Looking back, looking forward

Hello again,

Well, this is it! Our final day before returning to Australia. A part of us thought this trip would never end, but here we are. It’s been 3.5 years since we moved to London and it’s fair to say we’ve got mixed feelings about the return to Sydney. There are lots of things we’re looking forward to – seeing family and friends, the beaches, the food (fresh fruit, seafood, BBQs), and ultimately, not being on the road for a while.

Here’s a few stats on the last seven months to give you some perspective of how we’ve spent our time:

• Total travel days: 222
• Countries visited since leaving London: 11
• Different beds: 67, plus six nights camping
• Flights: 19 (with each connection counted separately)
• Bus rides: 33 (excluding day tours and local transport), roughly 200 hours
• Longest bus ride: 19 hours, including a game of bingo before bed
• Ferries: 12 (excluding day trips), including one four day journey
• Books finished: Tim 3, Lesley 44 (one book every five days, quite obscene)
• Blog posts: 40. Mostly by Tim whilst Lesley was reading
• Times we didn’t get all of our clothes back from the laundromat: Lesley 2, Tim 0

Phew! It’s all been worth it though, without a shadow of a doubt – the experience is it’s own reward. These days we think of travel as an essential part of a person’s education…it’s changed us both, for the better we hope. Whilst it’s so hard to rank or compare everything that has happened during this big trip, these are some of the things we’ll never forget (and a few photos to jog the memory)…

• Hot air ballooning in Cappadocia. A contender for Lesley’s favourite moment of the trip, and it happened in the first couple of weeks!

• An almost private Turkish Gulet cruise…

• A week in Crete; great value, great scenery, great history. The best tzatziki
• Getting engaged in Santorini…’nuff said

• A day on the water in Sardinia with great company, amazing beaches and plentiful wine

• Swimming with sea lions in the Galapagos
• Staying at Charlie’s in the Cordillera Blanca, for both the landscape and the serendipitous encounter with an inspiring (if eccentric) individual

• Witnessing Machu Picchu emerge from the early morning clouds; even with high expectations, this superstar attraction blew us away

• Seeing a Jaguar in Manu National Park, and more generally surviving that adventure

• Enjoying hot springs by starlight on our Salar de Uyuni tour with good company and a few bottles of wine
• A week in San Pedro de Atacama; great landscapes and Chilean civility = win, especially after Bolivia
• Drinking a little too much and loving it in the Colchagua Valley
• Watching the sun rise at Las Torres after hiking up in the dark, probably Tim’s overall number one moment of the trip for lots of reasons. Patagonia in general was an incredible highlight, made all the more special by the people we met and continued to bump into

• Getting to know the enigmatic Moai of Easter Island, and watching the sun rise over Ahu Tongariki

Of course, as we mentioned, the feelings are mixed, and we can see there are challenges on the horizon. A regular part of the last 3.5 years has been the insane level of newness that we’ve lived with. We’ll have to work harder to maintain some of that; we’re planning to be regular tourists in Australia (all suggestions welcome on favourite destinations and activities), and our travel wish list has only grown. Far off destinations like Europe, which we love, will be sorely missed; creating a lifestyle that enables us to visit them regularly is something we’ll be working on. And that’s a hint of perhaps the biggest challenge of all… creating a work-life balance we can both live with, which in reality would be hard anywhere. Travel helps with this too – part of the great thing about being on the road is all the awesome and inspiring people we’ve met. Just yesterday we were on a tour with a German couple who employed a management team to run a business they’d founded and built, enabling them to spend months of the year travelling and working remotely. We love that. We’ve learnt that seven months of travel is a long stint; about three months is perfect, any more and you start wishing for a week off! The ideal lifestyle for us is a stable base in Sydney, a challenging and rewarding work life, with the flexibility to travel or work remotely every 2-3 months. Figuring out what you want is half the battle right?

Figuring out what you don’t want is important too, and Tim has decided banking isn’t for him. Ever since leaving KPMG he’s been completely disillusioned with it. We’re both high achievers, and perhaps we try to please others to a fault. One of the nice things about where we are now is that we don’t feel like we have anything to prove to anybody. It’s time to make a change for the better…life is too short to hate what you do. Plus, he is keeping the beard.

Of course we’ve learnt about each other too. Being together day and night for such a long period of time will tend to do that; with our best and worst qualities both being exaggerated (no need to record these here). There have been surprisingly few big arguments on the trip, though plenty of times when we’ve both felt tired and snappy. Seems like a good sign. Time apart will be extremely weird at first, but very healthy.

So what comes next for us? Lesley doesn’t start work until February, so we have about six weeks of the Australian summer to enjoy. We’re already contemplating taking a week or so to do the Greater Ocean Road in a “Wicked Camper”, but we’ll see how we feel. Tim has a meeting with a recruiter lined up on the 22nd, but the job search will probably take months, especially given how quiet things will be in January. Meanwhile he wants to investigate establishing a photography business (strictly a hobby), even if it’s just a way to purchase camera equipment with tax advantages. We’ll be sussing out wedding venues, though Athol Hall sounds like it’ll be a winner, and scheduling that for late 2016. Beyond that we’re not really sure. Living overseas again has come in and out of vogue with us, but we currently feel it isn’t necessary to achieve the balanced life we want. What we do know is that we want to continue enjoying the little things and prioritising experiences over material goods; some of our best moments on this trip have been sunsets or sunrises in the great outdoors, and they’re both free.

If you suddenly have the urge to travel and want to know how we did 7 months on the road, carry on only, we’re breaking from tradition and providing some “useful” information below. This blog was always more about giving a record of our experiences, but we figure we’ve gotten pretty good at this, so why not strike while the iron is hot. Optional reading of course.

So, thanks for reading and following along with us! The 90 entries to date will become a book (another lengthy project for Tim) and eventually adorn a coffee table somewhere. We’re not sure yet whether this will be the last post, as we’ve got a lot more in us. Either way, this has been a crazy ride that we’d do all over again… we’re excited for the next chapter.

Cheers, and see you soon.
TL

Appendix: On being a value-loving pro-travelling carry-on only couple

Over time we’ve found a number of sites that were very useful. For accommodation booking, our favourites are:

• Airbnb: we generally went for self-contained apartments. Especially when travelling for a long time it made a big difference to be able to cook our meals and have private living space.
• Booking.com: hotel / B&B accommodation with the added benefit that you often don’t have to pay anything until you arrive.
• TripAdvisor: great for peer reviews on activities and restaurants. Key learning from reading thousands of reviews – no matter what it is, someone will say it was the best experience of their life, someone else will say it was terrible, someone will say too expensive and someone will say very good value. The average scores are helpful.
• HostelWorld: for private rooms, ideally with private bathrooms, in hostels or B&Bs. Good and cheap, with deferred payment.

Getting around: We downloaded an app called Pocket Earth Pro for a few dollars from the App Store and it has more than paid for itself! You can download maps for most places and then mark your accommodation, restaurants / bars, activities and routes between places. Best part – it can then be used offline using your GPS and the data stored in the app, so no expensive use of google maps on the go. Speaking of, we never moved to our prepaid international SIM cards (though we carried them for the whole seven months); Wifi and data based communications generally sufficed.

Keeping fit: Despite the hundreds of kilometres of walking we’ve done, either sightseeing or trekking, we wanted a different way to keep fit and maintain strength. We brought a skipping rope but never used it. Lesley got a tip from a work colleague on an app called the Seven Minute Workout Challenge. At first we couldn’t even get through one set, then we worked our way up to a peak of three. We’ve now settled back around two but it’s a great workout that you can do almost anywhere in a short time.

Packing

We decided to go with carry on luggage only for most of the trip. When Lesley first heard this suggestion her response was essentially “you’re a crazy person”, but she was slowly won over. The Travel Independent packing list was extremely useful (http://www.travelindependent.info/whattopack.htm). It took a LOT of planning and preparation, and some new purchases, but it really paid off and ultimately, you realise how little you need. Here’s what we took.

Lesley’s bag:

• Kelty Redwing 40 litre. When fully packed it definitely pushes the boundaries of allowable cabin luggage, but we never had any problems with it. Lesley calls it the Mary Poppins bag as there always seems to be space. The main downside? There’s no secure way to lock it. Overall: comfortable, a good fit and it’s stood the test of time well. She’ll be getting plenty more use out of it in years to come.
• Supplementary small day pack sourced from Jack Wolf in the UK which folds up to almost nothing. The lining is on its last legs, but it has withstood seven months of punishment well and it wasn’t expensive.
• For both of us, clothes were packed into vacuum seal bags, which helped to partition and save space. Wear and tear was an issue, more spares would’ve been good.

Tim’s Bag:

• Tim was insane in that he wanted to do carry on and also take professional camera equipment. Without the camera gear, a 30L pack would have done with space to spare! After weeks of research he found F-Stop bags, ultimately choosing a Loka Ultralight 40L, plus camera insert. All he can say is that it worked, and the extremely light bag withstood the punishment, but he really missed the convenience of his LowePro Flipside bag…that thing is a gem.
• This was supplemented with a small crappy backpack that the camera insert went into. Advantage – it didn’t look like a camera bag. Disadvantage – the camera wasn’t easy to access.

Shoes:

We spent an undue amount of time considering and finding the ideal footwear for this trip. In the end, we decided full hiking boots were too bulky and we only regretted that once when walking long days in Torres Del Paine. In the end Lesley chose…

• Mendl Gore-Tex trail runners – not a full hiking boot but a good walking shoe with a very stable base.
• A pair of fold up ballet flats (“Butterfly Twists”) – going out shoes. These have a foam base and they are so comfortable – as long as you’re not walking over a rocky, uneven surface.

…and Tim chose a similar low cut hiking shoe, though it was non-waterproof for added breathability. In the end, that was fine. We also both took a pair of Havianas, to prove we were Australian.

Clothing: our itinerary took us from the minuses to over 30 degrees celcius, so versatility was key (read, layering). Lesley took…

• 1 x fleece
• 1 x woollen cardigan
• 2 x t-shirts
• 2 x singlets
• 3 x Uniqlo long sleeve shirts – light yet suitable for cold weather
• 1 x long dress, the classic blue and white stripe
• 1 x ‘nice’ long skirt for going out
• 1 x everyday shorts
• 1 x leggings
• 1 x jeans. Despite being heavy, we just would have missed them too much.
• 1 x hiking pants
• 3 x exercise shirts, quick dry
• 2 x bra, sports and regular
• Various pairs of underwear. Advice, take as many as you can fit
• 5 x pairs of socks. Mix of hiking, ankle socks and a long / warm pair
• 1 x waterproof jacket wth hood – North Face
• 1 x set of thermals
• 1 x beanie and 1 x gloves – bought in South America, a good move
• 2 x scarves, one light which doubled as a sarong
• 1 x bikini

…and as for Tim…

• 1 x fleece
• 5 x shirts, including one long sleeve
• 1 x singlet – mainly for chilling out in
• 1 x button down going out shirt – got sent home to Australia after Europe, where it was more useful, and haven’t missed it since
• 1 x everyday shorts. These got a hole in them in Corsica and got sent home halfway through, better off without
• 1 x gym shorts
• 1 x jeans
• 1 x convertible hiking pants (North Face). Good quality and a staple in South America
• 3 x underwear – Uniqlo lightweight
• 5 x pairs of socks, mix as per Lesley
• 1 x waterproof jacket wth hood – North Face
• 1 x thermal trousers
• 1 x Beanie and 1 x gloves
• 1 x boardies

Electricals:

• MacBookPro plus charger: invaluable travel companion for entertainment, photo editing, blog writing, etc.
• External hard drive for backup and portable entertainment
• Kindles… self explanatory
• iPhone: navigation, maps, exercise, entertainment
• Earphones
• GPS: perfect for multiple car rentals in Europe. Posted home when no longer needed
• Camera gear: 5D Mark III, one 24-105mm f/4 lens, Gitzo Carbon Fiber Traveller Tripod, Really Right Stuff Ball head plus pano equipment, Lee Big Stopper, Lee Graduated Filter set, Remote Shutter Release Kit, Polarising Filter, Spare Battery, chargers
• Compact Olympus TG-4 waterproof camera for underwater shots and when uncomfortable using big camera. Shoots RAW, unlike a GoPro.
• Adapter and a bunch of cables
• Black Diamond head torch… really good quality and very useful
• Small Maglite torch… died on the trip. Not so useful.

Common:

• Silk sleeping sheets, perfect for when renting sleeping bags or when the sheets somewhere look nasty
• Microfibre towels, fold up to almost nothing
• Eye masks…essential again
• Blow up pillow for plane / overnight bus rides
• Ear plugs. Lindsey from the States taught us to roll them between our fingers before inserting in the ear. Good tip
• Very basic first aid kit
• Waiters friend… annoyingly hard to find in SA. Maybe there is a check in friendly version online? If not someone should invent one and make millions.
• LowePro waterproof bag covers, for when you can’t avoid getting wet

Things we took and didn’t use / left behind along the way:

• Skipping rope: we just didn’t feel the need to use it
• Umbrellas: turns out if it’s small enough to fit nicely in your bag, it’s probably flimsy and too small in a storm
• Booties for using on rocky beaches: Lesley used these a couple of times in Europe, Tim not at all

When it’s all laid out in a list like that, it does sound like a lot! The true testament is that very little will be discarded after this trip – it has almost all stood the test of time well and will continue to be worn / used by us in the future. After 7 months of solid use that is strong praise indeed!

The only downsides we can both think of for doing carry-on only are:

• Not being able to purchase as many gifts and souvenirs as we may have liked – we had to think about (expensive) postage or the ability to carry it for months on end
• Losing waiters friends along the way because we couldn’t check them in
• Having to manage your liquids to 100ml per item for some flights. This was far more of an issue in Europe than South America where they mostly didn’t seem to care, though we never knew that in advance
• Being challenged on an inconsistent basis when someone at security suddenly decided something we were carrying was a weapon, e.g. a tripod or hiking poles
• Not having a pair of shoes to work out in

Overall, we are both very glad we made this choice and there’s been more than a few times we’ve felt smug as we’ve watched other people stagger under the weight of their gigantic backpacks. If you’re tempted, give it a go!

Tahiti & Moorea (French Polynesia)

Hello again,

We were lucky to get a late checkout on our last day in Easter Island. We got the blog post out just before 19:00, left most of our luggage and went to dinner. It was our first restaurant meal on the island (we’d been subsisting mostly on a couscous salad and chicken, and empanadas for lunch); we had the place to ourselves and the nice Cuban owner got chatting as he brought us our pisco sours – the best we’d tasted yet, and probably also the most potent. Afterward we had time for one last sunset at Ahu Tahai before we left for the airport at 22:00 (already around our normal bedtime).

There was a lively atmosphere at Easter Island international airport. The passengers were a strange mix of locals (who knew each other and the airline crew) and white, generally middle aged tourists, who looked a little startled at their motley company. Some of the former carried weird animal objects like crowns made of feathers and a horse jaw bone (really). The guy who sat next to Lesley had what looked like a whole chicken stuffed into the front pocket of his jumper. Tim could see the black feathers and feet sticking out of one side and initially wondered if it was still alive (doubtful). When we set off at 00:40 it’d already felt like a long wait.

We both slept a bit on the flight after a random dinner meal was served, and when we pulled into Papeete five hours later it was about 1:30 local time. Our arrival wasn’t glamorous and it wasn’t like the movies, though even at that time there were three people singing and playing the guitar at the arrivals gate (welcome to paradise). We got our flower necklaces, which perked us up just long enough to make it to our hotel at 2:30. Finally, we turned in for “the night” (it was 7:30 Easter Island time).

Apart from the obvious, we’d chosen Tahiti because we really didn’t want to backtrack to Santiago and then fly direct from there to Sydney. For one thing, that would have been a massive buzz kill at the end of the trip, but we also wanted to minimise our air miles for environmental reasons. We only had four full days because we wanted to make it home for Christmas, and two of those would be transiting between Tahiti and Moorea. For the first time in a long time, it’d be a rush job.

Most everyone has been conditioned to associate the word Tahiti with images of the uber resorts in Bora Bora, which are eye wateringly expensive and yet another flight away from Papeete. That’s not what we had on the agenda. On our first day we left the relatively ugly capital, and caught the ferry to Moorea, only 45 minutes away. We booked our place through AirBnB and it was about one tenth of the price of a room at the Hilton or Four Seasons, plus we had our own kitchen. Our host picked us up from the ferry terminal and drove us to the supermarket so we could get spaghetti bolognese ingredients (dinner for three nights) and other essentials. The bungalow was right near the airport, which had hardly any traffic, and only a ten minute walk to the main public beach on the island; all in all, it was good value. The downsides were the numerous and hungry mosquitoes, and the wild roosters that roamed the yard and woke us up anywhere from 4:00 onwards with their crowing…jerks. Also, the humidity was over 75% during our stay, so frequent clothes washing was very necessary.

Luxury dream holiday in French Polynesia this was not, but what we lacked in comforts we made up for in activities. After all, we weren’t really in it for R&R. On our first full day in Moorea we had a group cruise booked, but when we turned up it was just us and the owners, a French couple who had recently relocated to the island. The weather was pretty decent; extremely lucky, because technically we were entering the off “rainy” season and the previous week had been stormy. In terms of corals and fish quantity the snorkelling was pretty average really, nothing that could hold a candle to the Great Barrier Reef, which surprised us a little. The swimming highlight was stopping at a particular spot where stingrays and black tip reef sharks congregate in numbers (they get fed there). It resulted in some interesting encounters. Who knew stingrays felt so slimy…check out Lesley’s neck muscles, tense much?

The scenery was spectacular and the other highlights of the day all took advantage of it. There was a mermaid tail on board and whilst it’d never occurred to her before, Lesley couldn’t resist posing in it…

…and our lunchspot was a real gem. We got a little bit of rain whilst sitting there, and with food on the table four dogs and a cat kept us company (plus the fish nibbling at our toes). The cat seemed to be the boss; at one point it launched itself from the shore onto our chair next to Lesley with a mid-air “meeoooowwww!”, and all the dogs cowered. Anyway… turns out there are hungry mutts in paradise too.

After lunch they all cleared off and the sun came out again.

The second tour we did was a 4×4 “safari” of the island with a guy called Francky Franck, a genuine character. As a Frenchman, he elected to complete his then compulsory military service in Moorea, and in later life decided to relocate here on a permanent basis. He kept the group entertained with his eccentricities, including a lewd sense of humour. We learnt about the production of vanilla beans (apparently the ones on the island are highly sought after for luxury perfumes), and sampled some local liqueurs and jams. It was also a good way to appreciate the verticality of Moorea, one of the so called “high islands”, though it wasn’t great light for photos. You can clearly see the two big bays of the island in the photo below, taken from the Belvedere lookout; the one on the left is where James Cook moored when he first arrived.

With our last tour complete, our brief spell in Tahiti is drawing to a close. We’ll spend the final night back in the capital before catching an early flight next day to Sydney via Auckland. We’ll post some reflections on the trip in the next (and probably final) post.

TL

Easter Island

Hello again,

After frigging about with rescheduling a taxi the night before, we were up at 2:30 and leaving our apartment in Buenos Aires shortly after 3:00. Our driver was a rotund fellow whose every breath seemed a wheezy, phlegmy battle. First impressions weren’t helped by a generous amount of butt crack on display above his shorts. The car must have stalled ten times on the way to the airport and we both wondered if man or machine would give out first.

The sun rose over the tarmac as we waited for our first flight to board. Once in the air, the highlight was passing over the snow capped Andes just before the descent into Santiago; they’d been a travel companion of sorts to us, and it was a fitting farewell to the South American continent.

Easter Island felt very far away that morning. It’s the peak of an underwater mountain range that was formed through volcanic activity and it’s over 2000km to the nearest inhabited island. The first settlers came from French Polynesia (over 3000km away) potentially sometime between 600-900AD. James Cook arrived in the 18th century after 100 days of sailing. So, in reality our thirteen hour journey to this isolated speck of land was a total 21st century cheat.

If you’ve ever stared out the window on long flights over the ocean, Easter Island feels like the answer to “I wonder what it’s like down there”. Winds buffet the island, and at least during our time there, the weather was all over the place. Apparently when the island was discovered it was covered with palm trees and edible plants, with lots of sea birds and good fishing in the surrounds. Now the landscape is a fairly desolate one: grassy hills, black rocks and of course, the enigmatic moai statues. The change is put down to a combination of land clearing for agriculture, the use of tree trunks to transport moai, and a breed of introduced rat that ate palm tree seeds. The presence of the ruins hints at the one time wealth of the indigineous people (the Rapa Nui) that lived here, and combined with their isolation and relatively sudden decline, there is a strong sense of mystery to the place. At the quarry called Rano Raraku, where hundreds of moai were built, it looks as though one day the workers simply put down their tools and left.

The outside world (in this case the Dutch) discovered Easter Island on Easter Sunday 1722; hence the name. In 1770 a Spanish expedition arrived; they made the locals sign a contract to claim the island for Spain, then sailed away. The Rapa Nui wouldn’t have had a clue what the piece of paper was, and Spain never claimed the island anyway. Captain Cook arrived in 1774; in four years conditions had worsened and a number of moai had been toppled. Sick at the time, he wrote in his journal:

“No Nation will ever contend for the honour of the discovery of Easter Island as there is hardly an Island in this sea which affords less refreshments and conveniences for Shipping than it does. Nature has hardly provided it with anything fit for men to eat or drink…”

Of course for the modern traveller (read lazy, or lucky) remoteness is part of the charm, and the windswept landscape has a character of its own. After Cook left the Rapa Nui civilisation went into decline. All the Moai were toppled from their platforms at some point (40 or so were later restored by archaeologists). Why? The Moai were the monuments to notable ancestors; the statues faced inland to watch over and protect the tribes. It could be that they were destroyed through tribal warfare, or maybe the Rapa Nui lost faith in them after life became increasingly hard on the island. The local population was further decimated by Peruvian slave raids; some 1500 Rapa Nui are thought to have been taken by force, and only 15 made it back…unfortunately they brought smallpox with them.

These days the island has a population of around 6000. All things considered, the fact that any of the Rapa Nui people survived is an incredible success story of resilience and survival in extreme isolation.

When we got to Santiago we needed to pay the entry fee for arriving by air to Chile before getting our domestic connection. Chalk that up to a planning mistake – we had previously avoided the fee twice by arriving via bus. It made us wonder why Easter Island is even part of Chile. Apparently in 1883 England encouraged Chile to claim ownership because… they didn’t want France to get it. Why the Chilean reciprocity fee only applies to Australians and Mexicans, and why we pay four times more, we can’t explain.

The LAN planes flying from Santiago to Easter Island are 787 Dreamliners; pretty snappy and fairly huge. Some of the passengers were clearly locals; there were more than a few eskies coming out in the luggage, easy to understand given the markup on fresh produce in these parts. Our hotel contacts greeted us at the airport and gave us flower necklaces, just like in the movies… except it was cloudy and there’s only one decent beach on the island, so it didn’t really have that tropical paradise vibe. We took a Lonely Planet recommendation on our lodgings and it really paid off… a self sufficient apartment with sea views and a terrace, a great place to relax and enjoy the space after the hustle and bustle of BA. It also came with a cat, which we adopted for the week (or rather, it adopted us for food and the occasional pat).

Unfortunately when unpacking we realised that the olive oil we’d brought had opened during the flight…we’d packed it to save money, talk about false economies! The worst part was two beanies we’d been carrying since Ecuador as gifts ended up soaked (even though we did bag the oil). Tim cursed himself as we did our best to clean everything up.

The first order of business after that was getting some cash out. We had a minor scare when our cards wouldn’t work at what we thought was the only VISA compatible ATM on the island. Nothing really drives the isolation home like not being able to pay for anything…those were a sad few minutes sitting by the roadside as we considered our next move. Fortunately, our information was out of date, and we stumbled on a Banco Estado ATM that saved the day. As for cooking, we found the supermarkets had enough ingredients and the prices were far better than the Galapagos (geographically closer than Santiago). Empanadas were a great cheap lunch option…and we stuck to that basically every day. We’d also brought six bottles of wine from BA which was an extremely good move. We just wish we’d left the oil in Argentina.

Despite being a relatively small island we’d decided to rent a car, at least for a few days. It was a good move; it meant we could avoid crowds, and drive to Tongariki for sunrise with ease. Tim had also planned to do some night photography, but it was overcast when we had the car. That suited Lesley, seeing as how she was the only one with a license (Tims’ recently expired). It was only the second time she’d driven in over three years. Everything went smoothly: the biggest difficulties were potholes and stray cows / horses on the road. The freedom of our own vehicle and the independence felt great. Here’s what we saw:

Ahu Tongariki: This is the largest ceremonial structure anywhere in Polynesia, measuring 220 metres from end to end with 15 large restored moai. We visited three times at different parts of the day, each time spending ages just taking in the atmosphere. Interestingly the largest earthquake ever recorded (a 9.5 in 1960) happened right on the coast of Chile, and the resulting tsunami waves (which were recorded at 11 metres high as far away as 10000kms from the epicentre) caused significant further damage to the moai, though at that stage they were already toppled. There were tsunami evacuation signs around town, but we preferred not to think about it in our beachside apartment. Here is a shot at sunrise, and later with the moai shadows stretching toward Rano Raraku…

Rano Raraku: All the Moai on the island were carved at this quarry, and many are still frozen in time at this spot. Each one took up to two years to complete, making them each a significant investment of time and effort. They were carved lying on their backs; face, torso and arms first, before being chipped away from the bedrock beneath and lowered down earth ramps into pre-prepared pits. The largest ever found is here, a whopping 21 metres in length, still staring up at the sky. The heads popping out of the ground are actually whole statues partially buried. There were various moai laying on the ground as well – if they fell anytime during the carving or transportation process they were abandoned… imagine telling your boss you’d dropped a moai after two years of carving work. We also did the walk up to the crater, and on the way back passed a local in a traditional costume… i.e. a g-string. We said “hola” and pretended everything seemed normal.

Anakena Beach: Thought to be the landing spot of the first Polynesian settlers. Today it is the main swimming beach for the entire island. The palm trees were brought from Tahiti in the 1960s. We would have gone more often if it hadn’t been on the opposite side of the island.

Ahu Tahai: This is a supremely popular spot near town for sunset… we could see the camera flashes from our balcony. We made the walk a couple of times, including with a bottle of red wine on our last night. Dogs always seemed to adopt us as we explored the site, often following us for a few hundred metres after we left before losing interest. Maybe they could smell the cat on us.

Terevaka: This is the highest point on the island, where you can actually see the curvature of the Earth. It was cloudy and incredibly windy when we walked up. The hillside is very exposed… mostly just grass, not unlike a paddock you might see in rural NSW. Interesting side note, Chile leased the entire island to the “Easter Island Exploitation Company” (real name), and from 1903 to 1953 it went about turning the entire place into a giant sheep farm and corralled the locals into Hanga Roa (the town); it was easy to imagine up there.

Orongo: From the 16th century the ancient system of worshipping ancestors and kings through the moai was being replaced by a new tangata-manu or “birdman” cult, and Orongo was the ceremonial centre. The site is spectacularly located between a volcanic crater and cliffs plunging down to the sea. It was interesting to learn about the annual birdman competition, a physical test that would ultimately legitimise a claim to power, either for the participant or the chief he represented. The last competition was held around 1867. The birdman cult is something we previously had no idea about; another layer to the fascinating history of Easter Island. This is a shot of the dwellings… to get in would have required crawling through the tiny doors.

We visited other Moai spots around the island, of which there are many. Each site had its’ own charm. Te Pito Kura once had the largest moai ever actually erected – it was ten metres tall, and its topknot alone is thought to have weighed 10 tonnes. We also made it to the Museum later in the week. The swell was up and we noticed locals riding some big waves offshore near town, so it was an added bonus to find an exhibit of hand painted surfboards in the Museum. Surfing is apparently a big part of the local culture.

Overall, we really loved our time in Easter Island. Fascinating history and incredible isolation, plus seeing and hearing the ocean from bed was a treat. You can probably tell by the tone of the post that our travel mojos have been somewhat restored. That is just as well, because tonight’s flight to Tahiti has been rescheduled twice, so we have a departure of 12:40 in the morning, followed by a six hour flight, and because of the time difference it’ll be roughly 2:00am when we’re settled into our hotel (hopefully). Bleh. There is only one such flight a week, so we’ll just have to live with it. Wish us luck.

TL

Buenos Aires

Hello,

We both had hopes of falling in love with Buenos Aires, the “Paris” of South America, so we’d given ourselves ten nights to do so; it would be a whirlwind romance…or not. In retrospect we could have done with a little less time. Beyond a shadow of a doubt, the best two things about the city are:

1. Well priced great wine
2. Well priced steak

We love both, but they don’t really fill the days. We spent hours wandering malls, markets (including San Telmo) and “trendy” neighbourhoods in search of cool things to buy, only to be frustrated at an oversupply of Warringah Mall-style clothing shopping (yawn) and a lack of good local stuff. Getting everyone mate mugs seemed a daft idea; we haven’t tried it ourselves in a country obsessed with the stuff (people literally carry thermoses around to top up their special cups filled with yerba mate, a highly caffeinated tea alternative, which is then drunk through a straw). Gaucho knives? What was the point. We’ve been looking for presents that are meaningful or useful, not just something to gather dust.

Anyway, surely a city this large has plenty going on and plenty to see? Our base was in Palermo, which has a Soho’esque feel to it, with eateries and shops along tree lined streets in a suburban setting. It was a pleasant place to stay, though it felt a little claustrophobic to Tim after the wide open spaces of Patagonia. As usual, day one we did a free walking tour of BA and saw some of the top sights, including a pink government building (La Casa Rosada), the obelisk, and an assortment of other European looking buildings. This is no Paris; it lacks the grand vision or scale of that city, and whilst there are some decent buildings we were left a little underwhelmed by the highlights.

The locals have been a bit of a mixed bag. Attitudes towards women are a bit backwards; some men leer and jeer at women whilst driving. We were both shocked walking down the street when one guy, standing on the sidewalk, started addressing Lesley with “hello, oh my god Lady wow…” etc etc. He completely ignored Tim during this outburst, until Tim swore at him and we moved on.

We did enjoy visiting this theatre-turned-bookshop, where we had a coffee on the old stage, if only for the novelty value.

And we visited the Recoleta cemetery, which has been written about as one of the most beautiful cemeteries in the world; we’re not cemetery connoisseurs but it was enough to entertain us for an hour or so. A lot of the tombs are quite impressive, if not pointlessly ostentatious.

Here is a pic of highlights 1 and 2 mentioned up first: a massive bife de chorizo / bife di lomo and malbec we had in a parilla just down the road from our apartment; the wine was cheaper in this restaurant than in the local shops, go figure! Other than steaks and burgers, our food choices have been a bit hit and miss here in BA, despite Lesley’s online research. We went to what is supposed to be one of the city’s best pizzerias, and Lesley ended up with a callous on her finger from sawing through the pizza crust – first world problems hey?

Lesley also did an Argentinian cooking course, learning how to make empanadas (a staple dish over here), a spicy sauce to accompany them, dulce de leche (a milk-based caramel, also widely used) and flan. She has resolved to use the recipes again in Australia; you can look forward to trying some slightly misshapen but delicious empanadas.

We’re now officially on the countdown to getting home, where we land in two weeks. BA has been our final stop on the South American continent; tomorrow we leave for Easter Island and we feel ready to go. Our flight is at 5:55am at an airport south of the city… seemed like a good idea when we booked it (it was cheap). We’re both looking forward to Easter Island, though we’re expecting food and accommodation to be quite basic. We’ll keep you posted.

TL

Iguazu Falls

Hello,

Unfortunately once again in northern Argentina we received sad news from home; Lesley’s grandfather Allan passed away. Whilst his health had been poor for some time and it wasn’t unexpected (especially given he was in his mid-90s), it’s a loss and we’re sorry to be missing the funeral.

We flew from El Calafate to Iguazu Falls via Buenos Aires. There was no facility in the capital for connecting flights, so we had to walk out of arrivals and straight back into departures. The security heroes sent us away to check in the hiking poles we’d carried on the first leg, and 30 minutes later when we returned they decided Tim’s tripod could be unfolded into a weapon. Sensing Tim might actually use it on them if they blocked us again, they sensibly let us through with a warning not to carry it on next time.

Puerto Iguazu town is right near the border with Brazil. It has the frontier feel of El Chalten, but with a jungle setting and oppressive humidity. We met a guy in Bolivia who’d been mugged here. There is a slightly seedy element to a steamy outpost such as this, an impression that was reinforced when we were politely offered cocaine on the street. But who cares? Ultimately, like every other tourist we’d come to see Iguazu falls.

There are vantage points from both Argentina and Brazil, but we decided to skip the Brazilian side because getting a visa was too much of a pain in the ass. The weather was cloudy during our entire stay and constantly threatening; it meant that a moonlight tour in the park was cancelled every night we were there. Rather a shame given we had specifically timed our visit to do said tour (it is only available around the full moon).

In the end we visited the Argentinian side two days running. Despite the rather inconvenient location of this natural wonder, it really is worth the effort. We were blown away by the scale of the falls, and the National Park has done a fantastic job of building walkways to maximise the experience.

We started at the “Devil’s Throat”, a u-shaped chasm with a c.80m drop. Everything is on an epic scale, including the sound and the spray shooting into the sky. Small birds were flying between the cliffs, presumably showing off for photos.

The rest of our time was spent exploring the “inferior” and “superior” paths (lower and upper paths); we walked the latter twice. The waterfalls weren’t the only attractions; some of the wildlife included monkeys, butterflies and colourful birds (see pic).

Butterflies landed to drink the sweat off our arms (and out of our backpacks). There were also coatees, bold possum like creatures that can give a nasty bite and steal your lunch. Lesley spent some time on the superior trail either worrying about or being “chased” by them (Tim thinks the danger was a little overblown and was anyway focusing on photos). According to Lesley’s testimony, one appeared out of nowhere the second she took out a sandwich, and stalked her through a crowd of people, even crawling under the mesh walkway to pop up at the other end right behind her to try and get her food. Here is a rather large example making trouble in one of the many picnic areas; we sense their natural habitat.

This is the highlight of the inferior trail. It was pretty packed when we arrived and even more so when we left; Tim had all of five seconds to get a few shots of Lesley on her own before hordes of ravenous tourists burst into frame for their selfies. Even at this vantage point Tim (and the camera) were getting fairly wet…

…and Lesley emerged fairly soaked for her troubles. Not really a terrible thing given the humidity.

You can see the same spot in the photo below, which is looking down from one of the lookouts on the superior trail.

The superior trail lived up to its name and provided some epic views. Without overdoing it, here are some of the better pictures.

You can particularly see the full sweep of the falls in the shot below.

Tim really liked the way the water rushed around the vegetation here. When we returned the second day there was a noticeable decrease in the water level and you could see the rocks the plants were growing on.

Here is Lesley in a prime selfie spot. We had to wait quite a while to get this to ourselves.

And a close up of the view behind her. You can see some people at the top right on another platform for a sense of scale.

To wrap up; Iguazu Falls isn’t conveniently located for most itineraries, but we’re glad we included it on ours. Even in poor weather it was a sight to behold. Our next stop is, almost unbelievably for us, the final one before we start our (admittedly long) journey home across the Pacific. We’ll cover Buenos Aires in the next post.

TL