Fin de la Aventura............16 de Febrero, 2011

196 days on the road,
9 countries,
17,200km of continent (calculated guess - as the crow flies),
327 hrs of bus travel,
92 hrs in a boat,

22 hrs in a plane (47 if you include return flights to from NZ),
71 places of accommodation (excluding countless night buses),
and 6000-odd photos later…….

It was briefly back to BA for one last Calatrava fix for Matt.

Los mejores accesorios de viaje - exclusión de la cámara (best travel accessories)
Sporks

Leatherman…………. for all those fish we gutted and trees we cut down.

Notebook computer………….for skype, photo storage and to spare waiting in queues at hostels.

Calculator watch
Sarong……..Matt hates that I put this but the many functions of a simple sarong. A picnic rug, towel, dress/skirt (for me), something to get changed under, blanket, sun shield or scarf.

Ear plugs…………for all those HONKO’S on overnight buses and in dorms. Our new favourite word – Portugese for snoring!

Lonely planet……. We love to hate it but it really is at times very handy.

Buena comida (best food)…………

Chilean empanada’s

Argentinian carne y vino tinto (steak and red wine) – So good that even I did a 400g on my own! Not recommended late at night unless you’re happy to be up for hours…….

Bolivian jugo de mango con leche

Peruvian Ceviche – raw fishy goodness

Brazilian Acai – deep purple berry - gritty goodness ground into a sorbet type substance with ice and banana, topped with granola.

Colombian fresh fruit and juice ­– 50c p/kg mango’s and strawberries. Miss you mango-man.

Homeward bound.

Nos perdimos (we missed) ………….. exclusion de la familia y amigo’s.

Marmite

NZ cheese……………simple people, simple needs!

Nos perderemos (we will miss)........
Lack of routine
Wearing the same clothes (as each other!!)
The incredible - colourful people, colourful cultures, colourful countryside!
Eating lunch at 3, 4, 5, whenever......
Each other.......1 hour is the longest time frame we've spent apart in 6 months.
Not having to wear pants.........trousers - its been ages!
Travelling.........

Que no se pierda (we won't miss)…………

"That guy" changing his ring tone on the bus.

Omnibus bano’s – never a pleasant experience!

80/90’s pop music - M-people, Ace of base, Michael Bolton………you get the drift, especially on repeat on overnight buses.

Protests…………… (refer to Huaraz blog)
False money – only happened twice and in miniscule amounts thankfully, but was always a worry and unfortunately happened to a lot of friends!
Brazilian public buses – they all have tiny turn-style gates which are a nightmare with a big pack.

Favorito experiencias………(impossible to keep it to 5)

Uyuni Salt Flats (Bolivia)

Torres del Paine – The BIG ‘W’ hike (Chile)

Salkantay y Macchu Pichu hike (Peru)

Volunteering at La Senda Verde - animal sanctuary (Bolivia)

Whale watching (Puerto Madryn de Argentina)

Hang Gliding (Rio de Janeiro de Brazil)

Hiking up and snowboarding down Volcan Villarica (Chile)

Snowboarding on the Andes (Chile y Argentina)
General exploration of small towns and communities (todo sudamerica) - the locals are incredible!

Favorito 5 ciudad de grande………

Cartagena (Colombia)

Rio de Janeiro (Brazil)

Buenos Aires (Argentina)

Salvador (Brazil)
Cusco (Peru)

Favorito 5 ciudad de piquena………

Sucre (Bolivia)

Pucon (Chile)

Valparaiso (Chile)

Montanita/Puerto Lopez (Ecuador)

Ilha Grande (Brazil)


Coming to you hot off the press - finishing the blog in Santiago airport with a bottle of wine (6 hours in transit).  Goal of the blog was to have it complete before hitting home-turf! 

Matt and Clare have survived the ultimate pre-marital test and the experiences we have shared over the last 6 months are indescribable - this really has been the trip of a lifetime!

South America, for us, has been awe inspiring, self discovering, enlightening, motivating and a bloody lot of fun! 
Quite simply, South America was all we hoped it to be and so much more!

As we head home its a combination of feelings 'its gone so fast' & 'we have been on holiday forever', alongside 'oh to keep on travelling'  & 'the green, green grass of home'.....

No post-holiday blues for us though as its back home to the excitement of Brad and Aimee's wedding, followed by some close friends weddings and ofcourse our own. Let the celebrations and catch up's begin!!

Thanks to everyone for sticking it out and following 'Sudamerica Aventura Blog' - your comments, messages and emails have been wonderful!!

Hasta pronto América del Sur (we will be back) y hasta mañana Nueva Zelanda!
Muchisimas gracias y mucho amore,
Matt and Clare

Punta del Este, Montevideo y Colonia de Uruguay, 7- 13 de Febrero

URUGUAY!

Aeropuerto de Montevideo. No not Calatrava, my new favourite Uruguayan Architect Rafael Viñoly!

We had a brilliant flight from Foz to our 9th and FINAL country of the Adventure. We don't mind the odd over-nighter but it always nice to substitute a good 30 hours of bus travel for 2 on a plane!

Uruguay also marked meeting up with old family friends of the Mitchells, the Bertis.
From Montevideo Clare and I headed 2 hours up the coast to Punta del Este to meet up with Simon + Juanita, their daughter Claudia and her two cute kids (Josephina & Pedro) - all whom were on their summer holiday together.  
We had a great relaxing few days at the beach, and the Bertis kindly showed us around a few of the sights, including a sort of animal petting farm where Dulce de Leche is made.


Our favourite South American family - The Berti's.

Sweet as! Dulce de Leche (lit. Sweet of milk) - the delectable and deliciously ugly spread that hails a religous following in Uruguay, Chile and Argentina.
 Here, Josephina is showing us how its done.
Clare and I only just managed to finish our panqueque. We now have the Berti's secret recipe adapted for NZ!

Whilst we were there, as luck would have it, the animal farm just happened to be hosting
Señorita Latin America! Unfortunately the models were not available for petting like the animals....

Clare on the swing with little Pedro, trying to shake off the energy overload from our Dulce consumption prior.

 

Punta del Este, Playa Mansa.
Uruguay and in particular Punta del Este is a hugely popular holiday destination for Argentinians - Buenos Aires only 5 hours or so away.



Over-exposed under-exposure. Hey Hey! The smugglers had to come out for what will, sadly, probably be their last time..!

Beach time and Mate (maa-tay for those anglo saxons out there).

Pedro having some chill-out time between energy bursts!

A spot of sand sculpture and dam-construction with Josephina.

 

Bonita Josephina!



The hand sculpture at Playa Brava.



...the middle finger.



MONTEVIDEO

Plaza Independencia

They say Montevideo is like a miniature Buenos Aires (BA being a stones throw across Rio de la Plata), and on arrival we thought much the same. Broad tree lined avenues, a lot of parks and plazas named after Spanish libertadors, and fantastic crumbling early-20th century architecture built during the beef boom! After further exploration by foot (shopping for wedding attire) we found the capital to be a pretty relaxed and slow-paced metropolis.


Mucho de air-con? Often on a hot day Clare and I have been rained on by these bad boys conveniently located above footpaths. Here you can see the condensor units seamlessly integrated with glass curtain-wall construction! 



Romantic roof-top dining at our hostel.

 

Mercado del Puerto!

This brilliant market serves host to back to back Parillada's - BBQ restaurants where you sit around a bar watching the chef grill your selected cut/s of meat over FIRE, ohhh! Certainly the place to go for a hot date, but not with your vegetarian girlfriend!! We went on a Saturday afternoon and the place was humming.



Mucho cerveza, Mucho carne - perfecto!


COLONIA DEL SACRAMENTO

Colonia, seen from the lighthouse.

From Montevideo we jumped on our last short bus ride to Colonia del Sacramento - the closest town and point from which we caught the ferry across the river to Buenos Aires: the nodal point of our 'figure 8' route around South America and ofcourse our place of final departure!

Another fantastic colonial gem, we spent a day wandering around the historical centre.


Up early the next morning, we were on the 5.30am ferry across to Buenos Aires for the final 2 days our adventure and last quick fix of carne, vino y tango!

Foz do Iguazu, 4-6 de Febrero

Our final 2 days in Brazil were spent in Foz to check out the Iguacu falls from both the Brazilian and Argentine sides. Never been to another country and back in the same day!

Brazil offers the expansive views of the falls while Argentina gets you up close and into the falls.
We sort-of forgot that we were in the jungle and were blown away by the awesome wildlife around which was an unexpected bonus.

Again more a photo album of the spectacle that was.....Iguaçu (Brazil) & Iguazú (Argentina). 

Brazil

First glimpse of Iguacu

80 & 88 are popular bib no.'s amongst the racing butterflies of Iguacu. 





Garganta del Diablo (The devils throat)



 





We haven't been very factual lately.........
Iguacu consists of 275 falls stretching 2.7 kilometres. All the individual falls are 64-82 metres high! A whopping average flow rate of 1,746 cubic meters per second - mucho agua!!

Argentina

Most impressive spot - Garganta del Diablo from above.
Muy GRANDE - 82m high, 150m wide and 700m long! 

Constantly changing view as this mist will rise 30-150m,
and as it does it soaks you on the platform!!



....as is about to happen here by the rain cloud behind!



Giant butterflies everywhere.........

 



Baby Coati's

Was obligatory to take a boat trip - consists of 5 mins of photo's and
then a drenching from both sides of the falls! 

Fluoro yellow butterflies - cool!!

These guys were a little too frequent for me - some with webs 3-4m
long at their widest part. Eeew!

One of the many view points where you get absolutely soaked!

Loved Iguacu so much - from both sides! Was an amazing spectactle with its apparent low-flow at the moment - would love to see it in the rainy season! Definitely a must-do to see it from both countries.

So there is the last BIG TICK put in place for our trip. 

Next and final destination Uruguay for a week and then a short boat trip across to Buenos Aires before returning to the land of the long white cloud!