Prisons, salt and empanadas

Last time I checked in I was in La Paz in Bolivia, which surprise surprise was a pretty long time ago now. Despite feeling pretty scared when I first arrived in La Paz due to it generally looking pretty run down and the gunshot-like sounds I heard in the taxi to my hostel I ended up having a pretty good time in Bolivia's capital. If you ever find yourself there I recommend doing the walking tour- I've found with a few cities that I don't instantly love that doing the walking tour can really open your eyes to the better aspects of a city and give you a better appreciation for it, as it's always an enthusiastic local doing the tour. One of the strangest parts of La Paz is San Pedro prison which is in the middle of the city. It's a low security prison in that there are a few guards on the outside of it but none inside- the place is run by the prisoners. It has restaurants, shops, a whole economy all of its own inside the walls of the prison. The rich prisoners have hot tubs, cable TV and they apparently have the wifi password for the 3 star hotel over the road. It's also famously known, due to the book Marching Powder, to be a major cocaine supplier with the inmates making the drug inside the prison and throwing it out of the roof at night in dirty nappies to waiting dealers on the streets. There was a time when an illegal 'tour' of the prison by an inmate was the number one thing for backpackers to do in La Paz but after horror stories of attacks and tourists being locked in the prison it doesn't seem to be popular anymore- probably a good thing as my curiosity probably would've got the better of me and I'd have ended up locked up in Bolivia.. We were also shown the witches market where we saw llama foetuses that apparently you're meant to bury under your house for good luck. I'll spare you the photo.

Anyway, other than the prison and buying animal foetuses there are other things to do in La Paz; people braver/stupider than me often take on Death Road, where you cycle a road known to be extremely dangerous. It isn't as bad nowadays as there's a new road that vehicles are meant to use, but my general nervous disposition, clumsiness and the fact I've rarely ridden a bike in the last ten years lead me to the decision that I shouldn't take on the challenge. Everyone I know who did it survived but I'm still happy with my decision. 

After La Paz I headed down to Sucre with Jack and Mike, two English guys I met in Cusco. Sucre was a welcome change to La Paz; it's a colonial town and a UNESCO world heritage site so is much prettier and nicer to walk around. 

We didn't do that much in Sucre but it was a good place to chill out after our stay at a well known party hostel in La Paz. We also spent Halloween in Sucre, meaning that an hour before the party started at our hostel we were down the market searching for anything we could use to dress up. The boys nearly went as sexy batman and robin but unfortunately the guy on the stall refused to sell them the costumes. In the end they settled for fairy wings and tutus (Mike also fashioned his own wand out of cardboard), and I did my half skeleton face paint that I've relied on for the last few years now. 

A fairly lethal happy hour meant that the next day we all woke up with one thing in mind; a full English breakfast. After extensive googling we found a place nearby. Unfortunately it didn't include fried mushrooms, proper baked beans or brown sauce but it did the job. 

Next stop after Sucre was Uyuni to sort out our salt flats trip. We'd heard that it was cold in Uyuni but when we stepped off our night bus at 3.30am into the freezing cold I think we all got a shock to the system. We also hadn't booked a hostel so we had to traipse around town waking up multiple hostel receptionists and having no luck for empty rooms. In the end we had to find a hotel who made us all pay 100 bolivianos despite the fact we got there half way through the night, but I was just happy to not have to sleep amongst the stray dogs outside. 

The next day we booked our salt flats tour through a company called World White Tours who we'd heard good things about, then spent the rest of the day being fairly unimpressed with the dusty streets of Uyuni. We did, however, find a pub very simply named the 'extreme fun pub'. Curiosity got the better of us so we went in and ordered a few drinks off the happy hour menu. Unfortunately we'd read the menu wrong and it was no longer happy hour; the pub had a solution for this however. If you're willing to get your bum stamped and written on with marker pen you can still get happy hour. All I'll say is I'm just glad that Jack and Mike went up to the bar instead of me.. 

At 10.30 the next morning we set off in our tour jeep with two German guys, Kai and Andy, and a Canadian girl, Rylei. I'd been excited to see the salt flats since the start of my trip and they didn't disappoint; it's amazing to see just how huge they are and see nothing but salt flats for miles around. Everyone who visits the salt flats has the ulterior motive of trying to get their own skewed perspective photos (google them, there's some really great ones out there) but despite our best efforts we struggled to get any really good photos. After about an hour of trying to balance on beer cans, be chased by toy dinosaurs and stand on each other's hands we gave up, did the standard group jump shot (which I also failed at), and got back into the jeep. 

That night we stayed in a salt hotel, which is exactly what it sounds like. It was pretty cool but the novelty wears off a bit when all your belongings end up covered in salt. 

Over the next two days we saw a train cemetery, various coloured lagoons, flamingos, geysers, cacti and amazing scenery. I think the salt flats was one of my favourite things I've done so far, probably enhanced by Oscar, our driver, who every so often that would quote Titanic to Jack.

At the end of our tour we were dropped at the border to Chile. This one was probably the dodgiest border I've seen so far- literally just a hut in the middle of the desert. Soon after we were stamped out of Bolivia we arrived in the desert town of San Pedro de Atacama. After the freezing cold of the salt flats the heat of the desert was a very welcome change. I really enjoyed my time in San Pedro- Jack and I went out to a place called Moon Valley, named so because the landscape looks like the surface of the moon, and the three of us also went stargazing another night which was really cool. Jack & I also discovered that you can buy a 1.5 litre bottle of red wine for about £2.50 which is never a bad thing in my eyes.

After a few good days in San Pedro we decided it was time to make the 24 hour bus journey down to Santiago. I was understandably dreading the journey but the roads in Chile are so much better than the ones in other countries that it felt like a much better journey than shorter ones in other countries in South America.

Santiago is a really lovely city. Chile is noticeably more developed than other countries, especially in contrast to Bolivia, but it still has such a nice vibe about it. We stayed in a very lively part of Santiago called Bellavista which was full of restaurants and bars, and we really liked our hostel- it was called La Chimba and I'd definitely recommend it if you're ever in Santiago. We managed to do quite a lot around the city; we got the funicular up San Cristobal hill and saw just how huge the city is, we visited the Museum for Human Memory and Rights all about the Pinochet dictatorship, saw the Plaza de Armas..and of course visited the mall. In my defence my jeans had the worst knee rips ever and I heard there was a Topshop there - it was impossible to resist. I think the reason I love Santiago is that it has a lot of parks too- the other day there was an event there called '100 in 1 day' where there were 100 different little things happening around the city for environmental and health awareness. For example in the park there was a bench with lots of cushions all over it and prompts to help people meditate and feel peaceful, and nearby people were writing down things they liked about the city and pegging them up between little tents. The streets were full of people engaging with these stations and walking round the city that day really solidified my love for it.

We also spent the weekend in a nearby seaside city called Valparaiso (Valpo to locals). I think it might be one of the best places I've visited so far. The winding streets are filled with art and there are lovely little cafes and shops everywhere you look. It has such a chilled out vibe and really seems like the kind of place that would be great to live in. Chileans also have a reputation for being the friendliest people in South America and so far I'd say they're living up to their reputation. On our first full day we happened across an empanada shop that sells 80 different varieties; in case you don't know an empanada is pretty much the South American version of a Cornish pasty, usually filled with cheese and whatever else you fancy. We went back to that place every day we were in Valpo in an attempt to try as many empanadas as possible, though I think my favourite was cheese, mushroom, onions and cream. 

I'm actually back in Valpo by myself right now before I fly down to Patagonia where hopefully I'll find the boys again. They decided to undertake a nearly 48 hour bus journey down there to do a 5 day hiking and camping trip- I think anyone who knows me will know that nothing in that previous sentence is the sort of thing I enjoy. I'm just waiting to hear that they made it there alive..keep your fingers crossed. 

I can't believe it's nearly Christmas and everyone back home is spending their weekends in the German market and generally being festive- I have no concept of seasons out here with it being 30 degrees for the last few days. I can't complain, I know, but a tiny part of me is starting to miss the build up to Christmas and the home comforts that come with it. Although last week I did manage to successfully make Yorkshire puddings in a hostel kitchen, so I'm not missing out too much I suppose. 

Until next time, I hope anyone back home is having a good day- and serious brownie points if you got to the end of this one!

Wonder of the world

I'll forgive anyone who has lost interest in where on earth I am; one thing I've realised out here is that it's incredibly easy to get lazy with blogging. I'll do my best to rewind the last three weeks now...

So I finished my last post in Lima having just said goodbye to my little travel group. After Lima I got a bus down to Paracas with Erika, another English girl, to see what had been described to us as the 'poor mans Galapagos'. I think that's putting it kindly because from my experience that man must have been very poor indeed. Basically, you can go on a 1 and a half hour boat ride out to a nearby island where you can see lots of sea lions, various types of birds and you might just be able to see a few Humboldt penguins. You can't get off the boat however and the whole area of Paracas basically smells like seaweed and bird poo. It was cool to see the sea lions and a few penguins but the trip was fairly disappointing overall and certainly hasn't satisfied my aim to one day to go to the real Galapagos. Paracas in general was a bit of a let down- the whole town lost power for a few hours both days we were there and I'm almost ashamed to admit this but on the second day as we entered hour 3 of no internet or power I actually made myself have a nap because there was nothing else to do. 

However, after Paracas we headed a bit further south to another small town called Huacachina which we absolutely loved. To call it a town is probably exagerrating; it is literally an oasis and a couple of streets that have been plonked down in the middle of sand dunes as you can see below (apologies for iPhone photos, I didn't want to get sand in my camera). It was so amazing to see the huge dunes surrounding the town and our hostel was good too (Bananas hostel FYI). We met some really cool people there and after a few drinks at the only bar in town (aptly named 'Huaca-f******-china') we made the decision at midnight to walk up to the highest sand dune we could find. It probably took about an hour to get up there and we were joined by some lovely local dogs who we like to think were protecting us on our journey. The view from the top was amazing and we could see the lights from lots of towns for miles around. Unfortunately nobody had a decent enough camera to get any good photos up there but that night is probably one of my favourite memories from the last month.

The next day we headed out for the main reason anyone heads to Huacachina- a ride in a dune buggy and sandboarding. The dune buggy was so much fun, heading down huge sand dunes is probably more fun than most roller coasters. I also had a young Chinese boy screaming in my ear the whole time which definitely enhanced the experience. Next was the sand boarding which was terrifying. We had a practice run on 3 smaller dunes but even on those I wouldn't even think about standing up, which most other people at least attempted- though there were a fair few painful looking falls on the way down. I resigned myself to sitting down which was still fun but I wish we'd got to spend a bit more time in the buggy to be honest, though that's just because I'm a bit of a wimp when it comes to facing my fears of hurtling face first down near 90 degree sand dunes. 

After the sand dunes we had to hurry back to town to get our bus back to Lima as we'd decided to fly from there to Cusco to avoid a nearly 24 hour bus. The amount of sand on my body during that bus ride was ridiculous; I kept finding new patches of skin that needed brushing off and I don't think I got all of the sand out of my hair for a good few days after. 

We spent 2 more days doing not very much in Lima, although I did go for a wander and find the Parque de Amor. The centrepiece of this park was of a couple kissing and it seems that it encourages life to imitate art- the park was full of loved-up couples. Despite this it was a lovely place to stumble across, with love quotations written out in mosaic tiles all over. A little further down from the park also seemed to be a popular launching point for people to go paragliding- there must have been 20 different people flying around at one point. In the end I think I did like Lima, despite the bad reputation it seems to gain from travellers, and I'd recommend a visit there to anyone going through Peru.

The next day Erika & I headed to the airport for our flight to Cusco, feeling very smug at reducing a 24 hour journey to just 1 hour. I had a really good feeling about Cusco as soon as we left the airport. It's a great city with a lovely old town and little streets full of shops selling the usual souvenirs. There are old women in traditional dress holding baby llamas in adorable woollen hats everywhere and a legitimate way for these old women to make money is to charge gringos 2 soles (40p) for a photo with them. Somehow I managed to resist but those baby llamas really were adorable. 

There's a market in Cusco which sells pretty much anything you could wish to buy, though much to my horror there was also one section where I witnessed a man hacking up a whole pig with a saw. There's also a black market where you can buy pretty much anything counterfeit and, luckily for me, you can get your phone screen fixed cheap- moral of the story don't leave your phone unattended while charging in a hostel because other people really don't care if they knock your phone off and leave it smashed on the floor. 

We also went on a walking tour in Cusco, although it wasn't exactly so much about Cusco as it was about the culture of Peru generally, as well as telling the story of the tour guide's life. We found out that when he was younger he had no choice but to help in the production of cocaine in the jungle (something he was not proud of) which I think startled a few of the older members of the tour. 

Of course the other thing people do from Cusco is go to Machu Picchu. I was so indecisive for ages about how to do it, I didn't want to do a 5 day trek and I wasn't feeling the popular jungle trek which included 4 hours of downhill mountain biking. In the end me and Sarah, a Canadian girl I've met along the way, decided to do the cheapest way possible which is to get a 7 hour bus to a hydroelectrico station then walk 2-3 hours down the train tracks to the town next to Machu Picchu. At one point on this walk the train that the richer travellers can afford to take passes you by but the walk isn't too bad if you can handle the flies swarming on you. 

We had a pretty early night in Aguas Calientes and the next morning we were up at 3.30am to get in the queue for the bus up to Machu Picchu. We got there at the perfect time because a few minutes later we saw the queue was getting so long and we managed to get on the second bus of the day. Machu Picchu itself is really amazing. I honestly can't fathom how the Inkas managed to build the town, though it is considered that they were the most intelligent ancient civilisation. We didn't get a tour guide there but we tried to be sneaky and just latch on to various different groups to hear snippets of information. The mountains surrounding the site were amazing too, the looked really mystical with the fog surrounding them. All in all, of course I'd say that Machu Picchu is a must see if you're in Peru- and don't let people make you feel guilty about not doing a proper trek if its not for you!

There's also lots of llamas in Machu Picchu- Sarah was unsuccessful in getting a decent selfie unfortunately.

 

The last few days have been fairly uneventful; we stayed a night in Puno on the way to cross the border into Bolivia but I decided against the floating islands there as I'd heard they were very touristy nowadays. I did however, inexplicably, find life size replicas of the animals in Ice Age so of course I had a photo next to them. 

Then I decided to get the bus all the way to La Paz as I know a few people here at the moment. I've not done too much here so far apart from find a lovely little coffee shop where I got a nutella latté, so clearly I'm being very cultural so far. The city doesn't seem like it'll be my favourite but I'm planning on doing the walking tour today so hopefully I'll see some good parts of the city. 

I'll try not leave it 3 weeks for the next update, but don't hold it against me if I fail!

Glaciers, lagunas..and shopping malls

Yet again it feels like so much has happened since I last checked in. Last time I was feeling guilty for being a lazy traveller and enjoying too much hammock time- you'll be glad to know that last week was pretty much the opposite of that...and that this week has kind of taken it full circle back to laziness. 

Beth & I left Mancora with 3 guys that we met in Montañita; 2 brothers from Wisconsin called JB and Jim and a Swedish guy named Olov. I had no real plans for the north of Peru having done very little research and the guys had a few places they wanted to stop on the way to Lima so we thought we may as well tag along. First stop was a couple of hours in Chiclayo on the way to Chachapoyas. The less said about Chiclayo the better; both Olov and I were convinced we were going to get food poisoning just in time for our night bus, but luckily I discovered that my stomach can apparently cope with raw chicken. We arrived in Chachapoyas in the early hours of last Tuesday having survived what felt like travelling inside an oven and all crashed in our dorm until lunchtime. The main reason people stop in Chachapoyas is to go to Kuelap, an old pre-inca ruin town, but by the time we all woke up it was too late for us to go so we spent the day wandering and being fairly underwhelmed by the town. Olov even let me paint his toenails bright red so I think that says it all. 

The next day we woke up bright and early to head off to Kuelap, a good 2-3 hour drive away. For some reason Olov had dressed for a day at the beach so when we woke up from our minibus naps to see rain he was a bit concerned about his choice of attire. Luckily the restaurant we stopped at to book our lunch for later seemed to be selling woollen vests (they were just hanging on the wall like decorations) so he did the only thing he could do and bought one, which gave us all a much needed boost every time we caught sight of him. Multiple Peruvian tourists asked him for photos- we weren't sure if they thought he was some sort of Swedish celebrity/model or if they just thought he looked ridiculous. The ruins themselves were interesting to see but the day was slightly dampened (excuse the pun) by the gradually increasing rain as time went on, with us all eventually running through the ruins as fast as we could back to the minibus to get out of the pouring rain. 

Then came the journey back- we had another night bus booked for 7.30 and had been told we'd be back well in time to make it. In true South American style we arrived back at our hostel late (about 6.40) and had to run across town with our backpacks in tow, somehow getting to the bus station just in time for our next uncomfortable sleep. We were treated to Taken 3 in Spanish however which was possibly even worse than the English version. 

We woke up the next day in Trujillo. Somehow we got incredibly lucky as the bus station had showers which I think we all were relieved to see as we knew we had to get another night bus later on- if you ever want to feel gross I recommend you take a night bus. I'll never moan about taking a 4 hour megabus back home again. There's not much going on in Trujillo so we opted to get a collectivo to the next town over, the seaside town of Huanchaco, where we spent the day chilling on the beach and playing many games of gin in a bar next to the sea. 

Fast forward to the night and we found ourselves boarding our fourth night bus in 8 days to Huaraz. There were a few others that we met in Mancora, including CeCe who I met in my first few days in Bogota, on the same bus as us too. There's almost something comforting in knowing that you aren't the only one whose going to have a terrible nights sleep-sadistic but true. 

Huaraz is a town people go to to use as a base for doing various hikes in the surrounding mountain range, the cordilleras blancos.  If you know me I know what you're thinking- I am not and never have been a hiker. However my time in Huaraz gave me some of the best experiences I've had so far. Last Saturday we decided to do a hike to a glacier. People recommend doing this hike first in order to acclimatise, as it goes pretty high (5200m) but isn't a very long hike so isn't too unbearable. I can say that now because I've already done it, but let me tell you altitude sickness is a very real thing. It's such an unpleasant feeling- the path we had to walk up really wouldn't have been challenging at sea level but at that altitude your head is spinning, you can hardly catch your breath and your legs start to feel like lead. The glacier was totally worth it though- I've never seen anything like it in real life, it was amazing to see. The only slight downer on the day was when I crouched down to take a photo of Beth and somehow lost my balance, causing me to fall backwards into a large puddle of freezing cold water. Not my finest moment. However on the same day I did also see a lamb wearing a tiny knitted hat, so it's all swings and roundabouts really.

(Beth, Olov, JB, me, Jim)

The next day I reluctantly decided to join the others on their 5am wake up call to do a hike to Laguna 69. This one wasn't quite as high, getting up to about 4600m, but was about 3 hours up and 2 more back down. It started off okay- I didn't feel the altitude right away and the path was clear. After about 45 minutes it started to hit me and suddenly the guide was directing us to scramble up steep rocky shortcuts. He didn't strike me as the most sympathetic guy (he told us if we felt really unwell to just go back to the bus because if we took too long to get back they'd just leave without us) so I forced myself up. I spent most of the second half of the hike there by myself, probably in the middle of our 30 person group. I had to stop pretty regularly to catch my breath and there were a few times that I seriously considered giving up, as I tend to do when I'm bad at something. But I kept on going, literally talking to myself and telling myself it was all in my head, and somehow at the top of the toughest part of the hike I turned the corner and caught my first glimpse of the brightest, bluest water I've ever seen. It was 100% worth doing and is probably one of the biggest physical challenges I've put myself through but I'm genuinely really proud of myself for making myself do it. The walk back down was much better but still very rocky- of course, again, I ended up on my bum at least once- but we all made it back to the bus intact and very ready to have a celebratory ron (spanish for rum) or five. 

The next day was spent recovering and waiting around for our next night bus to the capital city, Lima. 

We've been here since early Tuesday morning now and I'm sorry to say I have no real photos of the place and haven't been very successful at sight-seeing. Lima is just like any other big city in the world- it couldn't feel less Peruvian if it tried. Everyone can speak English, every big fast food chain is within walking distance of the hostel and the local supermarket is probably better than most of the ones in England. A few of us decided we deserved to step out of our backpacker bubble and went to a huge mall a few days ago; they had a Clarks, a River Island, a massive H&M, every food option possible...I honestly felt like I was walking around Westfield in London. Beth & Olov had hair cuts in a proper salon without living in fear that the hairdresser would just guess what they wanted. All in all it was a very successful day- I bought jeans, 2 tops and mascara for less than £50. Other than that my days have been fairly uneventful apart from a bit of wandering round nearby districts and sampling the traditional Peruvian alcohol, pisco, which I will simply say I don't think is the best choice for me to continue my impressive ability to never really get hangovers. 

Yesterday everyone went their separate ways; Beth flew to Cusco, Olov opted for the 21(!!) hour bus there, JB carried on down to Paracas and Jim got on a flight back home early this morning. These guys are all some of the best people I've met while travelling and I feel lucky that my path happened to cross with all of theirs. I'm sad (and a bit scared) to be alone again but the great thing about travel is that now I have friends from all over the world!

Chasing waterfalls

Once again I've spent the last few days getting a bit too used to spending all day in a hammock and neglecting this blog in the process. I've been to a few new places and actually crossed another border in the last couple of weeks so this might be a long one. First up: Baños. In the few days I spent there I think I did more 'activities' than I've done since I was in year 7 and we went on one of those adventure weekends.

The bus ride from Quito to Baños was drama-less and we (I'm currently travelling with Beth who I met in Quito:we both understand the importance of dessert after every meal so we get on well) arrived on a night with no trouble. It was dark when we arrived but it seemed like a small, safe town so we walked to our hostel- again no problems. The problems began when we encountered the guy on reception, who I would say is the rudest person that I've had the misfortune to meet so far. He asked if we spoke spanish, to which I replied my standard 'un poquito'. He then said, in spanish, 'why are you in Ecuador then?' and proceeded to tell us everything in very fast spanish, eventually asking in an incredibly patronising manner if we understood or did we need it in english too. I was so shocked by how rude he was that I defiantly said yes we understood (luckily Beth actually had understood it all) and off we went to our rooms. I don't understand this kind of person- why work in a hostel in a very touristy town if you don't want to speak to foreign people who may not speak the language fluently? Long story short, despite the actual hostel being pretty nice I wouldn't recommend staying at Great Backpackers Hostel in Baños purely so you never have to meet this horrible man.
Anyway, I did actually like Baños itself. It's a nice little town surrounded by green mountains and waterfalls and is probably the most touristy place I've been so far. Everything is catered to tourists- restaurants have english menus, more people than anywhere else I've been speak english and every tour operator/massage parlour (they're everywhere)/restaurant has someone outside it trying to get you in there. 

Last Friday Beth & I had a pretty adventurous day; our first activity was zip-lining. I don't think I've ever zip-lined before but for some reason I was pretty drawn to the idea, so we each paid our $20 and off we went. It was a lot of fun and definitely not as scary as I'd imagined, that is until the last line where both of us got stuck just short of the end leaving us dangling over a huge canyon. The woman who was taking us around the lines had to hook herself on and drag me back in, which was around the same time I decided to start wondering if I was covered for zip-lining on my travel insurance...but eventually we made it safely back to the platform. 

We continued our day by renting a quad bike to head up a mountain to 'the swing at the end of the world'; a swing hanging off a tree house which sees you swinging out into a canyon. I'll let you in on a secret though- the photos make it look so much scarier than it is. I mean you probably wouldn't want to fall off the swing, but actually the scariest part of the day came when I attempted to drive the quad bike. I thought I had it and then suddenly Beth was screaming "BRAKE BRAKE" and then we'd crashed into the side of the road. So the important things to take away from this story are 1) I should never drive a quad bike again and 2) so long as you pay up front they'll let you do whatever the hell you want in Ecuador- I think the people in the rental place were genuinely shocked we made it back alive. 

The next day we went a little less life-threatening and rented bikes for the day so that we could go on a waterfall route, ending at a huge one that they call the Devils cauldron. It was such a beautiful trip and I only nearly fell off my bike twice so all in all a much better result than the quad bike. 

The next day we decided to get the night bus to a little town on the coast called Montanita. Every traveller in Ecuador will tell you that Montanita is the place to be if you want to have fun- people liken it to places like Koh Phi Phi with its abundance of cheap cocktails (there's actually a street called Cocktail Alley full of people who will make you anything you want for less than £1) but with a better ratio of locals to gringos. I really liked the vibe of Montanita, and we met a lot of really cool people in our hostel. However I left the town with, no exaggerating, more than 50 mosquito bites. Bug spray was useless, the sandalwood sticks we burnt around the hostel did nothing- everyone was covered. 

We also had a little day trip out to a nearby town called Puerto Lopez to go whale watching which was so cool- they came so close to the boat and at one point I think there were 3 of them all swimming around us. Unfortunately I think I've come to the realisation that boats make me feel incredibly anxious- obviously we had to go pretty far out to find them and the water was so rough. I'm not sure what it is because I don't feel sick but I just feel so uncomfortable and spend the whole time thinking about when I can be on dry land again. Still, I'm really glad I went to see the whales seeing as I couldn't afford to head out to the Galápagos Islands on this trip. Please excuse how rubbish my photos are- I kept turning my camera off just at the wrong time!

I was intending to stay in Montanita all through the weekend but I decided I couldn't cope with the mosquitos anymore and so I decided to tag along with a group from my hostel who were getting a night bus to cross the border into Peru. I actually sleep on the night buses a lot better than I expected I would and so another uneventful bus and a couple more passport stamps later, I woke up in my third country. We're in a little beach town called Mancora being very bad tourists- we're at a hostel which is basically gringo central and encourages a lot of drinking and not much else. I'm currently entering my third hour spent in a hammock today trying to decide whether to go get an alcoholic slushie from the bar- it's a hard life sometimes. 

I'm not sure where I'm heading next- I think I'll just follow the crowd and jump on a bus wherever the group I'm hanging out with are heading. I've been out here just under 2 months now which is just crazy- I can't decide if I think it's going ridiculously fast or if it feels like I've been out here forever. I know one thing: it's been way too long since I last had Bovril. I actually think it's the thing I miss most (friends and family aside of course, you mean more to me than beef) and whenever I next know that I'll be staying somewhere for a while I'll be getting my parents to send me a jar or two. I hope you're allowed to mail Bovril. On that deep note, I'll draw this very long post to a close. 5 points for you if you made it this far!