Isla del sol – no, not Bornholm

Veröffentlicht am 16. April 2015 von Steffi

Copacabana (the original one) is located at the Bolivian shore of the famous lake Titicaca. It’s a pretty quite place inhabited by quite some hippies along with the indigenous people. It’s popular with any kind of tourist, so you find quite a choice of cafés, restaurants and people trying to sell you trips to the close by islands or bus tickets.

People here basically live of selling you (the gringo) something.

But what an tiny idyllic place, popular with tourists and locals.

While in Copacabana a trip to take is Isla del sol or the place where the sun god was born.
Boats to the island leave very day at 8:30 and 13:30 and you can just go down to the shore and buy a ticket for 3 US$. The boats look actually quite nice from far but turn out to be white colored wood with an attached diesel motor and get helplessly overloaded with tourist. When I first feared drowning due to a break down of the boat this fear was shortly after replaced by the fear of dying of carbon monoxid poisoning. It started raining so windows were closed and all the motor fumes accumulated in the inside of the wooden frame. However I seemed to be the only one concerned about that.

The boat was just a little packed with people and the fact that one motor was broken did not accelerated our journey.

After the total of three hours (not two as promised) we arrived in Challapampa at the nord end of the island. From here we headed to the famous Inca ruins (not without paying 10 BOV = 1.5US$ entrance fee) that seemed to us a bit to good looking to be thousands of years old, but who are we to judge. From the ruins most tourists including us head south to Yumami, but since we planned to stay there overnight we had all the time and the wide view over the lake, Bolivia and Peru almost to our selfs.

According to the ants, it must be a quite popular place. We stayed behind and had therefore all the attractions to ourself later.

I guess we and our carrots were the bigger attractions to the natives than the Inca ruins.

Looking nice, but 500 years old?

The landscape and the view over lake Titicaca definitely were the bigger attraction to us.

We also came along some sacrifice stones …

… and couldn’t resist. But no worries Tommy is just acting …

He was more in danger, when I tried to take a picture of him and his relatives.

Not far from Yumami we were hooked by a ten year old and his alpaca who sold us two his aunt, who owned a hostal in Yumami. It was quite simple but for 8$ per night we didn’t complained (later we found out that this is the average price and we could have gotten a better room). In a tiny restaurant in the middle of the eucalyptus forest we had our first candlelight dinner in South America and since the husband of the chief had a meeting until 8 pm we had a lot of time to enjoy the atmosphere (waited 2h for our food, but it was definitely worth it).

The little muggers and their Alpaca that hooked us to their aunts „hostel“. They even asked me for a tip later. Wonder what they raise their kids to here. 🙂

Yumami, spreading from the hill to the waterfront including some a famous Inca staircase and many donkeys which carry the beer for the tourists up the mountain.

Finally, steamed trout (a specialty from lake Titicaca though imported to the lake from Canada) and Pizza!

The next day we chose the rout via all the small villages on the island and experienced a little village life, with all the cute and not so cute animals and all their leftovers on the path. Tom helped a old lady down the hill and a nice lama got the great idea to spit on me to Toms great amusement (didn’t even got a picture of it).

It’s potatoes and not just polystyrene balls in this backpack prototype.

This cute one didn’t spit on me

We left Copacabana Easter Friday, when it got really funny because lots of people from all over Bolivia pilgrim here. Luckily camping is allowed in Bolivia where it’s possible, so people just slept on the central plaza :).

Should have know that and save the money for the hostal :).

LaPaz and the fast way down

Veröffentlicht am 16. April 2015 von Steffi

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After we spend two more nights in Sucre (didn’t wanted to miss out on quinoa cake and another round of squallyball) we took a morning bus to LaPaz. Actually we wanted to take an overnight bus but because of the election all over Bolivia on Sunday absolutely nothing was going to work from 0:00. They stop selling alcohol already on Thursday, every kind of traffic is prohibited except bikes, and absolutely all shops are closed. So we arrived in the biggest city of Bolivia which was paralyzed.

Just one day later these street was blocked with cars and busses.

On Sunday we literally walked over streets of LaPaz following the constant ascent of the altiplano surrounding LaPaz taking out our breaths but giving an amazing view over the hundreds of thousands red brick houses forming the city. And over and over again somebody would greet us with a friendly „buenos tardes“, a kindness being new to us in Bolivia.

If you live here and don’t have a car (most don’t) you don’t need to go to the gym.

The red bricks tower over the higher houses of city core on their hill sides.

The day of the election was a holiday for most people but the kids really got some fun out of the empty streets, because not one is flat.

In the afternoon just aiming for some food we ended up in a cafe with Kim and Ben where we spontaneously booked the adventure for the next day: a downhill ride on mountain bikes over the formerly deathliest road in the world.

Still smiling (before we got on the bikes).

The day started with a simply breakfast before a guide and a driver loaded the four of us into a Minibus and driving us up to 4700 m to the starting point. There we were dressed as warriors and put on full suspension bikes and off we went racing down the paved road with 40-50 km/h

This downhill bikes seemed a little overkill for the paved road we started on, until we got to our real destination.

As soon as I got used to that we were loaded again in the Minivan and driven to the road that really was the death road. This was the real challenge being hardly broad enough for a car, of rough gravel and with a very very steep cliff to the left side we were told to drive close to it all the time so passing cars had less trouble!!! Unfortunately (or not because you couldn’t make out the steepness of the cliff) the day was very foggy blocking the view on the incredible Bolivian landscape. To sad also because we were passing several climate zones on our 3000 m altitude race down.

I am not sure it was bad, that I could see, where this cliff ended.

The death road kind of looks cute snuggling its way around the hill side until you recall that once upon a time trucks were using due to the lack of alternatives (for an impression watch TopGears Bolivia special).

On the finish line we were brought to a „hotel“ (rather a falling apart barack, but who really cares) with a swimming pool and lunch. Which was okay but while hanging out we were eaten by sun flies and my whole body was itching the next day. The trip was pretty fun but I still think 80$ is a bit of a rip off considering average Bolivian prices.

First when the fog cleared the beauty of this country came into it’s own.

To finish off our visit to LaPaz Tom needed a ride with the newly build cable car (Evo paid the Swiss company Doppelmayer 300 mil. US$ for 7 lines.Very modern, clean, shiny and so not typical for Bolivia). They make traveling to the high ends of LaPaz really effortless and would make a good way to get a great view over the city, if the inhabitants wouldn’t just build houses into the view.

The very shiny and still rather cheap cable car makes the trip into the hillsides of LaPaz effortless (but of course it’s shut down on the election day).

What a view over the LaPaz, if there wouldn’t be this buildings everywhere. Bolivia still has to work on its touristic infrastructure.

Potosi – a visit to the devil in rubber boots

Veröffentlicht am 16. April 2015 von Steffi

The alarm went off at 5:45 am and Tom just asked whether I want to take the bus. Me and my bad stomach readily agreed to that even though we would miss the scenic train ride to Potosi (something Tom couldn’t forget about so we were actually taking the train back three days later).Three more hours of sleep and three hours in a creepy bus later we arrived in the highest city in the world at 4090 m and felt surprisingly good even though it was quite cold up here (our room had a TV! but no radiator so we slept in long underwear and with three blankets.).

Were ever you are in Postosi the towering "Cerro Rico" (rich mountain) is watching over you.

Were ever you are in Potosi the towering Cerro Rico is watching over you.

Once upon a time Potosi also was the richest city in the world though to the mountain towering over the city. Cerro Potosi general known as Cerro Rico (rich mountain) contained huge amounts if silver that was extracted by the hard labour of the indigenous people to be shipped away by the Spanish. Nowadays the mountain reminds if a Swiss cheese with its hundred of mines, but still 10.000 Bolivians still mine the mountain for tin and seldom earths under conditions that did not changed much in the last 400 years.

All the safety equipment you get is some extra layer of cloths, rubber boots and a helmet and that is far more than the miners have.

We decided to take a tour to visit the mines which was absolutely outside my comfort zone. Equipped with a thin layer of fabric, rubber boots, a dust mask and a helmet with lamps we more crawled through the 1 m high tunnels deep in the mountain knowing that an explosion could make a tunnel collapse and you are surrounded by dust causing lung diseases and toxic metals like arsenic.

There is not much silver left in Cerro Rico and most of it ended up somewhere in Spain.

Also the visit to the refining plant didn’t attested of many safety rules for workers in Bolivia. You better keep your distance to this machine.

And than equipped with our presents for the miners (juice, coca leaves and writing pads for their kids) we more crawled then walked through the centuries old mines.

The toxic stalactites are just a few cm above you head (if you bend down).

We crawled for about 2 exhausting hours visiting the miners that work there in average 12h, chewing coca leaves to not feel the hunger while drilling holes for explosives, carrying 20kg of stones in the back up the ladders between different levels our pushing wagons weighing tons out of the mountain. Most of them die in their fourties of lung diseases. We also paid a visit to the miners devil the Tio, which owns the erze. The miners regularly bring sacrificial offerings to ask for better ore quality and protection.

The guys in the back unloading the 20 kg heavy bags of scraps are supposed to be only 16 years old (still look younger). The guide told us kids start working in the mines when they are about 8 years old. Even though its forbidden, they need the money.

„El Tio“. God rules on earth, but below earth it’s the devil you need to keep an eye on. Anyway most miners more see El Tio as god below earth, who you have to respect. That’s why he is wearing rubber boots as the miners. Oh and of course the little insulting feature is an appeal for fertility for the miners.

Miners offer coca leaves, cigaretts and alcohol to El Tio. And here something for the food chemists. They offer and drink 96% alcohol with good taste („buen gusto“). One liter of this cost 10 BOV, one liter of beer 20 BOV!

We also tried this stuff. It’s actually strong but tasteless.

The guy here is drilling a hole for the explosives by hand (he can’t afford a drilling machine). The lump in his cheek is not from any disease but a bunch of coca leaves.

Somehow I was very happy, when we got out of the mountain again.

If somebody wants to know more, watch the movie „the devil’s miners“ about the 14 year old Basilo working in the mines. The movie is 10 years old and we were wondering what became of the boy. However we got three very different versions. Bertha from our homestay said he is indeed a teacher having three kids, Wikipedia says he is studying and partly still works in the mines and our Tour guide said he never worked in the mines and nowadays is a alcoholic working as a driver in Potosi? Officially children labor is not allowed, but nobody obeys the rules and kids as young as 8 years work down there. I also asked our guide whether conditions change with the new president but he said it only got worse and most miners would like to put a bar of dynamite into the presidents arse.

Have a close look on the three guys. This wagons are probably centuries old and weigh tons.

The next day we tried to climb the Cerro Rico, which was a quite different experience to hike between rubbish, rubble from the mines, mine entrances, trucks and miners, but the view over Potosi was exceptional.

Are green flamingo over viewing the Altiplano around Potosi.

The paths that we used were not any kind of leftovers but are used everyday by the people how can’t afford to live in the city and therefore live in little huts on the mountain.

And than the day came to take the „train“ back to Sucre. A bus on tracks! You can’t call Bolivians not to be creative.

This is the funniest train I have ever seen, but really comfy.

The ride (with thrilling 40km/h) was really entertaining. First we had to wait until the market cleared from the tracks in Potosi, than several obstacles like wheelbarrows and pigs, people getting of at nowhere, people asking the driver to take a bag of potatoes to relatives slowed down our journey and than again and again we were struck by the beauty of the green mountains of the altiplano sprinkled with tiny Bolivian farms. This trip really gives you a look on the life in the Bolivian countryside. Oh but I forgot to mention you shouldn’t be afraid of heights because the train is constantly driving along steep cliffs without any obvious security vorkehrungen.

The „train“ has a fixed schedule but people selling potatoes were still surprised that it passes exactly through the marketplace (the market took place on the tracks).

But we were not the only ones being excite about the journey. It’s the only way to get to the mountain villages.

I spend the total of 6 h looking out of the window, only the last 1 h I couldn’t resist sleep anymore.

Tarabucco – an unforgettable trip

Veröffentlicht am 16. April 2015 von Steffi

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This small village 1h bus ride from Sucre is popular for it’s every Sunday market and it’s festivities on the third weekend in March for Bolivias Independence Day. By chance we happened to be in Sucre on the third weekend in March and our Homestay „mum“ recommended us to take a trip to Tarabuco with a guy she knows. You can go their independently, but she told us, that it will be hard to find accommodation in Tarabucco on that weekend.

Our trip started on Saturday afternoon at 3:15 pm with me feeling quit ill (I really considered skipping the trip.) Together with Sanchia, Lucia and Sean we enter the diverging bus (Yeah well it’s Bolivia.). After we collected more people including our guide we headed off for Tarabucco. Unfortunately not for long, because after a short stop to check the conditions of a wheel we heard an explosion, saw the dust creeping into the bus before the bus stopped next to the cliff. On front wheel exploded. Yeah no reason to worry. Even though the driver couldn’t get the extra wheel loose he managed to exchange the broken one with one of the back twin tires.

Having a flat tire on a bus ride in Bolivia is a common part of the trip, so better bring some food.

We used the time to get to know the rest of the people in our group. I mean it was sunny and the landscape amazing.

This one lasted for more or less 200m before it broke down with a puncture so we went for the safe version and loaded our backpacks and a stack of mattresses from the bus on the road and the bus was heading back to Sucre. A new one was to come.

No it’s not the same tire from a different angel.

If it wouldn’t be for the hunger and the setting sun there were worse places to hang out and we seemed to be a good amusement for all Bolivians going to Tarabucco.

With a delay if three hours we arrived at the main plaza in Tarabuco. Unloaded the backpacks and mattresses that we only had to carry another 500 m down a by now dark dusty street to a small blue door. Behind the door waited what was to be our camp for the night. A moldy room that had to fit all 12 off us + 2 guides + 2 people that showed up during the night. We unrolled the 30 cm to short stained mattresses and prepared for the party to come.
First the guide let us to a rather simple restaurant were they severed us food of questionable quality. But the two chicken wings were deep fried so at least nothing was living in them. And then we headed off the the concert that was taking place in the huge sport hall. This was a weird thing in the beginning. Everybody was sitting on cold stone steps waiting for the concert to begin and stayed there even when the concert started. After an hour everybody in the group was so cold, that they wanted to head on. Our guide somehow seemed to be a bit overwhelmed by the requirements of his group since he let us to something that should be a party but was just a noisy dark room. And they actually wanted to charge us extra 10 BOV. So Tom and me decided go back to the concert and blended with the dancing locals which finally turned out to be quite fun. Funnily every single band had at least one guy playing the pan flute. Didn’t know that pan flutes are that popular in Bolivia. After the concert we just went for some more calories in form of a grilled street pizza before settling a bit uncomfortably in our room. At some point in the night also our guides returned drunken and noisy. And fell asleep were they falling. Meaning one of them next to Sanchia.

If he ever offers to be your guide, run!

The next day started as the previous promised. A confused guide trying to find breakfast for twelve people, surprised that the market is crowded on a day like this and then tried to fed us on one roll and a coffee. On the question when the ceremonial dancing starts he didn’t know the answer either, so we finally gave up on him and walked around the city in our own, finally found the dancers and the festival square with the it’s eatable tower (after the festival the mayor distributes the food between the people).

The dancers had a little extra feature, there shows were capable of leaving you deaf behind.

Ice creme was next to everything that can be fried to most consumed energy source on this festival. Interestingly most people didn’t drink alcohol during the dancing for Pachemama (mother earth). Only saw „gringos“ with beer cans in their hands.

A typical scene found around the festival place, with dancers (only men), woman in their traditional clothing and a few out of place tourists.

We were supposed to leave at two so we had some backed through food before heading back to the house with the blue door. There the guide was waiting for us to take us out for lunch. We skipped that and according to the face of one of the French guys we didn’t missed out on something. So now we only had to carry our mattresses back the 20 min to the official bus station before we could drive back to Sucre without any further incidents. It was by far the worst „tour“ we ever attended.

Happy to leave?

At this point I have to say that Tarabucco and the festival of independence is really worth a visit. Alone the bus drive offering views of the open landscape of the bolivian plateau is great and with regular punctures you usually even have photo stops. The village has a big market selling whatever you can think of and the traditions of dancing to honor Mother Earth is something you rarely experience. Just book an accommodation in advance and take the public bus (Guys that took it the told us they had a puncture too, but only one.).

Sucre – aprendía español

Veröffentlicht am 15. April 2015 von Steffi

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My memories of Sucre are colored by the fact that I was feeling ill for most of the time (I will probably never find out why they always give you infusions when you go to foreign hospitals.), so I didn’t even manage to see much more than the market, our Homestay and the way to my spanish school.

Feeling very untouristy eating at the market, but leave your fingers of the salad. They wash it in the river an not even the locals eat it without getting stomach issues.

The chief. One of dozens and though not the healthiest it was delicious food.

Shopping leek. We emptied the the place of it, because nobody in our homestay ever tried it before.

Our favourite place in the central market, the fruit juice stands. You get everything freshly made with our without milk and/or sugar, if you ask for it.

Yummi and it always comes with a second helping.

Zebras explaining how to use zebra crossing and jumping in front of moving cars, if their driver are to ignorant (of course the crossing are also equipped with traffic lights just lines on the ground would never work).

My spanish teacher. Did a good job on me, now I only need to practise.

But as far as I can judge Sucre is quite a clean, quite and safe place. And even tough the name „Sucre“ doesn’t have anything to do with sugar the white buildings in the center somehow reminded you of icing on a cake.

Sucre lies, like most andean cities in a valley, where the centre is the lowest point and the poorer districts crawl up the hill sides.

The white houses of Sucre. I assume the have a decree against colored wall paint.

What really made a difference was our stay with Bertha and her little family. We spend in total two weeks in her Homestay, playing with Coco the lovable dog that hates locals but loves foreigners, cooking food with Bertha and other guest, saw Bolivian movies and playing Volleysquash also called Squallyball a mix between squash and volleyball. In the end we really had a hard time leaving.

Coco would immediately lay down spread his legs and ask for cuddle units from you.

One of the many dinner gatherings in Bertha’s kitchen.

Because Bertha is a big fan of this german dish, I made my first lentils soup. A little piece from home.

Playing squallyball is really fun, quite physical demanding and played by Tom leaves you some bruises.

Salar de Uyuni – tons of salt at 4000 m

Veröffentlicht am 15. April 2015 von Steffi

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Entering the minivan at 7:30 am several tiered faces that would accompany us the next three days greeted us.

The Party companions: Pyria, Jen, Lisa, Gigi, Tom, me and of course of lovely guide and driver.

Great guy, always in good mood, with a little knowledge of English, and a save and most important sober driver.

First stop: Police station San Pedro for the emigration stamp from Chile.
Second stop: At already 4000 m for the immigration stamp to Bolivia and finally breakfast. By that time Gigi our Italian companion was already starting to feel sick.

We were definitely not the only ones going on this triṕ.

At the border to Bolivia we realized that we were definitely not the only ones going on this trip. Citation Tom: „Must be good, when so many people go there.“

Third stop: Laguna Blanca and Verde. Their colour is determined by different salts and shows up when the wind disrupts the mirroring surface.

I think based on the color that this is Laguna Verde (I was quite confused after five lakes on one day.).

Fourth stop: Dieserto Dali looking like one if Dali’s pictures and thereby getting this name.
Fifth stop: Agua termales a small hot pool set in the beautiful landscape of a salt lake.

This time I refused to get undressed, but Tom had a good time …

… while I couldn’t stop taking pictures of this amazing colors.

Sixth stop: Geyser Sol de Mañana getting its name from the colored ground surrounding the grey mud pools.

Okay, Tom always cheats with his polarisation filter, but the colors are impressive.

They don’t drive a single meter any more but make for a really good motive. Dead trains on their cemetery.

Seventh stop: Lunch finally at 3 pm.
Eighth stop: Laguna Colorada a salt lake colored like the polish flag. White from the borax salts and red from the algae growing in the flat water, sprinkled with hundreds of pink flamingos.

I am not quit sure, whether I got the English/Spanish right, but I think the color is supposed to come from the red algae growing in the lake.

And there were lots of them and we took dozens of pictures so you have to cope a least with the three here.

Hmm, wonder what the green one had to eat?

In between our tight schedule we were driving through a landscape formed of sand and white, yellow and red salt. By the end of the day I had to consult our schedule to remember what we all did. We settled down for the night at 4300 m and slowly the altitude was hitting in. Gigi that didn’t felt well all day were suffering the most not even able to drink a sip of coke no talking of eating or breathing. But no one could really fall a sleep, so we spent hours listening music, watching TopGear and going to the toilet. No wonder everybody was a bit destroyed the next day.

The morning was cold and despite the rainy season beautiful. So off we went to our safari through more desert and salt.

What a beautiful morning! just took a little effort to walk the 100 m to take the picture :).

First stop: funny stones washed out by time that everybody was keen to climb except the holly one.

The little mermaid in the desert.

Second stop: more stones that represent the habitat of some ancient plants looking like moos but being hard like stone.

Don’t really know why the form this knobs. Maybe the wind.

Third to fifth stop: salt lagunes of different size and color all coming with a bunch of flamingos.

You just get the picture of one here.

Sixth stop: an active Vulcan, by now 60% of the Group were already to tired to get out of the Jeep to take pictures.

And then around the corner it showed up. The biggest salt lake of the world: Salar de Uyuni. The view was impressive and we only got a tiny glimpse of it. Thank to the sunny weather we were able to drive through the salt lake to our final destination: a hostel made of salt. Driving through the endlessness of salt gave us a first taste of what was to come the next day: water like illusions all over the horizon gave a feeling of riding over the sea.

The first glimpse of the salar: not a lake, but a sea of salt.

Found new friends during our shopping break.

The dinning room in our salt hotel. Even the deco was mad of this corrosive material. And i found the stuff between my toes after dinner.

The next morning after a good nights sleep we entered the jeep at 5 am for our first stop sunrise at the isla de pescada home of hundreds kakti. Unfortunately we missed the sunrise but the scenery was anyway paying of for that.

An almost sunrise over the salt sea.

A kind of special location for a breakfast.

And than the illusions began first in the whiteness of the salt and than on the thin watery surface on some part of the salt lake. I have never seen something like that.

Only time in my life, that I am taller and stronger than Tom :).

Maybe we should have baptised the blog „with apple travelling the trains and busses of the world“.

An here the whole team. Some really are skilled jumpers for pictures.

The most popular salt hotel had be to turned into museum due to sanitation issues. Guess it{s not easy to build a sewer into salt.

If you don’t have some obstacles …

… you can’t determine where sky stops.

By the way, some of the salt is indeed used form nutritional and cosmetic purposes. Here it’s build into hills to dry before harvesting.

A perfect lunch and a few old trains later we arrived in Uyuni, relaxing with beer and pizza before our bus left for Sucre.

The dead trains close to Uyuni.

Tom couldn’t resist climbing them.

San Pedro and it’s Tours

Veröffentlicht am 15. April 2015 von Steffi

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After a short visit of Kristin in our favourite SA city we headed off north to San Pedro the Atacama.

After a short stop in at Kristin’s in our favourite south american city we headed off north to San Pedro the Atacama.

At the time of visit 63 travel agencies, running the most popular tours, were located in the town. Some destinations can unfortunately only be reached by a tour so we had the great fun of picking some that hopefully wouldn’t at least kill us (several dangers lay in front if us: altitude sickness, boiling geysers, unpaved roads, the simple fact of being in a desert and the likeliness of a drunken driver somewhere in Bolivia). We chose based on tripadviser and a funny/creepy book to be found in the tourist office if SPDA (Sam Pedro de Atacama) collecting complains and praises of travel agencies in town.

Some questions you would want to keep in mind will talking to any 
tour operator:

Which tour company is it?
How Many thanks to Tom apeople are going to be on the tour?
Does the guide speak English?
How long does the tour last?
How much time are we going to have at the POI?
What does the tour include?
Are there extra fees to be paid?
Is water included in the tour?
What do you have to bring?
Do the driver drink alcohol?

Roaming the main street of SPDA. You will find a few locals, many tourist, 63 tour operators and even more eateries (quite good and cheap though), many hostles and lots of sand.

It’s 4:30 in the morning. Busses of all sizes are roaming the through the streets of clay and sand. Tourist are squatting in front of every hostel desperately watching bus after bus go by until at one point one is stopping and feeding them into its belly and heads off to the mountains.

It’s 4.30 in the morning but the streets are busy with tourist and minivans. Get the feeling everybody booked a tour for this day.

The advise from Paco against altItsitude sickness was to breath slowly and deeply and wait for your brain to tell the body what to do. And of course chewing coca leaves. It’s perfectly legal in Chile but don’t try to pass a drug test soon after.

Still in the middle of the night we arrived at the geysers at 4000m because you get the best lights for pictures is during sunrise. Not for us, fog wrapped us tightly making the the whole place kind of spooky. Our guide again told us that you have to come here early because the geysers stopp spitting water after 9 am (by the end of the day I didn’t believed half of what he was telling us but it was entertaining anyway).

Not sure whether it’s fog or steam? Better keep an eye out for the boiling geysers.

Heading down again provided some more or less worth visiting attractions. Some hot pots of dazzling blue color and boiling hot temperature, a hot pool that was rather cool and of dubious hygienic conditions, a adean village build for tourist with locals selling lama BBQ of unclear origins (we had one anyway), a 4000 year old ruins of another village looking like build yesterday (as I said I did not take everything for real by that time) and lots of beautiful scenery, vicuñas (wild lamas), flamingos, and viscachas (a relative of the chinchilla). By the time we got back to the hostel we were so exhausted that we spent the rest of the day eating and sleeping.

Tom got me to go in there despite the freezing temperatures outside. I regretted it immediately. Cold, slimy and my skin started itching right away.

And than finally the sun came out, unfortunately we already left the geysers behind.

A volcano relfecting it self in a puddle of water (we found quite a lot water around here, despite the fact being in a desert).

Vincunas, the desert lama. By now they are protected in Chile and only a few people have the licence to cut the fur and use it for handicraft for tourists, of course.

Lama BBQ. A bit chewy, but okay. Now way right here to proof its really lama.

But they look happy enough to not be the source for the BBQ.

Viscachas are pretty shy, so we were pretty lucky to see one. To me it looks a bit like a mix of rabbit and guinea pig („Meerninchen“ in german).

The next morning (rather night) at 3:40 we were picked up by Jorge to do what Tom said he wanted to do. Watching the stars. Jorge explained us quite a lot about the southern sky and astronomy in general. Let us play with his telescopes and pointed out stars and planets for us (we saw Jupiter and it’s moons as well as Saturn) which was really amazing and paid of for the lack of sleep.

It’s not that often you can catch a glimps of the milky way, but here you can nearly ervery night.

Saturn as we saw it through the telescope. Really impressive.

You could probably spent several weeks here enjoying this incredible landscape but we just had time for one more small trip with Tom and Jeanette from Canada. The took us up to the salt flats and insulting rock formations around San Pedro including a some acclimatization time at 4600 m. Time just flew by while chatting in their car and soon our last day in San Pedro was over. After a finally a refreshing sleep of 8 h we headed of for Salar de Uyuni the next day.

Many thanks to Tom and Jeanette for taking us to the STONES :).

Don’t tell me, what is the first thing you are thinking of, when you see this. Oh yeah a rock by a salt lake!

We always thought its not raining in the desert. We were kind of wrong, but luckily missed the floods that were to come a few days later to Atacama.

Mendoza – Bacchus summer residence

Veröffentlicht am 15. April 2015 von Steffi

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The first thing that you recognize when arriving in Mendoza are green trees, bushes and parks. And this after driving for hours through the sand and dry landscape of a desert. Already the Incas used water courses to redirect the river coming from the mountains which were improved and are still used today and thereby creating this oasis.

Something of the green generated by the clever water systems and we were even allowed to try it.

These clever water systems in combination with the christianisation by the Spanish also cause Mendozas main attraction. Wine! Numerous wine yards around Mendoza produce some excellent grapes in this region of 300 sunny days a year. A speciality being a wine called Malbec. Originally from France it disappeared in Europe (I never tried it before.) during a wine pest but just flourish in the dry conditions here. It’s of almost black color, with a good amount spicy tannins (Never drink red wine without tannins. It will just result in a headache the next day.) and a flavor a black berries.

„Never drink wine without tannins“ was the good advice from the lady, that gave us a tasting of the to me unknown Malbec at two different occasions.

After our first night including a free wine tasting in the hostel and half a cow in a restaurant we found our selfs with a bunch of people from the hostel in bus 10/171 on the way to Maipu and it’s many wine yards. Due to some indirectness of the route it took much longer than expected and at a certain point the driver just ordered us out of the bus recommending to walk the rest (Bus 10/172 would have been the direct one but surely less scenic).

Not the best bikes, but decent cheap and including a small bottle of water (Where is the wine?).

We grabbed some bikes from one of the renting shops and headed of to the first wine yard. Here we met the girl from our tasting the night before, now not only explaining the difference between red and white wine but also how to distinguish different wine plants, how the wine is produced and what is so special about Malbec (very sensitive to bad wheather) and she let us taste their premium wine that is only sold in Argentina and of course Germany.

You can already smell the difference on the barrel or just smell the difference of one to another barrel.

These premium wines really were the best of the day and somebody is selling them somewhere in Germany!

After this we went to two more wine yards and one bodega ending up with more than a bottle each in our bloodstream.

Spirtis (or alcohol blood level) were getting high im bodegas and vineyards.

People working hard to bottle the wine.

People working not that hard to unbottle them again.

Accidents can not be excluded under such circumstance but luckily not more than a big scratch resulted from the fall in the ditch. Since spirits were already high and the day still young nobody put a veto to dinner and more wine bottles, so the next day was completely devoted to recovery.

How smart. Tasting different wines from the same yard over for each other. Bt don't mess with the glasses, because the drue is indicated in the paper below.

How smart. Tasting different wines from the same yard over for each other. But don’t mess with the glasses, because the grape is indicated in the paper below.

Bariloche or the tiny Switzerland of Nazi Germans

Veröffentlicht am 10. April 2015 von Steffi

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We can’t deny it. After the Second World War many Germans flew to South America especially Argentina and in Bariloche you find many of their traces mingled into the argentine culture. Cute little „Spitzdachhäuser“, German schools teaching in Spanish, German bakeries that sell at least one kind of integral bread, breweries offering deals including the argentine version of pizza with loads of cheese, chocolate manufactures producing pralines filled with dulce de leche and even the landscape resembles some Swiss features tough the network of lakes and hills is much more impressive than anything I have seen in Europe.

First thing is Bariloche: having a bear and pizza. Second thing in Bariloche: not feeling you are in Argentina if it weren’t for the loud argentine band in the background.

I was so happy, when we entered this chocolate store and even got a sample for free until I bit it and my mouth filled with this caramelised milk stuff „dulce de leche“.

Here we finally got what we came for to Argentina: not the beautiful landscape or the argentine culture, no we came for steak and wine. The recommended restaurant is really popular we Israelis meaning you get huge amounts for a reasonable price but you have to show up early. We came 20 min before the place opened and squeezed in just before a group if 22 Israelis. And than came the difficult part of what to chose. Bife de lomo turned out to be 4 cm thick and tender steaks and the normal argentine portion of 500g sufficient to make our stomachs just about to burst.

Just cut it very thick and add a bit of salt and then over on the BBQ.

We estimated at least one cow went over this BBQ per night.

Tom in great expectations!

To make up for the unreasonable protein intake we went for a bike tour in the National Park the next day. We rented bikes at km 18.6 (kind of an unusual address) which turned out to be good mountain bikes that came in handy on the hilly road (flat was not existent). The views on the lakes are worth every km and you can visit a lot of side tracks, so we actually 5.5 h to cover the 25 km of the circuit.

I guess, thats why they call it the lake district.

The most famous and probably also the most expensive Hotel of Argentina lays in this Nationalpark. And don’t tell me, that you are bot thinking of Switzerland in this moment.

Here you also find the famous red trees also called „llao-llao“?

The best view of the day came 3 km before the finishing line.

El Chalten – the little sister of Torres del Paine

Veröffentlicht am 10. April 2015 von Steffi

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When we finished Torres del Paine both of is were relatively done with hiking and carrying around heavy backpacks. Unfortunately everybody told us to stop by El Chalten in Argentina for some more hiking. „It’s really beautyfull.“ So we did.

Since we were also a little tired of booking ahead we arrived there not knowing were to stay. The tourist information here is very helpful and pointed out the hostels that had some free space (it weren’t many). We ended up in a cheap but a little creepy place surrounded by french (whatever it is about them and adventure holidays), the owner only spoke Spanish but was really nice tough. We spent two days hiking up the steep hills around El Chalten Cerro Torres and the dominating Frits Roy always in the corner of our eyes. The landscape here is really beautiful but not that different from Torres del Paine.

The biggest lake in the area spans over 17 km and is a little eye catcher on top of the mountain.

The mountain range around El Chalten and it’s wooden explanation, including „El Torre“, „Fritz Roy“ and „El Tomasz“ also known as „Cerro Knubbel“.

The famous Fritz Roy, sunning on this beautiful day in February.

El Chalten on an early sunny morning (just reminded us that we forgot to bring the sun creme).

El Chalten itself was only founded by Argentina a few decades ago to claim the area from Chile. Only the attractive landscape around drawing the tourists here provide a livelihood, so you can guess what’s dominating the place: Hostels, restaurants, tour agencies, kiosks and panaderias selling empenadas (dough moons filled with meat, vegetables or ham and cheese).

El Chalten on an early sunny morning (just reminded us that we forgot to bring the sun creme).

Somehow we expected Argentina to be cheaper than Chile (at least that’s what everybody keeps claiming). It isn’t. Especially when you don’t bring Euro or USD. Argentina has an extremely high inflation and since 2011 a law prohibits the investment of money in foreign currency. Therefore everybody here wants to keep there savings in USD. You are able to change USD for a 30% higher rate than the official rate which really saves a lot of money. Luckily somebody already told us in Santiago ;).

Steffi and Tom on the Road

With Tommy traveling in the trains of this World.

Archiv für den Monat: April 2015

Isla del sol – no, not Bornholm

LaPaz and the fast way down

Potosi – a visit to the devil in rubber boots

Tarabucco – an unforgettable trip

Sucre – aprendía español

Salar de Uyuni – tons of salt at 4000 m

San Pedro and it’s Tours

Mendoza – Bacchus summer residence

Bariloche or the tiny Switzerland of Nazi Germans

El Chalten – the little sister of Torres del Paine