Yesterday I was visiting the city centre. Hernan lent me a guide book with a walking track, showing the most beautiful and interesting places and buildings. They included squares, monuments, the biggest streets (9th of July is apparently the biggest street in the world), theatres, shops. Buenos Aires is huge, its streets are long and wide. To be honest after two hours of walking I had enough and I turned my attention to shops with clothes :) The city is incredibly beautiful though and the atmosphere is good, I feel safe. It reminds me of Palermo in Sicily, my favourite place in Europe. People are busy in the streets but somehow it's not the same crazy "busy" that in London.

At night I went to a lambada zouk club where I was dancing a lot. Do I have to say how happy I was??... I found the club on internet, I went there on my own... and I left having at least 20 friends who are waiting for me at the lambada street party tonight. The music was excellent and the dancers were very good. I was waiting for this moment for a long time (I was dancing lambada the last time 8 months ago in Fortaleza, Brazil). I felt a little bit nervous because I thought that maybe I forgot lambada steps but there was nothing to worry about - I was dancing better than ever before :)
When I arrived to the club people asked me about my teachers in London who are the best lambada dancers in the world, from the Kaoma group: Braz and Patricia Cruz from Porto Seguro in Brazil.
After dancing we went to a bar for a drink (in the picture - the lambada team). All the people working in the bar dance lambada :)
I met Federico who lives very close to my host's flat so he gave me a lift back on his motorbike.
So far my life in Buenos Aires could not be better.

On my first night in Buenos Aires I was...... dancing a lot :))) I went to a Couch Surfing meeting in a salsa club called Jannoy (in the picture). I met only two Couch Surfers at the bar, out of 70 who were supposed to come. But it wasn't a problem. I went to the place thinking that I would not find good dancers and I would come back home early. I was very surprised to meet many professional dancers and luckily, Argentinian guys are not shy so they were asking me for a dance a lot. Not like in Brazil where guys were dancing only with friends and I had to ask them for a dance. The place was great, with a lot of space to dance so you don't step on each other's feet.
I met Pedro from Mexico who has been travelling for 14 months now. He is a great dancer; he spent a month in Cali attending salsa classes. I think people attend the classes in Cali and they never use the skills they had learnt as Cali salsa you dance only in Cali. Yesterday we were dancing mainly New York style and surprisingly, a lot of bachata. I was very happy and I felt alive again, after more than two months without dancing.
My pictures from the trip through Andes (Chile - Argentina) and from two Argentinian cities:
Mendoza and Cordoba

In Buenos Aires

Cordoba - Buenos Aires: 770 km, 10 hours on the bus, cost: 29 pounds. The bus was very comfortable but at one point the air conditioning was too much for me. The cold air was blowing in my face and I could hear people behind me putting on clothes and suddenly getting quiet. I had a panoramic seat in front of the bus on the second floor so I went down to speak to the driver. He switched off the air conditioning for the whole night so people could sleep well :)
We arrived in the bus station in Retiro, a district in Buenos Aires. It is very cofusing when you want to board a bus to BA from another city. It always says Retiro on the bus and you think that it's not Buenos Aires. I took tube and I arrived in my host's flat. Tube is cheap here, it costs 18 pence a ride.
Hernan lives in a nice part of the city, by a small but beautiful park. When I arrived I had a sleep and I woke up at 4 pm again.
In the picture: the huge Avenida 9 de Julio in the centre of Buenos Aires (the famous obelisco in the background) and Avenida Cordoba.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Obelisk_of_Buenos_Aires

Yesterday I did some visiting again; visiting, visiting, visiting. Visiting is all my life at the moment. Walking miles to visit something. I went to Museum of Natural Sciences and did more visiting in the centre. Cordoba is a beautiful city I have to say.
This morning I woke up at 7 am (ouch!!...) because my host Cristian invited me on a trip outside of Cordoba. It was the first time I met my host as he lives in a different flat. We went to Villa los Aromos where Cristian girlfriend's family has been building a summer/weekend house and Cristian (who is an architect) is supervising the work. The village was very nice and the air so fresh!! Then we took another bus to Alta Gracia, a beautiful town where I visited museum of Che Guevara (in the picture).
What is really funny for me (I couldn't stop laughing...) is that if you ask a passerby or a local for information, you shout: hey, flaco!! - which means: hey, skinny!! - and nobody gets offended :) However, you can't shout: hey, gordo!! - hey, fatty!! because this is offensive.

In Cordoba

Distance Mendoza - Cordoba: 675 km, 11 hours on the bus, cost: 30 pounds. The bus was nice and clean but not comfortable, the seats didn't fold down much. However, I slept all the night and I woke up in Cordoba. I took taxi to my host's flat, he was at work so his lovely sister Mercedes opened the door for me. She looks very Argentinian. Her boyfriend twisted ankle while playing tennis, had an operation and has his leg in a cast so he can't work at the moment. He is a carpenter and has his own business. My host Cristian sleeps in his girlfriend's house so I can sleep in his room.
When I arrived in the flat at 9 am Mercedes had to come back to work. She works in a hospital as a chemist and she came home just to open the door for me. I lied down just for "20 minutes" to have a rest... and I woke up at 4 pm... I quickly went to the town centre to see where I was. I met Lionel from Couch Surfing (in the picture) who took me on a very cultural ride, starting from the preparation of "mate". Lionel works for Fiat in administration.
When he invited me to drink mate (which we simply call tea in Europe) I was sure we would go to a bar. I was wrong. We sat on a bench and he took out from his rucksack the mate leaves, thermos with hot water, surgar, silver straw and a small wooden gourd. He quickly prepared mate on the bench. We had three mates each and I have to say it was something I wouldn't drink regularly, it's too strong and bitter. However, this is what Argentinians are famous for, as well as people in Urugway and Paragway. I remember my host Carlos from Santiago de Chile asking me what's the difference between a Chilean and Argentinian on the beach in Viña del Mar. The answer (which I didn't know) was that all the Argentinians have thermoses with them and drink hot mate on the beach :)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mate_(beverage)

Mendoza is very famous for its wine, you can see the vineyards all the way from the Chilean border. The city is very small but clean, safe and pleasant. However the food in bars is pricy (since I left Bolivia I turned to cooking).
In the afternoon I went to Parque Mendoza. It's a huge park with an artificial lake (in the picture: entrance gate to the park). This night I will be travelling to Cordoba.
My pictures from the capital of Chile:
Santiago de Chile

I slept a lot this morning, my body is very tired now. Travelling for 10 months makes you exhausted.
Then I went out with my host Jose', he is a lovely guy. He lives in a big house with three housemates and a cat. He showed me the most interesting places in Mendoza (mainly squares) and.... a dogs market!!! (in the picture). I was talking to ladies who were giving away the puppies. They work for a dogs shelter which looks after homeless dogs. It's so much needed in Chile... well done!
In the evening I bought some food in a supermarket and I cooked a nice meal for all of us. The food in bars and restaurants is just too expensive.

ARGENTINA, In Mendoza

This morning I went to Plaza de Armas again, to post a card for my father. He loves receiving postcards from me. It was my last day in Chile, in the afternoon I left for Argentina.
I spent 150 pounds in 10 days in Chile. Chile is expensive, very European (so different from other
South American countries) and people in Santiago are busy. Although before I came to the city, I thought it was bigger and busier, kind of London but not, nothing like this. You can visit the whole city in one day on foot. What surprised me a lot were dogs. Millions of homeless dogs sleeping like dead in the streets and parks. They rule the cities and towns and they form gangs. Luckily, people respect them and feed them so they are not skinny like in Brazil for example, and they are generally very friendly. Sorry, maybe I talk to much about dogs :)
Spanish that people speak in Chile was the most difficult for me to understand, comparing to other South American countries. Sometimes it sounds like another language.

Santiago de Chile - Mendoza: 341 km, 6 hours on the bus, cost: 15 pounds. The route to the Chilean - Argentinian border is just spectacular. I highly recommend taking bus during the day to be amazed by the range of Andes, high mountains with snow on the summits.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andes
On our minibus I spoke to a guy about earthquakes (my favourite subject in Chile). I learnt so much about earthquakes and how to cope with them. In Santiago the deadly earthquake happened in February this year, the next one is expected in 20 - 25 years. The same in the south of the country. However, the north is preparing for a big one just now. All the government can do is to warn people and to introduce "survival" programmes because the exact date and time are not known. Apparently the best thing to do when it starts is to stand in the entrance door. Inside and outside of the house there is a risk of being hit by falling walls and objects.

In Viña del Mar and Valparaiso

This morning I took a bus to Viña del Mar. I was told that it's the most beautiful city in Chile. I can confirm that it's the most beautiful city I have seen in the country (in the picture). Situated 2 hours from Santiago, at the seaside (Santiago doesn't have access to the sea), clean, with just fantastic tall palm trees (kind of Las Vegas... I saw on TV), cormorans, beautiful houses, nice plants. I immediately felt happy when I started visiting the town.
In Chile, the first time in my trip, I found cheap shops, kind of Primark in London. It's so ironic - in poor countries of South America these shops don't exist, and in countries like Chile or England they do.
I was invited a couple of times for a drink by some rich men, they spotted me walking on my own and told the waiter to call me. I politely refused but I liked that they didn't have problem doing this, like in other countries where men are too shy.
In the late afternoon I took a local bus to Valparaiso, it takes 20 minutes to get there from Viña. Valparaiso is a port city but it's considered a world heritage site because of its beautiful town centre. Although the city is nice, I felt claustrophobic at times because there are a lot of buildings squeezed in small space.
I came back home to Santiago very late and very tired.

Today I went to the museum of Pablo Neruda, a very famous in the world Chilean writer and politician, who I knew from the Italian film "Il Postino".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pablo_Neruda
The museum, which was Neruda's house in the past, was interesting.
At home, Carlos asked me if I knew what "caffee with legs" was. My first thought was: coffee with sweets made of cow legs which I tried in Colombia, floating on the coffee surface. I was wrong. It's a way of serving coffee in a famous bar in Santiago - by waitresses in miniskirts. Of course the bar is very popular :)
Later at night I went to a Couch Surfing meeting where I met nice people (in the picture CS Santiago de Chile).

My host Carlos lives right in the centre of Santiago, in a beautiful building. His flat is on the 17th floor (wow, that's high!!). He said that during the scary earthquake in February this year he thought his life was going to end. Everything was shaking and living on the 17th floor made things even worse. His flat was swinging from one side to another, Carlos was holding onto a wall convinced that the building was going to collapse.
I would really like to experience a little earthquake, just a little one.... so I am waiting.
There is a drink called terremoto (earthquake). The story is that a German tourist asked for a glass of white wine in a bar. The wine came warm, not cold as white wine should be. So he asked for a scoop of pineaple ice-cream to make the wine cooler. After drinking it he said that there was a real terremoto in his head. Since then, terremoto has been a popular drink in Santiago. I think Chile is known in the world for these things:
1. earthquakes
2. wine (on the second place as for example Polish people don't drink much wine so they are more familiar with Chilean earthquakes than wine)
3. copper mines and the resent accident when miners were trapped underground for over 2 months

This afternoon I went to the city centre again. To be honest Santiago seems to be all shops, sqares and parks (in the picture - in Cerro Santa Lucia, a nice park on a hill with a view over the city). I don't think there are many tourists in Santiago and if they are it's not easy to see them, like in other cities. Maybe it's because Chile is expensive so people prefer to go to Peru or Bolivia. For this reason I am being hussled a lot by men.
I was upset to hear about the accident which happened last night - a bus hit truck on the motorway near Santiago, killing 19 people. I remember that my travel buddy, who was looking after me on the bus to Santiago, advised me not to travel with Tur Bus company because they have many accidents. Wow, he just said this yesterday and short time later this horrible accident happens.
Here are my pictures from Antofagasta:
Antofagasta

In Santiago de Chile

Last night I took a bus to Santiago. Antofagasta - Santiago: 1360 km, 18 hours on the bus, cost: 23.50 pounds (in the picture: on the road).
The bus was comfortable and for the first time in ages I slept a lot on the bus. Chile as a well-developed country has good roads, unlike Bolivia or Peru where it was just impossible to sleep on buses because of bumpy roads.
A guy sitting next to me was coming back home from work in a mine in Calama. He was the most caring person I have met on a bus in my whole trip, making sure that I wasn't cold at night and that I felt comfortable all the time. In the morning he bought me coffee and biscuits. If he knew how much he contributed to my positive impression of Chile through these little actions.... In the morning we were talking a lot about earthquakes, politics and travelling.
I arrived in Santiago at 2 pm, left my rucksack in the station and I am visiting the city centre now. My Couch Surfing host is coming back from work at 7.30 pm. The first thing I noticed in Santiago was the temperature. It's as hot as I like it to be. Finally, after months of mixed weather and cold nights, it's very hot. Hurrrahhhh!!!....
My pictures from two towns in the north part of Chile:
San Pedro de Atacama and Calama

I met Shirley's sister and her friend, they just arrived in Antofagasta. We all visited La Portada yesterday. It is a bunch of stones in the sea forming a beautiful gate (in the picture). Apparently this is what Antofagasta is famous for. It takes 30 minutes to get to La Portada, driving from the city through the desert. It is a very beautiful spot.
We also went to a seafood market and I bought huge mussles. Right by the market you can see sea lions, happily swimming in the sea. They are big and have funny faces :)
Than I went to a supermarket with Jorge (if you ask me what place I visited the most in Antofagasta, the answer will be Jumbo supermarket ha ha ha...). At night I cooked my speciality: mussles in tomato-cider sauce. We had a lot of fun while eating them as they were really big and some were difficult to open.

Yesterday we did shopping and then Jorge took me on a motorbike ride outside of the city. I enjoyed it a lot, few times we did over 150 km/h (in the picture after the ride).
At night I cooked a lovely omlette and I went out with Jorge to a local bar. It was birthday of his four friends. People were smoking, unfortunately in Chile you can smoke inside bars and clubs. I have to say that Chilean men are tall and good looking, they are my second favourite in South America, after Venezuelans.

Yesterday I went for a walk at the seaside. The seaside in Antofagasta is not especially beautiful but I was just happy to smell the sea. I love the smell of sea. There is one small beach in the middle of the city (in the picture), it is nice and the water is clean. Small beach but it brings a lot of happiness to people.
I met Shirley when she finished work in the afternoon. It was her last day in this fast food place. On Monday she and Jorge are opening a bar with Colombian food. I witnessed problems they are experiencing to open the bar but I hope that at the end everything will go smoothly and the business will be a great success.
I visited the city center with Shirley, it is nice but nothing special. Antofagasta is a mine city, not a tourist city.
In the evening Jorge cooked a delicious meal and then we were listening to lambada songs....

In Antofagasta

Distance Calama - Antofagasta: 215 km, 3 hours on the bus, cost: 5 pounds.
In the morning I went for a walk in Calama. There are so many homeless dogs in the town, more than I have ever seen in my life before, with exception of Bucarest in Romania. My heart was bleeding when I saw them sleeping in the streets and eating from the rubbish bins.
At 4 pm I took an extremely comfortable bus which crossed Atacama desert again.
When I arrived in the bus station in Antofagasta, I experienced a nightmare Couch Surfing situation (second of this kind in my trip). My host who I spoke to a day before and who confirmed that he would be waiting for me, wasn't answering phone all day. I was wandering in the bus station for 3 hours, phoning him every 10 minutes. Then I got angry. I went to internet cafe, found a number of another guy from CS who I had contacted before too, and I phoned him. Somehow, Jorge wasn't surprised that I was calling. He said I could stay in his flat and that he was going to pick me up in 10 minutes.
So I sat on the floor, very tired, and after a short while a girl approached me and asked: "Aga?". It was Shirley from Cali, Colombia!! I recognised her from her profile picture, I sent her an email a day before asking if she would like to have coffee with me in Antofagasta. It appeared that she rents a room in Jorge's flat. Such a coincidence :) My mood changed immediately, I felt I was in good hands.
On the same evening I went with Shirley to a jewellery shop of her friends, to put up Christmas decorations (in the picture - they needed somebody tall :)). Oh my god... is it Christmas yet? I don't feel the atmosphere at all, where is the snow??...
Few hours later, owners of the shop invited Shirley and me to a bar for dinner and drinks. I had Peruvian pisco sour and peach sour; both food and the drinks were lovely. At one point a drunk guy introduced himself to me and asked if I needed help. He wanted to phone Polish consulate or Chilean government... ha ha ha ha... No, I definitely didn't need help :)
Next batch of my pictures:
3-day trip to the Bolivian desert

In Calama

Distance San Pedro de Atacama - Calama: 95 km, 1.5 hours on the bus, cost: 2 pounds. Thomas was travelling with me but this night he is going back to Peru, to catch his plane to France. Travelling through Atacama desert is wonderful although it depends on the area. It is amazing to see dunes but it can be very boring if there is flat area for a long time.
When we arrived in Calama, I went to meet my hosts who live 5 minutes from the bus station and from the town centre. They are a lovely family, very talkative and full of energy. There is nothing to see in the town really, I am just stopping to have a rest and obviously the family is a great experience for me.
I introduced Thomas to the family. They invited us to eat with them but at the end it was Thomas and I who bought food in a supermarket and cooked. The food was Thomas' idea and it was absolutely delicious (in the picture Thomas in action). Then we sat in the kitchen, talking for ages, until Thomas had to catch his bus at night. The Family is great. The mother and father who are in their 60's recently went on a trip to Argentina and Urugway, doing Couch Surfing. Isn't it amazing?...
Some facts about the north part of Chile:
- it is very rich in minerals such as copper, iron, nitrates
- the biggest in the world open copper mine is situated 16 km from Calama. I was going to visit the mine but the tour was fully booked for the next 5 days
http://www.visitchile.com/eng/atacama-desert-altiplano/destination.asp?id=100
- there are many earthquakes, every day, just that most of them are unnoticeable. It is better when they are small and frequent so they don't accumulate resulting in one deadly earthquake
- Atacama desert is the driest places in the world. The Family told me the last time they experienced little rain 4 years ago
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atacama_Desert
- it was Chile - Urugway football match at night. Chile won 2:0. People in bars got crazy :)
My pictures from the capital of Bolivia:
La Paz

CHILE, In San Pedro de Atacama

I spent 143 pounds in 10 days in Bolivia. It included 3-day trip to the desert which cost 70 pounds, all the rest was very cheap. The country surprised me, before I came here I had a picture of Bolivia in my head: a poor rural mountain country... I found out there are salt flats, desert, islands, lagoons, beautiful capital and nice people. However, the country is far behind other South American countries in regards to hygene, communication, organisation and education. For example it is difficult to find fast internet connection in La Paz, or Skype. All the computers are old and dirty.
I feel I need a change now. After Peru and Bolivia I need a higher standard of life and apparently this is what Chile and Argentina can offer me.

Thomas and I left our wonderful jeep team and we took a bus to San Pedro de Atacama (in the picture). Surprisingly, the bus ticket was included in the price of the desert trip.
It took us 2 hours to get to San Pedro, a town in the middle of Atacama desert. When you cross the border, you are not allowed to carry coca leaves and fruits with you. If you do it, you will have problems with the police and you will be fined 200 dollars.
When we arrived in the town, we found a nice hotel. I started writing my blog and Thomas fell asleep. San Pedro is very small, there is nothing to do apart from many activities in the desert. We spent 3 days in the desert, driving miles on the sand from one place to another so we need to rest from the desert at the moment :)

Day 3

We woke up at 4 am (ouch ouch ouch!!!..). It was very cold at night, everyone slept in clothes and hats. I slept only one hour, the cold kept me awake. We woke up so early because we wanted to see geysers on the altitiude of almost 5000 meters above the sea level. You can see them only early in the morning, later in the day the steam becomes invisible. It was freezing cold up there (-7 degrees).
After that we visited thermal springs and we dipped in the hot water (in the picture - I loved it). The temperature of the water was 30 - 35 degrees. The temperature outside was much lower... Somebody shouted my name in the springs... I turned my head and I saw Barbara who I had met on the trip from Copacabana to Island of Sun on Lake Titicaca, a week ago :)
Then we went to see an amazing green lagoon (this time the water seemed to be green) and then the driver gave me lift to the Chilean border. Thomas joined me, all other people carried on to a city in eastern Bolivia and then to Argentina.

Day 2

We woke up at 6 am (ouuuch!!...) and after breakfast we left. We had many great conversations in the car before we arrived in the place with unique in the world tombs. People used to be burried in these beautiful little caves, you can see their skeletons. The tombs are unique, as well as the salt houses and hotels, and they are situated in the middle of a desert called Sinoli. I loved the place, there was so much space around. I felt the vastness of space and I was happy. I thought that I could do anything I wanted with my life, nothing was impossible. Usually you feel small in the face of powerful but immensely silent nature... I felt incredibly strong.
After that we visited an active vulcano, amazing rocks in the desert and four beautiful lagoons with flamingos living peacefully in the region (in the picture at the first lagoon). I wanted to take a picture of my bare feet, dirty from the smelly mud due to its high sulphur content. I was looking for a position of my body with no shadow, I mean in Europe you have shadow on one side and no shadow on the other side of your body. After short confusion I realised that it was not possible - my feet were always in shadow.
There was a lot of dust in the desert. I always feel dirty in cities due to dust but never in deserts. In deserts I feel very integrated with the nature and dust is a part of the nature.

The last (fourth) lake is in a national park. The colour of the lake is intensive red due to a special kind of algea. The beautiful red colour disappears before the sunset so we were in a hurry to get to the park for 4 pm. We left our luggage in a 6-bed room and we went for a long walk. The area and lake are great. On the way back there was a strong freezing wind, very unpleasant.
When we were having tea in our hotel, Nadia and Lisabeth told us what happened to them in La Paz. They got on a taxi. Two more people got on before it even moved and one of them said he was a policeman, and he asked them for passports and money. The girls were confused and they said they had left everything in their hotel. So the policeman searched their rucksacks. The girls were looking at what he was doing all the time but when they returned to the hotel, their photo cameras were not in the rucksacks any more....

Later in the night, at the dining table, I heard two people speak Polish!! It was Kasia and Robert from Warsaw. We had a nice chat but unfortunately not very long as our drivers wanted to sleep and their rooms were by the dining room. It was getting freezing cold too.
When I told the Polish guys about my death experience they both asked, shocked "....so why didn't you come back home??" ha ha ha....