South America movie

Ode to South America, 337 freakin' awesome days!!!!!

This is it.. The moment has come. The adventures of Gaetano en America del Sur have come to an end. The best days of my life, the craziest adventures of my life, the prettiest views of my life,... this is it! Reality has caught up with me and told me to go back home.

I've seen all the corners of this magnificent continent in all their beauty and glory. I've done my fair share of kilometres this year and have been through so much! I've walked through the driest deserts, over the highest mountains, through the deepest canyons, in thick jungles, seen the prettiest human settlements and ruins, sailed the largest rivers and bluest seas, rafted the wildest streams, tanned and partied on the coolest beaches, volunteered with the cutest, but poorest kids, had a beer or two on the go, ate the finest and dirtiest food imaginable, got myself in some bad situations, but always got out alive (so far), met tons of lovely people from all around the world, made new friends for life, spoke way too many different languages with all of them and did so much more.. and all of this happened during the last 337 best days of my life! (So far!)

It seems like years ago that first night when I arrived at the airport of Panama City. I reckon I might have started a bit on a wrong foot, but I can assure you: it was all for the greater good and I have no regrets whatsoever about anything!

If you want to have an idea of the behind-the-scenes part of such a trip, here are some stats:

Between all the fun and good times in cities, there is also a lot (yes, really a lot!) of time spent on buses or other means of transportation! I've been on 150 busrides averaging between 8 and 48hours, 9 boattrips, 8 flights, used 17 different means of transportation, set foot in 153 villages/towns/cities, slept in 72 different hostals, Couchsurfed 6 times, crashed at 16 friend's places, and a couple hammocks and tents, summited 7 peaks, went on 12 stunning hikes, walked more than 1,000km and bussed probably 40 times as much with an unreasonable amount of hours on them, ...

Furthermore I would like to take a moment to thank everyone that I met out here that made this trip what it became: a dream becoming reality! Thanks to all the people that travelled with me, especially Simon, David, Carlos, Vincent and Rachel who were my major travel buddies and with whom I could share a lot of unique memories during this 337 days long trip!

I would also want to thank all of you people back home for reading my lousy stories and supporting me in everything I did! I don't know who you all are, but you are many apparently. Thanks! I hope you enjoyed the pictures etc. and hope I have inspired some of you to get out there and see the world! There is more than work in life. And it is not me who got lucky to get this trip, it is a decision everyone can make. You just need the guts to do it.

If everything goes well, I should arrive on the home-land around 11:15am on Wednesday the 25th. But it could be that the customs find some things they don't like in my bags. I heard that anything that is derived from the coca plant is considered illegal in Europe.. I have 100gr of leaves and I have no clue either on the limit of alcohol import. (All presents for home ofcourse!) I might need to chat with the police first about all these things before going to the airport.

Thank you South America for everything you showed and gave me. I sincerely love everything about this continent! I hope some of you will ever set foot here!

Un ultimo beso y abrazo para todos,

G. (finally) coming home..

ps: If anyone ever wants information about South America or major backpacking trips in general, I'll be happy to help you out with your plans!

Buena onda en Argentina!!

As I was about to leave Bolivia, things did not really go as planned. I showed up at the busstation, but for a strange reason, the bus was not leaving from one of the terminal's platforms, but from an alley behind it. The reason for this seemed to be that it was forbidden to go to Villazón via Potosí due to the strikes from the villagers. Apparently the miners had nothing better to do than throwing dynamite and rocks at tourist buses and do other crazy stuff, so for our security we could not leave, not even from the little alley! This because the police came and put the driver in jail, so they were sure he would not be able to leave. Luckily we got refunded, but had no other option yet to leave this bloody country! The next plane would only leave four days later, which was not an option. After some brainstorming with two french girls, we found another bordercrossing between Bolivia and Argentina which would avoid the blocked region!

The following day we managed to find an itinerary and some tickets that would get us to this bordertown. The bad news was that we had to make a massive detour over Santa Cruz de la Sierra and in total sit on buses for the next 37 hours!

It was a long, boring and crazy wobbly ride, but FINALLY we got out of this unorganised anarchical country and arrived in what could be called: 'civilazation'! The first thing you obviously do when you arrive in Argentina is going to a Parilla (grill restaurant) and order half a kilo of the finest meat and a nice bottle of Malbec! Yes, life is grand!

One busride later we finally got to Salta, but as you can imagine, it did not go as smoothly as planned. The bus left at 1015pm and stopped just outide of town at 1025pm for a police control. This kind of reminded me of Venezuela! Full body check (no cavities, luckily), interrogation and luggage control. Just one we thought, but 15 minutes later we had a second one! And it continued at 0130am and 0430am with a third and fourth control! This really looked like the busrides I had in Venezuela!

Salta is merely known for the region around it. It is surrounded by weird, but beautifully coloured rock formations and the second largest winery region in Argentina! Two reasons to stay there for a couple of days and enjoy the wonders that the Pachamama (Mother Nature) gave us!

Some weeks ago I had friends who travelled this region, but they saw it all covered in snow. Me on the other had was walking in shorts and flip-flops in the sun! The same weird thing happened when I got to Cordoba. I came here to visit some friends that I met aboutseven months ago, when I was in Uruguay with my buddy Carlos. They told me that until the dayI arrived it was freezing here, but yet again, I am walking in shorts and flip-flops and it is strangely warm for being the middle of the winter! I am starting to believe that a natural anomaly of hot and sunny weather is following me all along my trip! In the 340 last days I've maybe only seen some raindrops fall in less than 10 days! I've read that the weather was horrible last month back home, so I am really curious if the sun is going to follow me until there!?!?

It has been a long time since I've been in a clean and civilised city as Cordoba! Stuff gets sold in shops behind windows instead of on the street or on dirty markets, and I don't stick out that much as a foreigner anymore, because of my height or skin colour!

I got guided around town by my friends and checked out some of the musea and bars. Tomorrow I will take my last bus to my final destination: Buenos Aires! After 149 busrides all averaging between 8 and 48 hours in Semi-Camas or crappy chicken buses, I deserve to do my 150th in style: I'm going Super Cama de Luxe Suite-styleto BsAs! (Don't judge me, I deserve this!)

During my previous visits to the Capital I'vealready seen about everything that has to be seenin town, sothis time is more about meeting up with some friends and having a serie of goodbye parties before stepping on that plane!

It's really getting close now.. In five short days I'm flying! Hope you're ready for it!!

Un abrazo,

G. on the road

The Argentina album: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=197320&id=634868429&l=4266cb577b

unBOLIVIAble times in Bolivia!

In my last post I forgot to educate you guys a little bit! I'll make it up to you right now: The last mountain I climbed, Nevado Sajama, as I told you is the highest mountain and puts Bolivia with this on the 13th place on the Country Highpoint list! (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_highest_point) Furthermore this mountain has the highest tree-line on the world and lies around 5,000m.

Back in La Paz I met one of my fellow volunteers from Trujillo in my hostel and after a great night I decided to ride the Death road. This is a world famous road where you mountainbike down about 60km pure downhill on, as it is called, the world's most dangerous road! It caries this name, because it is only large enough for one car and on the left side it is delimited by a vertical drop up to 600m!! You better do not miss one of the many corners! Averagely two tourists a year die on this road while mountainbiking it down. Luckily now they have opened a new road called 'the live road', so all traffic is deviated over that one and we can MTB safely down without having to dodge upcoming trucks.

The Death road starts at an altitude of 4,650m and brings you after about 60km down to the town of Yolosita which has an elevation of 1,200m!! I decided to stay here, because it already brought me a little closer to the jungle, so I decided to spend the night in the lovely town of Coroico. Sadly it was still horribly foggy and it was impossible to see across the little central plaza.

The next day I found myself trapped in the back on a tiny dirty seat of the worst chicken-bus ever on the worst road ever! After about 15 very long hours where it was impossible to sleep, I made it to Rurrenabaque! Still early the lost French guy in town that has the only and probably best bakery in whole South America just opened and I ate all I could of his delicious croissants and other pastries in the middle of the bloody jungle!! About an hour later I was sitting with two Croatian women on a little boat going deep into the jungle.

The following days we spend wandering around in the amazingly interesting jungle. We saw some wild boars, monkeys, millions of insects and spiders, birds, but especially the jungle trek is about trees and plants! Our guide was about the best you can have, he's an indigenous descendant and on top of that he studied to know every plant or blade of grass by name! He's that good that he can't get lost into the jungle! We walked for hours without knowing where we went, but he still brought us safely back to campsite.

He showed us plants and lianes that cure all kinds of 'incureable' diseases (that's what the western world tells us) but there are plants, combined with special diets that can cure: cancer, malaria, impotence, paralysis, arthritis, asthma and many others. There are probably many non-believers among you, but if one day I get one of these many diseases, I'll definitely try one of these treatments!

After having chopped our way through this wonderful jungle for a couple of days, I took a 50 minute plane back to the city of peace, instead of sitting for 20h on the crappiest bus! Sadly due to some protest that is going on around Potosí, the whole country is paralysed by their road-blocks! I had to change my plans rapidly and decided to make my way to the sugartown: Sucre! This is considered the real capital of Bolivia, because of the fact that the declaration of independence was signed here. I have no idea where mister Evo Morales (the president) is residing though.

Sucre is also known as the 'Ciudad Blanca' (White City) and this not without a reason! About 99% of the houses is painted white! Painters are massively lacking in originality here! Furthermore is Sucre famous for its chocolate, dinosaurs, churches and.. not much more. So I decided to relax here for a couple of days and in two hours I'm catching a bus that is trying to make its way around all the road-blocks to Villazón, bordertown with Argentina, where I should arrive tomorrow around noon to catch another bus to Salta!

Yet again I'm saying goodbye to another country and adding two stamps to my passport. In two weeks I set back foot on my homeland. For the moment not really ready for it, but it'll come!

Enjoy the last weeks without me there!!

G. on the road!

New load of pictures for who wants:

Volunteering in Trujillo and Around:http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=186808&id=634868429&l=c14549de11

Huayhuash: Second best hike in the world: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=189455&id=634868429&l=4d82446381

Hasta luego Peru: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=190162&id=634868429&l=eae198d882

unBOLIVIAble times in Bolivia: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=195265&id=634868429&l=500f6192aa

Huayna Potosí & Nevado Sajama: my sweetest dream is your worst nightmare!

After two months and a half I came back to the 3,600mn high city of La Paz, but this time, it was time for action! I already had made my contacts previously with mountain guides etc. so I could leave straight away for mountain #1: the Huayna Potosí. (6,088m)

This mountain is really famous among travellers to climb, because it is probably the easiest +6,000m mountain on earth. Normally it is done it three days with a first day of acclimatisation at base-camp and you also get some ice-climbing course. (I don't know why, because you don't need it on this mountain..) As this was not really useful, I decided to do it in just two days, because I had already been at reasonable altitude for the past month. The mountain has the reputation to be easy, but eventually it turned out to be pretty tough! The last bit we had to walk with crampons over a dangerous ridge of stones, but eventually my Australian partner and I made it first to the top and could enjoy the sunrise in silence. It was a MAGIC moment, once again!

The climb up did not go without any problems. First of all we had a big discussion with the guide about the hour we should leave for the top. All groups leave around 1-1.30am, but as he saw us walking fast up to high-camp, he wanted to leave around 3am! We both disagreed and eventually left like all the others and walked a normal slow-pace towards the summit.

That same afternoon I had to meet up with a Polish girl who had been waiting for me to climb another mountain. We had a dilemma about which one to climb. There were two candidates: Nevado Illimani or Nevado Sajama. I was already dreaming months about the Nevado Sajama, but the last two expeditions had failed due to too much wind. Nevado Sajama is a volcano located in the Cordillera Occidental near the Chilean border, so the winds from the pacific fly over the first range of the Andes to smash against the face of the lone standing mountain.

We talked a bit to some guides and asked for some opinions. Eventually we decided to go for the Nevado Sajama, but first I wanted to rest for a day to prepare myself for this massive mountain!

Of course it had to start-off the Bolivian way: we waited about two hours because they had forgotten to pack the ice-axes! Finally on the road I got to know better my Polish expedition-partner. And yes, she was a typical Polish! She loved to suffer and endure pain, so she would be my perfect climbing mate for that mountain!

Because we were late in the village of Sajama (4,250m), we had to hike a little faster to base-camp (4,600m). The first close-up view of the mountain gave me a little shiver, but he was the one to beat! After a good night in our tents, we left on day two for high-camp (5,600m). The climb was quite hard as we had to climb a steep face of loose rocks.

Once in high-camp, the resting could start. We would leave for the summit around 1am the next day. We met another expedition of two Spanish guys who were going to attempt the summit at the same time.

And then it came.. Around 7pm all hell broke loose at high-camp. After a whole day of blue sky, suddenly clouds started gathering around the mountain and winds of 80 to 100km/h came on crashing on our tents. The outer tent got ripped apart during this massive storm! We put massive stones around it to keep our tent on the ground, but it was the worst hell I've ever been in! It was almost impossible to sleep, so at 1 am the guide came to our tent to announce that we won't attempt to summit in this weather.

Sad and mad at the mountain I turned around and listened to the storm breaking the poles of our tent. Eventually around 2am it sounded a little bit less, so I decided to dress up and get the guide out of his tent to attempt summit! I put on a thermal shirt, a long-sleeve T-shirt, an alpaca jumper, a fleece, a down jacket and a shell! 6 layers around me to keep me warm during the ascent! Temperatures were around -15 degrees Celsius and with a wind of more than 80km/h this gives a sensation of -60!!!

The guide woke up and declared me suicidal and crazy, but I insisted on trying. I did not come out here to fail without trying. I promised him we would not take any risks. He also geared up and there we went, almost walking on hands an feet to not be blown over. We decided to go to the other side of the ridge to be protected from the winds, but at that moment we saw the Spanish expedition turning back. They were freezing and exhausted. On the north face of the mountain it went a little easier. The hardest part there was the rock-climbing with crampons on. Especially for me it was kind of weird. My guide who is a typical 1m55 Bolivian with a weight of probably no more than 60kg had to secure my life if I fell down. I did not see that happen, so I went extra precocious.

We could not forever stay on the wind-less face, so eventually we crawled over the ridge and came on the stormy north-west face! There we had to start to ice-climb a 60m 80 degree ice-wall. Again, very precocious we went for it, but the winds were almost blowing me off the wall. At this time I admitted that it was suicide and that I am not stronger than nature. The guide was yelling something down at me I could not understand, but I knew it was something in Spanish like: 'Let's get out of here before we die!'

We first had to finish the climb of this wall before we could go down, so for 10 more minutes we climbed in the worst hell and feeling of cold I've ever been. On top of it I wanted him to take a picture of me with the camera of the Polish girl, but only by taking it out of my bag without a glove, all my fingertips of my right hand froze in about 30 seconds! I had to endure the hardest pain ever during the next 10 minutes to get back some life in them. (Yes, I had to cry out of pain for those who want to know)

Eventually the picture turned out like crap before the camera froze too. I'll try to upload it, so you see what life is like at 6,200m.

As you can imagine, we did not summit, but I don't care. I tried and saw it was impossible. It was the best experience of this whole trip! I learned so much in these four days and it was the first time I had such a close encounter with the forces of nature.

The third day we had to go back down to base-camp, but something in me wanted to try again, so I talked to the Spanish guys and they were also going for a second attempt that night. My guide had to bring the Polish girl down, so I stayed behind with the two Spanish and a new expedition of a German guy and his guide.

Sadly, around 4pm a guide came up to high-camp to warm us for a new and even harder storm that night. Disappointed I dismantled the tent and went down to base-camp where I joined my team. I'll definitaly be back in a better season of the year for another attempt!

Be safe amigo's and see you soon!!

G. temporary retired from mountaineering!

Ps: my fingers are totally ok!

Hasta luego Peru y Chile!

I arrived on a Saturday morning in Huaraz and around the breakfast table I immediately met my future hiking team for the famous Huayhuash trek! It is considered one of the best and most intense hikes in the world, so I basically HAD to do it!

After residing for a month in Trujillo at sea-level, I found myself within 30 hours in the Cordillera Huayhuash at an altitude of 4,400m! This was kind of a hard-core acclimatisation for my body, that suffered of frequent small head-aches during the first two days. During the next six days, we constantly hiked at an altitude of 4,000 to 5,000m between the most stunning scenery's! We were surrounded by a range of 6,000+m mountains, crystal-clear lakes and various kinds of fauna (a lot of sheep and shepherds) and flora. In total we had to walk around 130km and climb over nine passes with an altitude between 4,700 and 5,000m!

Another weird thing about this hike is that you constantly have to pay 'protection money' to campesiños (farmers). The Cordillera Huayhuash is not a national park, so the locals can do what they want and charge you whatever they want in exchange of 'security' from.. themselves! Last year a guy died of a gun-wound, because he refused to pay. And it is not infrequent that hikers without an organization get mugged along the way.

After this legendary hike I decided to take some rock-climbing and high-mountaineering survival classes to prepare myself for my ultimate goal of this trip: climb the Nevado Sajama, aka highest peak of Bolivia with it's massive 6,542m of altitude!

Huaraz was really hard on me, so I needed a couple of days to relax and recover and I decided to do so in the Huacachina oasis near Ica in the south of Peru. I believed this place was a kind of laid-back hippie resort, but eventually it turned out to be this Peruvian posh holiday destination! I still managed to relax and have a awesome time dune-buggy riding and sandboarding in the dunes around the oasis. It was also a big coincidence that at the time I was reading 'the Alchemist' from Paulo Cuello. The ones who read this book know that it is about a shepherd from the mountains of Andalusia that goes on an adventure that brings him to an Oasis in the Egyptian desert.

I left Huacachina totally fresh and ready for some new hiking! This time my destination was the Colca Canyon near Arequipa! This is an exquisite location for hikers and condor-spotters! The canyon is considered the deepest in the world, but I think the one next to it might be deeper. (I don't want to feed you wrong info!) Once again we stayed, down in the canyon, in a superb oasis! The last day we had to hike out of the canyon, which would be a perfect training for me to see if I can hike fast enough to summit Nevado Sajama!

In my hostel in Arequipa I met this woman from Arica (north of Chile), which was my next destination! She was kind enough to be my guide during my short stay in this lovely sea/border-town. My main mission there was going up to the Bolivian border to have a first sneak-peak of the massive pile of rock an ice: Nevado Sajama that I was supposed to climb a week later! The other purpose was to hike around the Parque Nacional Lauca up there, but due to intense winds and cold I decided to go back to Arica and catch a bus to the city of peace in Bolivia.

The bus ride was definitely top three worst ever! It left two hours late (3am instead of 1am) and we waited for six hours at the border for it to open. Eventually I made it to La Paz, the city where my final mountaineering adventures in South America started! After one month of hard training and 100% sobriety, I was more ready than ever to climb two 6,000+m mountains in 6 days. You'll hear in later stories if I made it or not..

Hasta luego amigos! The mountaineering stories will follow soon!

Peace and love from La Paz!

G. on the road!

La vida en Trujillo and around

Friday the 2nd of July was my last day of volunteering in Trujillo. After a sad and choked-up goodbye, I left with my co-volunteers Brittany and Kylien to Huaraz to continue my adventures in South America! Nonetheless we had some good adventures in Trujillo too!

Every weekend we organised kind of a trip with the team of volunteers. The first weekend we went relaxing in the little beachtown Huanchaco, the place where I learned to surf properly and met Vincent, my friend from university, again.

The second weekend we decided to go visit some other volunteers in Agallpampa up in the cierra (mountains). They are involved in some kind of water project for the villages up there. It was also an interesting trip, because a lot of the kids from our schools are originally from this region. Their (grand)parents migrated to Trujillo in search of a better life, but eventually ended up in the slums around the city and this is how the kids ended up in our schools.

We were lucky to visit Agallpampa just that weekend, because there was a major party going on in town! They were celebrating some saints and therefor there where some folkloric dance competitions, a soccer game, music everywhere, rooster fights and everyone was contributing to this massive festive meal! And because we were the only foreigners in town, I helped out slaughtering some cows for the meal and had some fun drinking with the local policemen. They bought me a beer, because I won a bet that I could open a bottle of beer with a sheet of A4 paper and this is how we all got involved in the party and everyone liked us a lot!

The third weekend we decided to go on a surfari with the team. We rented some boards and went to Puerto Chacama, aka the village with the longest wave in the world! The first night we camped on the beach around a bonfire and the second day we went surfing this huge wave! #Once in a while there was also some excitement during the weeks! One day some Peruvians broke into the car of one of our volunteers that is driving from Canada to Argentina and back. They stole some of his trekking gear, so like everyone would do, you make up a police statement and hope to get some money back from the insurance.

In Peru, things go quite differently. Every town has a black market here, where you go (never alone) and have a look around and who knows, there might be someone selling your stuff! This time I went with him having a look around and by coincidence I walked into a shop and yes, there was all of his stuff in a glass display! This is already a good thing, but you cannot get it all back just like that by saying it is yours (which you better never say).

If you want to get the police involved, they need to gather all their forces and raid the black market, which will not be free; Policemen like bribes. One policeman would get stoned together with you by all the 'shop'-owners. Option two is using connections! Luckily we knew someone who knew someone that knew someone else that could do something for us and try to get JF's stuff back. This partially worked, because every part of the chain wants something in exchange for their service, so this option is not free either. Option three would be going there and buying your stuff back and hoping they don't have a clue of the value of the goods and just sell you a 400USD sleeping bag for 15USD.

We combined option two and three. Although that option one really would have been fun, we decided not to cause any war or major riot. Eventually JF got most of his stuff back and could, like us, leave for Huaraz for some hiking!

To be continued..

G. on the road!

The last dinosaur..

A long, long time ago I started this adventure far away from where I am now, in Panama City. Back in those days I was surrounded by seasonal travellers. After a while these guys all went back home and the hard-core travellers continued conquering this continent. Recently this kind of travellers started to come back and my kind is dying.. So badly, that the during the last two weeks I haven't met anyone that is travelling this continent for more than four weeks.. I start to feel like the last living dinosaur..

Originally I left for a nine month trip, but as you all might know, I extended my stay already a couple of times. Now I finally decided that also my time has come to go home.. South America has been more than good to me!

My home-coming day is planned on the 25th of August. (I'll try not to change it anymore this time!) On this glorious day I will set foot on the European continent at 11:15am!

To end I would like to summarize this trip with the words of Sir Frank Sinatra. Take it away Frank! : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8L1sg7RImyM

Sooooo.. see you all soon?!?!?!? Enjoy the last month without me! In the meanwhile I will keep you posted about my shenanigans out here!

G. on the road!