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Jambo?
Habari?
Mambo Poa?

We are back in Stonetown, the capitol of Zanzibar after 8 terrific...
and I mean really terrific days here. We have 2 days here before we go
back to Dar es Salaam and then onto the island of Mafia (south of
Zanzibar). We are staying in a treehouse on Mafia and then begin our
journey home.

Here is a story from our Zanzibar trip.
Yesterday, we took a boat to Chumbe Island, which is 8miles east of
Stonetown. The island is a marine and forest reserve and there are
only 7 bungalows on the whole island. We stayed in one, and WOW. The
coral is also in better shape than anywhere else on Zanzibar because
it is a reserve and fishing is not allowed (the dynamite fishing here
kills the coral pretty rapidly). Anyway, so we stayed on this island
with only 12 other tourists and had the run of it. Pretty terrific.

Hello everyone,

We are now in the last few weeks of our 7 month adventure! We are
writing this from a beach on the north of Zanzibar.

We haven't really sent a good update at any point during Africa, so we
will wrap it all up in one email.  For photos: 
http://photos.yahoo.com/jmilstei

Our trail through Africa took us through 9 countries (including one in Europe):

*Ethiopia
BEST: Visiting nearly a dozen churches chiseled out of stone and still
in use in the mountain town of Lalibela.
MOST MEMORABLE: The most heart-wrenching poverty anywhere we've ever been.

*Egypt
BEST: Floating in a hot air balloon over the sites of Luxor as the sun rose.
MOST MEMORABLE: Touts. When you take a taxi ride, the driver tries to
sell you a boat ride or a camel ride. When you take a boat ride, the
captain tries to sell you a cab ride.

*Sinai Peninsula
BEST: Amazing snorkeling in water so clear, you can see 100 feet ahead
of you, with a dazzling array of colored coral and a stunning variety
of fish.  It has to be seen to be believed.
MOST MEMORABLE: Following in the footsteps of Moses. Climbing Mt.
Sinai in the middle of the night and watching sunrise from the top.

*Turkey
BEST: A sunset boat ride on the Bosphorus, taking in the gorgeous
sights of Istanbul.
MOST MEMORABLE: Jen getting grabbed, pinched, and annoyed by Turkish men.

*Senegal
BEST: The raw impact of Ile de Goree, an island turned museum, where
hundreds of thousands of slaves were imprisoned before being shipped
off to America or Europe.
MOST MEMORABLE: Going to a music club to hear Senegalese music, but
instead listening to the "rap" of "Duggy-Tee," one of many West
Africans influenced by American music. (yes, there was also a boy-band
performing with all the moves of N'Sync).

*Gambia
BEST: Staying in a village that probably has not changed in hundreds
of years, with Jen's peace corps cousin, and greeting the locals in
their language of Mandinka. (Have you read "Roots?")
MOST MEMORABLE: Getting to the village. We rented a car and 40 miles
from a city, the gas tank actually broke off of the car, spilling 25
gallons of gas on the road. While small boys tried to scoop the gas
off the road, we found some men to put the car back together.

*Morocco
BEST: Riding camels on the massive dunes of the Sahara at sunset.
Climbing to the top of the tallest dune for sunrise and then sliding
all the way down!
MOST MEMORABLE: Getting invited to a Moroccan wedding. It started at
10pm and ended long after sunrise.

*Uganda
BEST: The primates. 
Gorillas: Standing 20 feet away from a 500lb Silverback as he raced
down a tree, pounding his chest. Then watching a whole gorilla family
interact from 5 feet away.
Chimps: Tracking a group of 80 chimps by listening to their screams,
watching them run through the forest, climb trees, and swing on vines
tarzan-style. (or was tarzan just imitating chimps?)
MOST MEMORABLE: Being parked on a road with 35 elephants around us,
and having to put the car in reverse when a big male decided to
charge.

*Kenya
BEST: Coming upon a pride of lions in the Masai Mara and watching the
cubs play while mom and dad had a little "private time."
MOST MEMORABLE: Our bus driver falling asleep at 1am on a muddy road.
The bus went off the road, the luggage fell from the racks, people
screamed, and the driver woke up.

*Tanzania
BEST: Ending more than 2 great weeks of safaris sitting outside our
tent sipping wine and watching elephants, antelopes, zebras, giraffes,
& wildebeests coming to a river below us to drink.
MOST MEMORABLE: With beers-in-hand, sitting on a gorgeous white-sand
beach in Zanzibar watching the red sun set into the turquoise water.

ODDS AND ENDS:
BEST HOTEL: Mena House in Egypt, where we could see the pyramids from our room.
WORST HOTEL: Wutma Hotel in Ethiopia, where we could hear the cats and
the neighbors getting busy all night.

TRANSPORTATION MISHAPS:
Driving through the Egypt desert in the middle of the night and having
our van catch on fire (then, the driver throw alcohol on the fire by
mistake).

Renting a car on Zanzibar, only to find out that an embezzlement
scheme has left the entire island without gasoline (we are still
dealing with this now!)

Trying to fly from Addis Ababa to Cairo, and getting delayed when a
cargo plane crashed on the runway. Then, when we took off the next
day, we had to return to Ethiopia mid-flight because of a massive
sandstorm in Sudan.

See you soon...

Jake and Jen

Jambo from Zanzibar!

We are relaxing on a beautiful white sand beach while turquoise waves
lap at our feet. We rented a car in Stonetown and have been exploring
the island's best beaches. We went snorkeling the day before
yesterday on a reef near a private island. Our transport to the reef
was a wooden dhow, a traditional East African sailing boat. It's
basically a long skinny canoe with a big sail and two pontoons, like a
trimaran. The sails are just pieces of cloth sewn together and the
rudder is just a piece of coconut bark. No sailing winches, just old
rope and a lot of guys pulling hard. Oh, and when the wind dies, they
stuck poles in the sand and pushed. It was not as fast as the speed
boats from the resorts but it was a lot more fun. The reefs were in
poor shape, but there were lots of fish anyway. We've heard that they
used to do dynamite fishing here, and we saw lots of fisherman with
their rusty spears walking on the reefs in their coconut husk sandals,
so that probably explains the condition of the reefs. We are spending
the next couple of days near the northern tip of Zanzibar at an area
called Kendwa. We are at Amaan Kendwa Beach Resort, although it is
not much of a resort, just some cement bungalows. After here, we will head to the
southeast to check out the coast there. Then we are going back to
Stonetown for 3 days. Then we go to Mafia for the final stop on our
7 month adventure. Sad--but it's been a great ride... and we miss
Thai food in San Francisco (and real breakfasts)!

Zanzibar is lovely. The sand is as white as snow. We are going
snorkeling tomorrow. Can't believe we only have about 20 days left in
our trip...

Tonight, we are in a hotel room with a phone in Nairobi. Tomorrow
morning we leave for Arusha. Kenya was terrific.

So we arrive in Uganda on the 17th. Then we are doing a gorilla trek
on the 19th for three days in Uganda. We will probably be leaving
Uganda and passing by Lake Victoria around the August 25th or 26th
when we head for Kenya. From there, we will probably go to Nairobi to
get a safari in the Masai Mara. Around the September 5th or 6th we
will probably head to Arusha, Tanzania for a safari in the Serengetti.
We will then head to Zanzibar around the 19th. I don't think we will
spend much time if any in Dar. We are planning to up our accomodation
budget a little in Zanzibar since it will be the last stop on our
trip.

We are now in Chefchaoen in the Rif Mountains. It is much cooler here
than in Fes where the temperature was around 112-degrees. We are
hoping to rent a car tomorrow to drive to the Mediterranean coast,
which is supposed to be beautiful. After that we will high tail it to
Rabat and then fly out of Casablanca to Cairo and then on to Uganda.

Fes was fabulous--beautiful crafts, winding alleyways and we got to
attend a Moroccan wedding, which was really amazing. We hired a woman
named Amina for a day tour of the city, and she invited us to her
sister's wedding. She ended our tour around 2pm and left to join her
sister at the hair salon. At 8:30pm when we arrived in her family's
neighborhood, they were still at the hair salon. We hung out in a
cafe until she could come meet us and take us to her house.

The house was multi-storied white stucco. For the wedding, the family
had placed a rectangular carpet and big gold pillars in front of the
door. Amina led us inside to a living room that was lined with
couches on all sides. Although the windows were open, it must have
been about 100 degrees in the room. Sitting on the couches were about
a dozen women most of them decked out in heavy full length silk robes
in bright colors and head scarves. None of them spoke English, so we
spoke some halting French and then all sat smiling politely in
silence. Apparently, in Moroccan culture sitting with others in
silence is perfectly acceptable; we noticed that even when we were not
in their presence, the women often just sat next to each other without
speaking. Later, a young woman who was a neighbor of the groom sat
down next to us. She spoke some English, and we were able to
communicate in Frenglish. She told us that she drove from Rabat where
she left the groom's sister crying. She said the sister was upset
because she had to work the next day and therefore could not attend
the wedding. This was our first clue that this was going to be a very
long evening.

After sitting awkwardly for about an hour in the living room, we were
herded up the stairs to a room with three tables. At two of the
tables all of the women and Jake were seated and at the other table
only men were seated. We then ate a delicous chicken and lamb tajine
(a type of crock pot meal with slow-cooked veggies and meat ) with our
hands off of a communal plate. After dinner we were herded up more
stairs to the roof terrace.

Chairs for guests had been placed lining three sides of the terrace.
On the remaining side were two gigantic gold thrones with red seat
covers for the bride and groom. We sat on the terrace with the other
guests for about two hours. During most of that time there was little
talking. Some of the guests dozed, others just sat in silence.
Fortunately, the cousin of the groom who ushered us to our seats spoke
a little English. So, we spent most of the two hours talking to him
about life Morocco and the United States.

A little after midnight we heard a commotion in the street below, and
the cousin led us downstairs where we could see what looked like a
parade coming up the street. It turned out to be the bride making her
entrance. She was in a gold litter being carried by four men who were
clearly enjoying bouncing her down the street. (She looked happy but
a little seasick.) Behind was a several piece band playing Moroccan
music. Wedding guests danced around the bride while she threw glitter
at them.

When the bride and her entourage arrived at the house, the groom
appeared, and the two of them shared milk and some almond nougat while
guests recited lines from the Koran. Then, they entered the house and
disappeared. A short time later they reappeared on the terrace along
with the band and seated themselves on the big gold thrones. The
bride was attended by four older women who arranged her dress
everytime she sat down or stood up. Once the couple was situated on
their thrones, all of the guests got up and started dancing for them.
With some light prodding, Jake and Jen also danced. However, Moroccan
dance is very fluid--think belly dancing, and Jake and Jen probably
looked very stiff by comparison.

The happy couple was probably in their late 20s. She wore a white
robe overlayed with gold lace, an enormous gold tiara and large gold
belt around her waist, similar to a prize fighter's. Her hair was
swept up in a large up-do, her eyes were rimmed with black and she had
red glittery lips. He wore a white tunic and pants. They both
looked very nervous. After several photos and and video, the couple
disappeared again. At this point, we were told that they had gone to
change outfits and that there would be several more changes of
clothing, each representing a different Moroccan culture. Apparently
the clothing changes were a pretty elaborate affair. The bride and
groom did not resurface for about another hour. This time the bride
was wearing a sparkly turquoise robe with a similar gold belt and
tiara. The groom was dressed in a John Travolta style black shirt
with a light beige suit. Their re-arrival led to more dancing,
picture and video taking. There were at total of six costume changes
(which mostly concerned the bride because the groom's changes were
pretty much confined to switching between the suit and a long flowing
white robe), each with anywhere from a half hour to an hour in
between. During this time, a DJ played Moroccan music while many of
the guests either danced or dozed, depending on their age. To fortify
the guests, waiters served a succession of water, mint tea and various
types of cookies.

The sun was rising by the time the couple came out in their final and
most striking costumes. They were both dressed in what we think was
Berber style wedding garb. The bride wore a very heavy and unwieldy
robe and veil that made her look a like she was imprisoned by her
clothing. When they stepped onto the terrace, both the bride the
groom were hoisted up into the air on cusions and paraded around. The
strange thing was that while the bride was being bounced around the
terrace, she and most of the women in the room started crying.
Meanwhile the groom looked like he was doing a victory dance from his
cushion. He was smiling and waving his arms while tears streamed down
her cheaks. We later learned from Amina our guide (who was also
very emotional) that everyone was crying because the end of the
wedding signifies the end of the bride's life with her family and the
beginning of her life with her new husband's family.

After this last costume change, we decided that we could not keep our
eyes open any longer. By this time it was about 7am. As we walked
out the door completely exhausted, we noticed a wedding cake still
waiting to be cut; and, even after we were several blocks away we
could still hear the music going strong!

We just got back from a 3 day trek in the
atlas mountains, staying with berber people in their mud brick houses
and drinking gallons of very sweet mint tea. It was wonderful and
very pretty. We have one more day in Marrakech and then we head to
the Sahara for a couple of days. We will bring lots of water.

We just got back from Gambia and are now in Dakar, Senegal again. We
fly out of here for Casablanca early Monday morning. Gambia was
really pretty incredible in many good and bad ways. We left Dakar
about 10 days ago and made a stop at a game preserve where we saw
giraffes, rhinos, antelopes, water buffalo, etc.

After the reserve, we spent a couple of nights at a beach resort in
Sali at what Senegal calls its Cote d'Azure. Because of the hot
weather, it was great being near a pool, but we did not think much of
the beach (a little dirty with lots of people hassling you to buy or
get your hair braided) or the resort, which was full of French people
and had a very obnoxious staff.

After two days, we hired a car to go to the Gambian border where we
hopped on a ferry to Banjul. We had a little problem with the border
crossing. Our driver had never been to the border before and drove
past the Gambia border station. When we got to the Gambia customs
stop, which was a few miles down the road, the guard noticed that our
passports had not been stamped. The guard would not let us go back to
get the stamps and he would not let our driver go any farther. It
took us about an hour of talking and waiting, but we were allowed to
continue to Gambia in a taxi, and we did not have to pay any bribes.

After reaching Banjul on the ferry, we took a taxi to Leybato's, a
beach hotel in Fajara that Jen's cousin Jill recommended. After a
couple of cold beers and some curried seafood seaside, we met up with
Jill and started to figure out our plan for Gambia.

We ended up spending a few days at the beach resort exploring Kombo
(the area around Banjul). We went to a nature preserve where we saw
lots of monkeys and birds. We checked out the crafts market. We hung
out on the beach, which was considerably nicer than the one in Senegal
and fairly hassle free, unless you are a woman alone. Gambia has
young men known as bumsters whose only job is to pester women for
money, sex or both. From what we saw, they are often successful. We
noticed quite a lot of older (50-70ish) women walking around hand in
hand with young Gambian boyfriends.

After a few days in Kombo, we rented a 4-wheel-drive from the friend
of a guy who worked at our hotel. We took off early Tuesday morning
on what was to be a very long and difficult drive. About 90k out of
Kombo on some pretty bumpy road, we heard a loud thud outside the car.
Turns out our gas tank had fallen off and was leaking the $60 in
diesel we had bought the night before through a variety of holes. We
managed to salvage a few liters of fuel. Then Jill and Jen got a ride
on a passing gelly-gelly (beat up bus-like vehicle) to go find a
mechanic in the nearest village. Jake and Amy (Jill's Peace Corps
friend who was catching a ride with us to her village) stayed with the
car. The car had drawn quite a crowd of people, mostly boys and
young men. They mostly just stood around looking at us. But, it was
a little uncomfortable. About 4 hours later, the car was fixed and we
made the decision to forge ahead, figuring the worst was behind us.

As it turns out, we had about 250k more of incredibly shitty road.
The potholes are gigantic and they are everywhere, so you are better
off driving in the dirt on the side of the road in most places. And,
it is impossible to go fast even of a seeminly good stretch of road
because you never known when the next mammoth hole will appear. To
top it off, the car was leaking oil and decided to stall at a
police/military checkpoint. (For some ridiculous reason there are
dozens of police/military checkpoints all over this county. Often
they just wave you by but this particular officer was angry because we
had almost blown by him. He demanded we turn the engine off. After
doing so, he and several other officers had to push start us.)

After a total of about 15 bone jarring hours and dropping Amy off at
her village, we finally arrived in Basse Santa Su, the biggest town
upcountry (up the Gambia River). We stayed the night at the Peace
Corps hostel, which has no power but had running water, wonderful cold
showers, and a shop with icy cold beer nearby.

About the power in Basse: apparently about a year ago, the people
running the power supply for the town started selling the fuel to
their friends until one day there was no fuel for power. Then the
President paid a visit and in a town hall meeting told them that they
would have to pay a $250,000 fine to get the power back on, even
though it was the President's friends who had been running the power
plant to begin with. Completely screwed up, like many things in The
Gambia.

The next morning after our harrowing drive, we went out to Jill's
village Koli Bantang. It was across the river and about 10k on dirt
road. The village is maybe 100-150 Mandinka. They live mostly in mud
brick huts with grass roofs. Although the more well off villagers
live in cement block houses with corrugated tin roofs. The huts are
clustered around a family compound which is protected by a stick
fence.

We stayed in Jill's hut, which was really pretty nice. It had some
basic furniture and a pit toilet outside with a cement floor, where we
also did our bathing with buckets of water from the nearby well.

We learned the traditional Mandinka greeting from Jill during our
drive from hell and used it liberally during our visit to the village.
Our limited Mandinka seemed to be a hit. Jill's host family was very
nice.

We got lessons on hauling water on our heads from one of the children
in Jill's compound. She is about 12 years old and does everything:
water hauling, cooking, taking care of her younger siblings, etc. For
dinner, we ate with the family in front of their house. The food was
a very salty dried fish and vegetable sauce over rice that made it
clear why Gambian cuisine is not a worldwide favorite.

Our second day in the village we helped Jill catalog books in the
library that she has started in the school and afterward, we went on a
hike in the bush. On the way back, we stopped to say the Mandinka
greeting to an older couple working in a nearby field. They invited
us to help with the work. However, with our limited Mandinka
vocabulary and gardening skills we weren't much help.

That night we spent back at the Peace Corps house in Basse so that we
could catch an early bush taxi to Velingara, Senegal. (We decided
after the car began dying about every 2k that we would be stupid to
try to drive it back. We left the key and money for the owner in
Basse.) From Velingara, we took a car known as a sept (car into which
seven people are crammed) to Dakar. It was about an 13 hour drive,
but thankfully there were many fewer potholes.

We are now in Dakar. It is very hot and dirty.
We are happy to be in internet cafe with airconditioning.

The park we planned to visit is closed... so we are trying to decide what to do.

We are in Casablanca for the day... sitting by the beach. Tonight we
fly to Dakar. Jen is guiding us with her French skills since Jake can
only say Je Ne Sais Quoi?

We are in Egypt on the Sinai peninsula. Our journey here turned out
to be about 48 hours long. We took a minivan from Harar and then
caught a plane in Harar to Addis. In Addis, we sat at the airport for
about 8 hours waiting for our flight to take off at 12:30am. Around
11:00pm they told us there was a problem with the runway lights. We
later found out that a cargo plane made a crash landing (no front
landing gear) and knocked the lights offline. Addis only has one
runway with lights so no planes could take off that night. Ethiopia
Airlines put us up in a decent hotel, although we didn't get there and
get to bed until around 2am. We got up early the next morning and
after a harang with security (they wanted to look at everything in our
bags) we managed to get to the gate with about 20 minutes to spare.
Everything was going fine until we got over Khartoum and the skies
were brown. The plane was supposed to stop there on its way but
because of a dust storm, we were unable to land. After several
attempts to land, instead of continuing on to Cairo, the plane turned
around and went back Addis. We were very unhappy. Then a huge rain
storm blew into Addis, so we ended up sitting in the airport for about
another 2 hours. Finally, they put us on a direct flight to Cairo.
We landed at about 10pm and found a minivan to take us to Duhab (where
we are now). We both crashed out but noticed the minivan did a lot of
stopping. Well, that was the driver trying to fix it. About 100
kilometers from Sharm-el-Sheik in the middle of the desert, the engine
caught fire. The driver poured several bottles of water on it and
then insisted on trying to fix it for the next couple of hours.
Finally, we flagged down another minivan full of workers on their way
to a contruction project. After a stop to let the workers off and
about a dozen Egyptian military roadblocks (not sure why so many, I
guess maybe because this area was the subject of a war), we finally
made it to Duhab. We are staying in a nice place with a balcony and
view of the water for about $18. We are planning to spend 4 days here
to do some snorkeling and climb Mt Sinai. Then, we head back to Cairo
to meet Elliott.

We just wanted to drop a line to let you know we are still here. Internet and phone access has been difficult or non-existent. We are having a great time. Ethiopia is a very poor country with many problems but it has some beautiful scenery, interesting history and good food. Tonight we head to Egypt where we are expecting the travel to be a bit easier.

Just wanted to let you know that we made it to Africa. We are in Ethiopia in Addis Ababa. We arrived late last night completely exhausted. Today we went to go see our ancestor Lucy and to the biggest open air market in Africa. We also arranged a trip to see some of the historic sites in the north. Tomorrow we fly to Gondar and then the next day to Lalibela. After two days there we are flying back to Addis and catching a train to Harar where we will watch hyenas and hyena men. Then, we fly back to Addis for a day and then on to Cairo. We may end up feeling like we are spending more time in the air over Africa than actually on the continent but overland travel here is very difficult and time consuming.

Hello Family and Friends!

We are just a few miles from the equator in Quito, Ecuador and at the
half way point on our trip. We leave South America behind in a couple
of days. After a brief pit stop in San Francisco, we will fly to
Africa: first stop Ethiopia.

It seems like a good time for a recap of some of the highlights.
South America has given us many, but most recently (in chronological
order):

-Wine tasting in Argentina's version of Napa Valley

-Watching the sunset on the beach in Viña del Mar, Chile while
drinking Pisco Sours

-Trying to catch our breath in La Paz, Bolivia at 11,913 feet above sea level

-Surviving a rainy night bus ride on the most dangerous part of the
narrow, winding mountain road known as "The World´s Most Dangerous
Road" (Coroico to Rurrenabaque, Bolivia)

-Swimming with pink dolphins and feeding bananas to monkeys in
Bolivia´s Amazon basin

-Taking a tour of the ruins on the islands of Lake Titicaca with a
descendant of the Incas

-Hiking through centuries old Andean villages in Peru on our way to Machu Picchu

-Sitting on ruins and watching the sunrise at Machu Picchu

-Spending a week in the Amazon rainforest in the north of Peru with a
coca leaf spitting, frequently drunk Vietnam Vet for a guide

-Going fishing with and getting marital advice from a Shuar shaman (an
Amazon tribe famous for head shrinking)

-Everything in the Galapagos but most of all: swimming with sea lions,
turtles and sharks; seeing giant tortoises and sunbathing marine
iguanas; observing the mating rituals of the blue footed booby and the
albatross (not with each other)

We can only hope that Africa holds as much adventure as we have been
fortunate to have in South America. If you want to see some photos,
check out http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/jmilstei/
click on the ´South America Album´
Until our next update...

Jen and Jake

We made it to Quito just in time for a big soccer game between Ecuador
and Argentina. Lots of people celebrating here, since Ecuador won.
We will be here for the next few days. After tonight we will be
staying at the Radisson Royal Quito

We are still in the Galapagos but making our way to the airport on San
Cristobal. We left Isabela this morning and are on Santa Cruz. This
afternoon we will take a boat to San Cristobal. We are flying out
tomorrow.

Isabela was wonderful we had a couple of days relaxing on the beach
but also got to see quite a bit. We went for a two day horseback
camping trip to see two of the volcanoes on the island. One was
spewing steam and all of the ground around the vents was bright yellow
from the sulfur. The other looked like Mars. It was all covered by
hardened chunks of red lava.

We also took sea kayaks out a couple of days to a lava formation in
the ocean to see penguins, blue footed boobies, marine iguanas,
turtles, sea lions and sharks. We even went snorkeling with the
sharks (white tipped reef sharks). We saw probably about 30 of them.
Apparently the sea lions like to give them a hard time. We watched
one sea lion bite the tail of two different sharks! It is one of the
funniest things I have ever seen. Unfortunately, we were out of film
on the underwater camera when it happened.

We are still in the Galapagos. Mostly we are just relaxing, but also
doing a little looking around. Went to see big tortoises yesterday
and today we are going to see sharks. The beach here is beautiful,
white sand and turquoise water but I think we are about ready to leave
paradise. We are going to hop in a boat tomorrow and head for the
airport or to another nearby island if we can´t get all the way there.
Then, we are going to try to fly to Quito on the 4th.

We are in the galapagos at a port that had an internet connection, so
I checked just a few minutes ago and my name is on the CA Bar pass
list! I just about passed out trying to read the results but am now
so relieved! We are having an absolutely fabulous time--for me even
better now that I know the results. The Galapagos is the most amazing
place! The animals are everywhere and not afraid of people at all.
We will write more when our cruise is done.

We had an amazing trip to Machu Picchu! It
is an absolutely amazing sight--not to be missed. Our 4 day hike was
fabulous. We trekked through the mountains, saw beautiful scenery,
tons of llamas and alpacas, lots of Quechua people and stayed in small
villages. We got a very authentic glimpse of life in the Andes. The
grand finale was Machu Picchu and it lived up to every expectation and
then some. I only wish we had more than a day there. We got some
terrific pictures.

We are toward the end of our 4 day trek
right now and in a town called Ollyantanambo (sp?) looking at ruins
and waiting to head on to Machu Picchu. The first two days of our
hike were through tiny Andean villages and in the mountains. The
scenery was spectacular and it was really interesting getting to see
how the descendants of the Incas live.

Our 3 day tour in the Bolivian pampas was terrific! We took a 4 wheel
drive from Rurrenabaque over the muddiest road with the deepest ruts
that either of us had ever seen. Three brain scrambling hours and
one Anaconda in the road later we arrived at an Amazon tributary.
There we boarded a very long canoe shaped wooden boat and motored up
the river an hour and a half to our camp. Along the way, we saw
monkeys and tons of birds.

Our camp was made up of wooden shacks, one for eating and one for
sleeping. It was situated right next to the river, so the ground was
very wet and muddy. There were millions of mosquitos and each of them
managed to take a chunk out of Jake. I came out unscathed. That
night we took a boat ride by moonlight to look for alligators and
caimans but only saw a couple pairs of glowing eyes in the brush.

The next day an alligator was waiting for us outside our camp.
Apparently, he is a regular. Our guide fed him while we snapped away
pictures. Later, we went for a swim with pink dolphins. It was cold
and rainy but the water was very warm. The dolphins warmed up to
Jake, brushing past his legs a few times. I never got very close.
They had a lot of teeth. We got to watch them play with a stick,
dragging it around the water.

During the course of our stay in the pampas saw two more types of
monkeys, capuchin and howler monkeys. We also saw a toucan, eagles
and many other types of birds. On the way back, we stopped to fish
for pirhanas with raw meat. We both caught little ones. They were a
lovely yellow color with very sharp teeth.

After our 3 days in the pampas, we arrived back in Rurrenabaque to
find out that the rain had stopped up flights out and there was a huge
back up of people waiting to get out. The runway is dirt and gets very
muddy when it rains. We did not want to drive back to La Paz, as the
bus ride to Rurrenabaque was an absolute nightmare. The road is 16
hours of dirt with lots of ruts. Nearly the whole thing winds around
steep cliffs. Thankfully, we did it at night so we couldn´t see much
but then probably neither could the bus driver! Needless to say, we
wanted to fly. With lots of luck and persistence we managed to get a
military flight out to La Paz.

After a night in La Paz, we took a bus to Lake Titicaca and a boat to
Isla del Sol and island in the lake with Inca ruins and a community of
less than 2000 people. We stayed in a place with a beautiful view of
the lake. Although getting to it nearly killed us. The lake is very
high (the highest navigable lake in the world) and after being in the
pampas lowlands, we were no longer acclimated to the altitude. The
hike to get to our place on Isla del Sol was straight up and I thought
my chest would explode.

We got up early the next morning and motored in a boat to two sets of
ruins and an energy island where we meditated. Our guide was directly
descended from the Incas and very knowledgeable. He told us a lot
about the indigenous religion and life on the island. The ruins are
apparently still used for traditional festivals during the year.

After our tour we caught a bus to Cuzco, Peru at 1pm that was supposed
to get in at 10:30pm but didn´t arrive until around 1am. It was a
very long and unpleasant ride. At one point a woman with a basket
full of some type of raw meat positioned herself next to me in the
aisle and was using a cleaver to chop up the meat for a customer. We
kept a tight hold on our belongings. We have heard from other
travelers that there is a lot of petty theft in Peru.

We woke up in Cuzco this morning and booked a 4 day hike starting
tomorrow that will end at Machu Picchu. Can´t wait!

Love, jen

We are headed today to Rurrenabaque for a 3 day Pampas tour and will be out of touch with the internet for a while. Although I think there is internet in the town, it does not exist at the camp where we will be staying. We will fly back from Rurrenabaque to La Paz on Thursday and then head on to Lake Titicaca and Peru.

La Paz was amazing--gigantic city set in the mountains. But, we have moved on to Coroico now. It is about 1000m below La Paz. The road from La Paz to here is called "the worlds most dangerous road." (100 fatalities per year on a 80km road that took us about 3 1/2 hours in a minibus) I dont know whether it is or not but it was pretty scary--muddy dirt road, very narrow, tons of blind corners, precipitous drops. Coroico is beautiful. We are staying in a cabana in the cloud forest that overlooks the mountains for $20 per night. www.solyluna-bolivia.com

Just to back up a little: Forgot to mention that before Santiago, we were in Valparaiso, Chile and before there Mendoza, Argentina. We spent a couple of days in Mendoza--one of them checking out the city and the other day we went wine tasting. It was very different from the California experience. Not many people do tasting, so it was just us at most of the wineries. We visited a couple of really big ones and a couple of smaller ones. The best was Tapiz, a family owned winery where we had an absolutely fabulous tour that included lots of grape and wine tasting. From Mendoza, we took a bus over the Andes (gorgeous) to Valparaiso, Chile, a port city. We stayed at a great place up in the hills above Valparaiso with a 360-degree view of the city. The only downside was that our room was in the attic and to get to the communal bathroom we had to go down 30 or so rather slippery stairs. We mostly relaxed in Valparaiso. Our first day we sat at a cafe for several hours drinking Pisco Sours. They consist of Pisco which is a grape based liquor, lime juice, sugar and an egg white, which thankfully you cannot taste. Very good way to spend an afternoon. Later, we met up with a relative of Jake´s Dad´s friend Isidor Hes for dinner and a tour of his slaughter house. He owns about 13 carnicerias (butcher shops) in the area. The next day, Senior Hes set up a tour of the national Congress of Chile for us that was really terrific. Then we took a walk on the beach and watched the sun set while again drinking Pisco Sours and eating Machas a la Parmigiana (clams with parmesan). Very nice! The next day we hopped a bus for the two hour bus ride to Santiago. We had a great time in Santiago. We just sort of wandered around a bit- there are lots of pedestrian malls there so it was a nice place to wander. Among other things, we went to a pre-Colombian art museum and to a huge market. The fruit is so amazing here. I bought a kilo of grapes that are 4 times the size of normal grapes and a huge carton of raspberries for about 2 dollars. We are now in La Paz, Bolivia. It is the highest city in the world and when we got off the plane today, I felt completely light-headed. I am also a little under the weather because of a cold :-(. But, we did a little wandering around today anyway. The air is so thin, the smallest walk makes me winded. We went to what is known as the witches market. There they were selling monkey carcasses and other talisman type paraphenalia that is supposed to bring you good luck. We also wandered around a craft market where there was very delicious fresh squeezed OJ and grapefruit juice for about 25-cents. Tomorrow, we are going to Tihuanaco, where we will check out the ruins of a pre-Inca civilization (possibly the Aymara).

We are headed to La Paz on Sunday morning early. It is the highest city in the world and supposedly the altitude can make you sick. We got our camera today from the Foreign Minister of Chile´s office. He carried it here from DC at the request of a friend of Jake´s Dad. Santiago is nice, lots of pedestrian malls and cobble streets in the area where we are staying. Tomorrow, we will try to do a little sightseeing.

We are right now in Trevelin, an area where many Welsh people settled. We just had a Welsh tea--tea, breads, jams and several pastries and cakes. Delicious but very filling. We have just come from driving Ruta 40--the main north south highway (I use that term very loosely) in western Patagonia. Route 40 is all gravel. There were parts of our drive where we didn´t see any other cars for almost an entire day! We did see a ton of ostriches and guanacos. Guanacos are prehistoric looking animals that are members of the camel family. Along 40 we stopped in Parque Nacionale Los Glaciares--a huge national park in the Andes. We did a three day hike into the park and camped in the mountains next to glaciers and lakes. It is fall here, so there was snow on the mountains and the trees were bright shades of red, orange and yellow. Absolutely gorgeous! We also made a stop at Cueva de las Manos--the cave of hands. It is a canyon wall with paintings (mostly of hands and animals) some of which date back nearly 10,000 years. It was amazing how little some of the paintings have faded considering the winds that blow through the canyon. We give up our rental car in two days. We are planning a visit tomorrow to Parque Nacionale de Los Alerces, which is known for its giant trees. After that we are headed north hopefully to some warmer weather.

We´ve almost finished our first month of traveling. In some ways, it feels like longer...in some ways, it´s blown by. We thought we´d share the highlights instead of writing a novel..so here goes:

2. Watched Orcas jump onto a beach to eat sea lion pups (Peninsula Valdes, Argentina)

3. Rented a car and drove from the top of Patagonia to the bottom and back up. Followed Che´s route up Highway 40 and felt like rebelling a little.

4. Camped and hiked in Argentina´s National Park of the Glaciers, and put up the tent across the lake from a glacier.

5. Watched Caimans (small alligators), Capybaras (50 lb rats, not kidding), & Howler Monkeys go for food at sunset in a wildlife reserve near the Argentina-Paraguay-Brazil border.

7. Got in the middle of a political demonstration in Buenos Aires. Chanted loudly in Spanish. Still unsure of the topic.

8. Sat on a beach on a Brazilian island. It has sand so fine, it squeaks when you walk on it.

9. Visited several Penguin colonies in Argentina, and saw tens of thousands of penguins as they get ready to move north to Brazilian beaches (not kidding).

10. Went to a canyon in Argentina with cave drawings from 9900 years ago. Really amazing: the drawings are still clear and vibrant.We are now headed north to Argentinian wine country.... then to Chile, Bolivia, Peru & Ecuador.