Ancient History, Volume XXIV

Previously: the dumbest birds ever, nests o' poop, and a Teletubby/Snuggie/sleeping bag.

After five days of doing Not Very Much Because I'm a Chicken in beautiful downtown Quito, it was time to leave Ecuador for Guatemala. Months earlier, when Ness and I were booking our grand adventure, the travel agent informed us that there were two ways of flying from Quito to Guatemala City:

1. Quito to Guatemala City via Bogata, Columbia.
2. Quito to Guatemala City via Miami.

For numerous reasons that primarily seemed to involve "Oh God, we might die" and "Our mothers will have heart attacks", we decided that it was for the best that we NOT have a four hour layover in Columbia.

Totally what happens in Columbia, right?? Source.

When my alarm went off at THREE O'CLOCK IN THE MORNING, I began to suspect that this wasn't such a spectacular decision. This feeling got a little stronger as I got into a cab at 3.45am, and a HELL of a lot stronger when I got to Quito Airport at 4am to find that my 6.30am flight had been delayed until 8.15am. There's nothing quite like being told you've gotten up in the middle of the night for absolutely no reason! *sigh*

Public service announcement: Quito Airport at 4am is REALLY boring.

Also? As you can see from this awesome map I just made, the trip via Bogata probably would have left at a civilised hour and would have taken A MILLIONTY LESS HOURS:

The plane to Miami finally left at about 8.30am, and was accompanied by the rudest flight crew I've ever had the misfortune of being trapped in a flying metal tube with. On a plane from Quito to Miami, you'd think that they'd have at least ONE member of the flight crew who spoke Spanish, right? WRONG. Apparently, if all you speak is "American" and you're confronted with a person who only speaks Spanish? You should just yell the breakfast options at them louder and louder as they get more and more perplexed and embarrassed.

Ahem.

I reached Miami at about 1pm, and had the following conversation:
Immigration Guy: So, how long are you going to be in the US?
Me: About 4 hours.
Immigration Guy: Seriously??
Me: I'm en route to Guatemala.
Immigration Guy: Oh, cool! Can you speak Spanish?
Me: I can say "Quisiera un cerveza, por favor" and ask for the bill?
Immigration Guy: All the important stuff, huh? You'll be FINE!

Moral of the story: Immigration staff in Miami are much nicer than in Los Angeles. #justsaying

My flight out of Miami was delayed by two hours. AWESOME. Because what you really want when you got up at 3am and have already had a two hour delay is ANOTHER two hour delay. On the plus side, I stocked up on books and Haribo. On the downside, the plane ride from Miami to Guatemala City took an hour longer than scheduled, so I didn't arrive in Guatemala City until 8.15. AT NIGHT. And from there, it was an hour and fifteen minute shuttle ride down to Antigua and my hotel.

I was starving, but was FAR too much of a zombie to go exploring. So instead, I found Supernatural on the good old WB. And that's the story of how I woke up at 2.30 in the morning wondering why there were people talking in my hotel room, and why all the lights were still on. Including the light in the bathroom...

Next up, I make new friends and climb an active volcano!

K xx

Ancient History, Volume XXIII

In the last installment, giant lava bubbles, sharks, sea lions and penguins.

Our last day in the Galapagos started stupidly early. As in we were off the boat and on North Seymour Island by 7am early. We started out by seeing the frigate birds up close. We'd seen a bunch of them flying behind the boat over the previous days, but they're SO MUCH BIGGER when you see them on the ground. A couple of the males had their balloons inflated, which was pretty spectacular.

They inflate the balloons to attract a mate and they stay inflated for up to eight days, during which time the birds can't eat. I still can't decide if that's batshit cray-cray or seriously impressive...

From there, we headed across to the other side of the island to see the blue-footed boobies. On the way, we past a couple of land iguanas, which were rather enormous and VERY sleepy looking:

So, blue-footed boobies. They're SUPER dumb. Apparently a bunch of juveniles die every year because they fly out over the sea, spot a fish they want, and dive into the sea with their beaks open, at which point their lungs fill with water and they drown. Also? Their version of building a nest is pooping in a circle and laying an egg in the middle of it.

So yeah. They're dumb. But also kind of cute in their dumbness:

Apparently this is a mating dance

She doesn't seem very impressed...

Nest o' poop

After about an hour of going "ZOMG, there's a blue-footed boobie like a metre away from me!!!", it was back to the boat for the sail back to Baltra. We then had the joyous task of sitting around the shed airport shed for about three hours before our flight back to the mainland. The last half hour or so was pure agony, because:
a) it was about 32 degrees C outside (90 degrees Fahrenheit);
b) the plane's engines weren't on;
c) this meant the air conditioning wasn't running.

Have you ever been in a giant metal cylinder in 32 degree heat with no air circulation? It was NOT enjoyable. Thankfully, the flight back to the mainland was uneventful. Back in Quito, we decided that we should go to Boca de Lobo for dinner again. It was even more phenomenal the second time around - we ordered a dish called Ferocious Chicken and everything!

The following day, we headed up the Teleferico cable car, which offers pretty awesome views over Quito:

Back down in the new town, London Bound and I wandered around a bunch of camping stores, where we came across this:

Yup. It's a sleeping bag with arms and legs. Because, you know, who doesn't want to look like a Teletubbie while they camp?!

London Bound left the next day, and I had five days in Quito on my own. You'd think I would have seen a bunch of stuff. NOPE. I spent a crapton of time on the internet, drank a lot of hot chocolate, watched an awful lot of television ("Soopernatooral: Miercoles en Warner Channel!" featured quite strongly), and ate FAR too much for my own good. I also tried to find the archaeology museum that was apparently several blocks away, but failed miserably.

Next up? I spend forever flying to Guatemala, and climb an active volcano.

K xx

Ancient History, Volume XXI

Last time, I left Peru for Ecuador, went to the equator and ate my body weight in melted cheese. The day AFTER eating my body weight in melted cheese, we were off to the airport again, heading to the Galapagos. Turns out when you fly to the Galapagos? You fly via Guayaquil, which is about 35 minutes flight from Quito, and is the economic capital of Ecuador as well as its largest city. Kind of like Canberra and Sydney, really!

Anyway, the flight from Guayaquil to the Galapagos was about an hour and a half. The AIRPORT in the Galapagos is basically a tin shed, with no walls, which made claiming our luggage kind of interesting... From the airport, we headed to Puerto Ayora where we were transferred to our home for the next four days - the Darwin Yacht (or, as the stickers we were given said, Darwin Yatch).

After settling into our cabins and a quick spot of lunch, we were off to the Charles Darwin Research Station to see the giant tortoises. We got to get right up close to them, which was pretty amazing.

I was terrified that I was going to topple backwards and squish a tortoise...

We also got to see poor old Lonesome George, the last Pinta Island tortoise (he died about a month ago, so now there are NO Pinta Island tortoises. SAD PANDA). He did look very lonesome...

He's the rock looking thing behind the pond.

And we got to see BABY TORTOISES!!! (Also? Do you have ANY idea how hard it was for me not to write 'Esio Trot' in all these sentences???)

The colours painted on their backs tell the keepers which species they are.

Wandering around the research station (which also houses lava lizards, iguanas, and a bunch of different bird species) took up the rest of the day. That night, back on the boat, we had a briefing about the next day's activities, before we headed to the upper deck for a few drinks. And at about midnight, we set sail! I had a rather exciting(??) night, because the door to my cabin decided to fall open by itself, and bang against the wall, scaring the crap out of me. (Thankfully, my millionty kilo pack held it closed very nicely for the remaining nights!)

The following day, we were up stupidly early and doing our first trip ashore before 8am on the island of Rabida. It was pretty incredible - the beaches are red volcanic sand. We got to see hermit crabs, marine iguanas, sealions, pelicans and Darwin finches.

Marine iguana! They're kind of gross. There's almost no fresh water in the Galapagos, so
they've adapted to drinking seawater and snorting the salt out through their noses...

Cranky looking nesting pelicans

Sealions

And from there, we went snorkelling with several schools of fish, and a very curious sealion!! That part was ZOMG worthy, because the sealion swam along side us in the waves for a good ten minutes. After the snorkelling, it was back to the boat and off to Santiago. Public service announcement: taking a shower while sailing through choppy water is...interesting. On the plus side, there were a bunch of frigate birds handing out behind the boat, which was pretty awesome.

After a couple of hours of sailing and an hour for lunch, we were back in the dinghy heading for shore on Santiago. It's pretty amazing that two islands can be so close together and so completely different. Santiago had black sand beaches and a whole stack of crazy lava formations, along with TONS of marine iguanas, and a brand new baby sealion:

Kooky lava formations

Baby sealion, mummy sealion, and a butt ton of marine iguanas

We had a pretty long walk around the island, and wound up near some inlets getting to see a group of fur seals playing, which was incredible:

SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!!

From there, we went snorkelling again, before sailing off into the sunset (literally) past a rock formation that was used for target practice during World War II (seriously), and a colony of masked boobies:

The Bishop

Masked boobies. THEY'RE BIRDS, YOU SMUTTY PEOPLE.

All in all? Not a bad two days! 

Next up, underwater craters, sharks, and a dose of "Hey, I remember this from Master and Commander!!"

K xx

Ancient History, Volume XX

In the last installment, there was some trauma. And y'all should get travel insurance any time you leave the country, JUST IN CASES. (Seriously)

In the end, I had less than 24 hours in Lima the second time around. This meant I didn't see Ness from the time I left the hospital until I got back to Melbourne six weeks later. The idea of spending six weeks travelling on my own was more than a little terrifying. Thankfully, there were three other people from the Peru trip going on to Ecaudor with me, which eased me into things!

Our trip to Ecuador started with London Bound's (totally a code name) need to obtain a Filet o' Fish. She had (and I assume still has) this thing that she has to eat a Filet o' Fish in every country she visits. And she hadn't yet had one in Peru. Luckily, there was a Macca's (Mickey D's to you, America) at the airport and - after waiting FORTY FIVE MINUTES (seriously, who waits 45 minutes for Macca's?!) for the breakfast menu to end - she finally had her Filet o' Fish. Things were off to a good start.

The flight to Quito was uneventful, with the exception of them telling us we were about to land approximately 90 seconds before the wheels hit the tarmac. We got to our hotel without any problems, and shortly after that, we headed into the old city to have a look around, and possibly find a tapas bar. Sadly, everything was closed, and there was an ENORMOUS religious festival going on. After getting caught in several panic-inducing crushes, we decided to abandon ship on the old city and headed back to the new town. By the time we got back there, we were all starving (due to it being 5pm and the fact that we hadn't eaten since that Macca's at 11am). And so the tapas snack that we were planning on having suddenly turned into "let's each order an appetiser plate and stuff ourselves on mozzarella sticks and potato skins". Whoops?

The next day, London Bound got a roommate. This was something of a shock to her, because during the Peru trip, there were an odd number of girls so she'd had a room to herself the entire trip. Her new roommate was lovely, but was also about sixty, from Queensland, and on her first ever overseas trip. She was travelling with nothing but a carry-on suitcase, which contained three changes of clothing. She showered in her clothes to save on going to the laundromat. And every rum and Coke she drank, she sighed a little because it wasn't Bundaberg rum. So yes. She was a little...eccentric.

We spent a good chunk of the rest of the day out at "The City at the Middle of the World", otherwise known as an uber-tacky tourist attraction build at(ish) the equator. 

Now is the point where I confess that I never realised that the equator ran through Ecuador before I went there. Uh, Past Kirsti? EQUATOR. ECUADOR. These are not dissimilar words. You are a moron.

Past Me is in the north and south hemispheres at the same time. WHEEEE!!

Once we'd finished taking typical tourist photos, we headed back to the hotel and pottered about the new town until it was time for our briefing. There, we discovered that this tour would ALSO include a Watermelon-esque couple, although not nearly as bad as Mr and Mrs Watermelon. This young married couple were taking a year long, round-the-world honeymoon, and her parents had decided to travel with them (AWWWWWWWWKWARD) for a month. So at the briefing, her mother asked all kinds of questions like "Will we need to bring our own bed linen on the boat?" 

Can we just stop and marvel at that question for a second? Because not only did she think that it was a possibility. She thought it was such a STRONG possibility that she carried sheets and towels ALL THE WAY FROM AUSTRALIA. How she had space in her luggage for anything but those is completely beyond me! (And no. We didn't need to supply our own linen) 

The four of us from the Peru trip had dinner together that night at the most incredible restaurant of EVER. If you ever happen to be in the new town of Quito and feel in need of a bite to eat, GO TO BOCA DE LOBO. Because it is AMAAAAAAAZING. They have spectacular cocktails and quite possibly the most fantastic raclettes of EVER. (Although I'm not sure how it would be possible to go wrong with a giant plate of melted cheese!) #OMNOMNOMNOM

They also had quite spectacularly enormous hot chocolates:

Their motto was "Drink and live forever, or die trying", and some of their cocktails had truly amazing names. Case in point: London Bound ordered a "Little Bitch from Hell". Apparently it was delicious!

After we'd stuffed ourselves with cheese and cocktails and hot chocolates, we headed back to the hotel to watch Ecuadorian Dancing with the Stars (it wasn't very good) and pack up our things yet again. Because first thing in the morning, we were off to the airport to board a flight to the Galapagos!!

But that's a story for next time...

K xx

ABC of travel

Yesterday, the lovely Deidre of Decoybetty tagged me in this. It's totally awesome and allows me wibble on about travel, even though I'm currently freezing to death in Melbourne. (HEY MELBOURNE - IT'S SUMMER, YOU NUMBSKULL!!! TURN UP THE TEMPERATURE!) Ahem.

A: Age you went on your first overseas trip. I'm pretty sure my first overseas trip was when we moved to Canada when I was four. The longest I've gone since then without going overseas was from October 1998 to September 2002.

B: Best (foreign) beer you've had and where. Yeah, I don't like beer. But there was a moment in Guatemala when it was so hot that my brain melted out of my ears and I decided that the only thing that would cool me down was beer. So I'm going to go with Brahva (not to be confused with Brahma) in Rio Dulce, Guatemala.

C: Cuisine (favourite). Mexican. Hands down. Although I'm also partial to Thai food. NOM NOM NOM.

D: Destinations, favourite, least favourite and why. Favourite? Either London or New York. Because history and museums and nerdiness, oh my! Least favourite? It's a toss up between Salem and Philadelphia. I found both of them disappointing. Or Quito, because I was by myself for five days and was too chicken to venture any distance from the hotel for fear of getting lost and then mugged. Yeah...

E: Event you experienced abroad that made you say 'wow!'. Flying over the Nazca lines in a teeny tiny plane.

F: Favourite mode of transport. I'm quite partial to trains. But mostly I tend to wander around on foot. Because it's free and I'm a cheapskate.

G: Greatest feeling while travelling. Seeing a new place for the first time.

H: Hottest place you've travelled to. Well, technically as I was living in Canberra at the time, it would be Melbourne on Black Saturday. It was around 47 degrees C in Melbourne that day. That's around 117 degrees F. (If you want to experience it, turn your oven on to the lowest setting, and open the door.) Other than that, it would be Guatemala, where it was a millionty degrees with something like 95% humidity. It was pretty unpleasant. Luckily, the amazingness of Tikal made me (partially) forget that it was hot and damp as a fat old man in a sauna. #gross

I: Incredible service you've experienced and where. The good people at Covermore travel insurance. They were AMAZING when Ness got sick in Peru. I've never been so glad to talk to a bogan with an ocker accent in my entire life.

J: Journey that took the longest. I think technically there was a trip home from Canada for Christmas one year when I was a kid that took around 48 hours door to door. But I don't remember any of it. So I'm going to go with flying from Melbourne to Lima. Or, more accurately, Melbourne to Sydney to Auckland to Santiago to Lima. My flight to Sydney left at around 8am and we arrived in Lima at 11.50pm Peru time. Which means it was about 4pm the following day in Melbourne. Fun times!

K: Keepsake from your travels. I seem to have a habit of not really thinking through what I buy overseas. Which is how I ended up buying a blanket in Peru during the first WEEK of a nine week trip. It's really hard to pack a pack around a BLANKET, as it turns out. Guess how many times I've used said blanket? NADA. Not my best purchase ever. What I *do* buy as keepsakes that are a good idea? Bookmarks. Because then every time you open your book, you go "awwwwww, good memories..."

L: Let down sight, where and why. Anything in Salem, Massachusetts. Epic waste of time.

M: Moment where you fell in love with travel. It was either one of the millionty museums I went to as a kid, or watching movies I shouldn't have been allowed to watch because we were on a plane and it was on a giant screen. That's how I saw Pretty Woman when I was four!

N: Nicest hotel you've stayed in. I have no idea what it was called, but when I was a kid, my dad went to a conference in Zurich. And the rest of the family tagged along for the ride. When we got to the hotel, it turned out they'd put us in the penthouse. Which had floor to ceiling glass windows giving us a panoramic view of Zurich. It was pretty awesome.

O: Obsession - what are you obsessed with taking pictures of while travelling? Landscapes. And museum objects. Every time I get home, my mum looks at my pictures and goes "BUT WHERE ARE THE PEOPLE?!?!" Whoops.

P: Passport stamps - how many and from where? In my current passport? 17. From the UK, the US, Peru, Machu Picchu, Ecuador, the Galapagos, Guatemala, Belize, Mexico and Thailand. If you add in two of my three old passports (I couldn't find my very first passport. SAD FACE.), there's a total of 41 stamps, representing 16 different places.

Q: Quirkiest attraction you've visited and where: The big anything. Australia is littered with giant fibreglass crap. Here, for instance, is the big Ned Kelly in Glenrowan.

R: Recommended sight, event or experience: A Broadway show in New York. It's totally worth every penny.

S: Splurge - something you have no problem forking over money for while travelling. Once in a lifetime activities. Whether it's taking a helicopter to the Grand Canyon, flying over the Nazca Lines, riding an elephant, or going to the 20SB Summit to meet up with a bunch of random internet strangers!

T: Touristy thing you've done. Stood with one foot on each side of the equator.

U: Unforgettable travel memory. The Inca Trail. It may nearly have killed me, I may have cried like a little bitch until Ness yelled at me to stop because I was going to make her cry too, and it may have resulted in me almost getting stuck using a squat toilet when my quads cramped up. But it was totally worth it.

V: Visas - how many and for where? Surprisingly few, actually. A student visa for the UK, a residential visa for the UK from when I lived there as a kid, and a visa for France from back when Australia was cranky at France over nuclear testing in the Pacific, and so they made Australians jump through a million hoops to get into France. If I could find my very first passport, there'd probably be a residential visa for Canada in there too.

W: Wine - best glass of wine you've had while travelling and where. Much like beer, I don't drink wine. But I did have some pretty spectacular cocktails at La Boca del Lobo in Quito, Ecuador! (And if you're ever in Quito, you should check it out. It's a seriously awesome restaurant!)

X: eXcellent view and from where. Okay, first of all? Writing 'excellent' like that made me cringey. Secondly, here's a Peruvian volcano, complete with a vicuña in the foreground.

Y: Years spent travelling. 28, more or less. Sure, it may not all have been internationally, and it wasn't CONSTANT travel. But I don't think there's a single year in my life when I haven't boarded a plane/gotten in a car to somewhere or other!

Z: Zealous sports fans and where. We're pretty sports mad in Melbourne. I mean, we have a public holiday for a horse race, for crying out loud! But I'm pretty sure that no one in Melbourne has ever had to barricade themselves into their house in case the soccer hooligans get out of control as a friend had to do when she lived down the road from the stadium. So I'm giving the prize to Leicester, where I did my study abroad.

Tag, you're it! I'm going to tag some of my wonderful bloggy friends because they always seem to have awesome travel stories!
Jorah Day from Terminally Beautiful
Sweeney from Sweeney Says
Vanisha from Vanisha's Life in Australia
Kat from On Oxford Time
Lauren from The Blog You're About to Read

K xx

Picture-palooza

This time three years ago, I was on a plane heading to Peru. That nine weeks in the Americas turned out to be the best and worst of my life. Ness got sick (in a med-evac by the Peruvian Air Force kind of a way) and I got to be grateful that Guatemalan bathrooms are so small that you can (MASSIVE OVERSHARE!) puke into the shower while sitting on the loo. But I got to see some of the most amazing historic sites in the world, and I met people on that trip who've become some of my best friends.

Anyway, seeing as the trip was in my pre-blogging days, I now present the highlights of nine weeks in the Americas!

Arequipa, Peru

En route to Colca Canyon, Peru (complete with alpaca!)

Sunset over Lake Titicaca, Peru

Saqsaywaman, just outside Cusco, Peru

Ollantaytambo, Peru

Inca Trail Day 1, Peru

The best rock on Earth, Inca Trail Day 3, Peru

Inca Trail Day 3, Peru

Machu Picchu, Peru

Group 'Hurrah, We Did It!' photo at Machu Picchu

Machu Picchu from the adjacent mountain, Peru

Standing on the equator, near Quito, Ecuador

Giant tortoises, Santa Cruz, Galapagos Islands

Fur seals on Santiago, Galapagos Islands

Bartolome, Galapagos Islands

Sombrero Chino, Galapagos Islands

Sealions, Sombrero Chino, Galapagos Islands

Frigate Bird, North Seymour, Galapagos Islands

Blue footed booby (snigger), North Seymour, Galapagos Islands

Antigua, Guatemala

Flores, Guatemala

Tikal, Guatemala

Achtun Tunichil Muknal caves, Belize

Chichen Itza, Mexico

Swimming in cenotes near Merida, Mexico

Palenque, Mexico

San Cristobal de las Casas, Mexico

Cramming nine people in a tuktuk, Panajachel, Guatemala. Sara was on the parcel shelf!

Lake Atitlan, Guatemala

Teotihuacan, Mexico

The biggest flag I've ever seen, Mexico City, Mexico

Grand Canyon from a helicopter, USA

The ridiculousness that is The Luxor, Las Vegas, USA

Also, I REALLY wish I could show you the quarantine video that was screened on the way into New Zealand. The woman pulled a massive salami, an entire wheel of cheese and a WHOLE PINEAPPLE OUT OF HER HAND LUGGAGE. It was the greatest thing I've ever seen. Sadly, it doesn't seem to be available online anywhere, so you'll just have to imagine it!

K xx