The Road to Buenos Aires

It over 4 months now since I set foot in South America, and time is flying by. When I first arrived I couldn't imagine what I would do in the months before Hannah (my girlfriend, for those who don't know) come out to join me in July. Now it is only 6 weeks until she arrives, and I am still in Argentina and have to cover Brasil and Venezuela before meeting her in Lima - an impossible task.

When I got back from Easter Island I resolved to shift up a gear and start travelling more quickly. The downside to this is that it is always harder to meet people when moving fast, and always being on the move tires you out in no time. My route was taking me north into Chile through the Atacama desert, before crossing back into Argentina and making my way to Buenos Aires - all in a few weeks.

The best option - for meeting people and covering ground quickly - proved to be taking a "flexible backpacker bus", that took 5 days to reach San Pedro de Atacama, in northern Chile, stopping at scenic locations en route and dropping us at the hostel of our choice each night. As things turned out, it didn't quite work like this, but the idea was a sound one.....

We left Santiago on the 7th May, 14 gringos in a small bus, heading for La Serena, a few hundred kilometres up the coast. There was the usual initial round of introductions ("Where are you from, how long have you been in South America, where are you going, do you speak Spanish...?") and soon our group - 4 English, 2 Irish, 2 Germans, 3 Swedes, 1 Canadian were all getting along well as we had our first lunch stop at at what was euphemistically called a "beach resort" en route to La Serena.

Our bus promised us stops for photos and walking in nice areas - but to be honest, doing this and covering several hundred kilometres a day isn't really practical. So we pulled into La Serena in the early evening, had a short stroll down the beach to an ugly lighthouse - the symbol of the town - before being dropped off at the accomodation picked for us.


La Serena's lighthouse

The following day we headed further up the coast to Bahía Inglesa ("English Bay"), so named after an English pirate who settled in the area in the 1640s. Apart from the long white sandy beach there is little to be inspired about - the area is dry and pretty barren, and in the summer is burning hot. En route to Bahía Inglesa we stopped at Punta de Choros, a jumping off point for boat tours around a marine National Park. This was excellent - sea lions abounded, plus thousands of cormorants, pelicans and gulls. The beautiful islands made a very pleasant lunch stop, and the highlight was seeing a few handfuls of Humbolt penguins (too distant for photos!) - my fourth penguin species so far.


The Daddy of all sea lions

At Bahía Inglesa we stayed 2 nights to relax and enjoy the sea and a large barbeque. Of the 3 of us who made it into the icy sea, all of us escaped hypothermia, but resolved not to do it again until there was a tropical climate to enjoy when getting out. The barbeque was an excellent - usual quantities of meat are 1kg per person at these things - and the last person turned in, definitely worse for wear, at 5am - 3 hours before we had to leave.


From the marine National Park

The longest day heading north was the following stretch to Antofagasta, passing through huge bare stretches of the Atacama desert where in some places no rain has fallen in the past 50 years. Antofagasta is a large city on the coast, existing for one reason - mining. The Atacama is rich in mineral resources and in the 1870s, when global demand for saltpetre was high, Chile annexed a large part of coastal Bolivia, thus precipitating the War of the Pacific against Peru and Bolivia. Bolivia came off the worst, losing all it's coastline to Chile, who built a railway line into the now landlocked country by way of compensation.


Pan-American Highway

En route to Antofagasta we stopped only three times in the parched desert heat. The first was a lunch and photo stop at a fuel station, where trucks thundered past on the Pan American Highway, on an unbending road to the shimmering horizon. The second was at a miners cemetery, where the windblown sand had eroded away coffins and left just bleached white bones . Finally we stopped at the "Hand of the Desert" - it left me wondering how much more there was under the magnificent scenery. We arrived just a little late for sunset in Antogfagasta, and ate in a pretty shocking pizzeria (sometimes you can have too much beef) - the "Hawaiian" pizza included glacé cherries as a topping. Odd.


Erm.....

We turned west the next day and started crossing the Atacama to reach San Pedro de Atacama, a small oasis town that has become a major tourist centre in the region. A few hours west of Antofagasta we reached the salt flats that the area is famed for. The initial view was not as impressive as I had expected, but as we got to the flats the variety and size and thickness of the salt crystals was unlike anything I had ever seen. There was a lot of salt production in the area and in places there were mountains of refined salt that glowed white amongst the surrounding dirty brown flats. We arrived at an oasis for lunch - a former important stop on the Inca Royal Road that stretched all the way up the Andes to the Incan capital in Cusco, Peru. Despite the sun, swimming at 2500m was a cold and slightly smelly (lots of algae) experience - but there was something special about being in the water, overlooking the desert with snowcapped Andean peaks behind you.


Salt Flats

We stopped at the Salar de Toconao for sunset. This salt flat is a small one in comparison to the huge Salar de Uyuni in Bolivia, but as a taster it was great. Underneath the salt there is still a lagoon, and in places there is water on the surface, where flamingos love to feed. The sight was spectacular as the sun set over the Salar and against the chain of volcanoes that make up the Andes cordillera at this point. With the sun out of the sky the temperature plummeted and we made the short drive into San Pedro in the cold dark.


Sunset of the salt flats...


...and the temperature falls.

The following day our small group split up - most were staying for a couple of days in San Pedro and many were going to the Valley of the Moon to see sunset that evening. We spent the day wandering the adobe streets of San Pedro, drinking in the relaxed atmosphere after too long spent in buses. That evening we made the short drive to the most popular tourist spot around the town, the Valley of the Moon - so named becasue of it's stark lunar landscape. We watched the sunset accompanied by dozens of other tourists who had made the long trudge up a huge sand dune - it was nice, but given the plentiful surrounding terrain I couldn't help but feel there must be other things to do at sunset.



Almost all of our group wanted to go sandboarding the following day, and we had the good fortune to pick Javier, an Argentine sandboarder-cum-chef who transported us to the dunes and gave us some instruction, all at a good price. Being a sometime snowboarder, the instant sucess I expected was not forthcoming; the technique is different and the board needs waxing with each descent - which is good as after walking up the dune you need a rest. All the group had an excellent time, and 4 of us resolved to do it again the following day.


International Sandboarding Champions

The second day of boarding was even better - after the previous day's small dunes Javier took us to a series of much larger dunes. The sand was firmer, we went faster and fell harder, and against the Andes backdrop it was truly stunning. After 5 hours and some very steep dune climbing we were ready to drop, and made the last run down a huge dune before the walk back across the hot desert sand to the jeep.



By the following day we were almost all out of cash (this major tourist town having no cash machine), and the four of us that were left - myself, Frank (a German doctor working in Mendoza), John and Lucy (an English couple of a year RTW trip) took the slow bus to Salta, in northern Argentina. The crossing reached 5000m - heights that I had been struggling at in February - before dropping down to the Argentine salt flats. As dark fell we were still driving south, missing rugged mountain scenery before arriving in Salta at midnight. We chose the cheapest hostel (bad idea) before eating some excellent food and turning in. Salta has a reputation on the Gringo Trail for being a very relaxed and fun party town. After changing hostels we set out to explore this, and found a relatively poor city with that couldn't match Mendoza for charm. We decided to hire a car the following day before stuffing ourselves with Argentina's best product - beef. For 2 quid I ate a huge (500gr or so) steak that was delicious.


Giant cacti forests

The following day we drove to the small town of Cachi, some 170km southwest of Salta. The drive was worth as much as the town - passing first through a deep river canyon then ascending through forests of giant cacti up to Cachi. The town was reminiscent of San Pedro - sleepy, adobe buildings with stray dogs lazing in the sun. There were quite a few tourists around - not what we had expected - but it was incredibly easy to get off the beaten path; one question in a shop found us in a local restaurant, not 20m from the main square, unvisited by other tourists.


In Cachi - Frank, Lucy and John

We headed out to some pre-Incan ruins at Las Pailas afterwards; the ruins are huge and barely excavated. Without a guide all we could see where some possible stone circles and tumbledown walls - all surrounded by the giant cacti.


Driving back through the canyon

The following day I left for Mendoza with Frank on an 19 hour southwards bus ride, leaving John and Lucy to continue their route northwards into Bolivia. In Mendoza I was going to meet Wouter, a Dutch writer who I had met months before in Antarctica Hostel, Ushuaia. It seems a little frivolous to go some 12 hours out of my way just for lunch, but I reasoned that if I had the time.... It was well worth it - being back in Mendoza was like comfortable and homely, even if it was much colder than February, and lunch with Wouter was excellent. Frank, my erstwhile local guide, gave me free accomodation in his apartment and an insider's guide to a night out on the town. I left for Cordoba the following evening well pleased with my little detour.


Cordoba central square - General San Martín

Cordoba, Argentina's second city of 4 million people, sits some 600km west of Buenos Aires at the heart of the argicultural region of the country. I arrived early in the morning, having enjoyed another overnight bus with coche-cama, an extra wide seat that reclines far enough back to allow a good sleep. I explored the heart of Cordoba during the day - it struck me as a larger version of Mendoza. At the hostel we arranged a night out - famed in this country because of it's huge student population - and sloped back in at 6am, earing ringing from the universal appeal of hip-hop and dance music. There is nothing quite as wasteful, both in terms of money and time, as Argentinian nights out. The night starts at around 2.30am, finishes at 7am, and the following day is a write-off. And although the prices are relatively cheap, your money tends to go a lot less further than when sober! So after an excellent lunchtime parilla at the hostel the following day, I went for another wander around the city before catching another late overnight bus to Buenos Aires.

Buenos Aires, Argentina's huge and bustling capital, never seems to stop. It's pretty traveller friendly and I made my way to the hostel in the subway before taking it back to the city centre to see the main sights. The financial crisis that crippled Argentina in 2000 is still an issue, and there is a huge, mostly unseen, poverty problem.There are regular street protests and the banks come in for particular amounts of stick. In the centre, where all the main bank offices are, the majority are boarded up with wood or metal screens covered in fly-posted protests; the few brave companies that have normal windows have them spraypainted on a daily basis by protesters. The anger is not limited to the banks - the central government office, the Casa Rosada, has security barriers ready to be erected at a moment's notice. The busy centre feels like any other city until you see the state of virtual siege of some buildings.


The Casa Rosada security force......


And banking the Argentinian way

The central square is named Plaza 25 de Mayo, the date in 1810 that Argentina gained independence from Spain under the auspices of General San Martin, leader of the Argentine army at the time and all-round South American hero. After his exploits in Argentina, he led his army over the Andes to assist Chile in it's fight for independence. Nowadays the Plaza is remembered for an entirely different reason - every Thursday the Mothers of the Disappeared parade around the square, in memory of those people still missing from the "Dirty War" conducted by the military dictatorship in the 70s and early 80s.

The heart of the city may be around the central square, but there are large separate districts t be explored. Recoleta, upmarket with parks and a famous cemetery (the resting place of Evita Peron), adjoins Palermo, with it's beautiful old buildings and narrow streets. Santelmo - home of my hostel - is a friendly, arty district, adjoining La Boca, a much poorer area and home to the Boca Juniors, Diego Maradona's old club. Today is the 25th of May, and apart from a lot of taxis with flags and no open shops, it seems to be business as usual. The Buenos Aires vibe - fun, relaxed and friendly - remains, and people are gearing up for a long weekend of partying due to the national bank strike called for Thursday and Friday. I might go to Uruguay.

Rapa Nui - Easter Island

Rapa Nui, better known as Easter Island to the English speaking world, has been a dream destination of mine since I was young. From the first time I saw pictures of moai I wanted to visit, and South America gave me the opportunity to do just that. There is a certain air of anticipation and expectation when you reach places you have always wanted to visit - anticipation and expectation that can be crushed if it fails to live up to your imagination. The last place I visited with similar feelings was Angkor in Cambodia - which passed with flying colours.

Easter Island has the honour of being the remotest inhabited scrap of land in the world - the nearest landfall is the Pitcairn Islands, 2200km away, home to the Bounty mutineers, and the South American mainland is 3700km to the east. The island, about 20km along each side, is roughly triangular and was formed by 3 (now extinct) volcanoes in each corner of the island. It is inhabited by about 4000 people, around half of whom are original Rapa Nui islanders, with their own language - Rapa Nui - and very obvious culture.

It is both reassuring and a little lonely when first seen from the air - landing on the huge runway (the largest in South America, extended by the USA to allow emergency landings by Space Shuttles) after hours over water then taxiing to the tiny terminal feels like arriving in a friendly provincial town - except that all around the ocean. I found a cheap guesthouse on the coast in Hanga Roa, the only settlement on the island, and settled in get to grips with my new camera and hangover from clubbing in Santiago the night before.

I only had 4 whole days to explore the island, so the following morning I set off to walk around Rano Kau, the beautiful volcano crater close to the town, and look at the relics of the Birdman culture that flourished on the island in recent centuries. On my way I acquired a friendly dog that stayed with me the whole day whilst I completed my crater walk and first visits to ahu. The first called Ahu Vinapu, was unrestored and contained two ahu each with several toppled moai, complete with fallen red topknots. It was a sad and slightly eerie sight - the faces buried in the ground where they had been toppled years before.

Easter Island has worldwide fame for being the home of moai - huge stone statues that sit on ahu, ceremonial altars. It is now generally accepted that the island was first inhabited around 400 A.D. by Polynesians, who also introduced a variety of plants and trees onto the island. Within 300-400 years their culure had developed sufficiently to allow moai building to begin. It appears that the moai represented ancestral figures unique to each village or clan, mounted on their own ahu. After approximately 1000 years of stable society problems occurred - probably due in part to deforestation of the island, caused by use of trees as rollers to transport moai on, as well as overutilisation of their limited resources. There were a series of civil wars during which eventually all the standing moai were toppled - the last reported standing was in the 1830s and by 1864 there were none left upright. An alternative culture, based around warrior chief of clans, developed and became known as the Birdman cult due to the annual race to retrieve the first egg of the Sooty Tern laid on a small islet off the island.


Three moai at Ahu Tongariki

Since the first Western contact - back on Easter Sunday in the 1722 - there has been a sorry tale of exploitation of the island and islanders; first as slaves in Tahiti, then the use of the island as a huge sheep ranch in the early 20th century. The population was stable at around 4,000 until the 1850s, when smallpox and emigration reduced the numbers to their lowest figure of 110. Tourism first started in 1967 with the opening of the airport, by which time several moai had been restored, and the island now depends entirely on tourism for it's tiny economy.

The following day I hired a jeep, with Jamie and Steph, 2 girls from my guesthouse, to explore the rest of the island. We started by taking the north-easterly coastal road, that passes a string of ahu, almost all of which were in a poor state of repair with absent or badly weathered moai. The island is volcanic and so the stone is fairly soft to carve - but degrades easily. Only one ahu, at Ahu Hanga Tee, had a row of face-down moai; the description, "Testatment to the destruction of the moai" said it all. We moved on to Rano Raraku, the quarry where the moai were mined and now almost 700 lie in partial states of completion. Perhaps the most perplexing part of the Easter Island story is why many so moai were left in the quarry - only about 200 were moved elsewhere - and some of those remaining are huge, up to 50 feet high. Why did the islanders continue in their production despite the continuing and worsening deforestation and food shortages? To me the quarry - birthplace of the moai - felt more life a graveyard and again, despite the sunshine, there was sadness along with the awe.


Rano Raraku, the quarry

We moved on to the largest ahu, restored with 15 standing moai, one of which sports a red topknot, representative of a mass of dyed hair. The site, Ahu Tongariki, was the most impressive - you cannot failed to be inspired by the huge figures with an impenetrable skyward gaze. We resolved to return for sunrise the following day before moving on along the north coast of the island. In Rapa Nui language the island is also known as Te Pito O Te Henua - The Navel of the World - and we stopped at the 5 rocks that represent this, before reaching the small, gorgeous beach at Ovahe, complete with pink tinged sand. Further on we came to Anakena beach and perhaps the most aesthetically pleasing ahu with restored moai - the white sand backdrop, palm fringed beach made the seven statues, some with topknots, almost surreal after the harsh volcanic beauty of Ahu Tongariki.


Ahu Nau Nau at Anakena beach

We visited Puna Pau, the other quarry on the island where the topknots were sculpted from red volcanic stone, before taking the western coastal road in the dark - another place to revisit.

The following morning we were alone at Ahu Tongariki for sunrise, and enjoyed the dawn in the cool damp air; there was something about Tongariki that kept drawing me back, and I wanted to return even after we had moved on to Anakena to spend some more time on the beach there.


Sunrise at Ahu Tongariki

After relaxing on the beach we moved on to see what we had failed to the day before. First port of call was Ahu Akivi - an inland site featuring the only ahu with moai facing the sea. It had been well restored and without the continual crashing of the Pacific swell pounding the beaches close by, was a peaceful spot.


Ahu Akivi

Not all of Easter Island's attractions are moai related; the volcanic rock contains vast warrens of caves, several with openings to the sky. Amongst these the caves at Anu Te Pahu and Ana Kakenga were the most accessible and impressive - but to me they paled in comparison to the moai.

Just north of Hanga Roa, on the coast, sit several restored ahu that I visited at sunset. Tahai, containing 5 standing moai, was most impressive, but a little further on was Ranga Kio'e, a moai fully restored with red topknot, white coral eyes and red scoria iris and pupils. I'll let you make your own mind up about the sunset - sometimes it's easy feel a bit jaded.


It was actually more beautiful in real life....

The following day was my last full day on the island, and after some souvenir shopping I hired a car again with the girls, to revisit some sites with the intention of a more relaxed exploration. First, though, we drove to the to the highest point of the island. From there we were able to see almost every point on the island, and the sea was visible on the entire horizon - it made me feel very small.

We returned next to the quarry, then Ahu Tongariki again - I couldn't get enough. On the way back to town we went to Ahu Vinapu - my first ahu, before heading up to Orongo, on the crater rim near town. Orongo is the site of the main Birdman relics - around a dozen small stone houses are built overlooking the Birdman Island, and petrogylphs litter most flat rock surfaces. It is a fascinating testimony to the ability of man to adapt culture depending on his circumstances - in this case done in the face of exhaustion of the island's natural resources. We watched the sun go down from Orongo -maybe like the Rapa Nui had done centuries before - before heading back into town.



The following morning was my last on the island. With my last couple of hours I took Jamie and Steph up to Anakena - they were going to walk around the north western corner of the island whilst I returned to Ahu Tongariki just one last time before my flight left. The sunrise wasn't as good as the first, but there was the same air of tranquil calm guarding the site, and as I returned to the jeep I couldn't help but take some backward glances over my shoulder.