Karl and Kara in South America

Kara says: A few days in BA and now settling into Montevideo. Nice to be back in BA but completely different city! Winter (brrr), swine flu (or the less stigmatising, for pigs, "gripe A") and not a soul around. The schools were closed for a month to contain the spread of flu, the theatres closed, people were supposed to stay at home - and they really did! So very odd. Felt alot more european than before, don't know if it was because everyone was wrapped up in winter clothes shuffling through the biting wind or because now we've seen some more of South America we get why BA is seen as being the Paris of the south. Visited all our favourite haunts - local english pub for delicious ale and even more delicious porter, bar El Federal (see photo of Karl) for cosy nibbles and our favourite milonga (where there was room on the dance-floor all night! crazy.) and wandered around generally, reminiscing... Photo of the Obelisco with giant argentine flag just to remind us where we...

Kara says: Caracas. Not the world's most attractive city. Also fairly dangerous so we did the pathetic tourist-in-a-taxi thing and snapped a few photos through the windows. A few colonial buildings left in the centre of town - parliment, Hugo's place, a couple of goverment buildings. We went up to the top of a hill by cable car for a bird's eye view of the ugliness, and in all fairness of some green-ness over the back of the hill, see photos. Also saw Bolivar's tomb, see photo. Bolivar: famous and much loved freedom getter for much of south america. His dream was to ditch the spanish and have a united states of south america. He did well with ditching the spanish, got them out of Venezuela, Colombia, Panama, Ecuador and I think was also instrumental in getting independence for Peru, Bolivia and Paraguay. Alas less successful with the uniting states bit. Venezuela, Colombia, Panama and Ecuador were united for a while which explains why all their flags are the same - I t...

Kara says: Angel Falls. Fan-bloody-tastic. Karl got his hobo baggage (see photo) and we got in a canoe and headed upriver. We ran rapids! Upriver and downriver!!! Can't decide which is more exciting, downriver is much faster but upriver has the added tension of praying that the engine doesn't die. We went through a section of huge rocks like the shotover jet in Queenstown only narrower and with an actual risk that you might crash and die. Pushing hands were deployed at key points. The river winds it's way through rainforest and tepuis. A tepui is that mountain sticking up with shear sides and a flat top. As the flora and fauna on the top have been effectively isolated for a gizillion years each tepui has species that have evolved uniquely. I'm sure it's wildly exciting if you're a botanist. Don't know what creationists make of it all though. The rocks are various shades of pink and the rusty tanins in the river mean the shallow areas have a fabulous ruby col...

Kara says: Canaima - a little indiginous village in the middle of nowhere in the southeast of Venezuela. You can only get here by air, all the vehicles (all ten of them!) in the village were airlifted in by the military, same goes for anything that doesn't grow here - concrete, tin for roofs, food, clothes, everything. It's on the edge of a lagoon at the base of a line of waterfalls. We settled ourselves in a little thatched cabana at the edge of the lagoon (or OUR lagoon as we liked to think of it although occasionally other people came by to swim in it!) and sat on the couch out front for two days just admiring the view, reading, admiring the view, drinking wine, admiring the view, swimming, admiring the view... As usual the photos don't really do it justice, it's just beautiful. And completely unspoilt and undeveloped with the hotels/camps hidden in the rainforest. See various photos of the lagoon, photo of Karl doing a handstand in our lagoon, photo of our cabana. T...

Kara says: So Colombia. Been here a week now and no kidnapping, no shoot-outs, not so much as a single offer of cocaine, all in all very anti-climatic. I was certain I had spotted a drug dealer across the road from our hotel (stood around his car, waiting, all day, doing nothing but making occasional contact with people who seemed to be customers), I had him under surveillance from my balcony but then he disappointingly turned out to be a car washer. Cartagena, on the Corr-iiii-bi-on, mon. A whole new sea! That doesn't happen everyday. And i finally got to swim!!! In a clear, warm sea by a proper sand-coloured sandy beach. I have developed a new appreciation for beaches, I admit I used to take them for granted, avoid them even at times, but not anymore. Every Saturday morning when Karl gets up to surf he's under strict instructions to remind me of my beach craving and how hard they were to come by in this neck of the woods and insist I come up the coast with him. Only in summer...