went back to Bella Vista for another meal and some drinks with 2 of our hosts, Anna and Mattias. They suggested a club for us to go to afterwards, which we inexplicably failed to find but we did stumble on another small club called El Tunel which was very amusing. As the only gringos in the joint, we were well looked after and never short on a chance to try out some of our bad Spanish on locals (okay, local girls), who were keen to practice their English with us. Ed put in the hard yards with one girl who was lovely, and then somehow got it into his head at the end of the night that she was a hooker, so politely declined her invitation home. Naturally, he was regretting such a train of thought in the cold light of day. If Argentine girls are as friendly (whether or not in the sense of being possible to pull) we´re in for a good trip, but somehow I reckon this is more of a Chilean feature.

Our last day took us on another walk up the other elevated area in the city, Cerro Santa Lucia. This is apparently well known for being a favourite place for the locals to engage in PDA, which South Americans generally are not shy about from what we've seen. We didn´t see anything too full-on and did get some nice views of the city from there also. As well as being propositioned by a young local girl. We were feeling a bit jaded after the 5am finish the previous night so it was a relaxed dinner and an early night for us, ahead of an early bus the following morning.

November 21: Santiago - Mendoza

Buses are the main way to travel around South America, with varying degrees of comfort. Some bus journeys can take longer than a flight from London to NZ, so I will be keeping my fingers crossed that they´ll generally not be too uncomfortable. Our first experience was a relatively short 7 hour bus over the Andes, from Santiago to the small city of Mendoza, nestled at the foot of the Aregentine side of the mountains. The crossing was magnificent, taking us through some incredible scenery. We headed slightly north of Santiago, then hung a right and headed towards the Andes. When you reach the mountains, you start winding up, and up, and up, and up, and..... negotiating several hairpins. As you can see, the view back down of the hairpins you´ve just come up is kind of remarkable.

And so it was goodbye (for now) Chile.....

....and hello Argentina!

Just after the passport control point near the summit of the crossing, you pass on the left Aconcagua, which is the highest mountain outside of Asia, at a shade under 7,000m. The Argentine side of the Andes is much straighter and affords great views of sweeping valleys surrounded by imposing slopes of multi-coloured rock with varying degrees of growth, and a rust-red river snaking along the floor. There was a narrow railway line that followed the course of the road, but it looked as if there had been some landslides in places which have rendered the tracks unusable.

Exiting the mountain range, we pulled into Mendoza in the late afternoon and went on what turned out to be a bit of a mission to find our hostel. We´d booked it the previous night on the basis that it had a pool, so were disappointed to find there was no such thing when we arrived. They had a barbeque that night that we paid for but didn´t really end up getting involved, as the music was enough to burst anyone´s eardrums and consisted of 3 or 4 beats of some track or other followed by a god-awful intrusion of noise, repeated ad nauseum, which made the whole repertoire sound like nails down a blackboard, on crack. Craig wasn´t feeling too chipper, so he turned in while Ed and I sat outside chatting to a couple of other barbeque-goers who, like us, didn´t partake in the conga. I went on a tour of the city with one of them late into the night too, which was fun.

Next day we got the hell out of there and checked into another hostel across town which was much more in keeping with what we wanted. Our host, Arial, was a very genial guy, and quick to help with suggestions of things to do around the area. Plus he had a swimming pool, which was great and provided much hilarity with his portly 7 year old son giving us many demonstrations of his unorthodox diving techniques.

In some ways it´s difficult to see why Mendoza is so popular, as there seems to be a disconnect between its status as a ¨must see¨place in Argentina and how much there is to actually see and do. It´s pleasant enough, and we enjoyed it, so don´t get me wrong - I would still recommend it as a place to come for a few days to relax and do a couple of things, and the array of mullets on show was very impressive. We wondered what the collective noun would be and reckoned on a Mendoza of Mullets. The city is absolutely choc full of trees and has several beautiful parks and plazas, which lends it a relaxed feeling. With relatively little rainfall you wonder at first how the city can be so green. There are irrigation channels running alongside all the roads, which water the trees, a system devised originally by the Incas. On our last day there was a big hailstorm out near some wineries, with hail stones the size of tomatoes. Apparently car windscreens were being smashed - you wouldn´t want to be caught in it. Apparently when it rains hard in Mendoza the irrigation channels fill up and the roads are covered with surface water, and the gringos fall into the channels. I'd love to see that. Luckily it didn´t happen to us.

You can do all sorts of trekking and rafting stuff here. We opted for hanging out in the picturesque Parque General san Martin one afternoon and heading back to Aconcagua for a wander on another. Our last night we went to a restaurant called La Barra which had been recommended to us by my mate Toby (of NZ roadie fame). The owner, Enzo, cooks while you watch and drink some of Mendoza´s beautiful red, the signature wine around here being Malbec. The food was incredible too; meat cooked to perfection and with tasty bits and pieces to go with it. And again, inexpensive.

It´s hard to believe I´ve only been in South America for a week. My Spanish has improved slightly, to a level of ¨less shit than it was¨and I´m enjoying whipping out the phrase book to bumble my way through situations. Tonight we´re heading south on a bus for around 17 hours, to a place called Bariloche.

If you're familar with my blog from eastern Europe, you´ll know I like to snap a sign if it has a friend's name on it. So Dani, this is for you...

Hasta luego amigos.

New Zealand

It's hard to know where to start. This was the first time I'd been back here in a couple of years; most other times I've come back it was just for a week or two, so I was looking forward to spending 5 weeks here this time and seeing a bit more of my country. I was meeting my mate Toby from the UK who was coming here for a month, so we hired a car and got on a roadie around the North and South Islands. Here's how it unfolded.

14 - 24 October: North Island

We stayed with my brother Ed for a couple of nights in Wellington and had a pretty relaxing time. Toby had flown in from Sri Lanka via India and Melbourne so had a bit of jetlag to beat too. I caught up with a couple of mates I hadn't seen for a while, so inevitably we had a few beers. Wellington's always nice to get back to. A lot of people who travel to NZ don't spend any time in Wellington, which is a shame. It's a great city and is very easy to get around and friendly, especially for a capital city. So if you're visiting NZ anytime, make sure you have a night or 2 there. Ok? Ok.

Our roadie started out in fine fashion - when we went to pick up the car the dude behind the counter asked what we were up to. When we replied that we were on a roadie, he exclaimed a loud and long "sweeeet!!" as if it was the best thing he'd ever heard. Great form for a fella working in a car rental place. So already the stage was set for an amusing few weeks.

longest place name in the world

The first night we spent in a we place called Waipukurau, which is in central Hawkes Bay. You probably won't see it on many tourist maps, as there isn't much to see or do there, but it's a handy place to spend a night if you're on your way up to the Bay from Wellington. We perched at the bar of the hotel we stayed in and got a decent roast down, and sat there for a good few hours knocking back Tui - one of many NZ beers to which Toby would be introduced - with the locals. He was also very amused at the fact that the bar is also a bookies, so you can sit on your stool, watch the hounds and horses and place some bets if you're so inclined. Which I was, if even just for the novelty value. It's like having a William Hill and Slug & Lettuce rolled in to one. Like the guy in the rental shop said, "sweet". The barman at this place was a good joker and is setting up a hostel so if you find yourself in the area, for some odd reason, check out http://www.teshack.co.nz/. [LATER EDIT. BEN CHAPMAN WAS SADLY KILLED IN A ROAD ACCIDENT IN 2009. R.I.P. BEN]

Bright eyed and bushy tailed we headed north through Napier and stayed next night at Waipatiki Beach. It's a great little spot which is still kind of a well kept secret. I went there with Ed a couple of years ago when we went on a mini roadie up to Hawkes Bay last time I was home, and left a towel there when we left. The woman remembered the incident without prompting when I told her I'd been there a couple of years ago with my brother. That's how much goes down here. Nice view from the hut too.



It was pissing down most of the time so we didn't get out exploring and didn't get into the sea. But the wildlife provided some entertainment. We slowed for a baby possum crossing the road and then stopped to marvel at the cute little fella, then it tried to climb into the car wheels, so we had to get some passing road workers to extract it gently with a rake, which it held on to by its tail. A couple of turkeys going at it with some voyeur cows watching on was pretty funny too.

Next day we were off to Gisborne, the first city in the world to see the sun each day. On the way, we went to Lake Waikaremoana and had a wee wander up to another lake nearby - Lake Waikareiti - which was one of the quiest places I've ever been.



On the walk up we were treated to plenty of chirping from one of NZ's favourite birds, the tui (yes, same as the beer...) which we would hear all over the country.

"look at this little fella"

Without wishing to sound like a fake David Attenborough, the birdsong's one thing that always gets me when I visit home. And the birds generally. There are plenty of native birds that can't fly (the kiwi being the best known), which kind of defeats the raison d'etre for a bird, but we like 'em all the same as most are endangered, and native.

After a quiet night in Gisborne (we'd hammered a fair bit of grass and beers when we were rained in in our hut at Waipatiki) we headed to Rotorua (or "Rotovegas" as its also known around here).The area is well known for its thermal activity so on the way we went and checked out Hell's Gate.



Man, I am so glad we weren't hungover. You know it's gonna smell, but the whiff still knocks you for six. We had a soak in a thermal bath and most of my clothes, a few weeks on, still have a whiff of sulphur from being in the machine when I washed my shorts afterwards. We stayed at a great hostel with plenty of character. If you're ever in Vegas, you find a better hostel to stay than Cactus Jack's. We went for a couple of beers which turned into a ridiculously heavy night, especially for a Sunday.

So with Tobes feeling pretty shaky after our impromptu mammoth Sunday session, we headed further north, to the Coromandel Peninsula. I hadn't been up that way before so it was nice to be discovering new ground. And it's seriously good looking up there. Big, unspoilt and empty beaches all over the place. On the way we stopped in at Opoutere Beach for a couple of hours. There wasn't a soul on it.

That night we stayed in a wee place called Tairua. There's a hill overlooking it called Paku, which gives views over Tairua and its fancy Aucklanders-with-holiday-homes neighbour Pauanui, and also out across some islands in the Pacific.

We had a pretty amusing night at the hostel playing drinking games with a couple of young upstarts from Auckland who were on a roadie of their own, navigating only by way of tossing a coin and turning left or right as the coin dictated. I like the spirit.

Next day and we're off again, this time cutting across the Coromandel Peninsula and heading west and across the north island, south of Auckland.


There are some stunning views as you cross the Coromandel, and I can now
see well what all the fuss is about. The colours are amazing, the way the greens of the grass and the bush bounces off the blue of the sea and the sky. You don't need to photoshop pictures in NZ, nature does it for you.

We had a couple of nights in Raglan, south of Auckland on the west coast of the North Island and part of the so-called "Surf Highway". The waves were looking good too - it's easy to see why some people say Raglan's got the best surf in the country. My guess is there's a well kept secret hidden away somewhere that would have better surf than Raglan. Maybe one day I'll find it. We saw quite possibly the finest display of "not arsed" parking in Raglan too. Check this out. We were cracking up about it when we discovered that the guy we'd been drinking with for the previous 3 or 4 hours was the man behind the legend.


Next day we headed to New Plymouth on our way back down south. Nothing remarkable about New Plymouth and the weather was shit again, but we did see a nice waterfall just outside of Raglan as we left - Bridal Veil Falls.

After New Plymouth we continued to Wellington for another night and stayed with my friends Sally and Mike. A heavy night, that one, as it was always going to be (thanks guys!).

25 October - 9 November: South Island

We caught the ferry across the Cook Strait to the South Island. That crossing can get pretty rough when the wind's up, so with our hangovers we were glad to have calm waters. We had a couple of uneventful nights in Christchurch and Dunedin and then headed west to Te Anau, in Fiordland, where some of NZ's most amazing scenery can be found.

Just south of Te Anau is Lake Manapouri, which can be reached by road or by way of walking the Keplar Track. There are various ways you can do it - a walk over several days right around the Keplar track, or the option we went with, which was just a half day walk to the lake and back.

It was raining so the clouds were low and visibility over and around the lake wasn't great, but somehow that added to the atmosphere of the place. There wasn't a soul around, so we had a smoke and just stood there listening to the rain and the sound of bellbirds which were amazing - kind of a digital sound, which you couldn't believe a living creature could make. With the benefit of the smoke, in my head I was imagining what it would be like to have the bellbirds mixed in with a bassline and some beats, and it sounded pretty bloody amazing. I'll have to see if I can put something like that together someday.

The walk back was amazing too, the forest floor covered with a carpet of moss. It gets pretty wet down here so the surroundings are incredible and vivid, which means the rain isn't a problem when you're tripping around.

The next night we spent on an overnight trip to Doubtful Sound. which is kind of mis-named as it's a fjord. This is one of the most remote places you could ever see. The landscape is amazing, sheer cliff faces formed thousands of years ago with glacial activity, covered with lush vegetation and with waterfalls all over the place.


Fiordland is one of the wettest places on earth, with annual rainfall of 7 metres or more. We were lucky enough to get a bit of sunlight in the afternoon, so could see better the rainforest surrounding us. I'd always thought that it had to be warm for rainforest to survive so it was interesting to see that temperature isn't an issue, at least down here.

There's a seal colony here too,
but these are sea lions.

We saw some penguins too.

































We headed to Queenstown after the night in Doubtful Sound. Bizarrely the population is only 5,000 which seems incredible given the scenery around there. We went for a drive around Lake Wakatipu and a little north of that, to Glenorchy.

































It's well known for its adventure tourism and must pump a fair bit of cash in to NZ's economy. They're certainly good at relieving you of some cash down there. After a couple of days resisting the temptation, I saw we were in for a day 0f 25 degree sunshine with no cloud and no wind. Perfect for jumping out of a plane at 12,000 feet strapped to a Finnish dude half my weight...


Worth every cent too. I didn't feel nervous beforehand, though the closer I got to it the more I wondered what I was about to let myself in for. The tension builds slowly as you ascend in the little plane and it was when it levelled out at the drop zone that I started to get a bit of the fear.


That wasn't helped by seeing the other punter, an Irish lad called Eddie, fall out attached to his tandem dude. They disappeared from view immediately, then it was my turn. I sat on the edge of the floor, with my feet out the door.


You have to dangle your feet right over the rail as well, so there's no support beneath your feet. That was the aspect of it I found most difficult - being subject totally to someone else's control. Who's half my size. Then we were off.



The first few seconds were amazing and I replayed them in my head several times over the next few days. It's 45 seconds freefall from that height, and I didn't feel like it went too quickly at the time - like I had enough time to really appreciate and buzz off it before the chute opened.

Thinking back on it after the event, it does seem like it went quicker, but I do remember being able to appreciate it fully at the time. It's an incredible experience and it won't be the last time I do it, for sure.

After Queenstown we headed up the West Coast to Fox Glacier. You can go walking on the glacier but it was pissing down so we didn't. It's a tiny place without a great deal to do but we ended up having a couple of nights there. The second day we went and had a look at Lake Matheson, which when totally calm gives an amazing mirror effect with the surroundings. On a good day you can see mountains reflected, but there was low cloud when we went. All the same it was pretty sweet.


































From there it was off to the northern part of the South Island, near Nelson, which was where I went to school and know the area well and remember fondly.



We borrowed a rugby ball from a guy at the kayak hire place and lost it in the water at Kaiteriteri beach, so I had to brave the cold water to swim (unsuccessfully) after it when the wind got up and swept it out. Good way to wake up though.








That night we watched with relief and amazement as the US elction results came in. There wer a few Americans staying there too and the relief for them was easily apparent.



We were nearing the end of the trip by now and decided on a couple of days' kayaking in Abel Tasman National Park, which really is one of NZ's most beautiful areas. They gave us an hour's safety briefing and then we were off in the kayak.

It was pretty easy going, we only needed a couple of hours worth of real effort to reach the boat we were staying on for the night, so that gave us time to pull in to a couple of beaches and chill out
and have a beer and something to eat.














We stayed on a floating backpackers in Anchorage Bay which was great. We enjoyed a wee smoke on the back of the boat and watched the stars. We saw a meteor enter the earth's atmosphere, trail for a second and burn up, which was pretty incredible and a sight I'll never forget.

Last stop was Nelson, where my other brother Dave lives with his wife Trace and my niece and nephew, Edie and Tom.


Always great to see them and this time was added value with Tracee's 40th birthday. Very boozy. Nelson's a beautiful wee place and if I ever move back to NZ it'll be when I'm ready to settle down a bit, so Nelson's a good place as any to do it. We will see.










The day after Tracee's 40th was a bit of a slow one, to say the least, with our hangovers. We had a smoke in the Centre of NZ, which is a walk up a hill to the geographical centre of the country. Which seemed kind of an appropriate place to sign off on the roadie.