The Death Train!!!

Hmmm have i posted this before, anyway nehmind, finally got to la paz! The highest capital city in the world! Although technically sucre is the proper capital la paz is just the centre of government.
Anyway its a crazy city, the place is 3600m above sea level and is in a kind of bowl. the rim of the bowl is 4000m high and the city is literally overflowing from its 'bowl' onto the Andean plains above!
Anyway crazy city, lots and lots of traffic all tooting their horns, went to the main church and had a guided tour and saw a demonstration by miners from the roof and tower, was a great place. Then visited the witches market where they sell llama feotuses for sacrifice!! Scary stuff but its where most people presents have come from!!!
Then the other day we went to the ancient city of Tiwanaku. Its not properly excavated yet but there are three monuments, one to the heavens which was once a big pyramid with a pool on top shaped like the southern cross where they observed the stars! The second temple is one to earth whcih is precisely aligned to the soltices and has the real life star gate!!! Then the third is underground and is the temple to the dead and there are all these carved heads in the walls and some people say that some look like aliens!! Wierd stuff. But they were predecesors of the inca and the city was built about the same time as ancient greece and rome!! They even had the same calender as us! 7 days, 12 months!!! Amazing!
Today we went up a real Andeee....he he...a 4800m mountain. We drove most of the way up a really scary dirt track!! Then we gave an offering to pacha mama. This place used to be a ski resort 20 years ago but now the glacier is practically non existant! Crazy, so they all know about global warming here!
Secondly today we went to the moon valley which were these wierd turmite mound type hills that created this really amazing landscape! The indians used to beleive that they represented the souls of people and the continuation of life....but unfortunaly they;ve managed to build over most of the formations because they are really soft.

Anyway tomorrow we head to copacabana on lake titicaca....will post pics when i can.....

Okay well i managed to upload the video, cool eh? bearing in mind it was raining on the surface its still pretty clear is the video...ooh just been told a joke apparently...how many stars are there in the sky...cinquenta...apparently its a spanish ´joke´??
anyway here are some pics of the pantanal. from bonito managed to visit an authentic indeginous indian village. it wasnt mud huts unfortunatly but the people gave me and django some v funny looks...then i saw a building dated 193....i reckon these people only becamse "exploited" by the white man within the last 100yrs! Crazy.
Anyway in the pantanal we saw lots of annimals. stopped off on the way at this roadside restaurant where the owner told us to visit the tourist attraction. bearing in mind it was dark i walked down with my head torch on and almost immediatly saw three glinting eyes looking at me. then round the corner i saw about 20 more eyes! There were all alligators looking at us!! was amazing, counted about 0 eyes altogether..bearing in mind that you can only see one side of thier heads thats a lot of crocs!!
Anyway yeh the pantanal, wel lots of mossies and loads and loads of birds. they were so tame, got quite close up to some of them! Here are some pics....
In Bolivia now as i mentioned below...i think.....breakfast time for me....think its bank holiday there at home, have a good one....

Well here are a few pics of Iguazu and Bonito. Need i say more about the falls???? Anyway i´m trying to upload a video of Bonito where we snorkelled down the Rio da Prata which is a pure spring that produces crystal clear water! We went with a group of five German rockers who were failry amusing and softies at heartm we all got kitted out with wetsuits and walked throught eh jungle. Unfortunatly half way through and the heavens opened and we were in the middle of a tropical rain storm....but we were going to get wet anyway. We then found the river, as soon as you get in and put your head underwater there are loads of fish, plus its like swimming in a goldfish bowl, its sooo clear! you then simply let the current take you along the river, it got a bit hairy at times with the sharp rocks and shallow water and there was one bit where the current was really strong and you had to literally go with the flow and hope that you didnt hit any rocks!! was increadible, just like a computer game or something, you went really fast trying to keep yourself as flat as possible while the current twisted you round all the rocks then up and over into a crystal clear pool or 23 degree water!! was amazing! Anyway if the vid uploads you can see for yourself....prividing its the right video and not the one of me videoing when i didnt know how to work the camera! From there it was onto the Pantanal....i´ll haveto upload those pics later...just deciding at the moment whther to head to la paz or to sucre in bolivia...any suggestions....i think this time tomorrow i may have some signs of altitude sickness...hmmmm.....

Floripa to Iguazu

Its taking ages to upload pics on this thing so unfortunatly no pics of getting stranded at the lake. Anyway finally headed to IGUAZU...Stayed the first night with our freind crazy holly in a bit of a rubbish place called pousada laura. But in the afternoon we headed to the brazillian side of the falls.....wow...we first all saw all these trickles of water falling down this very jurassic loking landscape. i expected to see dinasaurs emerging from the trees and eating everyone. But we folllowed the path along and then head the thunder of the falls so we thought something was good around the corner. Little did we know how good it was...a MASSIVE gorge of waterfall at the end of the river valley with steam and spray shooting high into the air..it was amazing!!!!! The next day we all went to the argentine side of the falls. and after suze got on a bus that drove off from the border crossing without us it was just me holly and some americans than entered argentina!! Finally tracked down suze and the impatient bus driver had set off into argentina without us, plusi had her passport.
I really liked puerto iguazu and made me want to stay in argentina for a bit longer. Unlike the brazilian side the town had grown up a,ongst its native trees and not choppped them all down for cattle farming! Plus the actually feel and dare i say it...urban design of the place felt much better.
Anyway didnt do much that day but then in the evening we all went for our first visit to the argenitinian side of the falls....at 10pm!!! Yes under a full moon!!! We got the bus there, on a long straight road amongst rainforest then got dropped off at the park entracne. It was a bit like dinseyland but we were so excited to go see the falls under the moon. We walked along all these gangplanks over really calm, clear water with the moon reflecting in the water. Then we heard the roar of the falls, and saw the moon become a bit hazy due to the mist. Then we saw the lip of the falls and as we got closer it just tumbled into darkness below. i even saw a moon rainbow!!! the moon was so bright it created a monotone rainbow!! WOW! Next day went back to the park and Holly tried skinny dipping on the only river beach in the park, a story to tell the grandkids she said! See why i call her crazy holly!!! he he
Anyway my pics still havent uploaded so you may have to get all these in one go....hmmm. After iguazu it was time to head north again to meet django and dani in the Pantanal, the worlds largest wetlands and a haven for spotting wildlife.....

Getting stranded on the lake

The other day Dani came round and we all went for a walk north along the lakeside. Its a wierd place a very long walk through the jungle where at the end there are some very isolated settlements that are only in contact with the rest of the island by this long path or by boat. So on the way we called off at dani and djangos bit of land but my slip on sandals werent the best for climbing in so after walking through SNAKE INFESTED UNDERGROWTH we had to turn back...phew.....
We saw a bit of snakeskin and a humming bird aswell as a very old colonial house that was built for a local cachaca distillary. Anyway we eventually after about 3 hours arrived at the settlement where we had brasilain fish stew and waited for the boat to bring us back.... dani asked in portugese and the woman in the restaurant said that there would be a boat in an hour and that we had just missed one so we settled into having a free espresso and just as we took our first sip the water taxi plied by our jetty...either the restaurant clock was wrong or the woman was batty. so we really did feel stranded because the next boat wouldnt be for ages! so as dani and suze hung around and panicked i took some pics. eventually however a boat appeared and dropped some bloke off who proceeded to hail us another passing boat who agreed to take us back for free! bonus..so we managed to survive the strange isolated colonies and made it back...phew.....

SANDBOARDING!!!!!

This is the mountain road leading down from

the mountains.

Mysterious sand girl

The Magic Isle

Barra de Lagoa beach where we went surfing

View from the hostel!!

At the head of this canyon there was a really high waterfall that plunged like hardrow force in the dales.

The cloud view as we heading back to the lowlands....theres max there too!

Well Florianopolis, been moving around places quite alot here trying to get the balance between beachlife and seeing django and Dani. So we ended up for a few days in a place called Barra..now i~m not sure if im repeating myself here but here are a few images of the island. We went for our first surf lesson the other day, was really cool although i dont think i was one with the wave quite long enough to stand up for more than 0.3 of a second and then spectacularily plunged into the drink! Was lots of fun but i~ve got chaving on my knees and sandy hair now.

Following this, as if spending a morning being battered by the South Altantic wasnt enough we went with some other people to the local sand dunes where we did sandboarding!! Just like snowboarding except on sand! Was really cool, very hot and very soft sand but very very steep!! I tried to go down standing up a few times but then fell over and my neck made rather unhealthy cracking sound so i ended up sledging down for the rest of the time!! Anyway have pics so when this pc enables me to upload i will!!

In the meantime here are a few more shots of one of the view from one of the hostels, (quite plush but ponsy...actually the hostels here are more expensive than the poussadas!!)

Other pics are the remnants of our trip into the interior. When we were coming down from the mountains there was a huge escarpment that was so high we were eye level with the clouds! was quite amazing and pretty chilly, then a widing mountain road took us (and Max) down back to the lowlands and we heading back to the beachlife.

Thinking of moving on from here soon now, just planning a route....bolivia is my new country of paranoia so must face my fears!!!

How cool are these guys!!

me at papa noels house soo wierd?!

We left Curituba last Thursday on another 6 hour bus drive south to Florianopolis. Picked up by Django in his little VW beatle car called Max. Photo below. Was still a bit of a rotten day rainy so we didnt see much of the ´Magic Isle´ But he lives in a cool little place called Lagoa. Lots of cool nice little cafes etc and loads of surf shops. Its stiuated on a lake and very near the coast aswell.

Anyway first couple of days we didnt do too much but then on saturday we all went for a drive into the mountains with Max to try to find an apple festival. Just to explain its autumn here now and although its still warm on the coast inland up the hills its a bit more like september...although to us it was still like May. So, chugging along at barely 20mph most of the time (even less uphill) it was refrshing to have a slow drive in the country. As the weather began to clear we stopped off in a tiny little village where there was a cool bridge and found this roadside place selling all the produce of the region. Now because this is brasil lots of places here were colonised by Germans. So we were in what could easily have been an alpine village in a shop selling amazing cheese german sausage, honey and apples!! Amazing! THEN we learnt that in the next town...a place called Alfredo Wagner no less, there was being held a Rodeo!!!! Yes real cowboys etc!! But before then we had to go to see Papau Noels house!!!! Crazy i know but this guy has turned his house into a little wooden shack where he builds model houses and model vilages!!! Amazing!

So we finally found the rodeo, all cowboys and horses and cowgirls and beer and Cascasa (the local tipple)! And amazing views!! really was one of the oddest days i can ever remember!!!

Okay just a quick step back to Rio, this is the view from the top of sugar loaf mountain....pretty cool isnt it!!!

At last, Curitiba pics...note the Huddersfield shop!!