Hello people, so before i dive into the latest update i've stumbled across a few quotes which, i really think describe the situations me and adam have been in and how good we are feeling at the minute. So i'd like to share these with you.

"Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbour. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover."

"The traveler was active; he went strenuously in search of people, of adventure, of experience. The tourist is passive; he expects interesting things to happen to him. He goes: sight-seeing."

"Traveling is a brutality. It forces you to trust strangers and to lose sight of all that familiar comfort of home and friends. You are constantly off balance. Nothing is yours except the essential things - air, sleep, dreams, the sea, the sky - all things tending towards the eternal or what we imagine of it."

"When you travel, you experience, in a very practical way, the act of rebirth. You confront completely new situations, the day passes more slowly, and on most journeys you don't even understand the language the people speak. So you are like a child just out of the womb. You begin to attach much more importance to the things around you because your survival depends upon them. You begin to be more accessible to others because they may be able to help you in different situations. At the same time, since all things are new, you see only the beauty in them, and you feel happy to be alive."

And now what we have been upto....

New stamp in the passport!
So we made it to La Paz in bolivia! But what a journey it has been to get here from Buenos Aires. 

Burying children alive!
So before getting to bolivia we spent a couple of days in a town called Salta, situated in northern argentina. A town famed for the discovery of 3 500year old preserved inca children who were offered as a sacrifice to the "sacred mountains" they are kept on show in a museum. A sight that was pretty disturbing, what was worse was that these children were buried alive and it is inca belief that they did not die but are simply sleeping. Apparently it was a great honour to be offered to the mountais.-bag of s**t if you ask me, i'd rather not take part- its worth google image searchimg "the lightning girl salta" to really see what im on about.

Drunk on £6?
So embracing this new found argentinian party spirit, me and adam had a massive night out in salta-managing to get a bottle of vodka orange juice redbull and some chips for less than 3 quid each...this was going to be messy! Heading into the main strip of salta we generally cant remember that much, all i know is my reggaton salsa dancing was simply amazing compared with buenos aires!

Super sweeds
So in salta we were sharing a room with 2 sweedish lasses who seemeed to be on our wavelength, they have become our new travel buddies and have joined us on our journey up to la paz.- not to mention one of them can speak spanish which, has been a god send!  

Being famous. 
So i've never really thought i'm the kind of guy that sticks out in a crowd, however me and adam now know what it feels like to be a 'gringa' honestly, in salta and in bolivia we just get stared at, its so strange but as they cant speak english we can give them some bant too. Either way i cant decide if people are just curious and a bit shy, or if they just generally dont like us.

Bolivia is cheap
Hostels for £2 a night
Meals in restaurants for less than £4
Litres of beer for £1
Cakes and coffee for less than 30p
Taxis for pence

Stray dogs
Everywhere you look in south america there are just stray dogs roaming the streets, probably filled with rabis, either way get them rounded up and shot!

Hot shower
What i wouldnt give to have a hot shower right now, its probably not worth contemplating, bolivians dont seem to believe in a nice hot shower-retards!

Good buildings
So when i was in inguacu i got talking to kiwi guy wjo warned me about bolivia, one thing by saying that, everything is broken they dont have any good carpenters or electricians, thinking he was exagerating i got a quick reality slap. The remote villages we hav stayed in are simply ridiculous, i'd argue going on thrid world. Things are broken and glued together. The buildings all look like a 2 yea old had a temper tantrum wjilst trying to buol a lego house.

"thats made me feel sick"
So we stayed in one place on the boarder between argentina and bolivia, a extremly poor place where the roads were all gravel and dust, people living in essentially slums. However the thing that really made me wretch was seeing little children just bending down in the streets going to the toilet.-i mean if i did that in england i would get charged £80 

First class train travel
So a 15 hour train ride, first class for less than 20quid sounds a good deal? Yea we thought so too, however first class in bolivia is probably about as luxurious as a weekend in skeg-vegas. This train was a nightmare- ive been on smoother roller coasters, all i could imagine was how bad was standard class!!

Oruro has hot springs!
So before getting to la paz we stopped in a town called Oruro, to break the journey up and to see what there was. Our new found swedish friends have brought the bible with them (the lonely planet guides) and informed us that there were some natural hot springs in the mountains that we should go to, getting lost in our imaginations we all thought these would be pretty "lush" and a great way to relax.-again we were wrong, the expression "piss filled swimming pool" was more of the reality. Oh and again 4 white europeans in a swimming pool full of bolivians is like frowing a cat to the dogs. The girls were getting photographed by horny teenagers who have probably never seen a white girl before, further on from that we were just out of our comfort zones...but loved it! Again "when in rome"-or not, it was pretty surreal to be honest.

La paz
So we are now in la paz, spending a few days here before the inca trail kicks off next week in peru. This place on first impressions is simpy phenominal. We are 4000m above sea level and altitude sickness may kick in. The streets are so steep but there seems to be something a little special about this place. Further more you decend into the city from the mountains, something that was pretty spectacular to see.

Death road
So booking to do the bolivian death road on mointain bikes, was more than enough to send goosebumps down our spines, but the reality of it...(goggle image "bolivian death road" if you dont know what this is...)(mum i'm writing this after i have done it so dont worry...i'm alive)- well basically its a 40 mile down hill bike ride on what is classed as the worlds most dangerous road. I'm sure many of you saw the top gear special that was filmed on it.
So how was it? - basically it was the most exilerating, adrenaline pumping thing i have ever done (bunjee jumps and sky dives come in november) whilst also encountering the most breathtaking scenary i have ever seen. 
The first 10kmish was on tar mac starting at an altitude of 4700meters, you get to charge full steam down some steep hair pin filled roads. With nothing more on your mind than "faster faster faster" The actual death road was a different reality, narrow,loose gravel and low visability to start with helped fuel the buzz we were feeling. The guides were cool and kept having regular pi stops to let us know of any terrain changes etc. They also split the group in two groups- the more confident from the lesser, well as me and adam are highly unexperienced in mountain biking, and the steepest road we have probably been on is our street at home, we naturally ended up in the front group setting a respectable pace behind the lead guide. The pictures are on facebook and before we knew it 3 hours had passed and we were supping a nice cold beer at the bottom.

Dangerous or overhyped?
So me and adam sat at the bottom discussing if we actually felt in that much danger? Well no we didint, we both had a iffy moment where we lost  control and veered towards the edge, but nothing herat stopping, that was nothing more than us needing to mak a complete stop. we agreed it wasn't that dangerous and we would love to do it again.

Harsh reality slap, 
The minibus drove us back up the death road to get back to la paz, enabling us to see all the things we had missed, due to concentrating on our routes and cornering on the way down. Wow we really missed some grim reminders of the dangers this road holds if people become too complacent. You cant help but notice the sheer amount of memorials to people who have lost their lifes on this road. Notably there were 3 places that made me think "wow this place is unforgiving" firstly the tour quides showed us where a english guy was getting over confident and shot off a cliff to his death, something our guide witnessed, secondly the site where a girl fell to her death on a foggy day, falling over 100m hitting two cliff ledges only 6 months ago.-again our tour guides helpe recover her body. Finally our minibus pulled over and pointed over a edge that was over 150m sheer drop and said "look theres a car"-a family who plunged to their death only last month, a moving memorial situated in the cliff face above, although initially we thought it had just happened.

Having said this all however, this was an incredible experience and despite the dangers our tour guides were incredible and our safety never felt compromised- definatly one of the coolest things i have ever done!!! 

Llamacroft
So embracing local culture, i have absolutley demolished a lasagne tonight, however made with llama meat- it was delightful!

The quest for guinness
Me and adam both enjoy a cheeky pint of guinness, and after sampling guinness in englad, dublin, ibiza and corfu we are on a mission to try it in south america in a cheeky irish bar. So far brazil didnt deliver, argentina had two irish bars, one in burnos aires and one in salta- however both had no guinness. Finaly in la paz we found another irish bar- however for 50 bolivianos a can (about a fiver) we decided against it-the quest continues!

Showing how we party up'north
Sampling the La Pazian (that work?) night life- we promised our new bff's the sweeds we would show them how me and adam party when we are in sheff. Our dance routines encourporated       leap froggin each other on the dance floor and some strange synced leaning thrusting dance- we had the barmen in stitches- lady gaga never sounded so good! Goodbye to this sambary salsary shiite.

General chat
So my Mobile number basically no longer exists, so if you have text me im not being rude by not replying. Also i am doing all these updates from my ipod as internet access is limited- this is why there are so many typos etc.

Few days in la paz then onto peru people!! Cant believe all that we have seen so far.
Tara for now x x x  

Tomaty loco! Tomaty loco!

Buenos Aires
Amazing city, great vibe and buzzing atmosphere. A mix of London meets new York feel with a load of chikka chikka espanol frown in for good measure. Definatly reccomend this place, even if it's just to get Dior clothes at a stupidly low price.

On a roof top terrace nations meet.
So our hostel is pretty querky and has a lot of character and it has quite a nice decking on the roof. Whilst drinking last night it dawned on me how incredible traveling is. Sat in a group all drinking there were people from all ends of the planet. I mean realistically when is the next time after this year i will get a chance to sit with Americans, kiwis, Australians, Argentinians, sweedish and brazillian all together sharing beers and stories, pretty much never it was a cool experience.

Mummy says "do not drink too much in south America"
Sorry mum, but last night me and Adam fully embraced the Argentinian culture of how to party, while obviously remaining cautious we are still alive to tell the story, just that old saying "when in Rome"

Private nightclub
So in England that title probably makes you think of a strip club if it's called a private club. But over here they have nightclubs that are essentially private I guess as we have been told a place where the rich kids go. Oh and for some reason me and Adam found ourselves in one of these clubs. Pretty exclusive, one of our room mates knew a girl who knew a girl who knew a secret handshake or something to get us in.  Being told it was pretty expensive due to the clientele we got in for free and beer was only 10 pasos equiv of about £1.50 we soon realized we were wealthy westerners in terms of that being a bargain to us!
Soaking up the pure sound of Argentinian salsa/rumba/regge influenced music we soon got approached by some chikka's being told that were obvous "gringos" probably because of the way we were dancing. -that bad?

The girls told us that unless you dance like salsa and grab girls to twirl and pull in to you then You are a "cock sucker" in her words. Further on from this when meeting men or women you are meant to kiss them on the cheek, so as me and Adam refussed to kiss each other apparently we are 'homophobes'- a part of the Argentinian culture we are not going to adopt!!!

Rub your body sexy when you dance- these were the final cringe instructions we were told to do on the dancefloor on advice how to win the women over- so imagine me now for a minute essentially rubbing my self down as if I was in the shower- possibly one of the cringest things I have ever done.

So our whistle stop tour of Burnos Aires concludes tomorrow which culminates with a massive night out to Pacha tonight. Unfortunatley we didint get to see loads of the city but what we saw was amazing but. What we didint see is due to being far too hingover to care about not seeing.

The next set of thougts

Giving blood
So I've always wanted to give blood, the thought of helping another person out by giving my blood is quite appealing. However, I have never got round to doing it. That is until I got here to south america and I have become a regular blood doner...to the f*****g mossis Not even been here 2 weeks and I have been bitten over 30 times. The mossis have turned me into their bitch and I'm itching hard!

Massive crab
Something I forgot to mention on my last blog update was the showdown I had with possibly the biggest crab ever seen to man. Late one night in ilah grande me and adam were walking back from having a few cheeky beers on the beach. We saw what looked like a massive rock and felt the urge to kick it. Upon closer inspection we realized it was a crab. Wielding one ginormous claw and one small claw. Fascinated by it but in a slightly drunken manner I decided to get close and personal with it. Imagine a steretypical Mexican accent goin 'hey amigo what the f**k you looking at?' well this is what I imagined it was saying to me anyway. It kept raising it claws at us almost like it was giving us the rods. This led me to asking it if it had a liscene to carry such a large weapon, the response was no in crabbish so, being the mature guy that I am I removed it's claw and told the now clawless crab I would look after it until it was a little more responsible and well mannered!

Hypnotic water
Arriving in iguazu on the brazillian, Argentinian boarder we have been lucky enough to see possibly one of the coolest natural things This planet has to offer. The waterfalls here are unbelievable, the photos already on facebook do not do them justice. The sheer quantity and vastness of the falls are enough to give you goosebumps. There is a saying that you can't leave  the falls being depressed because they just 
 make you happy, a statement I can believe until i asked about if people commit suicide here by jumping in to the falls, which the answer was yes. So obviously not true for everyone.

Something megabus should learn from
The propsect of a 20 hour long bus ride is never something you look froward to. A 4 hour bus ride from Sheffield to London can feel like touture. However this is not the case in Argentina, a full cooked meal, free beer, free bubbly and near fully reclining chairs with ample leg room is enough to set you up for these long rides. Flat screen TVs and blankets are just the added bonus. If all of that isn't enough then you can always rely on a good old game of ispy to pass the time

Winding Swiss people up also passes time
Sat across from a Swiss girl on the bus down to buenos aires turned out to be quite funny for me and Adam. Whilst talking our usual shit to each other we soon managed to her engage in our coversations. Something I guess she is regretting now. Enquiring about nick names she wanted to know what me and Adam were known as by nicnames. Adam convinced her I was victor as in victor meldrew as I'm always complaining apparently, however I ensured she believed Adam was called an arse hole by everyone back at home- she was loving the B-anter. Until she told us she is known as "big octopus" by her friends...something that kept us tickled for a while...silly Swiss people.

St Christopher
Now south America is a heavily religious place with catholism being the national religion. Now not being overly religious my self I am however catholic and I know tha a geeza called saint christopher is the saint of safe travel, ironic that the taxi driver in buenos aires had a image of st chris hanging from his mirror but drove like a f*****g maniac- either that or he genuinly believes t'old st chris will keep him safe even when cutting up busses and other heavy goods vehicles .

Poverty
Arriving in buenos airies you can't help bu notice the sheer poverty some people live in, always an eye opener for me. Leading to a more cautious and suspicious attitude from both of us, it is hard to see and even harder not to become snobby/appriciative of what we have back at home.


Cows
So the Argie bargies are renowned for their steak, something I have been desperate to sample for a while now. This desire has been settled with the amazing creation of a all you can eat steak house. All food and all beers for 70 pasos basically just under 15quid. We have absolutley smashed the fattest steaks and beef joints known to man, concluding that Argentinian beef is simply delicious!- especially win you can just keep going back for more!!

Point of thought
So everyone knows that south America is unbelievably passionate about football, this is no suprise- however what has opened my eyes is that in brazil amongst the dirty over crowded multi towering shacks in the favellas, where space seems so precious they litrally build on top of each other, on the steepest of cliffs. there was always a decent sized well laid out football field, weather on grass or gravel next to the favellas. I guess football is a social communal activity that requires a greater priority over having enough room for compared to he need for more spacious living areas?

Next stop Bolivia 
X x x  

Still Alive

Hello people!

So we have now been here a week so I will try and update you on what we have been upto!
Instead of giving you all a boring update about the places we have been to I will just give you the general low down of our week

1. Just beacuse people do not talk english, does not mean that they are dangerous!
So before coming out to South America we have been warned umpteen times that it is dangerous out here and to not trust anyone, however so far so good, people seem extremly fiendly and helpful and Rio felt suprisingly safe.

2. When sharing rooms with people who are not english - do not insult them in english
So we were sharing a room in Rio with two Korean girls one night who did nothing but continuously turn the light on when we were trying to sleep (the general unwritten rule is to use a torch if people are asleep) - so me and adam being ourselves started shouting random insults at them thinking they did not understand...it was only the morning after when they started talking to us in English did our naievity come to surface...however thankfully our strong yorkshire accents meant they thought we were only shouting the word ¨funny¨...i will leave it to your imagination what we were saying.

3. Concrete can leave you speachless...
so in Rio there is that big mega mahussive statue of the big man Jesus Christ - something that is simply outstanding, we went on a tour up to the statue at me and adam were both left in dissaray at the sheer presence the statue has close up! - definatly the highlight of Rio

4. When talking to German girls, do not tell them that the English think all german women are hairy...followed by rubbing your moustache...it does not go down well

5. When it rains in Rio...it is shit..simple

6. Talking to fellow travelers can reveal hidden gems..
so we were meant to be going to sao paulo after rio but after spending a rainy day stuck in the hostel in rio, we got talking to some girls from manchester who had some annoyingly catchy sayings (BELLL-CHING!!! to name but one) they reccomended we go to an island called Ilah Grande...so we did. This place was simply amazing, A island that has no roads and the only car seemed to be the police van. Our hostel was on decking above the sea and the word paradise became frequently used...however the problem with an island like this is that it tends to be designed for honeymoon couples...and im there with my best mate!

7. 2 and a half hour treck!
so on ilha grande there is an option to treck for 2 and a half hours through the dense forest and up the mountains to reach a beach...something I did not think was worth doing...however 2 and a half hours later there was something that was simply more than just a beach...

8. A beach really can pass the daz whiter than white challege...
So this beach is known as Lopez Mendez and is often reffered to as one of the top ten beaches in the world - a quick google image search will show you why...the sand was the whitest I have ever seen and the water was crystal blue. A true hidden gem on this island! - however it is not just the beach that has passed the daz challange, me and adam seem to be up against a lot of stick from other travelers whos skin is luckily enough to have some colour on, we just keep getting laughed at for being white

9. 30 hour bus rides are not fun.
pretty simple - a bus rider from ilha grande to Iguazu takes this long..it is long, boring, tiring and generally what we have got to look forward to for a good few more weeks

10. Arrived in Iguazu - on the boarder between Argentina and Brazil, we are here to see some ¨spectacular¨waterfalls before heading on to Buenos Aeres in Argentina

Photos should follow soon but for now

taraa

xxx

So little time left

Hello people!

So it is finally nearly here! Last time I updated this blog it was April and I was drowning under the heavy demands of final year uni work...well how things have moved on. I have now graduated and joined the ranks of the "alumni," the student dream feels so distant

I have had a cracking summer trying to earn a bit of extra cash at what feels like my second home, the ever fun d2! Leaving me in a situation to afford a few more little bits for the travels.

I have had every injection now and hopefully, I should now be immune to any nasty diseases that I could potentially contract whilst in a number of the countries that I will be visiting.

Further on from this, I have now got just about got everything needed for my this trip as you can see by the picture.


As you can see clothing options are going to be limited! This will only add to all the fun we will have though...right?

The feeling of excitment is growing rapidly by the second, a feeling similar to an excited child being unable to sleep on xmas eve...

Despite all of this, however, it still doesn't feel like a reality, nothing more than a 2 week holiday that will be no different than any other...even at my leaving do this weekend it didn't feel like a goodbye, more of a absolutley quality bank holiday event!

Either way, this time next week I will be somewhere in Brazil and be in a position to actually tell you all how things have started!

Until that point, all that stands between sheffield and the rest of the world is..a delightful 4 hour mega bus ride down to london...good one!

that is all for now :D