There's more than one way to get from point A to point B

Traveling is a lot of fun. You get to meet people, see places, and do things that are quite outside of the scope of normal everyday life. Everyone should travel. If more people traveled, I think we’d be a little closer to world peace than we currently are. Traveling gives us the opportunity to connect and understand each other. It breaks down barriers and helps us realize that we really aren’t very different from one another, that our basic human commonalities far outweigh our differences in both number and magnitude.

After spending months trying to write this article, and renaming it several times, it has made me realize something – it’s really difficult to give specific travel advice. Traveling is such a widely varying pursuit, and everyone’s experience and expectations are so dramatically different and can vary so much from destination to destination that it is extremely difficult to say stuff like “you’ll definitely need ______”. So instead of attempting to come up with some kind of definitive packing list, or definitive anything, I’ve decided to instead structure my advice around general “principles” of travel. I have tried to structure them so that they begin with more general advice, and slowly get more and more specific.

If you travel a lot, it is worth getting a passport with more pages

Essentials

(this list is very AP-style in that you can stop reading at any time, and have the most important items and gist. i.e. if you took only one thing with you, it would be your passport, if you took only two things with you, it would be your passport and some money, etc.)

Passport – this might seem obvious, but I’m not just saying that you should have one. Always travel with a few photocopies of the photo page. If you can be bothered, always have the phone numbers of the embassies or consulates of your country in the countries that you’re traveling to. I have so far never had to replace a passport while traveling, but I’ve seen plenty of friends do it and having a photocopy of the old one can speed the process up significantly. Also, if you have the option of getting a passport with more pages (if you travel a lot) then you should get one.

Money – Always have some cash, and always have access to more money. There is no quicker way to derail a trip than to run out of money, and it is surprisingly easy to do. Even if you have a lot of money, if you suddenly find yourself in a country where your cards don’t work, you can be in a lot of trouble. Keeping track of which currencies are used in which countries is important, as is finding a good balance of how much actual cash you carry on your person. Once upon a time, traveling through lots of European countries was a nightmare because you had to have lots of different currencies on hand, now the Euro makes this much easier. South America is a little strange because, depending on where you are, even though each country has its own currency, many places don’t want it and prefer US dollars. Then you get places like Cuba, where for political reasons, the conversion rate from USD to Cuban pesos is ridiculously expensive compared to the conversion from British Pounds, or from the Euro. There is also the consideration of not wanting to have too much cash on hand in the event that you should get robbed. It is also easier to turn down a con-man in the street trying to sell you a worthless 50 Euro “friendship band” if you can open your wallet and show them that you really don’t have any cash on you (which I usually follow up with “do you accept visa?” at which point, annoyed, they leave me alone).

one MILLION colombian pesos... which isn't actually very much

Further on the subject of money, access to it has steadily gotten easier over the years. In many large cities it is possible to make bank withdrawals if your card has a “cirrus” or “maestro” logo on the back. An exorbitant fee is usually charged, so it is worth making a fewer number of withdrawals of larger amounts. Credit cards are also becoming more and more widely accepted although one must be cautious and wary of credit card fraud, which is also becoming more widely practiced. If you’re traveling through more rural or undeveloped areas, cash is generally more useful than cards. Some places will surprise you though, so it always pays to do some research beforehand and listen to other travelers who have traveled recently to your destination. The Netherlands for example is unusual in that, outside of the big cities, credit cards are useless. Even in the big cities, you can’t buy anything from a supermarket with a credit card… and this is in the country that invented insurance, and was the first modern capitalist state in the world, go figure.

Information – especially up-to-date information is very important. Visa regulations, for example, change all the time. When I traveled through France to go to Switzerland in 1995, I needed a visa just to be in transit for 3 hours. Now I don’t need one for any of the Shengen states. A more recent example is Paraguay, which I was sure didn’t require Australian passport holders to have visas when I left home (in January), but by the time I got there (in May) I needed a visa. For all I know the guy might have been making it up, because 50 USD later, everything was ok. The point here is that these things are definitely worth checking. Related to this, are fees you might get hit with at point of entry or exit. These fees are unpredictable and often have funny rules. When an Australian passport holder flies through Chile (this doesn’t apply to the land borders) a fee of 30 USD must be paid. Why? Apparently Australia does the same to Chilean passport holders who fly through Australia. However, this is a once-off fee, and doesn’t have to be paid again… ever (and for all I know, it may not even exist anymore). But little fees like this can often result in embarrassing situations in airports where you haven’t got enough money in the correct currency, and the airport has no credit card facilities.

SO many more ways to get from point A to point B...

Tied into the point about information is language – making even a token attempt at speaking the local tongue can make it ten times easier to obtain good information. Luckily, thanks to the British and subsequent American empires, English is the world’s most widely-spoken language. However, there are many parts of the world where it is not spoken AT ALL. Most of Latin America only speaks Spanish and vast swathes of Africa and the Middle East only speak Arabic or French. In China, outside of big tourist areas in big cities you will need to know some Chinese. Even in very urban Moscow, very few people speak any English. Even within English-speaking countries you may encounter difficulties with accents. Luckily, I speak with a very neutral BBC British-Australian mix and can, under duress, mimic many kinds of American, and Scottish accents (which speakers of English as a second language struggle with).

An important point to remember when speaking to someone for whom English is not their native tongue, is that their English is probably still a lot better than your French or German (or whatever you dropped out of in high school). Speak slowly and clearly, pronounce all the letters in the words, and try not to use any slang. Repeating what you just said but louder is generally not a good way to make yourself understood. Don’t be impatient. It is also useful to remember that, in verbal communication, a LOT is communicated by your tone and body language so try to accentuate that. Carrying a notepad and playing pictionary is also a great way to communicate if you really do just suck at words.

Research, research, research. The internet is a wonderful tool and it allows you to get a very good idea of the places you might visit before you get there. Weather forecasts, climate conditions, diseases to look out for, sights to see, exchange rates, useful phrases – all just a click away. Also, with the prevalence of travel blogs, one can also experience foreign destinations from many different perspectives before even booking a flight.

Uses for duct tape: making two bags into one bag

Tape – it might sound obvious, but it is essential to have some kind of heavy-duty tape with you. Duct tape and gaffer tape work best and are quite inexpensive and widely available. Medical tape is expensive, but generally of a very high quality. I usually travel with some kind of heavy-duty tape as well as a small roll of thin medical tape. The thin tape is for my feet, but is also good for spot-repairs on small appliances. The thick tape is useful for all sorts of things and the more off-the-beaten-trail you go, the more useful you will find it. Even on my last trip through Europe, a relatively tame trip even though it included a lot of eastern Europe, I used the small tape to repair my toiletries bag, which burst a seam, and the big tape to tape two small check-in bags together to form one larger check-in bag and avoid the extra bag fee that KLM hits you with if you check in more than one bag.

A Towel – this might seem very Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, but there is actually a lot of truth to this. A towel is obviously useful for drying one’s self after a shower, but it can also double as a makeshift beach towel, a tourniquet, and even a tablecloth. Towels are also surprisingly useful for emergency situations – maybe you get a bleeding nose and there are no tissues around (like, for example, if you’re riding an elephant at the time), maybe you’ve visited a holy site and forgot to bring something to kneel on, or maybe you have an unexpected sexual encounter – you get the point; towels are useful. I’m personally a big fan of these slightly overpriced microfiber towels. They are very thin, light, pack into a small space, and do two things very well – they dry you well, and they themselves dry very quickly.

This is all I traveled with for the last 3 months of my trip through South America

General Advice

Less is more – packing light has become easier and easier. The outdoor clothing industry is big business and as a result we have a myriad of space-saving gadgets to help us with our packing. An outdoor clothing shop is the most likely place for you to get one of those space-saving microfiber towels, for example. As for clothing, check the average temperature of your destination during the time you’ll be there and pack accordingly. Dress in layers and choose your clothing combinations to be as versatile as possible, i.e. don’t pack a pair of pants that only goes well with one shirt. Choose clothing that is easily washable, and that dries quickly. Until recently, clothing that did this was a bit limited style-wise and generally made you look like you were a regular at Mount Everest base camp. Luckily things have improved, and the range of this kind of “travel-convenient” clothing has expanded dramatically.

Gadgets are wonderful things. I still travel everywhere with a laptop to deal with the obscene amount of photos that I take wherever I go, but with the advent of netbooks, and soon, slate tablet computers, even this will become less and less of a burden. My iPhone too has made things easier, as it combines phone, notepad, gps, diary, gaming console, torch, and music box (and camera, if your standards aren’t as high as mine) into one device. The ability to surf the internet and access just about any information you can think of (and a lot of information that you can’t think of) is truly a godsend and the combination of all of these things has aided me greatly in my travels. As a general rule, anything that can serve more than one function should be chosen over something that serves only one function. Camera flash cover that also functions as a teacup – take it, hair gel that also functions as an adhesive – take it, mosquito spray that doubles as a cream substitute for your coffee – you get the idea.

2 months in Europe - note the compression bags for my clothes, and that most of the space in my bag is taken up by photo gear.

Local knowledge – us it. Guidebooks are wonderful, as is google and wikitravel, but few things are more valuable (and rewarding) than having a local show you around their hometown/country. I’ve been extremely lucky in that throughout my life I’ve been exposed to environments which have allowed me to meet and get to know many people who live all around the world. Getting a local’s perspective isn’t just a page out of stuffwhitepeoplelike, but is your best chance at understanding what it is really like to live in a place. In addition, a local will be able to give you a much more authentic cultural experience including food, social life, and (if you time your trip well) festivals. Think about it, if someone from Hungary, Romania or Denmark (just to use some recent examples) were to visit your home, you would totally be able make sure they get a better experience and see better stuff than your standard whistle-stop package tour. Hanging with a local is also a kazillion times safer than bashing it like a tourist because having a local with you, who can order in the local language, and buy you public transport tickets without the extensive use of sign language, gives you the kind of street cred that keeps unsavoury types at bay (unless your local is a local drug dealer or pimp, in which case it may not be as safe).

Group up – traveling alone can be very rewarding, and I’ve done it quite a lot, but it presents many challenges which disappear when you travel as a group. There are many advantages to traveling in a group aside from the good company: it allows you to pool resources more easily, it is safer, it makes it a hell of a lot easier to go to the toilet (you don’t have to take all your stuff with you) while in transit, and it also ensures that you get one of two photos that actually have you in them. It can also give you more bargaining power when negotiating the price of tours, as well as making things cheaper.

For the same reasons that groups are much more effective at trivia nights than single people or pairs of people, traveling in a group allows you to use your collective knowledge and travel experience to more effectively get stuff done. However there is more to benefit from than simply the pooling of knowledge – throwing different people together means that there is a greater chance of having different personalities. The mixing of different personality types can make for conflict… but if you can behave like adults, it can also be quite a positive boon – some people are just better suited to dealing with cranky russian train ticket inspectors, while others are just good at checking all of the little details, like making sure everyone has all of their stuff with them.

Use the post office – If there was a postal equivalent to frequent flying miles for using post offices, then I would probably have a few… umm… free packages by now. As I have become more experienced with travel, I have gotten better at not accumulating useless things along the way. I generally don’t buy souvenirs for people unless it is a very special occasion, like a wedding. Even without the accumulation of stuff, it often happens during a trip that you realize you don’t really need a certain item, or commonly, after a section of your trip spent say, rock climbing, all your rock climbing gear becomes useless. It is a good idea to post the gear home. Of course one should beware of the quality of the postal service in whichever country you happen to be in. You’re pretty safe when it comes to advanced industrialized countries like Denmark or Australia, but if you find yourself in Cuba or Mexico, then finding a DHL or FedEx might be a safer bet.

absolutely essential - the multi-adaptor (newer models come with USB slots for charging smartphones)

Specific Advice

Power - electricity may or may not be a crucial element in your travel kit. I usually travel with a laptop, a phone, and a LOT of photo gear so it’s very important to me. All of this stuff needs charging. Luckily, these days the power adaptors for most appliances will accept any voltage meaning you don’t have to carry a transformer around with you (and those things are HEAVY). To prevent confusion with plugs, I generally only travel with appliances with american plugs (for no other reason than they are the most compact). I carry one adaptor (photo above) and one surge-protecting powerboard which takes three US-style plugs. Spare batteries for devices are essential – cameras, camera flashes, phones, flashlights.

Scams – more than just an annoyance, some scams can be quite elaborate and can completely ruin a trip. These are most common in poorer countries, but can also be encountered in wealthy countries where there is a high degree of income inequality. Obviously you should always try to blend in with the locals, but often this is simply not possible (there aren’t many asian people in Romania, for example). Unfortunately it is very difficult to avoid certain scams, but a few general rules of thumb will help you stay out of most trouble.

Do not ever hand over your passport, even if a person looks very official. Border checkpoints, embassies, and airports are the only safe places to hand a passport to someone else, and even then you should keep it in your sight. An illustrative (true) short story:

I was walking to the train station, about to leave Budapest, Hungary recently when a man came up to me at a quiet intersection asked for directions. Knowing the area quite well (it was near my hotel) I stopped and tried to help him when another man claiming to be an undercover policeman approached us and demanded to see our passports. He flipped open his wallet to reveal questionably-authentic police credentials and the other man (who had just asked for directions) quickly handed his passport over. Luckily I was paying attention quite closely to what was going on, and I detected in the body language of the two men that they knew each other (they were pretty terrible actors) so I was immediately suspicious. At first I refused, and as the “policeman” became insistent, I took my passport out and showed him the photo page, but steadfastly refused to hand it over. I stared him down for an awkward minute or two until he relented and then tried a different tack. He asked to “check our cash” at which point I went from 99% to 100% sure that this was a scam. I told him that I wouldn’t give him my cash, and if he was a legitimate policeman, then I would go back to a police station with him and we could sort it all out. Then I started walking away.

You just have to keep your wits about you and be very wary. If you have an autism spectrum disorder, even a mild case of asperger’s, then you should really travel with a friend who is good at playing poker if you intend on going anywhere off the well-worn tourist trail.

Beggars – as a general rule, I don’t give money to beggars. This might seem strange coming from a bleeding-heart liberal such as myself, but after much thinking about ways to end poverty, I’ve decided that giving money to beggars doesn’t accomplish anything. It is emotionally difficult for me not to give money to beggars because I do feel a great deal of pity for them, but in the grand scheme of things, if I give my spare change instead to a donation tin at a homeless shelter, or an NGO (things like UNICEF‘s change for good program) then my money will accomplish more. I guess the point here is that you shouldn’t give your money to beggars, but instead give that money to organizations who are working to ensure that the begging doesn’t need to happen. (however, in what may be viewed as very hypocritical, I will give money to buskers, but only if they play their instruments well).

Crime – it happens. It happens everywhere. Don’t be afraid of it, because most of it is just a little bit inconvenient and not life-threatening. Avoiding crime is a combination of commonsense (dimly lit alleyways at midnight? maybe steer clear of those…) as well as being alert and astute. For someone like me, it is a little easier because I’m male, very strong for my size, and an unusually fast runner. Those attributes may make it easier for me to get out of a sticky situation, but what they really do is make me a less likely target. A petty thief after a snatch-and-grab would probably see me and think “too hard” and move onto a short overweight girl with a limp who is asking every other passer-by if they speak English. Hotel rooms are a bit of a mixed bag. Don’t leave passports in hotel rooms. An interesting strategy I’ve heard from a few other travelers is to have a “fake” wallet with a small amount of cash, and expired credit cards to hand over in the event of a mugging.

Travel insurance is a good idea if you’re traveling to a country like Colombia, where the chances of being robbed (even from a supposedly secure hotel room) are high. Also make sure you have contact details for your credit and debit cards so you can quickly cancel them in an emergency (actually, it’s easier to keep those numbers safe with someone at home and just call them in an emergency, and they can make all the necessary calls).

keeping mobile costs down can be a challenge, as can keeping all your sim cards organized

Sim cards – a nomadic existence can be expensive, and this can manifest itself especially acutely in the cost of making mobile telephone calls. Most carriers offer international roaming on their phone plans, but it can be extremely expensive. It is slowly getting cheaper, but if you’re like me and seem to have no permanent residence, it is also very difficult to get a phone plan and you end up only having prepaid numbers, which either don’t offer roaming, or offer it at an exorbitant price. Add to that my *need* to have data access on a 3G network and things can get complicated. So far my best solution has been a mixed strategy of cheap prepaid sim cards from countries that offer them with data, and a special-purpose roaming sim with which I can make and receive calls and text messages from 230 different countries (most of which I can’t even name) and data in most of those countries (so far Hungary and Denmark are the only two where I haven’t been able to get data). The romaing sim is tremendously convenient, but also quite expensive to use (but less expensive than the international roaming charges of most carriers). In addition to this, I have had to cut up all my standard sim cards to make them micro-sim-sized to fit into my iPhone 4. Someday, when a more advanced version of the iPad comes along, I will probably have to work something out for that too.

Meds – I’m generally not the sort of person who pops pills, but when traveling, one should be prepared to. First there are pills designed for diarrhea – one should be cautious with these though because often it is good to just “get it all out” so to speak, because these pills work by “blocking up the pipes” so to speak. There are various pills available for motion sickness as well as natural remedies involving wristbands and acupuncture points. In any case, I am so susceptible to motion sickness (especially on boats) that none of these remedies work, so I don’t even bother. For sleep, there is melatonin which works on your body’s endocrine cycle rather than simply sedating you. This has several advantages, the first being that it will help your body clock adjust to new time zones faster, and secondly normal sedatives help you fall asleep, but the quality of your sleep is often adversely affected (this also happens when you drink yourself to sleep). Then of course there is doxycycline for malaria prevention (or lariam, if you don’t mind having trippy dreams).

Also included in the “meds” section is vaccines. Do some research into where you’re going and get the necessary vaccines. Most clinics will be able to advise you on which vaccines are required for which regions of the world, and longer trips will generally require more jabs. Also pay attention to legal requirements – in Australia, if you’ve traveled to Africa or South America, they won’t let you back in the country unless you have a certificate saying that you’ve had a yellow fever vaccination.

somewhere behind the orange gloves is me, and St Basil's Cathederal

Clothes – don’t take too many. It is also good to keep in mind that if you’re going somewhere with a particularly harsh or extreme climate, then the kind of clothing you will need will not only be more readily available there, but it will probably be cheaper too. As was shown in a previous photo, I pack my clothing into compression bags which not only serve to reduce the space taken up by the clothing, but also keeps them dry in the event that they are exposed to water (or your bottle of contact lens solution leaks on the plane). I usually pack about three full sets of clothes and mix and match them. I always take no-iron shirts, and I always choose the ones with breast pockets, which are useful for boarding passes, train and bus tickets, and pocket calculators if you’re going for the nerdy look. You should also take at least one item of clothing (preferably an accessory like a hat or glove) which is really brightly coloured. This is useful for being spotted in a crowd, or from a distance, which is important when meeting up with people, especially if they don’t know what you look like, so you can say “I’m the one with the orange gloves”.

Photos – take lots. The advent of digital photography has made this easier than ever. You don’t need to worry about carting film around with you, nor do you have to worry about getting it developed. It is also a lot easier to share your photos (this website is proof enough of that) than it used to be. It is the author’s opinion that it is worth carting around a large SLR camera along with several lenses as well as an external flashgun. Even if you don’t hold a similar view, there are still plenty of compact cameras out there now with large image sensors which can take photos of near-SLR quality. For anyone out there who is wondering, I travel with a Nikon D700 with the 24-70mm f/2.8 lens as my primary “walk-about” lens. I also pack an SB-900 flashgun and a fairly large lightbox attachment to go with it. As for lenses, I will usually bring along a 60mm macro lens, and maybe the 70-200mm f/2.8 depending on whether or not I think I’ll have to take photos of things from far away. I have written more extensively on photo gear elsewhere on this website. I usually also travel with a laptop of some kind so that I can upload the photos to the internet as quickly as possible. For those with a less-overdeveloped sense of urgency, a handful of high-capacity SD cards should be enough to get you through a trip.

so long, farewell, auf wiedersehen goodbeye

The week prior to that, most of us were in Moscow for the Junior World Championships. Of course, only two of the skaters in our squad are actually juniors, the rest of us were basically there as “team support” otherwise known as tourists. I had run into some visa trouble prior to departing, the main problem being that I didn’t have one. You see, it ordinarily takes 6 working days to process a Russian visa, but since I had only returned from Canada 6 days previously (and only 4 working days) there was worry that I might not be able to get my visa in time. Add to that, the strange quirk that the Russian consulate was closed on international women’s day, and the fact that it took two hours (and almost 50 euros) each way for me to get there by train, I really only had two working days to play with. Luckily, everything worked out and I was able to travel to Moscow as a tourist team leader for Australia (and Sophie also tagged along, as the team’s medical person).

Touristing around Moscow was an interesting experience. Traveling is something that I do quite often but it is very rare that I get to experience a place that is as “foreign” as Moscow city is. First, there was the language. Prior to arriving in Moscow, I did not know any of the letters of the Cyrillic alphabet that weren’t obviously the same as those from the Latin alphabet. On the evening we arrived, I grabbed a few tourist maps of the city and began trying to teach myself the alphabet, if only to enable me to recognize train stations. By then end of our four-day trip, I was able to read Cyrillic (although not very quickly, and not with any understanding of what the words actually meant, though most were guessable). Trains in Moscow are pretty special. The Metro is the second most used in the world (behind Tokyo), trains run frequently, and the coverage is good. The stations themselves are magnificent. My darkroom website features a stitched panoramic shot of the Komsomolskaya station to give you an example of just how wonderful these places are.

We had a good day and a half of dedicated touristing during which we saw a lot of the city. We began with a bus tour just to get an initial familiarization with the sights and layout of the city. As it was low season (apparently, everyone comes in the summer time and not in the middle of winter) the bus was empty save for us, so even though we arrived late, and in the wrong location, the bus actually came around to pick us up. After the bus tour, we went walking and did a bit of museum-hopping as well as visiting Lenin’s tomb. Lenin’s tomb is an interesting sight because, despite dying in 1924, his body has been preserved (quite well, if slightly discoloured) in a tomb where anyone can come and visit.

St Basil's Cathedral at Red Square

Not only is Russian architecture very different to anything that I’m used to (a constant reminder that I’m in a foreign city) Russian history itself lends a strange backdrop to the experience of modern Moscow. In many ways, Moscow reminded me of Beijing, and the parallels don’t stop at comparisons of communist regimes. Both China and Russia experienced long histories of very powerful dynastic empires, “glory days” if you will, during which the respective countries were dominant world powers. Then the empires fell into decline, exacerbated by war, and were eventually overthrown. Now they are both growing and struggling with their image and identity in the world.

Here is a link to some of the photos from the trip.

Junior world championships went well, with a few Australian records falling (not just junior records either). We all seemed to enjoy ourselves and are very hopeful for the future of Australian speed skating. And now we come to the reason for the name of this blog entry – the future of Australian speed skating will most likely not include me. Obviously I will continue to skate (because I really enjoy it) but intense training and high-level competition are not for me anymore. I am also getting older, and my body is becoming less-suited to sports like speed skating, and more-suited to sports like curling, which I intend to take up. I also hope to continue my academic career a bit, and eventually get a job and save the world (though not necessarily in that order). Do not be alarmed – this is not the penultimate post of the website, but it is the penultimate post concerning speed skating.

Why penultimate? Because I expect to have one more.

Some of you may be aware already, but I’m currently in the process of shooting and then putting together a documentary about the journey of the Australian speed skating team from about October 2008 until now. This is a difficult process because, apart from all of the shooting that has to be done and interviews (all on a super tight budget), I will soon have to hit the editing suites and begin editing video and sound until this documentary feature comes together. Hopefully it will be of high enough quality to do justice to the extraordinary story of this group of skaters. If anyone out there knows anything about documentary film making or would like to help out, I would really appreciate any assistance (I’ve never done this before). Eventually I’d like to hit a few film festivals and then get this doco shown on Australian and Dutch TV, and maybe a few other countries depending on how successful it is. Hopefully I can get this all done before the next Olympic Games in Сочи (Sochi).

And finally, possibly the last Yeow News Network update to primarily feature speed skating. (This one is of a slightly comical nature) Enjoy!

Barack Obama announces... not a lot

København

The anti-climax to rival all anti-climaxes occurred late on Friday, December 18th 2009. One of the great opportunities for the world to come together and address the urgent problems brought about by man-made climate change, and to take decisive steps towards mitigating it was squandered in dramatic fashion which ended in Barack Obama announcing a draft agreement (that hardly anyone had seen, much less agreed to). I stood, dumbstruck, alongside hundreds of others who represented the many NGOs¹ who congregated in the “Øksnehallen” while the most powerful man in the world deflated our hopes for a meaningful climate accord.

I arrived late on the stage. The conference had already been going for one and a half weeks when I arrived disheveled and jet-lagged late on Wednesday evening. My flight from Salt Lake City to Calgary had been relatively uneventful save for the spectacular flyover of the Grand Canyon. My flight from Calgary to Copenhagen, however was anything but. It seemed doomed from the very beginning when my taxi from the hotel to the airport managed to break down due to a flat battery. After an agonizing wait for a relief taxi to arrive, I rushed into the airport terminal to find a huge queue waiting to check in to my flight, which was to depart for London’s Heathrow airport in half and hour’s time. Luckily, the flight had been delayed by 3 hours due to a mechanical failure. I later learned that the mechanical failure was so bad that an entirely new aircraft had to be flown in from Toronto, hence the ridiculous delay.

The Grand Canyon

When I arrived at the check-in desk I was informed of the rather distressing news that there were many more people booked on the flight than there were seats. I was given a “standby” ticket which I was to hold on to at the gate and wait for my name to be called from a list. Brilliant. So there I sat, nervously, while they called names out and boarded the plane. I had changed my ticket to Amsterdam to Copenhagen only the day before, and I was now beginning to regret that last-minute decision. Just as the lounge was emptying and it looked like they had just about boarded the plane completely, they called my name out. I was thrilled. I eagerly marched onto the plane and listened – no more names were being called. I had miraculously made it onto the last available spot on the aircraft. It also happened that this last available spot was in the first class part of the cabin, which made my 9-hour transit to London just a little more bearable than it usually isn’t.

Bright, sunny London Heathrow

Obviously, arriving in London 3 hours late meant that I missed my connecting flight on to Copenhagen. Luckily, the lovely people at the Scandinavian Airlines transfer desk were able to fit me onto the next flight out and I ended up finally arriving in Copenhagen (or København to the locas) a bit past 10pm (I was originally meant to arrive at about 5pm).

A bar somewhere in København

Those who have followed my travels closely will note that my final decision to divert my flight to Copenhagen came very last minute (Monday, in fact) and I had not yet arranged accommodation. Just calling a hotel wasn’t going to work, because the largest, most significant conference on climate change EVER was taking place, and with over 100 heads of state arriving for it, all the hotels were booked out. So I did what came naturally to me, and I went to a bar to meet up with some friends. As it happened, I picked a very good bar, and an even better group of friends to bump into during my first hours in Copenhagen. Among those present were names such as Naomi Klein, and Andy Bichlbaum of the “Yes Men“. Among the crowd was a friend from Columbia, Laurel Whitney, who had recently began working with the Yes Men who was able to find me a couch to crash on for the next few days.

A Couch

Early the next day, I found my way into downtown Copenhagen and towards the very centrally-located Gallery Poulsen, which was to be the Headquarters of various art-activist groups during the COP15. In the basement of the art gallery, there was an impressive set up of a “fake” Bella Center. From a distance, the set looked like an incomplete furniture construction project, with logos scattered randomly around the place, and bubble wrap and mattresses taped to the walls. However, on closer inspection, particularly if you were to look through the viewfinder of one of the cameras mounted on a tripod, the space looked exactly like one of the many rooms from within the “real” Bella center from which “real” press conferences were being transmitted.

HQ

In fact, it was from this very headquarters that an elaborate prank on Canada was pulled. It is not well-known that Canada is some 36% over its agreed-on Kyoto protocol targets. Moreover, it has recently been trying to amend any agreements to set the measurement baseline to more recent times, obviously because then Canada wouldn’t have to reduce its carbon emissions as much. About five press releases and a few videos later, at least one Canadian minister “shit his pants” (I’m not joking, one of the Danish mainstream newspapers actually wrote that) and it made big news all over Canada. Read more on the story here.

Our Bella Center

Not wanting to have a perfectly awesome looking set go to waste, the crew decided in typical yes men fashion to use it for a bit more culture jamming. By the time I arrived, the conference had started refusing entry to many of the “civil society” organizations which were supposed to be there. Many NGOs suddenly found that their accreditations no longer got them into the building. Of course, when you have a conference venue that seats 15,000 and end up with over 45,000 registrations, these are the sorts of problems that you run into. So, “good COP15″ was born so that people could give positive “wouldn’t it be nice if this really happened” messages from our own Bella Center, and they would then be broadcast on the web at the good-COP15 website.

A flip-cam and some logos is all you need...

In between our culture-jamming shenanigans, there were nightly speakers and forums in various venues around the city. Just up the road, at the “clean air blogging center” on the Thursday night, we went to hear a speaker from the United Nations foundation (who had basically sponsored the blogging center and the tcktcktck project) as well as give a performance of our own which featured a collaboration with the Yes Men crew and their Survivaballs as well as the climate debt agents with whom we collaborated for the Canada hoax.

speakers and bloggers come together at the fresh air blogging center

Survivaballs...

By the end of the week, the actual negotiations seemed to be going pear-shaped. Friday morning saw the arrival of the President of the United States, Barack Obama, and with his arrival our hopes were buoyed. However, when he gave his opening speech, we were all somewhat deflated because… well… he didn’t really say anything.

Gathering round to watch Obama speak (notice the Obama socks)

Throughout the day we continued to record messages, and continued to deal with the technical difficulties of editing and converting those videos to be viewed on the internet. Towards the end of the day, feeling exhausted, we journeyed out into the city to find something to eat, and planned to eventually end up at what was described by at least one person as “the mother of all NGO parties”. By the time 10pm rolled around, we still weren’t quite sure where this party was supposed to be, but decided that a good idea would be to stop by at the Øksnehallen because that is where all the NGOs who were kicked out of the Bella Center (almost all of them) had set up shop.

Øksnehallen

It was basically a huge warehouse with a lot of tables and free wireless internet. At one end of the hall, there were two large screens where a live telecast of what was happening in the (real) Bella Center was being screened. We eventually learned that the party was at a basement location very close to the hall and that everybody was tired from two weeks of trying very hard to get stuff done, usually with very limited success. There was a feeling that the negotiations would run well into Saturday and possibly even Sunday.

keeping track of live webcasts from the white house

Suddenly, somewhat unexpectedly, Barack Obama was on the screen. “Turn the sound up” someone cried. An entire warehouse full of people gravitated towards the screen where Obama was speaking to listen to what possible miracles he might have pulled on the world of flagging climate negotiations.

gather round, Obama is speaking

If there was ever a defining moment in the COP15, this was it. This was more than disappointing, this was infuriating. To all those in the know, (and EVERYONE in the room knew) Obama had delivered a less than useful deal. Moreover, the announcement of this draft had only been seen by a very small number of delegates and many were completely blindsided by this – never a good thing in international negotiations. There were jeers, and some outright booing from the crowd. Many onlookers were visibly upset and angry at what they were hearing. And to add insult to injury, Obama concluded his speech with “see you on the plane”, a comment that was so grating and inappropriate, that he had to backpedal embarrassingly for a few moments before he finally made his rushed exit.

The anger was so great, that a large number of us (myself included) headed to the Bella Center almost immediately and began protesting. If only to vent our anger, we gathered outside the Bella Center and shouted for hours in the -10 weather.

Protest outside the Bella Center

It got very cold, and very windy, but we persisted. I don’t know if anyone heard us. The police were out in force, but they seemed to be in quite a good mood that night. If any of them were edgy, the appearance of a few survivaballs took the edge off and lightened the mood a bit.

Survivaballs make any protest more fun

We eventually got tired, gave up, and went home. The negotiations hadn’t gone as well as we’d hoped and there wasn’t a whole lot more we could do about it. Later that night (at about 2am) I got a call from a friend who was still inside the Bella Center – they were still going, and they, like us, were not at all happy with what had happened.

Climate Shame

We were all over the newspapers in the following days. We had made friends with a lot of the local activists and journalists, one of whom related to us an almost unbelievable story: He found Lord Monckton (a famously outspoken climate change denier) and a delegate from the Cook Islands (one of the Islands which is shrinking because of sea-level rise), taken the two on stage and, with one in each hand, raised Monckton’s and declared him the winner of these climate talks. What ensued was a heated conversation between the delegate, who was angry and distraught because her mother’s house was literally being flooded by the rising seas, and Lord Monckton who kept insisting that the science indicated that what she described was impossible because climate change was actually one big hoax.

No, I didn’t believe the story either, until this journalist pointed out that he made sure that he got a photo of it and that it was on the back page of one of the major newspapers.

Monckton is declared the winner!

So who really won? Nobody. There are talks that the talks will be continued ASAP, i.e. before the next scheduled COP² (Mexico). Currently the word is Bonn, in April or May 2010, maybe earlier. Hopefully, next time I’ll be able to arrive a bit sooner than with only 2 days to go (although the President of the United States of America arrived on the last day and expected to achieve something, and instead he did the opposite, hmmm). The disappointment is akin to seeing a beloved football team lose an important game, except in this case, the fate of humanity rests on the outcome while in the other case, it’s just a dumb game. Maybe someday I’ll learn to deal with it, hopefully by becoming more involved in the process than just hanging out with a bunch of activist pranksters (not that there’s anything wrong with that).

A return fare to Washington DC from New York is $35. Moreover, the bus doesn’t go to a stupid bus station, it drops you off in Chinatown!

…so my journey begins in chinatown in New York

…chinatown in DC doesn’t look too different.

My original idea was to take a later bus and arrive in time to watch the sunrise. Unfortunately, many things conspired against this plan. First of all, the last bus to leave New York leaves at 11pm and, since there is very little traffic at this time of the night, it arrives in DC at 3am. Oh well… let’s try to find the Capitol building… hey mister traffic light, can you please point me to the capitol? thanks.

Ever wondered what the Washington monument looks like at about 4am?

…how about that Capitol?

the funny colour changes on the monument are caused by the way the water flows off of it… yes… it was raining when I got there.

A slightly different perspective on the WWII memorial, one of the newest memorials in the capital, dedicated in 2004. The structure that dominates the centre is an arch-gazebo-thing representing the pacific operations theatre. The pillars to the left and right each represent a state or territory. The wreaths are of oak and wheat symbolizing strength and… food, yum.

…and on the ground, a plaque to remind everyone of what the memorial is actually for.

here it is again, taken with a lens with a less absurd focal length.

…another picture of the monument… once the world’s tallest penis… er… structure. Until the Eiffel tower took the title in 1889

A duck! (if you weigh as much as a duck, then you must be made of wood, and therefore a witch… geddit?)

oohhh… here comes the sunrise…

except that there were too many clouds to actually see the sun rise, d’oh

This is the landing from which Martin Luther King JR delivered his famous “I Have a Dream” speech. Of course, when he did that, there were lots more people in front, and it probably wasn’t 7am.

And behind him, was the statue of the man who emancipated the slaves, the 16th president of the United States, Abraham Lincoln.

The poor chap had to deal with the pesky american civil war… but for his troubles, he is credited with holding the union together

…and his very famous “four score and seven” speech… rather coincidentally, there are exactly four score and seven steps leading up to the monument.

This reminded me of that movie – “Team America”. You know, the easiest way to support the troops is not to go to war…

I like how all the signs have “United States” on the top, just in case you forget which country you happen to be in.

Oh, how I would like to have a tree named afer me someday.

Finally, 8:30am came around and something opened… the Smithsonian Institute visitors and information centre.

“what’re you looking at?”

there were many pretty display cases, but if I wanted natural history, I could always just go to New York (I do live there, after all)

so just a quick stroll down to road… oohh… what’s this, a monster truck. I wonder if it is a hybrid… it’d have a rather alarming carbon footprint otherwise

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! (this is just an indication that I am perfectly sane)

…and apart from the pretty buildings and monuments, this is pretty much the whole reason that I came here

just outside the enrance, was this funny looking thing, which looks a bit like a fancy back-scratcher for a very very large man with a very very itchy back

The Spirit of St Louis, named for the small town that supported Charles Lindbergh’s first ever transatlantic flight. Notice that it doesn’t actually have a windscreen… the budget was small, at about 15,000 and Lindbergh had to look through a periscope to see where he was going.

The Messerschmitt Me 262, the word’s first ever jet-figher plane… unfortunately came too late to change the tide in the war.

A scale model of the Nimitz-class aircraft carriers of the age of modern naval warfare. (or perhaps it was the real deal… in which case… it is a carrier for ants, and needs to be at least three times bigger…) Aircraft carriers effectively rendered Battleships, Battlecruisers and Cruisers obsolete.

Yay! more scale models (I used to make tons of these as a kid)

This is a “heads up display” or HUD. It was basically a very fancy gunsight which, on more modern planes, also shows you trivial little details like your bearings, altitude and airspeed

Medals of Honour (except they spelled “Honour” incorrectly)

The Zero… the bane of allied forces fighting in the pacific. More manœuverable than just about anything… until the P-51 mustang came along… and that was very late in the piece. The US simply relied on greater numbers to defeat the Japanese until then…

On top, the Messerschmitt Bf-109, the Luftwaffe’s word for “we kick ass”. These guys f**ked up allied planes in the early part of the war and, if it weren’t for the superior top-speed of spitfires, may well have won the war in the air. Below… the P-51 mustang by North American Aviation (now Rockwell), “Cadillac of the sky” benefited from advanced aerodynamics which made it faster AND more fuel efficient, giving it enough range to escort bombers for the full duration of their missions… which decisively turned the war in favour of the allies.

Model planes used to teach pilots how to identify theirs and enemy planes

This place is soooo cool. Most of these planes aren’t even models, they’re the real thing.

…and the one that started it all – the Wright Flyer, which made its first powered flight in 1903

This is the camera that they took to the moon.

…what I want to know, is where are the cupholders?

The Saturn V rocket, which would carry Apollo 11 to the moon. (this is a scale model, the real thing is a bit bigger)

The F-1 engines for the Saturn V first module. Interestingly, the engines for the subsequent stages of the rocket are named J-1, J-2, J-3 etc… these guys were manufactured by the same people who made the P-51 from a few pictures ago.

The Lunar lander. This is a life-size model… the real ones aren’t around anymore. The bottom half gets left on the moon, you see, so they’re a little tricky to retrieve, and the top half is discarded once its job is complete.

The American History museum was closed for renovations, so they moved some of the cooler items to the Air and Space museum temporarily. This is Abe’s hat…

…and Ed’s light bulb.

…and my hero – Kermit the Frog.

“there’s no place like home”

This is a Stradivarius… this one is interesting in that it is one of only 11 Stadivari which are decorated…

R2D2 and C3P0 from the Stargate trilogy

…a very old stopwatch.

This was a bit of a curiosity. An old typewriter. The caption is factually incorrect, and I must write to the Smithsonian about it when I get the time. It says that they arrangement of keys was to (1) prevent the typewriter from jamming (this is correct) and (2) also to promote faster typing (this is not correct, in fact, the very opposite is true, the arrangement is designed to slow down typists so that the typewriter wouldn’t jam)

Mold on exhibits is a museum curator’s nightmare… except of course, when it is this mold.

Some guy named Babe Ruth was apparently very good at baseball. (actually, he was a really really good pitcher… but he ended up stuck with the bat all the time because of the economic principle of comparative advantage)

This one belonged to Louis Armstrong

These were Muhammed Ali’s (the boxer formerly known as Cassius Clay)

Just can’t get enough of George Washington’s stuff…

Who’s seen “Full Metal Jacket”? That’s the hard hat.

I kinda grew up watching M*A*S*H… this is the streetsign from the set.

…and this is the stopwatch from 60 minutes.

This is Jackie Kennedy’s gown…I think she borrowed it from the Elves

For some reason, some of the exhibits were covered. I can make out some experimental high-altitude test planes, and the famous Soyuz 19 -Apollo 18 dock.

The X-29, an experimental forward-swept winged plane. It was so unsable that it required a computer to keep it in the air, and if that computer malfunctioned, the pilot had to eject.

Another experimental plane, the HIMAT, designed to test the boundaries of agility in air combat, and a modern example of computer-aided design.

More computer-aided design, this time of a turboprop.

The North American Aviation X-15, experimental planes tested in the upper limits of the atmosphere. They, were dropped from a B-29 bomber after already attaining a very high altitude… then proceeded upwards. They, for all intents and purposes, got into space… and reached speeds as high as 6.7 times the speed of sound. The project ceased after 199 flights.

This guy will hit you before you’ve even heard it coming… why? Because it’s the Bell X-1, piloted by Chuck Yeager, the first plane to (officially) breach the sound barrier.

Speaking of firsts, just over 10 years after Glamorous Glennis’ supersonic (the name of Yeager’s X-1) flight, the Russians pulled a fast one on us and put Sputnik 1 into space.

Not to be oudone, about twelve years after that… the US put a man on the moon. Whoah… and here’s the heat shield of the Apollo 11 command module (named Columbia)

Apparently, there’s music on the moon as well. Maybe that’s what Holst was referring to with the whole “music of the spheres” deal

When I walked out, the rain had ceased… and the St. Patrick’s day parade was just getting started (a whole day before St Patrick’s day)

A pipe band… and here is its drum Major…notice the harp on his belt to indicate Irish origin rather than Scottish (which is what the style of bagpipes seem to suggest)

…and most of the parade was like this… costumes and Irish dancing.

..and some music. Irish dance music, rather than moon rock.

At least these kids coordinated their colours well… although the pink sneakers did kinda stand out.

…and what’s a parade without some pennyfarthings?

old meets new… a pennyfarthing and a segway.

A ridiculous green… thing.

Let’s play a game – see if you can spot the masonic symbol

I went on a very cool (free!) walking tour run by a company called DC by foot. The guy in the orange cap was our guide.

Aahh… the WWII memorial and the Washington Monument… which look quite different during the day. The monument is exactly 555ft and 5/8 of an inch high. The stone changes colour because they ran out of money as it was being built, then when they resumed, they had to use slightly different stone (but from the same quarry)

I’m about two weeks early for the cherry blossom festival. These were gifts to the US from Japan.

Our guide was a good laugh… here he is calling a payphone. (she’s a bit young for you though…)

The Vietnam Veterans memorial is peculiar… it was a result of a design competition whose winner was an architecture student from Yale (who got a B- for this very design). This half of it points towards the Washington Monument.

In the middle, it begins in 1959 and lists all the names in chronological order of being killed. The beginning and the end are in the same place… symbolizing: “shit, we’re back where we started” (the design wasn’t supposed to be political at all… but this somehow managed to slip through)

The other half points to the lincoln memorial. One half point to the man who made this nation, the other points to the man who kept it together… and vietnam… where did it get us? hmmm…. I sense another veiled political message.

Some more statues of soldiers… carrying an M16 assault rifle (man on the right) and an M60 machine gun (man on the left). Notice thatthe man in the middle has one dog-tag tied to his boots… because it would make it easier to identify the body in the event that the lower half becomes seperated from the upper half.

yeah… this view looks HEAPS different by day.

The federal reserve. Don’t like interest rates? Go throw some stones…

A statue of Simon Bolivar.

Something to do with Mexico… I think… the foreground is dominated by a black print on glass medium… oohh.. tricksy

The white house… from a distance….

…and from a bit closer.

This is what the lions at Columbia should look like…

…and the source of so many of the developing world’s ills…

The signs here were very helpful

oohh… my inspiration to photography… the National Geographic Society

The National Geographic museum had a wonderful photographic exhibition about frogs.

If I were ever homesick…

Washington DC at a glance…

Iwo Jima… apparently

The distinctive 108 degree angle between the outer walls can only mean one thing – a pentagon… but not just any pentagon – The Pentagon, where 1.9 BILLION dollars is spent wasted EVERY DAY. (did you know that a mere 1.5 billion dollars is all it would take to cover every sleeping site in malaria-endemic Africa for five years?)

A child is attacked by Washington DC’s viscious birds.

For a nation with a preoccupation with eagles, there sure are lots of lions in the capital.

A casual look down the mall in the late afternoon sun.

….and this is what the mall looks like from… the mall…

The Capitol… up close

The Capitol… up closer. Can someone explain to me why the flag was at half-mast? (16 March 2008)

The voice of america? right here?

Ready for lift-off? Washington DC’s metro system looks like some kind of spaceship accelerator.

As you can see… we made one or two little deviations from the original plan. The most major of these was a trip to the US of A to check out graduate schools (Nick’s mission) and just check things out and relax (my mission). Aside from that, and the skipping of Colombia, I actually managed to stick fairly close to the original plan… and I even managed to go further south than I thought I would. Below is a grid showing the schedule of where I was and when…

…and a pie chart showing the various percentages of transport taken. The numbers indicate the amount of time spent on each mode of transportation in hours. Yes, I spent 228.5 hours on buses and 83 hours on planes. This isn’t even counting time spent in transit lounges and waiting around in bus stations.

Those buses… it would be difficult to choose a “worst movie” that I saw on those buses. There were many which were so bad that I simply tuned out and went to sleep (even if it was in the middle of the day), which makes it difficult to compare. Terminator 3 was laughably bad, mostly because of the sharp and witty dialogue that the governor of California got to deliver. The best movie was easily “El Senor de los Anillos” (The Lord of the Rings), which they showed on my bus ride from Ushuaia to Calafate. Border crossings were interesting… aside from the bribe-for-a-visa disaster on my way into Paraguay, everything went rather smoothly. In fact, the land borders especially were very relaxed. On may 4th, I accumulated 7 stamps – exit Paraguay, enter Brazil, exit Brazil, enter Argentina, exit Argentina, enter Brazil, exit Brazil, enter Argentina. This would have been much simpler if they had just built another bridge at the three borders area between Paraguay and Argentina (at the moment, you have to go through Brazil to travel between the two). There were also many border crossings between Argentina and Chile because bus routes through Patagonia often straddled the border because sometimes those were the only roads which linked certain towns to each other. Most of the car travel was done in Cuba, where we rented a car… and my boat ride from Colonia del Sacramento, Uruguay to Buenos Aires, Argentina was my sole major boat trip.

Getting Back (12/6/07)

20 hours, 10 time zones, 5 months… we look surprisingly well-rested

Luckily, Santiago de Chile is not actually as far from Melbourne as Mexico City is… at least not by the “civil aviation metric”. The flight from Santiago, Chile to Auckland is a mere13 hours, and the time from Auckland to Melbourne is only 4 hours. Adding transit time… the total travel time is only 20 hours. Our plane from Auckland to Melbourne got delayed because engine 2 was overheated or something. I also got my toothpaste confiscated… damn. I guess my plans for taking over the world with an almost-empty container of toothpaste will have to be put on hold for the time being. Unsurprisingly, I was held up in Australian Customs because I was asian. Just because I wasn’t surprised doesn’t mean that I was not also livid about it. I eventually got through customs who, after thoroughly searching my bags, determined that I wasn’t as dodgy as the colour of my skin apparently suggests. Getting home was very pleasant indeed and when I went out for lunch later that day, I caught myself saying “gracias” to everyone and stopped just short of starting my order with “quiero comer…”

I can’t quite believe that 5 months is over… blink and you’ll miss it. When we left, we spoke almost no Spanish and had no idea what we were going to be doing next year. Now we speak some Spanish (although Nick’s is head and shoulders above mine… just like… his head and… shoulders) and have definite plans for further education in the USA. Not only have I learned a great deal about the many countries I visited and people I met along the way, I think I learned much about myself as well. I hope people who have been following this journal can make it to the little homecoming gathering, it should be good.

..oh and PLEASE don’t ask me “so Daniel, what was the best thing you saw in South America?”, because that is way too hard a question…

Miscellaneous Stuff

Front Pages

Those who have followed danielyeow.com from the beginning will know that it has undergone three major facelifts since its launch in January 2004. The most recent one was inspired by a belated attempt at an April fool’s joke which was carried out on a whim and completed in four hours while I was sitting around in a hotel in Lima, Peru. Of course, I had a dilemma regarding a suitable front page image. It was to represent the “main story” of my life at the time, which of course, was my travelling. I thought I’d include an inspirational quote and a nice panoramic photo of some sort. They are included below for your amusement. Click on the images for the full-size versions.

The skyline is, of course, New York. It would be more readily recognizable if the twin towers of the World Trade Centre were still there… but anyway. The quote and the image don’t really have that much to do with each other.

After a while, I thought that maybe I could use an image that linked with the quote in some way. When I came across these railway tracks in the middle of nowhere just south of the Salar de Uyuni in Bolivia, this quote from Robert Frost immediately came to mind.

The wonderful landscapes of the Costa Verde, south of Rio de Janiero, inspired this photo. It is a quote that I’ve always liked and one which I paraphrased in this little speech that I wrote to inspire my “troops” prior to the first “Stand Up For Your Rights” comedy night in Melbourne.

The mere thought of climbing the volcano Lanin made this quote pop into my head. I originally intended to take a nice panoramic shot from the summit (the view of the Andes range is supposed to be spectacular from the top), but alas, I never saw the top… not even from a distance, due to some rather awful weather. This photo was taken just after we got off the mountain and I realised that visibility had improved enough to take a photo.

Desktop Backgrounds

The wealth of great landscape shots from this trip gave rise to some desktop background for my laptop. Click on the images for full-size versions (1366 x 768 pixels, which is, funnily enough, the resolution of my laptop’s screen). If you would like one of these for yourself, email me your desktop resolution and I’ll do one up for you.

Canaima National Park, taken from the air. There was actually a bit of photoshop work done to this to remove bits of aeroplane from the corners. Impressed?

The Chaco in Paraguay, just outside Asuncion. The sun was setting, my 50 hour bus adventure was starting to kill me and I could barely hold my camera steady because the quality of the road was questionable. This is a bit of a freak shot in that it came out so clearly…

The mighty Iguazu Falls from the Argentine side. The image is nice, but the main reason it is included is because it reminds me of the few days after I learned of my admission to Columbia University when I was in a sickeningly good mood.

The famous Copacabana beach in Rio de Janiero, Brazil. 10 second exposure demonstrates the quality of the Canon CMOS sensor especially in regard to low-light photography. Didn’t actually work that well as a desktop background because of the dark bits which made the text under the icons difficult to read.

Another freak shot which just grabbed me while I was reviewing my photos from the day. You can’t tell, but I’m lying on the roof of a boat in the Costa Verde, south of Rio.

My first sunrise at the end of the world. Ushuaia provided a wealth of opportunities for brilliant landscape shots. Again, due to its darkness, it didn’t work very well as a background.

Near Ushuaia, lake Fagnano. It was so cold that I almost couldn’t be bothered taking my gloves off to operate my camera. I’m glad that I did. I am so pleased with this photo that I am considering entering it into photography competitions.

I just don’t learn do I? Didn’t work as a desktop background at all… but it is a wonderful shot. 30 second exposure at about 5 in the morning.

8am at the park ranger “base camp” near the base of Lanin, the volcano that beat me. I guess this is what the whole “red sky in morning, shepherd’s warning” this is all about. (The rhyme goes something like – red sky at night, shepherd’s delight, red sky in morning, global warming)

Playing with my circular polarizing filter, I managed this freak shot out the window on the drive back from Lanin. The p-filter is just wonderful, it makes any picture that includes a bit of sky look brilliant.

Now, I have no formal qualifications in the field of security, but I fail to see what this could possibly achieve. The introduction of tighter measures such as removal of shoes (which is still niether widely carried out nor strictly enforced) makes sense as it is a well-known fact that it is easy to hide a bladed weapon in the soles of one’s shoes where it won’t get picked up by the metal detectors. The liquids thing is really very daft. I imagine that the concern is that people may be able to take the seperate ingredients of an explosive device onto a plane in liquid containers and then manufacture their bomb while onboard. This is a legitimate concern. The regulations, however, do nothing to stop this possibility from happening. Liquids, being liquid, can easily be divided into many small containers (each smaller than 100ml) and therefore the new regulation does little more than cause inconvenience to the vast majority of passengers who are not terrorists.

If all of this is a response to the 9/11 attacks, then this is all even stupider. The terrorists who carried out the 9/11 attacks were armed with small knives, not bombs. I believe that they also told passengers that there was a bomb on the plane (which was a half-lie – the bomb was the plane itself) and thus gained control of the aircraft. Now, I think that tighter security on flights is a good thing. The fact that it has resulted as an inaccurate response to the 9/11 attacks doesn’t really bother me. Tighter security needs to be effective though, and this is not. At best, it is a minor inconvenience to everyone who is not a terrorist and, at worst, it is a minor victory for “enemies of freedom” as we so like to call these terrorists.

A collection of some of the more interesting signs… some spanglish, some are inglespanol… some are just silly. Most of the jokes are lewd and tasteless, so if you’re used to the normal content of danielyeow.com, then it shouldn’t be a problem

I have a silly sense of humour… our journey begins in Mexico city. Right on the Zocolo, there is a “Joyeria” named Liliana! Hahahaha! (Joyeria is actually Mexican for Jeweller)

The big bread company here is called “bimbo”, they sponsor lots of sporting teams, have huge trucks delivering their bread… always good for a giggle.

Olle Berggren’s Spanish dictionary. Over the whole 4 weeks of my Spanish course, this joke never stopped being funny. Olle had some fun of his own – he would frequently ask me to read some Swedish. Apparently, to Scandanavians, listening to foreigners try to read their language also never stops being funnny.

That’s a bit raunchy to have on the tables in the cafeteria in the Spanish school…

hehehe… this needs little explanation. Its actually a hardware store… but I like to think that one comes here to pick out a good ferret.

…the orange juice that gives you your b-b-b-boing!

This one was spotted by Nick in Oaxaca…

I never quite understood where the name came from. Long tubular and full of sea men I suppose…

Prior to his revolutionary antics, Che had a little-known dip into the vices of capitalism in the form of a Supermarket…

Interesting…

The painkillers that the doctor gave me for my dry cough in Mexico. The only instance during the whole trip that I actually got properly sick.

This one was above the door of a bus to Chichen Itza. I think a better translation would be “have you left something?”

This was just a little silly… I was very tempted to “ask and be pleased” but there were too many people around

This was in Cancun, near the bus station. Not sure whether this was deliberate or just very bad spanglish

“To the victims of the Maine who were sacrificed by voracious imperialism in its desire to gain control of the island of Cuba” a fine example of *modified* monuments in Cuba

The Museo de la Revolucion… it reminded me of reading the CPSU-version of history when I was studying the Russian revolution.

Me and Nick avoided the “Pain Omelet”

A sign giving information on the water coming out of the spring. Interestingly… there doesn’t seem to be any water… what a curious oversight

This was quite funny… no explanation required

…and during the bay of pigs assault, comandante Fidel Castro immediately moved to central australia to command his forces – wuss.

A leftover sign from when Venezuelan president, Hugo Chavez was an internationally acclaimed fast-bowler

An interesting name for a supermarket… reminds me of the radio station, Coma FM, as parodied be Triple J in Australia

Ah… the US was a brilliant place for interesting signs. This made me wonder about all those non-drug-free school zones

…so THAT’S where babies come from!

What the…?

Someone at UC berkeley modified the “Geological Engineering Laboratory” to this… much more apt

The clothing store at Berkeley… I decided to pass on buying anything here because there is such a thing as too much of a good thing.

I could relate to this… I’m sure many of you can too.

wha…? Naturally, I just HAD to have a look

Sure enough… lots of interesting shirts… some subtle, some others… not so subtle

more maths jokes from UC Berkeley

This would be a lot less funny if we didn’t hear the Men At Work song “Down Under” almost everywhere that we went

Yes, it is true, the US is a nation of pun-sters.

Nick spotted this on the map of Stanford Campus, so I decided I would take a look at what this was. Just some residential halls…

The actual Harvard motto is “Veritas” which means “truth” in latin. Tha Harvard cycling team’s jersey modified it slightly. I guess they wanted to be in line with “pro” cycling teams in that nobody seems to know the truth when it comes to doping…

A sign near Massachussets Avenue, between Harvard and MIT…

The MIT bookshop

At a restaurant near MIT where Peter, Nick and I ate dinner… I had some… excited Chicken…

In a pub near MIT…

This was one that I took when I was all optimistic about the possibility of getting into Harvard. Unfortunately, it wasn’t to be. I hear Columbia isn’t a bad institution though… and that Jeffrey Sachs fellow, no slouch either.

Really? well… what if I don’t want to die?

A sign that you don’t see every day at a museum. If I didn’t tell you that this was in a museum… well… we’ll just leave that one in your imaginations

An intersting jacket in the adidas store, near Harvard. I was very tempted to buy it… except that my name isn’t James Hunt.

I couldn’t believe it… I’d have to see it to believe it… alas, not enough time in New York.

A sign at a sports store in Princeton… made me think of my friend Andrew Kwok… or “Cool Kwok” abbreviated to CK… as we like to call him… he’s so hot right now…

Organic? Nitrogen tetroxide? wha…?

Self-storage is hugely popular in the US.

As is litigation. FYI… did you know that Australia is the world’s second most litigious society?

A mock protest by actors wearing costumes from the time of the tudors… it was actually a publicity stunt for the series “Tudors”

I’m a bit surprised these guys didn’t get sued…

I was wondering where to drop off my fed ex documents… then it hit me… almost.

In Quito Ecuador… my club… well… if I was a pimp.

What to do on the 20 hour bus ride from Lima to Cusco? Play bingo of course!

A sign at the desk of the south american explorer’s office in Cusco, where Nick obtained details for his volunteering

Fly tickets?

A sign to warn children of… well… use your imagination

Good thing for this sign… otherwise Nick and I wouldn’t have got ANY sleep

Lots of things to giggle about on this sign, take your pick…

I just can’t get a grip on these weird signs…

Ah ha! So all that necessary noise that I was making is ok then?

Nick’s hostel in Lima had this gem… take note, this could save your life.

Nick took this wonderful photo in Cusco… (Arco Iris is Spanish for Rainbow)

The tea brand around here is… interesting

It certainly puts your mind at ease that there are escape routes all along the railway line…

hahaha! …its the story of my life…

…and what a well-timed moment for Jose to wear this shirt… I must remember this.

The tea (which made up most of our breakfast on the 4th day of our hike).

Ahhh… continue… good thing for that sign. I was about to stop 100m short of Machu Picchu. That would’ve made me feel like an idiot.

…and I thought I’d given up mathematics for good!

Great cave? Well… if its that great, I’d better go…

I screeched to a halt in front of this eatery…

Nevermind the creepiness of me taking photos in the toilets… but I laughed out loud when I saw this above the urinal. Lucky there wasn’t anyone else around… if anyone turned around, things could have gotten quite awkward (and messy)

riiiight… I guess, at 4000m above sea level, one must take precautions

I’m hungry, how about some salted frish?

You’ll never guess who drew the kangaroo…

just in case this was your first time in a public toilet…

First of all… “road” is a rather loose definition of what we were driving on. Secondly… I was dissapointed when a booming voice didn’t chime in with “TIME EXTENSION” when we passed under the gate. Thirdly… the gate says “Aduana Nacional de Bolivia” which means Bolivian Customs… yeah, maximum border security… keeping the world safe for democracy

The drink that I got served on my 50-hour bus odyssey from Potosi, Bolivia to Asuncion, Paraguay

hehehe… giggle… smirk

Now… I’m sure this has a different meaning in Spanish than English… although I was staying suspiciously close to the red-light district in Asuncion.

A sign for hurdlers? or perhaps John Landy?

They spelt socceroos rong.

I thought this was some kind of fancy thermometer… then I had a closer look. It is actually a really quirky clock, in one of the nicest shopping malls in all of Sao Paulo

Portuguese isn’t all that different to Spanish… but the translation helps – Free Hugs!

Ok… I get the sex shop bit… but why “burning”?

This was a slightly unusual ad… I’m not sure if I’d want my hair to do that.

Forget Riemann integrals, forget Lebesgue integrals… this is the integral of the future – Lavanderia Integral! (this is a very groan-worthy maths joke… don’t worry if you don’t get it)

There are comfortable buses… then there are COMFORTABLE buses… with full-service

Odd sized? Does that refer to the sum or the product of the dimensions of your luggage?

Someone should have probably told these people that, to someone for whom English is a first language… this probably isn’t the best promotion one could ask for.

Well then… I’d better not drink it if it’s Bob’s

…and there are definitely no male toilets in THIS jet engine

oohhh… goody! Manga!

A happy little artisan shop in Montevideo, Uruguay

The quality of Argentine translations had been doing so well up to this point (this is the port at Buenos Aires… where I first set foot in Argentina… well, apart from Iguazu Falls)

There was a very international flavour to my fruit salad…

I KNEW it! I just knew that the nights went for longer in Buenos Aires

Oh my… maybe I’ll just have to hold it in.

Everywhere you go, if you mention that you are from Australia, many people respond with “muchos kanguros!”. Are there actually any outback steak houses in Australia?

an interesting sign to be found at the port in Costa Verde, near Rio

The captain of this boat is a restraining order waiting to happen

Antarctica eh? It wasn’t THAT cold… what were they thinking?

I’d never had the urge to purchase a winged insect before…

Spare batteries in the lighthouse at Colonia del Sacramento in Uruguay…

An airport shuttle bus parked outside the French Embassy in Buenos Aires… I’m sure I wasn’t the first to have a chuckle at this one.

They spelt subtle wrong…

Is this why Argentina smells so nice?

The tourist maps always had these big red dots on them, but whenever I looked around, I could never find the red dots. The guy who steals them all must bring them here… to Ushuaia, appropriately at the end of the world…

This is an interesting use of the Perito Moreno Glacier for advertising… I wonder what Francisco Moreno would’ve thought about all this?

Crab in its own juice? That’s almost as wrong as “excited chicken”

There still seems to be some bitterness in Argentina over this whole Falkland Island thing

…what I’ve always wanted..

Down here, the box drinks are named after Italian strikers who make significant blunders at world cups…

If you need me to explain this to you… then you’ve probably missed most of the humour on this whole website.

…well, there goes the idea of shooting “The Weakest Link” on location on Lago Argentina

At first, I thought this said “Don’t Trolling”… oh well… I guess its still a little bit funny.

This one’s for all my ex’es…

wow… the Argentines are REALLY bitter about the whole Falkland Islands thing…

7up with some vitamins added… hmm…

When you’re popular, you’re popular… and when you’re not…

One of the cheapest drinks in the house… I wonder why

A moment of good visibility...

This one one of a series of travel emails I sent to friends and family who wished to follow my travels through Latin America in the first half of 2007

“Do you want a bigger pole?”

“Uh, yes… thanks”

“Ideally, you want it to come up to about hip-height”

“Actually, I’d like mine to come up just past my belly button”

“Suit yourself, alot of girls like them slightly longer too… I dunno, I think they just like having that little bit of extra reach. Righto, you’ve got your trekking pole, here’s your ice axe, just strap it to your pack, we don’t need it yet. Its alot of equipment to get up, but you’ll definitely need all of it. She’s very unforgiving if you’re lacking in the equipment department.”

“She… who?”

“Oh, Lanin – the mountain”

“Right, got it”

This was tricky. My gloves didn’t afford much dexterity, making it difficult to manipulate the straps on my *rental-pack-from-hell*. I asked the guide if it was safe to leave things in the car to which he responded with a quizzical look. I glanced around – there was nobody else in the car park. It was winter, we were in the Andes. If it wasn’t for the signs, I would never have guessed that the clearing that we were in was a car park. Apparently, there were lines on the ground, but they were presently covered with snow which came up to our ankles. It was dark. We had driven since 4:30am and were now at the edge of the Lanin national park. The Lanin volcano, at 3770m, was still some distance away but that distance was now to be covered on foot.

It was cold – very cold. The sky had been crystal clear all night and our fingers barely retained the manoeuvrability required to complete some of our otherwise-simple preparation tasks. It took us almost 20 minutes to adjust my crampons. Just short of 8am and with the sun still well below the horizon, we set off into the forest which surrounds the volcano. In six hours, we would reach the mountainside refuge where we would stay the night to rest and acclimatise before scrambling the 14-hour round-trip from there to the summit and back. Lanin is not a technically demanding climb, the slope only occasionally exceeding forty five degrees, but it is certainly no walk in the park – national park that is. Before long we would require our crampons and ice axes to traverse the many icy slopes which lay between the base and the summit.

The first day was gentle. The sky alternated between overcast and partly cloudy and there was barely a whisper of wind. As far as precipitation was concerned, it snowed the snow-equivalent of spitting. Just teasing us every now and then with a subtle spattering. The refuge was at 2260m above sea-level. It seemed a fair way to go for just one day but I was reminded that the car park where we started is at about 900m above seal-level so, in actual fact, the refuge was about half-way up the mountain. Even so, it was at a decent altitude and from the base of the mountain, it was not visible as it was above the clouds. As the least experienced climber of our group, I was given the responsibility for carrying most of the food because it was relatively light. This also meant that I had unlimited access to an impressive assortment of sweet biscuits and nuts which we paused frequently to consume.

We reached the refuge just after one in the afternoon. It was a small orange building which looked like a mini-bread roll. A flag pole with a rag flapping from the top which I later learned to be a very worn Argentine flag stood a few metres away. The interior of the building could be described as “Spartan” but it did protect us from the cold and the snow. My guide, visibly pleased by our rapid ascent, prepared a light lunch and told the group (which was made up of myself, himself and a buddy of his who thought it would be fun to tag along) to have a little nap afterwards and we would do some activities later in the afternoon if the weather was good.

We woke up at three to the sound of clinking crampons. We grabbed our gear – crampons, rope, ice axes and helmets, and proceeded to ascend a further few hundred metres to the steepest part of the slope. As we trudged along I couldn’t help but notice the odd frozen shrub jutting out from under the rocks. I could scarcely believe that things could grow here; at temperatures where things generally had a tendency to shrink. The slope at this point was very steep indeed, although not quite steep enough to require the use of all four limbs at all times provided that one had a sufficient level of grip. Given that this part of the slope was also very icy, grip was not always easy to come by, unless of course you had crampons, which we did.

With all the gear, I was considerably heavier

Crampons reminded me alot of very old-school roller skates but without the wheels. Instead, ten steel spikes protruded out and, one would imagine, into the ice giving you grip where previously there was none. My guide quickly went through the basics of walking up and down a slope with crampons and explained the subtle nuances of how not to kick yourself with your own sharp metal spikes – a valuable lesson. Then came the fun part of the afternoon – a lesson in self-arresting. The self-arrest is a standard manoeuvre used to control and (hopefully) halt an unplanned slide down an icy slope. Seeing as the mountain that we were planning to summit was just bursting with slippery, icy slopes, this seemed a very appropriate lesson to learn.

The idea of the self-arrest is orient oneself so that one is sliding feet-first and facing the slope. Once this was established, with one hand placed on the “axe-bit” and one on the handle, one would bring the pointy-end of the ice axe to bear on the slope. Then the axe would dig into the mountain and (hopefully) bring you to a stop. The theory was simple enough. Putting it into practice required some… well… practice. Despite the obvious dangers, I found it altogether too much fun sliding down the side of an icy mountain. Maybe it was the altitude, maybe it was the fact that my waterproof-overpants weren’t actually mine. In any case, we spent about an hour rehearsing the manoeuvre from every conceivable position (that was not a dirty joke) until my guide was satisfied that, if I were to fall to my death, that he would not be held responsible being able to cite that he had taught me how to self-arrest.

As we walked back to the refuge, I looked to the west because, not only was the sun setting and turning the sky a bright orange, but that was where the wind was blowing from and thus, where the weather would come from. It looked overcast. Oh well. We got back to the refuge and cooked ourselves a delightful meal of ravioli Bolognese after which we quickly got to task of catching up on the sleep that we had missed from having to wake up at 4am.

I woke up at 6. Although I had gone to sleep at 8, I did not feel well-rested. It was probably a combination of the altitude and the sound of the wind buffeting the sides of our little building. I walked over to the door and opened it, and then I very quickly closed it. It was snowing very heavily and, not covering my mouth to yawn as I opened the door, I copped a mouthful of the white stuff. The snow outside the door was also about waist-height, which turned my trivial early-morning toilet break into a mini-odyssey in itself. After having a bit of breakfast, my guide took another look outside. The snow that I had shovelled out of the doorway had replenished itself and was now back to waist-height. This was a problem.

After waiting for a bit and a having brief chat, we agreed that we had two realistic options. We could wait for a few more hours and hope that the weather improved (not likely, given that it was the start of winter), or we could pack up our stuff and begin our decent now in case the weather didn’t change or got any worse. Although we all agreed that it was unlikely that it was going to get any worse (mostly because it was already quite terrible), we came to the unanimous agreement that we should begin our descent as soon as possible. Our food would only last us until the end of that day and, although the park rangers were aware of this and our presence on the mountain, starving on the mountainside and needing to be rescued was not my idea of fun.

The weather was very bad. I was not aware that weather could get this bad. Stinging particles of snow bombarded us from the side. I was wearing a balaclava and only the smallest portion of my skin was exposed to the outside world… but it hurt. My face was still red for several days afterwards. The wind was so strong that we had to lean into it otherwise we would literally be blown over. As if that wasn’t bad enough, the wind frequently changed direction and, when it did, one or more of us would be blown over and disappear briefly into the deep snow. Apart from the snow getting in my eyes making me reluctant to keep them open for very long, when they were open, they could only see for about five metres before everything was obscured by white haze that surrounded us and threatened to swallow us.

My first instinct was to turn back. I probably would have if it weren’t for the knowledge that, if I did, I would probably be stranded in the refuge until I became so weak from hunger that I would require rescue, or starve to death. Looking back, it probably wouldn’t have come to that because Lanin, although not a trivial climb, was also not a remote one. We would probably have survived at least another two days by which time the worst of the weather would almost certainly have passed. But today, we were blown off; almost literally. As we descended, it became less windy although the snow persisted. I was thankful for the increase in visibility. For the first hour or so, I had only been able to follow my guide by tracing his footsteps because I could only occasionally see him. Now, I could actually see where I was going.

As we made it to the plain that separated the volcano from the forest that surrounds it, we let out a collective sigh of relief. It was still very windy, but at this altitude there wasn’t as much ice and snow about for the wind to blow into us. I paused as our path crossed a set of fresh animal tracks. “A puma” said my guide. Excited, I indicated that I wanted to stop briefly to take a photo. He indicated that there were times when it was ok to stop and there were times when one must press on with utmost haste and that this was one of the times which fell into the latter category. I understood, and pressed on.

I’d barely had time to pop my ears when we made it to the relative safety of the forest. Here it was not so windy and I was able to remove my balaclava; parts of which, by now, had become soaked with my nasal fluids and frozen over making it difficult to breathe. When we finally got to the car, we were quite wet and our fingers were so cold that we could barely operate the door handles. We somehow managed to get in, defrost and make our way back to Bariloche from where I would eventually take a bus to Chile, my final country before returning home to Australia.

I’ve read somewhere that when climbers fail to reach the summit of a peak, there is a very Freudian response which is akin to sexual frustration and may manifest itself in the form of unintentional sexual innuendo. I don’t know what that’s all about, although I didn’t go all the way, it was certainly very hard most of the time… and quite satisfying as well. Admittedly, it would have been nice to get to the peak and I was ultimately left wanting more. I’m definitely coming again and making sure I get on top.

As it stands, the score is now: Lanin – 1, Daniel – nil

Those who remember my first excursion to South America will remember that I was in and out in just over a week and didn’t get to see much (I was there to compete in speed skating world championships) and so I promised myself that I would return and see Angel Falls and Machu Picchu – which I did. Now, with winter setting in and another attempt on Lanin impossible, I must now reluctantly admit defeat at the hands of the Andes and vow to return, (in summer next time), to settle the score. (Anyone care to join me on an attempt on Aconcagua?).

Since Ushuaia (where our story actually left off), I took a bus to El Calafate and got a good look at the Perito Moreno Glacier – a curiosity among glaciers in that it is advancing rather than retreating. I must say again that I am very impressed by the tourism infrastructure here because every night, I would stroll into town, walk into a travel agency and say (in Inglespanol) “hi, what tours do you have running tomorrow? Oh, I don’t have much money…”. Being low-season also helps because nothing is booked out and tour operators are very eager to give discounts because empty boats and buses aren’t good for business. By Bariloche though, I was starting to get a little tired of being on the standard tourist bandwagon so I decided that I would do something where it would be unlikely to have to put up with posing tourists getting in the way of the view. I was also attempting (albeit failing) to satiate my insatiable hunger for adventure.

With less than a week to go, I’m feeling a bit sad that I have to leave this place. South America is a truly wonderful continent and I was surprised at every turn at how many absolutely magnificent places I would come across which I had never heard of before. The people here are very warm and friendly (yes, even people from Argentina who apparently have the unenviable reputation of being the “French” of South America). I am, however, ready to come home, satisfied that, given the constraints (time, money and, occasionally, the weather), I have probably made close to the most out of this trip.

The closest significant Chilean city to Bariloche was Puerto Montt which I decided would be my launching point to either Coyhaique or Puerto Natales… unfortunately, for my whole time there, the weather was kind of bad… The main industry here is Salmon and Trout and, naturally the seafood here is very fresh (guess what I ate every night)

I decided to take a little tour of some estancias – farm homesteads. The wildlife here really isn’t scared of humans… I saw some of these guys in Bolivia near the Salar de Uyuni but onlt from a distance. If I had been unfortunate enough to be carrying any food on me, I would have probably been attacked by this guy.

…and I finally got to see a Puma. An animal that inspired a brand of sportswear and revered by the indigenous people of South America… it was a little sad to see this fellow in a cage. Chiquita, as she is called, was found, abandonded, as a cub and it was apparently a great deal of trouble to find someone to take her in. She is very very tame… frequently pressing herself up against her cage to get her head scratched by her many visitors.

This guy wasn’t quite so tame… obviously displeased by the amount of attention the puma was getting, he did his utmost to grab my attention.

Hey there… what are you looking at?

Close to Puerto Montt, there are a number of lakes (this IS the lake district) and these lakes are surrounded by mountains (the andes). Among thos mountains is the volcano Osorno… unfortunately it was too cloudy to see (damn!!!) but some of the lakes immediately surrounding it were this peculiar green-blue colour because of the volcano.

Some of these lakes are also very big with impressively big waves for such small bodies of water.

Argh! More boats! Stupid lakes in the lakes district… we took a boat to the other side of one lake to eat lunch at an estancia…

…where we were greeted by this little perrito… (note the two “r”s in perrito, to distinguish it from Perito, as in Perito Moreno Glacier)

“Two legs bad, four legs good!” Can anyone remember the words to “beasts of England”? Hmm…. just looking at him is making me hungry.

This dog… well… you can see for yourself. Perhaps if you stare into his white eye, you will see how you die (anyone who hasn’t should watch the movie “Big Fish”)

Ha! And you thought I was sick of waterfalls… admittedly these weren’t nearly as impressive as Angel Falls or Iguazu Falls, but they were still pretty cool. Especially for the effect they made on the lake below… (mouse over the image)

The Plaza de Armas by night.

A view of the town by night…

Coyhaique (4/6/07 – 5/6/07)

The main reason I wanted to go to Puerto Natales was to do some glacier trekking and ice climbing on Glaciar Grey. However, when I called the company that runs that stuff they informed me that, not only was the season over (it is low season now), but nobody runs trekking or ice climbing on the glacier anymore. D’oh. This left me with little choice but to journey to Coyhaique… the launching point for trips to the San Rafael glacier… although, being low season, it was exceedingly unlikely that I would be able to visit it given my rather dire time constraints

The weather, as if you taunt me… turned good just as I left. Not only that… but the route from Puerto Montt to Coyhaique actually goes through Argentina… not only that, it goes THROUGH BARILOCHE! So I sat in the bus for 22 hours looking at the sky and shaking my fist at it – “Where were you three days ago when I was trying to climb Lanin!!!!”

Indeed, the occasional bits of leftover snow were the only evidence of the severe snowstorm which halted my ascent just days ago.

…I don’t really want to bore you all to death, but it is just way too much fun taking long exposure shots of the sky. The above constellation is, of course, Scorpio (mouse over the image)

Bored yet? For those of you who haven’t caught on yet… this is the southern cross (mouse over the image)

…and what do you know, just as I was about to arrive at my destination… the weather started to become overcast again. Although it did make for a pretty nice sunrise.

shame about those power lines…

This is not a forced perspective trick – this is a real condor feather…

On my first day, I took a three hour diverson to the nearby (1 hour drive) town of Puerto Aysen. Formerly, the foremost port in the area. Now, its only claim to fame is the fact that it has the longest suspension bridge in Chile. Although the weather wasn’t great, it was very calm, allowing for some spectacular photographs using the reflection of the river.

And there you have it folks, Chile’s longest suspension bridge. Not exactly golden gate, but fairly decent.

In the low season, Coyhaique is a pretty chillin’ town. Hardly any tours are running… so I just chilled out. Before long, I got itchy feet… then I looked up, and had an idea…

Just outside my hospdaje, the Plaza of the Pioneers. This sculpture depicts their Andean crossing, at the point when they got covered in snow.

Yes, Coyhaique is a nice place to just chill out, and not only because it is a fairly chilly location in Chile.

So I found my man… Jordi Andreu Simini Gracia (try saying that ten times in a hurry). Pilot. Here he demonstrates his skills on a volkswagen beetle which is at least twice as old as I am.

Gee… this hanger is a little stuffy, lets open up that door…

A two-seater Cessna… one if you’re BMI is over 30… and our transport for this afternoon.

The skies finally cleared up for us… good thing too because it was getting late (the sun sets quite early this far south in winter)

Ok Daniel, step into my office and we’ll get started.

He goes through the pre flight checklist… which doesn’t include “check that your passenger actually likes flying, and if he doesn’t, give him a sick bag”. Oh well… I’ll just have to keep it all inside…

It was a little bit windy that day… and the plane, at times, felt more rickety than the volkswagen… this would have to be one of the crazier things that I’ve done in my life.

Excuse me for stating the obvious, but everything looks really different from the air…

Oh, the Andes… conveniently located at the end of the armies… (bad joke, don’t worry). “Hey, can we get closer to those mountains?”

Oh yeah… lakes district, I get it.

Apparently the peaks aren’t as snowy as they usually are at this time of year. Indeed, we flew over a small ski resort and there was no snow on any of the runs.

Ok… that’s close enough… no really… that’s plenty close enough.

Coyhaique looks alot bigger from the air.

A view over the Plaza de Armas… the main town square which is… not actually a square, but a pentagon. Which was very confusing at first…

Oh thank goodness! Any more of that and I would have been ill. Mind you, my pilot was quite mad… he let me fly the plane for about five minutes while we were over Coyhaique… I mean… what the…?

After the flght, I did a little bit more sightseeing on the way back into town. Here is a curious rock formation which looks a bit like a face.

This is not the longest suspension bridge in Chile…

Valparaiso (6/6/07)

I arrived in the evening at this beautiful costal city. My hostel was not in the safest area in town… but it was quite central and it had a little hatch to the roof where I was able to climb up and take some… you guessed it, panoramic shots. (you know the deal, click the picture)

This building has a hole in it… how unsual. There is a building in Hong Kong with a hole in it too… for Feng Shuey reasons. I wonder why this building has a hole in it. Maybe it is holy?

Look! A cat on a cold tin roof…

Most of the architecture here didn’t survive past the 1906 earthquake which devastated most of Chile. In 1984, about half of the place was flattened by another earthquake… oh well. There are still an small handful of old buildings. This is the headquaters of the Chilean Navy

There are some rather nice walls near my hostel

…and from on top of one of them, one can get a good view of the plaza, and the top of the Naval headquarters

Of course, some of the architecture is also very new… and weird

A light rail track runs along the coast and on to Vina del Mar, a nearby city

Another lovely municipal building, recently restored

…and in keeping with the “I want to be a European city” theme, we have lots of fountains

…and obelisks

The main avenue is very picturesque, with lots of busts and statues of famous people (including captain prat…)

The observant among you will notice that the base of this statue bears a masonic symbol…

and occasionally, one has to stop and look up at the many cerros – hills surrounding the port town… it reminded me a little bit of… Guanajuato

…and we thought Melbourne Uni had funding issues…

If I’m not mistaken – “School of rights”

yeah… alot like Guanajuato… only not as safe. A few times I was told by passers by to watch my camera because snatchers on vespas were common in these parts

If the Essendon Bombers and the North Melbourne Kangaroos were to merge… and purchase a bunch of fire engines… then their headquarters would probably look like this

The universe laughs at me again… one last time before I leave for home… more steps! Well, at least I’m not at altitude.

Guess what…? Another panoramic shot. This time… its a 360-degree shot. (click the picture – this one is quite big, be patient)

Santiago (7/6/07 – 9/6/07)

I’ve been here before… so there wasn’t the manic urge to rush out and see as much as humanly possible in the limited time that I had. So I just chilled in my hotel… enjoying the view over Ave Providencia.

Although it was a bit cold, smoggy and hazy… unlike the last time I was here, in the middle of summer, the sunsets were still quite beautiful.

Later that night I was reunited with Nick… and the next day the weather cleared up, so we went for a little stroll.

Thinking that it would be nice to get a view over the city, we found ourselves a cable car to take us to the top of Cerro San Cristobal.

The view from the top was pretty nice… but… the smog obscured most of the Andes mountain range from view

The way down was a bit steeper… and we took the funicular rail. This one was very efficient, requiring only one set of tracks for most of the way except at the point where the cars cross, where it splits.

When we came back down, we wandered through this park, where this path seemed to go on forever.

And there was some strange and random art… which had lots of graffiti on it… which, in a strange way, added to the art.

On the way we were ambushed by some Gypsies… who offered to read Nick’s palm but instead tried very hard to steal his money…. the ploy almost worked, but didn’t quite.

Near the middle of town, there was another small hill… this time with a castle in the middle of it, amongst some lovely gardens…

And a very nice fountain… (see, I’m NOT addicted to long-exposure shots of water flowing… that sounded really wrong for some reason)

An interesting piece of artwork…

I never knew before, but apparently… Paris and London intersect… right here!

Returning to the Plaza de Armas was a strange experience. The last time I was here, in October 2003, I was in a very strange emotional place… just after my first comedy night, just after writing about 8000 words of assessment in 3 days with about 3 hours of sleep… and just before my first world championships in Barquisimeto, Venezuela. Oh well… interesting memories… and they still play chess here.

I wasn’t here at night last time… there was dancing in the streets when we got there.

And the ever-efficient metro system was still… ever efficient. Always nice to know that some things don’t change.

…and on our final night of the trip, we just chilled out in our little hotel…

which was actually quite a big hotel… the Ritz-Carlton… pretty decent actually, especially after five months of slumming it in dodgy hotels and youth hostels where the warmth of my laptop’s heatsink was the only heating available.

…and as the time for our flight approached, we just sat back and relaxed for a bit.

A feeble attempt at capturing the enormity of the Iguazu Falls

This one one of a series of travel emails I sent to friends and family who wished to follow my travels through Latin America in the first half of 2007

Nothing really prepares you for the Iguazu falls. They’re big. Very big. They are the second most voluminous waterfalls in the world after Victoria falls, at the source of the Nile. They’re also one of the lesser-known attractions of South America. Everyone has heard of Machu Picchu and Patagonia and Angel Falls… but poor Iguazu falls seems to fall by the wayside. In fact, I hadn’t heard of them until I was glancing through Nick’s Lonely Planet: “South America on a Shoestring”.

The falls are situated in the rather awkward, three-borders-area between Argentina, Paraguay and Uruguay. Lucky for me seeing as I had 72 hours to get myself out of Paraguay. This is a tricky place to be because the falls themselves are on the Rio Iguazu which IS the border between Brazil and Argentina. Visiting the falls generally involves passing from one side to the other quite frequently. Lucky for me (you think I’m lucky? just wait… there’s more) I managed to get a multiple entry visa for Brazil but it turns out I needn’t have bothered because, if you plan on returning on the same day, they don’t bother to check your passport or give you a stamp. The Argentines are bit stricter… I didn’t need a visa, but I did need lots of stamps during the three days that I was there.

Another forgotten treasure in this area is the Itaipu hydroelectric power plant – the largest hydroelectric power plant in the world. I had not heard of it until I got to Asuncion. It is terribly impressive. It lies on the Rio Parana (named after the fish and spelled incorrectly (I’m kidding)) which is the border between Paraguay and Brazil… luckily, nobody checked my passport. The spillway of the dam has a capacity for a flow of water 40 times that of the Iguazu falls… and since the average flow of the Iguazu falls is about 1.5 million litres of water per second… well, I’m not great at math, but that’s an awful lot.

But I’m getting ahead of myself… our story left off in Asuncion, the capital of Paraguay, one of only two landlocked countries in all of South America. I had managed to finally get my visa (the travel permit, not the credit card) from the Brazilian embassy and arrange my bus trip from Asuncion to Ciudad del Este, which would then connect to Puerto Iguazu on the Argentine side of the falls. I was feeling pretty good about how things were going when I got back to my hotel and checked my email to find an item in my inbox from the admissions office of Columbia University…

Those who know me from Melbourne Uni know that my academic record is quite exceptional. Exceptional because one wonders how I didn’t get kicked out for failing so many subjects. Exceptional because on two separate occasions, I passed only one subject in a semester… but lets not dwell on the negatives. Anyway, the pattern of emails from university admissions offices so far had been disappointing but not entirely surprising. I sat up in my chair, took a few deep breaths, then clicked… “Dear Daniel, on behalf of the… blah blah blah…” I was skimming for the words “sorry”, “regret” and “unable”… but, quite to my confusion, I couldn’t find them. Instead, I found that I had received an offer of admission.

I was shocked. I checked the browser to make sure that I hadn’t accidentally opened someone else’s email account. I couldn’t believe it… I start in September this year…!

I celebrated by walking down to the hotel lobby and asking nicely if I could play the piano which I had noticed in their dining room. Despite it being about 11pm, because there was hardly anyone else in the hotel (and I assume the dining room had decent sound insulation), they said yes. I sat down and let rip with my fingers for the first time in over three months. I was rusty… but the piano was horrendously out of tune as well… but I didn’t mind. I played and I sang and I’m sure the hotel staff were in the lobby having a quiet chuckle. It was a good day.

So there I was, walking around Iguazu falls in a stupidly good mood. I was tagging along with a tour and one of the other people on the tour was from Boston. Someone once told me that it was very important to find an institution which had a good orientation or culture which matches my own. When I told this guy that I was going to Columbia he said “oh dear, they are going to turn you into a left-wing, tree-hugging hippie! You better watch yourself, I can’t stand those people”. In doing so, he did something which I wasn’t sure was possible at that time – put me in an even better mood…

Most of the falls are on the Argentine side. From the Brazilian side however, one can get a more expansive view of all the falls. Even this wasn’t enough for me though… so I opted to take a boat out into the middle of the Rio Iguazu and get a *really* panoramic view of the falls. These boat trips aren’t for people who don’t like to get wet. Everyone got thoroughly soaked, but it was an awful lot of fun. Good thing I had a plastic bag for my camera.

After the Iguazu falls, I hopped on a plane for the first time in over a month and flew to Sao Paulo (which is called “San Pablo” in all the Spanish-language brochures), Brazil, an expansive and very populated city. After catching my breath and eating some nice meals (though… not as nice as the ones I had in New York) I moved onto Rio de Janiero where I would stay on Copacabana beach and do some REALLY touristy stuff, like go for a morning jog.

Although I was there for about five days, it really wasn’t enough. Aside from the obvious touristy things to do, such as taking the cable car to the top of the Sugar Loaf Mountain and visiting the statue of Christ the Redeemer, I also attended a football match. Let me just say now that Melbourne football crowds have NOTHING on Brazilian ones. Not only is everyone a little bit more passionate (yes, even more passionate than Collingwood supporters), there are samba bands, massive banners, illegal fireworks and flares constantly throughout the game.

Next stop – Montevideo, Uruguay. Suddenly I found myself in a city which was more like Europe than South America. A slightly poorer Europe, to be sure… but even the climate matched. First thing that stood out for me – good beef. Uruguayan beef seems to live in the shadow of Argentine beef, but it is, in my opinion, just as good. This could also be because Argentina exports all of its best beef, leaving it’s “B” grade beef for the locals (which is still exceptionally good). Montevideo is also a very safe city… and, due to Uruguay’s location and being, at various times in its history, caught in the middle of a tug-of-war between Spain and Portugal… then Argentina and Brazil… has an eclectic mix of architectural styles.

On my last night in Montevideo, I went to a shopping mall which used to be a prison… this shopping mall was so large that it had not one, not two… but three cinema complexes attached to it. I went to see Spiderman 3 with two other people because the other cinema company had beaten this one to a copy of the Spanish dub… which everyone flocked to see (especially because it happened to show at exactly the same time).

Colonia del Sacramento, across the Rio de la Plata from Buenos Aires, was established by the Portuguese… on land claimed by the Spanish. This did not end well… there was some fighting. It also served as an important smuggling port because security wasn’t as tight here as it was in Buenos Aires (it still isn’t). Two hours from Montevideo by bus and about one hour from Buenos Aires by boat, I spent an afternoon here before catching the ferry to the Argentinian side. Despite being an hour by ferry, it was a clear day and one could actually see the taller buildings of Buenos Aires from the shores of Colonia, which I thought was pretty neat.

Buenos Aires

Apart from eating lots of beef and seeing some tango (two things I’d promised myself that I’d do when in Argentina), one of the first things I did was visit the ‘local’ cemetery. Why? I had that stupid song from the musical Evita, “Buenos Aires” I think it’s called, stuck in my head… so I thought I’d pay a visit to Eva Peron’s final resting place. The cemetery itself is extensive and there are free tours. Good thing too because there are a fair few dead people here (c’mon, its a cemetery) who had very interesting life stories. People who were buried alive by accident, couples who had quarreled in life so in death requested that their busts face in opposite directions and a fair supply of eccentric political figures.

I spent the rest of my time just walking around the city, admiring the architecture (definitely looks like a European city) and planning my next move. The question begging was… how far south do I dare to go? I finally decided to go somewhere where, at the time, there was only one flight a week – Ushuaia. I city I had never heard of before but is, apparently, the southernmost city in the world.

It feels like the southernmost city in the world. It has snowed every day that I’ve been here and it is very cold. It feels much colder that 4-6 degrees (what the thermometer says). Although it is low-season, it is still one of the most spectacularly beautiful places I have ever been to (and I’ve been to a few…). Ushuaia has a great deal in common with Australia. For a start… it is pronounced similarly… well, if you’re an aussie who pronounces Australia “ostraya”. It also received its first significant boost in population as a penal colony… and most sailors at the time would have agreed that it was about as inaccessible as a place could get.

The waters around here and cape horn are notorious for sinking ships. When the industrial revolution came along and made wooden ships with sails obsolete, this was a favourite location to have an “accident” to collect a bit of insurance to go towards replacing your fleet. Even the Beagle channel, on which Ushuaia is located, supposedly one of the calmest bits of ocean in these parts… made me feel quite ill (my head is still rocking back and forth and its been two days dammit!).

Argentina’s tourism infrastructure is impressively well-developed. In addition… Ushuaia has a disproportionately large number of specialist photographic equipment stores and wireless internet hotspots… which is how I’ve managed to send this email. The food here is also quite excellent, the seafood is fresh (I wonder why) and the meat is of typically high quality.

After this, I am going north in search of warmer weather and the Perito Moreno glacier which flows into Lago Argentina… Calafate is meant to be a good place to start that particular quest. I will probably meet up with Nick on the Chilean side at the northern end of the lakes district after which we will go to Santiago de Chile from where our flight departs for Melbourne. I can’t believe there are less than three weeks left… it doesn’t seem like five months have passed…

Overlooking Lake Fagnano