FAST FORWARD: Bali! – March 2010

One thing I have learned about blogging during this travel: uploading many fotos looks really nice, but it is a paaaaain in the a… when you don’t have a high speed connection available all the time – and where do you have that really when you are travelling (and certainly not in Bali).

Second thing: writing about things weeks and maybe even months past is a bit unexciting…

So lets fast forward, starting with a summary update:

• We are in Bali now, enjoying our last 3 weeks of travel (for this time )
• I am extremely happy about my new job – back at Vistaprint but this time in Sydney! – starting on the 5th of April (though I will only get to Sydney on the 29th)
• My job start includes 1 week back in Barcelona, 12th to 18th of April, nice! Looking so much forward to see my friends again there – those who haven’t moved back to somewhere in the meantime that is – and play a game of beach volley or two

Now, BALI:

Maybe the most suprising place in the whole last 6 months for me, certainly the place with the sweetest people, calmest atmosphere and most interesting culture-wise. And this with 2.000.000 tourists a year…

When we decided to stay here we mostly chose it for beach and some easy relaxation after the quite busy travel the last months (no trecking, climbing mountains or any other exercise planned for sure here). Of course we knew it was a super top touristy location since years, so I had expected some kind of asian Mallorca – not saying that you cannot still find nice spots on the balearic islands too.

But we were completely surprised: thanks to renting a car (14$ a day for the smallest 4×4 jeep in the world, but with the size of the streets, and the state of some, that’s really a good thing) we found so many nice, completely uncrowded and sometimes even pristine places on the east and north coast. Bright green ricefields as far as you can see, temples everywhere, religious processions, offerings with flowers, incense and whatnot everywhere. But most of all super calm, smiling, extremely friendly people who make it even easy to answer the same 3 questions about 2 dozen times a day: “where are you from?”, “what’s your name?” and “where are you’re going today?”. Even the, in fairness a little bit annoying, “yes taxi? transport sir?” when you walk through the more touristy parts is easy to bear in this atmosphere (though already thought about writing on my t-shirt “i have a car” or simply hanging my car key around my neck).

First two days in Kuta - due to "Njepy", Balinese New Year - see next post

On the road towards the north

Sunrise at the water temple near Bedugul, at on of the vulcano lakes

Relaxing in Pemuteran, northwest

I don’t know about India, I would love to travel there too some day, but here I must say, Hindu culture rules. Hey, we’re still only here for 2 weeks now, I have no clue if the people are really that happy or how it would be to live in the society, but for sure I can say that they look pretty happy and serene, and it feels really good to be a visitor here.

So I would defenitely recommend anyone looking for some good mix of different culture, some beach, some other nature, and for sure some diving or snorqueling to give Bali a try.

Here’s my top10 of things to do, see, etc.

1. Rent a car! Preferably the whole time and stay in different places on the island- just too much to see on this island, especially when you drive off the main roads or even best just get lost a bit. The island is only 30 by 50km and there’s villages every 100m (or so it feels), so getting lost is a different getting lost here. To traffic, driving in Bali and the particularities of maps see bit further below
2. Ubud. I hadn’t read about “that damn book” let alone the book itself (and guess I won’t), but still: it’s a beautiful place, so much to do, so much culture, and all that in a pretty barable climate – cool in the night, not as hot as down on the coast in the day either.
3. If you are in Ubud, go to as many different dance show as you can. They are all good, they are all different. Costumes are amazing, dancing between beautiful and just so different, gamelan music is bit different to european ears at first, then you get to like it really.
4. Go diving, or at least snorqueling. Good places: Permuteran in the north, from there you can do a day trip to the national park. Ahmed in the east, from where you can go diving on the shipwreck Liberty One.
5. Gili Islands. We did not have to go there unfortunately – can’t do everything – but everyone, locals, europeans who live here and tourists/travellers alike told us it’s a paradise: beautiful beaches, diving/snorqueling and just having the perfect beach stay for a few days. Gili islands are off Lombok, but there are speedboats which get you there from Bali’s east coast directly.
6. Balinese food: try everything, from nice restaurants to warongs, little local food stalls in small villages, anywhere. You can get a good meal from 0.80 US$ on local food stalls where you are not always sure what it is you eat, but hey, the local eat it and they look pretty healthy. One of my favourites: sweet soy sauce dishes – anything with “kecap” in the title, e.g. “Goreng kecap ayam” (rice and chicken in sweet soy sauce). They sweeten a lot with palm sugar here, hmmmmmm. And “sweet” does not mean they would not put some garlic and chili in it as well.
7. At least on some days, get up at 7am or even 6am and go through the villages and rice fields – it’s a very special atmosphere. In Ubud you can get a guided rice field walk, 2hrs for maybe 10 US$ (and if we paid too much we happily did) not only enjoying the atmosphere but also getting some info about village life, religion and rice farming while you pass by.
8. Unless you want to be in the midst of tourist-only life (and why would you come that far then), avoid the south, that is Kuta and around.
9. If you have that car and get out of the southern busy part and from around the height of Ubut and further up, get lost: all main (and busy) roads go north-south. So just take a road right or left at any sign to village names you cannot find on the map, drive a few kilometers through smaller villages and rice fields and enjoy the scenery. At some point stop and ask locals where you are or how to get to XYZ near where you think you are. They might often not speak english but nevertheless are super friendly and you always find your way out somehow – with the advantage of having seen things you might otherwise have just missed: little temples, tiny villages, water buffalos working in the rice fields – or even that 80-year old woman standing naked from her waist on in some shop, just as Balinese woman used to be dressed before too many westerns came (or mainly muslim Jakarta passed a pornography law ). I must say I had to concentrate on the road, Rieke saw her. And no, we did not take pictures.
10. Just enjoy being there. If you don’t understand something, they don’t understand you, or you think something is wrong, first thing you do: smile. Then see further. Btw, even the bargaining down the prices is done smiling here – or was that because we paid some dolars too much? well, 10 instead of 5$ for a handcrafted basket, we’ll certainly survive.
11. almost forgot one, so 11 this time: massages! Try the foot reflex massage, full body massage, thai massage (sure not 100% thai but pretty close), any massage. Nice! around 5euro for 1 hour…

Legong dance

Kecac dance

The Kecac dance group plus one

Barong dance

The Barong

Diving at the Liberty One shipwreck near Ahmed, east coast

Nemo!

Driving in Bali:

• you drive on the left hand side – unless you are a local and have a scooter and want to turn right somewhere, maybe in 50m, 0r 100m… So don’t be suprised to see full traffic approaching you from the front on your right hand side lane while 1 or 2 scooters do the same on the left side. Or a big van…
• you overtake, well, when you can. Scooters overtake you all the time, cars sometimes, traffic coming in front doing the same – so don’t be surprised when a road being 4m wide somehow turns 4 lanes suddenly, well, “lanes”. Funny thing: it always works somehow, people seem to drive like crazy, but the slow down for someone who doesnt make it to overtake in time – so should you do
• good thing with all this: traffic is slow, roads are almost 100% paved, but that includes paved potholes too so even outside villages you never go faster than 50 or 60. Better for slowing down or stopping when that van coming in opposite direction is overtaken by another van suddenly
• there’s no sidewalks really, so people – in the village as well as in between – walk on the side of the street.  So even without any overtaking (that is not too often) there’s sort of 4 lanes: people walking left, yourself, car coming from front, people walking right – and in the first part of the day heaps of school children in their school uniforms
• make sure your horn works when you rent a car. it’s used all the time, and mainly means “hello I am there, careful”. scooters use it when they overtake, you use it when you drive past people, a wonder pedestrians don’t have horns yet – but as almost everyone seems to have a scooter nowadays it’s almost the same

In summary: A different place, an extremely nice place. I can fully understand why foreigners are falling in love with Bali since a 100 years or so.

PS: Pictures being added soon, internet is not one of the strengths of Bali – but that can also be a good thing. After all, aren’t we here to relax?

21.12.-26.12.: Christmas at the “End of the World” – Ushuaia, Argentina

We had heard a lot about Ushuaia – from being a great place to being totally overrated with nothing to offer but the tag “end of the world / southern most city in the americas” – and we actually had already discarded going there.

Then Christmas was approaching, and with both Rieke and me never having spent a Christmas being away from the family we thought: if we’re already THAT far from everyone on that date, what better place to go then than the End of the World. Also the fact that is was around 30 degrees and humid in Buenos Aires at that time, from where we would leave to New Zealand a few days later, was not really too appealing. At least we wanted to get a bit closer to the German Christmas feeling weather wise – and that’s what we got: 5-10 degrees and a few showers o.k., only that this year Germany got a fairy tale winter with 2 months of consistent snow or so. Can’t have everything it seems.

So Ushuaia: a really nice place actually! And in a beautiful setting between a snowy mountain range in the back and Beagle Channel in front. The perfect choice for our Christmas eve in South America, except maybe the fact that we had to have our Christmas dinner at 16:00h because all the restaurants close in the evening – but perfect timing for the christmas skype calls with our 3 families that is Riekes’ 1 and my 2 beloved ones (ooooh, how sweet was my grandma on skype!!!).

Crossing the border to Argentina again (5th time?) - Argentinians collect the price for slowest border procedures by far in whole south america btw.

Our home for the 5 days in Ushuaia - got pretty lucky actually, incredible how crowded this town is at that time of the year

View at Ushuaia from the harbour with the Martial Mountain range in the back

Not a castle but nice to have some space for a few days

Christmas skyping with my Family - bit sad to be so far away on that day, actually that was my first Christmas not being home I realized. But very nice to be able to not only talk to but see everyone over video at least

Streets of Ushuaia

And that was our time in Tierra del Fuego already - view from the plane

19.12.2010: Punta Arenas – and 130.000 Penguins

Punta Arenas is not a place worth visiting really, we’d say – expensive, certainly not a beauty, cold – except for one reason:

130.00 PENGUINS breeding on a nearby island!

Walking through the "city center" - bit cold too

Saw this one next to our hostel

Getting onto the ship to the penguin island - a car ferry!

Tickets are collected by the "Chief of operations"

And there they are already waiting for us

65.000 penguin couples nesting here - 130.000!! Very cute, but also interesting smell really

So cute, and absolutely not afraid of the human visitors at all

10.12.-18.12.2009: Torres del Paine, Chile

Top10 Tips for Torres del Paine:

1. Bring enough cash! You have to pay cash for the the camping grounds as well as for food if you run out… How many people we have seen struggling with their reserves for lack of  a few dollars more including your correspondant
2. Lots of insect repellent
3. Do the “O”, that is the full round, if you want to have some real outdoor experience. The “W” might include all the “highlights”, except one for sure: Tranquility, just you and the nature. Expect to meet fellow hikers every 5mins on the “W” route. On the backside of the mountains you might see a just a couple in a whole day even in high season. Plus: you get the 1.200m pass and the great view on huge glacier Grey
4. Pasta and rice, no instant mashed potatoes…
5. If you do more hiking trips, invest in a MSR white gas/kerosene cooker. So much faster cooking, less fuel to carry
6. Camp Grey is a great place to stay 2 nights, or even 3
7. Consider the trip from Camp Grey onto and into glacier grey – costs quite some extra money (180dollars in fact), but we heard it’s a unique experience and saw amazing pictures of friends: you enter ice caves within the glacier
8. Take … with you
9. If you do the “O”, bring your trecking sandals, no flip-flops. Easier to do the creek crossings – you need something under your feet as it’s freezing and slippery. And the trecking sandals don’t wash away in the stream
10. Do the trip from Puerto Natales, not Punta Arenas. Puerto Natales is closer and it’s really a cute place also to relax after the trip. Better hostals for better money as well. And actually you can forget about Punta Arenas, nothing to see there, except for the Penguin Island. But that you also have near Ushuaia which again is so much nicer.

DAY 1: From Hosteria Torres del Paine to Seron (and a bit further)

Our food for the 9 days

Ready to go

Around 18kg here...

First hundred meters, already looks nice!

One of the many creek crossings on the first day - doesn't look big, but just big enough so you cannot jump over it

...and another... I think on the one between these I had lost my flip-flop

Funny cloud formations

resting

Luckily we didn't have to cross that one

First night camp - we had skipped Camp Seron as we thought it would be nicer to advance a bit more (in the end we made another 35minutes...) and also to have a bit more nature - only later we learned it was absoltely illegal to camp wild, ouch!

DAY 2: to Campamento Dickson (aka Mosquito Mayhem…)

Breakfast - porridge, yummy!

and on the road again

This must be a cold place: even the insects wear fur!

Tea break with some extra motivation

"Is it far yet?" yes it was

Yey, a bridge!

Yeeey, Dickson!

But still a bit to go, around that river, down that cliff

First things first: shower!

No, it's not actually THAT cold, it's mosquito protection...

Dinner time - around 18h or so. At 20h we were usually already in bed, sleeping 11hrs every night never in my life slept that much and that deep

Evening walk on the glacier lake, beautiful

DAY 3: from Dickson to Campamento Perros

Leaving Dickson

towards Perros, past more glaciers

Another glacier, just before the entrance to camp Perros

Dinner in Perros - in a cooking tent, no mosquitos, luxury!

hmmm, and a special desert

...giving us strength for a little evening sidetrip: Glacier Puma - "Wir sind ja nicht zum Spass hier!"

Glaciar Puma, and you can get pretty close too

Here my personal interpretation why this is the Puma Glacier - right?!

DAY 4: From Perros over the pass (1.200m) to Campamento Paso

Thaaat's the way

Through the snow again

and further up

getting hot

getting closer

Finally there! with the 15kg backpacks. Thinking that our guides did this for us in Peru, only 3.000m more altitude, puh

And what a view on the other side of the pass: the whole space filled by glacier Grey

then there was still the way down on the other side... leg muscle killer

The other side of the pass, bit steeper here

Downhill skiing on size 11

Finally in Campamento Paso, dinner time

DAY 5: From campamento Paso to campamento Grey

Morning number 4: feeling as fresh as it looks

Hours walking past glacier Grey

Climbing some river beds

after 5hrs of walk, reaching the end of the glacier

Campamento Grey, a peaceful paradise (and no mosquitos btw, 0, nil, nada)

DAY 6: From Grey to overcrowded campamento Italiano (welcome to the “W”)

Morning number 5

more river beds, more ladders

Luxury food once more

First glance of "los cuernos"

Arriving at campamento Italiano

2,000 pesos for this one

DAY 7: Side trip into Valle Frances and then to campamento Cuernos

Walking up the French Valley

Later that day, approaching campamento Cuernos right down at the sea shore

And there they actually accepted credit cards so we finally had some change in the diet for dinner

Please take off your shoes will not talk about the air inside now

he? inside??

DAY 8: Up to campamento Torres

Meeting a Guanaco

and up again

Oh, still not finished climbing today

First glimpse of the "Torres" we're climbing up to see at sunrise

Thank God we made it

Campamento Torres - pretty cold here

Hamburg's Globetrotter Curry Chicken, saved for last

Going to sleep at 0 degree, brrr. My 15 year old sleeping bag and a flat formerly inflatable matress wasn't big help either. First time I envy Rieke for her equipment

DAY 9 – Finale: Getting up at 4.30 am to climb up to the Torres del Paine view point – and finishing the treck in the afternoon

Dusk to the back

There they are!

Group foto with 3 very nice Israelis we had met continuously since camp Perros

Going back home

Back in Puerto Natales - only days til Christmas!

7.12.-9.12.: Perito Moreno, Argentinian Patagonia

You’ll like Perito Moreno when you:

• like lots of ice o.k., when you always wanted to see a pretty impressive glacier from close!
• don’t want to walk for miles to see that glacier from closer
• want to see a pretty active glacier and hear the thunder of it calving

You’ll not feel too hot about PM when you:

• need adventure on every trip
• want to have the glacier all for yourself

Interesting fact of the day:

The origin of the name is in memory of Dr. Francisco Pascasio Moreno. “Perito” meaning specialist, expert in Spanish.

Perito Moreno village, nice for a few days stay too

Even a casino in town

then we tested our tent for the big trip

29.11.-6.12.09: Visiting Rieke’s Family in Buenos Aires – and 5 days lazy vacation in Punta del Este (Uruguay)

You’ll like Uruguay when you are looking for:

• peacefulness in the middle of south american hustle & bustle
• clean and tidy streets, villages, beaches
• supermarkets where you find everything you’d expect at home
• great food: meat as good as in Argentina, fantastic fresh pasta, super yummy icecream…
• super friendly, easygoing people
• not to bargain about prices for taxis, rooms, etc. etc.

You would not be too excited about Uruguay when you are looking for:

• wild adventure
• exotic surroundings
• a cheap holiday

Some call Uruguay the Switzerland of Sout America (David? ). I think these people refer to the fact that Uruguay serves as the banking center for it’s bigger neighbours (and the place where banks don’t ask where that money came from?). But getting into Uruguay we were not sure whether that comparison was not rather because of the extreeeeme tidyness, plus the cows and pasture everywhere no hills though, but surf.

But how did we end up in Uruguay?

I actually had never seen myself visiting that country – somewhere tucked in between Argentina and Brasil. Neither had I had a very clear idea of Uruguay. Apart from one rather distant sense, from knowing “Richi”, aka Richard from Barcelona Beach volley I could have deducted something to the easy goingness and uruguayans’ loving to have a chat about anything at any time with anyone.

But as it happened, Rieke has distant family in Buenos Aires, who we visited of course. They had never seen each other, in fact Rieke had only known about their existance shortly before she started her travel, but we were so extremely well and nicely received by Rudi, Brigitte and their daughter Valeria! It felt almost like being home with family there.

As it also happened, Brigitte and Rudi have a house near Punta del Este, Uruguay, which they were so nice to let us spend a week there to have a well needed rest from our power-travel

And what a vacation it was!

Arriving on "Busstop 35", hmmm, beeeeeach

Home sweet home - all for us for 1 week, thank you Rudi & Brigitte!

Table tennis center and tuc tuc storage

breakfast

The daily icecream

Trip to Punta del Este - Rieke on her hot bike

High five

BBQ on 1st Advent

The best fresh Gnocchi we EVER had - even raw they tasted like, well like in Gnocchi heaven

What you do when you have a lot of time

Of course I had to try the moped as well, speed madness

the daily table tennis match

Everything you always wanted to know about SEO – Part 1

Completely travel unrelated but I had to put it somewhere. Some people have asked what have I actually done before my travel, what are the projects I am still sometimes working on about, then what is SEO etc. etc. Of course SEO was not the only thing I worked on over the last year, but it was quite a bit too.

SEO is “Search Engine Optimization” for starters. And that is to optimize an existing Website the way that it should be best found when people are looking on search engines (i.e. mainly Google) for things you consider your website offers/sells/gives information about.

How do you do this?

So there are onsite factors – things directly on your website like the URLs, the page titles, meta-tags, page content, internal links (links from one page to another one of yours), hey, just Google “onsite SEO factors”, you will get a lot of answers. Generally onsite factors are easier to influence, since it’s your website…

Then there are offsite factors – things like links from other website pointing to your site, the age of these links, the general value/trust/age/reputation the website has which is pointing to you, etc. etc. Again, just google “offsite SEO factors” and you get a lot of more answers.

But how are those factors weighted in the Google algorithm – or: which factors are most important to determine the position of your website in a specific Google search result? Find below what I would consider a pretty good summary and comparison of factors regarded by top SEOs as being most important for influencing your ranking in Google – from 2005, 2007 and 2009. I highlighted onsite factors in BOLD. The rest is obviously offsite factors, i.e. inbound links with different aspects being looked at: number of links, diversity, topics, link anchor text, “trust” of linking domain (age, own link history etc.).

Enjoy!

Background:
SEOmoz ranking factors is done by interviewing reknown top SEOs from different agencies and companies (from US…) and building a list of factors out of that with 2 variables: 1.) Importance score of factor, 2.) Consensus score – how much or little did SEOs agree on a factor

Summary: lot has moved from importance of onsite factors to importance of offsite factors – apparently - though see the “grain of salt”, “top queries vs. long tail” and “takeaways” comment below too.

Top 10 Ranking Factors in 2005 (http://www.seomoz.org/article/search-ranking-factors-2005)

1. Title Tag – 4.57
2. Anchor Text of Links – 4.46
3. Keyword Use in Document Text – 4.38
4. Accessibility of Document – 4.3
5. Links to Document from Site-Internal Pages – 4.15
6. Primary Subject Matter of Site – 4.00
7. External Links to Linking Pages – 3.92
8. Link Popularity of Site in Topical Community – 3.77
9. Global Link Popularity of Site – 3.69
10. Keyword Spamming – 3.69

Top 10 Ranking Factors in 2007 (http://www.seomoz.org/blog/ranking-factors-version-2-released)

1. Keyword Use in Title Tag (4.9)
2. Global Link Popularity of Site (4.5)
3. Anchor Text of Inbound Link (4.4)
4. Link Popularity within the Site’s Internal Link Structure (4.1)
5. Age of Site (4)
6. Topical Relevance of Inbound Links to Site (3.9)
7. Link Popularity of Site in Topical Community (3.9)
8. Keyword Use in Body Text (3.9)
9. Global Link Popularity of Linking Site (3.7)
10. Topical Relationship of Linking Page (3.6)

Top 5 Ranking Factors 2009 (http://www.seomoz.org/article/search-ranking-factors)

1. Keyword Focused Anchor Text from External Links
2. External Link Popularity (quantity/quality of external links)
3. Diversity of Link Sources (links from many unique root domains)
4. Keyword Use Anywhere in the Title Tag
5. Trustworthiness of the Domain Based on Link Distance from Trusted Domains (e.g. TrustRank, Domain mozTrust, etc.)

The grains of salt:

• this list and SEO opinions in general tend to overemphazise a bit everything which is new. SEO is also a bit of marketing… First it was ALL onsite, then it was ALL overall relevance with emphasis on quantity, then for a very short while it was ALL social media optimization…, now it is ALL “trust” score
• different markets still behave differently – that just depends on how mature a market is in terms of optimization of webpages. See it like this: in a market where there’s tons of crap pages, one which is very basically optimized onsite will still go up easily. Also if there’s a lot of bad pages in a market, or even just a different way to create pages and content in general, Google cannot use the same factors to rank websites for queries. If the market is mature and all companies do their best to have a good quality site, accessible and relevant content, use all ways to optimize onsite, then obviously there have to be additional factors to distinguish the better from the not so good results for any query
• after all this list reflects not so much what are the most important factors for ranking in Google, but what are the most important factors to touch when you want to make a site go up within a measurable amount of time: looking at the factors from 2005 to 2009 the summary would be: before it was easier/faster, now it’s a bit more mid/long term
• AND:
  • could you ignore external links before? Better not, how would you now have old and trusted links
  • should you ignore onsite optimization now? Well, it still counts: Still Google has to match queries with content… And still it’s something which is directly in your hand.

Top queries vs. long tail (…chunky middle, chewy bits…):

• there’s also a difference how you can optimize for top queries vs. for long tail queries: for top queries there’s simply more competition, also there’s more history on search behaviour… For long tail queries, the more KWs are used in a query, the less documents will be relevant for a query, less external links for a specific topic, etc. etc.
• same is valid for markets (see above)

Take-aways:

• onsite optimization is not “done”, it should just be done on your site by now - all the other guys in your market already did it too
  
• try to get those links from those trusted sites… That’s a marketing and a business development task: engage your audience, engage with other important players
• So it’s just a sign that internet is maturing as a channel: before you could get traffic almost entirely with Tech resources, now you actually have to have a business behind too

25.-29.11.09: Rio de Janeiro

DOs in Rio de Janeiro:

• Stay in Santa Teresa, the old bohemian living area on a hill directly overlooking Lapa’s nightlife and Rio’s metropolitan center, for example in: Terra Brasilis
• Take the old tram, “Bondinho” from behind the Cathedral/Petrobras Building to Santa Teresa or right up to the foot of Corcovado
• Go by bus: you see a lot of Rio, the ticket clerks are usually very nice and  tell you where they go, where they don’t and when to hop off. Also Rio bus drivers all seem to love formula 1, at least they try driving that way, but the buses only seem to jump out of the curves, they really don’t
• Go up to Corcovado’s Christ the redeemer statue, it’s really worth it
• Try as many juices from the juice stands you find every 20m in Rio – once you’ve left Brasil you will miss them
• Try the burgers at the juice shops too, they are not the usual McDo stuff, they taste great
• Have a cold can of beer on Saturday evening/night (around 7-8pm) at the Curvelo station (first stop in Santa Teresa): locals gather to play, sing and dance samba on the street. 100% non-commercial
• Have a Sunday afternoon stroll through Lapa. Maybe don’t go into too dark streets, don’t wave around with you wallet and don’t wear golden necklaces (where would you do that in South America anyway…), but though that nightlife area looks a bit run-down during the day it’s really actually the closest you can get to a historic center in Rio

DON’Ts in Rio:

• A city tour – there is really nothing you cannot see yourself, and Rio is not about specific buildings or sites (o.k., the Corcovado, see above) but the whole setting and atmosphere – you will not take that in from a bus driving through the traffic jam
• Pay an agency for a “tour” to see a Samba school rehearsal – it’s really not worth it, and if you really want to go just take a taxi to the place. They are not in dangerous favelas (whatever the tour operators want to make you believe – crime and danger in Rio seem to be a business factor too…), taxis do drive there and you can leave whenever you want as well. Though still, rather go to Curvelo on saturday evening or a samba show in Lapa

Narrow streets down from Santa Teresa to Lapa

Ons of many stops for a quick fruit juice (recommended combinations: Papaya / Orange, Orange / Goyaba, or just plain Water melon, hmmm)

Tourist on Copacabana

Christmas feeling in Ipanema

How to resist that maracuja caipirinha...

Ipanema beach at late afternoon (see Caipirinha above why not early afternoon )

Walk through the "historic center" - not much left of it, Rio center seems to be "modernized" mainly in the 60ies/70ies, same as elsewhere they just loved their concrete back then...

Alô?

Taking the "bondinho" back to Santa Teresa - with a very nice brazilian from Belem we've met at the station

Santa Teresa by night

Santa Teresa by night II

Lagoa Rodrigo de Freitas from Corcovado

Cristo redentor - Christ the redeemer. Planned in 1922, inaugurated in 1931

Pao de Azucar from Corcovado (Sugar loaf, Zuckerhut...)

Rieke and a japanese bunny on Corcovado (no, we did not ask...)

A happy couple on Corcovado

At maracana stadium - with the great tour we did we actually did not enter the stadium (nor did we see much else of what we had thought. TOP TIP Rio: do not make tours...)

The sambodromo. Here goes the world known Samba parade on Rio's Carnival - and just here. Every samba school (there are 12) has 90 minutes to parade up and down that road, 200.000 spectators fit in here, but the parade never leaves that place. I'd think it's a bit sterile, and though people in Rio think carnival is the best in the world here I'd rather go to Recife or Salvador or elsewhere.. I was stranded in Corumba in the Pantanal in 1995 and that carnival there was just great too

Metropolitan Cathedral with Christmas deco

THIS reminded me SO much of my good old Ruhr-University in Bochum... 60s/70s concrete sins look similar all over the world I guess judge yourself

That could well be between Hörsaalzentrum Ost and the N buildings...

The Petrobras building. Looks nice at night in green and yellow

Bondinho by day - at Curvelo stop in Santa Teresa

Nice mansions in Santa Teresa

Not so well preserved but grand old building in Santa Teresa

Parque das Ruinas in Santa Teresa - a cultural center (theater and stuff). That's where we had the pleasure to meet and chat with an 83 year old man, turning out to have been a pretty successful playwright and music compositor back in the days, and the son of the late founder of the Brazilian Comunist Party (Abilio Nequete). Incredible the people you meet travelling

Locals playing Samba and generally having a good time near Curvelo on Saturday evening

View from our room over Lapa and the city center

even our bathroom had a view

Walk through Lapa

Wall painting at the aquaeduct in Lapa

more wall paintings

More of Lapa - how nice could that part of the city center be (and in fact then would be the real historic center) if overhauled it a bit, like they did with the Pelorinho in Salvador de Bahia...

Christmas deco on our way to Leblon

At the samba school rehearsal (yes, we went... Don't do it unless you don't mind tourist events)

A bit of "Pagode" before the Samba part

Samba

Good-bye Rio

22.-25.11.09: Iguazu – waterfalls and butterflies

We were received by water falling – from the sky – already on our bus tour to the falls, around 12hrs before we reached Iguazu. Water continued to pour down the whole first day we spent there, while the water in hostels, aka hot shower or toilet…, was cut  in the whole town. Technical problems.

Later we read in the newspapers that this was the worst rainfalls in years and the whole region had suffered damages to streets and other infrastructure. So we were extremely lucky with the day we picked to visit the waterfalls, on the 3rd day in Iguazu rain started again and we had the only really sunny day on the falls in the whole week.

Iguazu itself was amazing – of course the waterfalls, and all the more with the amount of water coming down there with the whole region being soaked with rain – but also the nature around is incredible: I had never seen so many butterflies, and for sure none ever before sitting on our hands, hats and backpacks all the time. We also saw humming birds, monkeys, all kinds of lizzards… Veeeery nice.

Birds waiting for tourists (and food) on the way to the waterfalls

and butterflies

Lots of butterflies

and they seemed to really like us

Garganta del Diablo - Devil's throat, from the argentinian side

a few more butterflies

Garganta del Diablo from further away

another butterfly from pretty close by

Someone who probably likes butterflies too

The Iguazu waterfalls on the argentinian side

below one of the boats we took a bit later - you can already imagine it's a pretty wet adventure

another waterfall - every single one has a name, but it's nearly 200 different ones I think

Queuing for our waterfall baptism

after the boat tour - though with 30 degrees or more every refreshment is well received

after the boat tour II

Ein Waran? (monitor lizard?!)

his bigger brother (on the left...)

View from the argentinian upper walk

Another view from the upper walk

A humming bird - Kolibri

Rieke is hungry

Another little visitor

That one was pretty persistent

In the evening we couldn't resist to try that Hostel's barbecue as well

though with a bit healthier touch now

Charming christmas decoration at Iguazu Airport

rain again - electricity went down again too, but luckily in the end we only had a 2 hr delay to Rio

Last view on the Iguazu falls from above

No change in Argentina…

This is not meant politically though I think the Peronistas govern this country for decades and here the Kirchner’s managed to do what the Clinton’s failed at in the US.

No, this is meant entirely monetary: it’s amazing! The whole country does not seem to have small change!!

I mean, you’re used to some degree of that problem when you are in countries like Ecuador or Bolivia, or Guatemala if you want: you go to a bank and withdraw the equivalent of 100 USD – and you get 2 bills of the equivalent of 50. Fantastic idea you think, that’s a worker’s monthly salary in one bill, great idea to fill the ATMs with these… But then you plan a bit and pay your next night bus ticket, hostel bill or whatnot with it first.

But Argentina! And here we are not talking about the equivalent of a worker’s wage. I am talking you go to a shop with a 20 pesos bill (5 USD…), buy a water, a juice and 2 empanadas which amounts to 15.50 pesos (as an example) – and the guy at the cashier looks at you with a sorry face: “do you have it smaller please?”. EVERYWHERE. And in50% of the cases they REALLY do not have any change – in the other 50% they act as if they do not have any, just in case for the next time they need that change again… Which makes it even worse: because everyone is so neurotic about small change nobody wants to hand the small bills out to anybody – you never know when you might really need them next time…

The most crazy example for me, so far: on the night bus to Iguazu we have ONE stop where we can buy water and some crackers etc., around midight. I arrive at the ONLY shop open there, want to buy the water, the crackers etc. – for 15 peso, with a bill of 50 pesos (12 USD). No change, sorry. Can’t sell you anything, sorry. HA. Luckily there was this nice guy from Heidelberg who just gave me a 10 pesos bill at least for the water.

Now there’s only 4 possible explanations for me:

• Small bills cost too much for the argentinian central bank, or they think “if I print a 2 pesos bill I can as well print a 100 pesos bill for the same price of ink and paper!”
• Small bills are rotting so fast – nobody uses wallets in south america, bills are kept straight in the pocket – they can’t be replaced fast enough?
• It’s an entirely psychological thing: someone started this “do you have it smaller” thing, then everyone started keeping their small money for “later”, that’s why it justdoesn’t circulate
• Someone eats the small bills…

Anyone with another good explanation?

PS: It took me THREE days to see my first argentinian coin! I am not kidding!!