The Hungary Years

My Mate Marmite

2007-02-12T08:45:00.000+01:00

I've been living in Hungary for quite a long time now. But while I've got my favourite foods and snacks from Hungary (turo rudi for instance), I still get a craving every now and then for a taste of home.

I weaned myself off the standard English expat fare mainly by not knowing a lot of other English expats when I first came here and also not going back and forth between the two countries that often.

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For some reason, I've been getting the odd pang of hunger for some quintessential British culinary items. I think the blame can be placed squarely on the heads of two people at my work who now visit the UK every few weeks and always ask if I want something brought back.

This means that I'm stocked up on Marmite and Cheddar cheese along with Computer Shopper and Top Gear magazines. Sadly I don't think I could get away with asking for several barrels of John Smiths.

For those that have an even stronger slavering for a slice of home food there's always some small specialty shops that deal in these rare goods. The downside is of course the price you pay.

The most well known of the shops in Budapest I think has to be Culinaris. There's one in the 6th district on Hunyadi tér and another in Buda's 3rd district at Perc utca, though strangely, I've never been in either of them. Although the shops have been at the back of my mind for a while, they were brought to my attention recently by the lovely lady who surprised me with a packet of my coveted salt and vinegar Walkers crisps.

There's a few other shops where the trade in these UK treasures can be found. Quite often, shops that deal with special spices will have a small section dedicated to the expat community. I popped into an Indian shop the other week on Wesselenyi utca, where upstairs was full of Indian furnishings while downstairs was a small supermarket, which as well as normal Indian flavourful food, also had PG Tips, ginger beer and export strength Guinness.

Then again, sometimes you don't have to wander far at all to find these things. Just the other day at my local, standard yet tin CBA shop I noticed that they were selling promotional packets of Tetley Tea. 100 bags + a "free" mug for just under 1,000 Forints. A bit pricey but if you're desperate for decent tea, you might just pay it. It's all a matter of taste.

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Historical Flags

2007-02-07T09:03:00.000+01:00

Staying on the subject of protests from the last post, I thought I'd write a few words on the Arpad flag. Although the flags with the "Arpad stripes" date back 700-1000 years they are fairly new to me. Even after living in Hungary for over a decade this is something I had never seen until last year. It was only when protestors started gathering at parliament and waving them around did I start to notice the different flags.

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Of course there was also the now standard Hungarian flag with the center torn out that turns up at almost every rally. The same used in the 1956 uprising when the communist symbol was ripped out. People use this flag today to express their feelings that something is wrong at the core of the country, namely the government.

The Arpad flag is somehow different. This one isn't waved by small children or little old ladies as the holey flag is. The Arpad stripes have more sinister connotations. Unless I'm very much mistaken, it has become the de facto flag for very right-wing protests, and it's slightly scary.

This is the flag that was picked up by the definitely scary Arrow Cross , a political party based pretty much on the incredibly scary German Nazi party. The Arrow Cross killed thousands of Jews with a lot of the victims being shot and dumped into the Danube river. For a sad reminder of this, just take a stroll by the water next to the parliament building to see a statue comprised of lots of iron shoes set into the ground to commemorate those that died there.

While displaying the Nazi's swastika and the Arrow Cross' arrows are forbidden, flags with the Arpad stripes are still okay to wave around in public. So with it's background and the fact that a lot of the flag bearers are bomber-jacketed skinheads with the odd SS tattoo, I think it's quite healthy for me to be wary of these groups.

I intend to stay healthy, which is why, if I see a bunch of people with Arpad flags, I'll walk the other way.

-- You can read a perhaps more balanced view at Portfolio.

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Breaking Down Barriers

2007-02-05T08:58:00.000+01:00

There was another bout of political poo-pooing on Friday and over the weekend. Since the riots last September, Kossuth tér - the square where parliament is situated - has been closed to the public. There were protestors camped outside for a while but I think they all got moved on a couple of weeks ago. Some people would come to the barriers and mope around a bit and shout but it seemed to be dying down.

Whether the barriers are a good thing or not is hard to say. On the one hand, it would be good to keep an angry mob away from the nation's big house. On the other hand, the barriers also serve to remind people that there's a restriction of freedom in place.

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On Friday, the opposition party thought it would be a good idea to remove the barriers themselves. So complete with their leader they set about dismantling the cordon. Bemused and unsure, the police that were on watch, just watched. It all made for a good bit of media and so the cameras were out and the speeches were made. Later, there was a lot of huffing and puffing about whether the action was legal or illegal. Or better still, was it right or wrong?

Of course, with the increase in media interest, the protestors came back. With their flags and megaphones they were enthusiastic in exercising their freedom of speech.

All this is fine, but I can't help thinking that the leader of the opposition holding a meeting in front of the parliament and then (perhaps illegally) removing the barriers in front of an eager camera crew is not good for business. Surely you're going to keep or gain credibility with a good debate about why the current government is making a big mistake by keeping the railings up.

By going ahead and getting stuck in without debate, without warning, surely the message to the people believing in you is that the only option available is direct action and forget about the legalities.

People learn from example and this wasn't a good one.

* Images taken from VG.hu

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Car and a Half

2007-02-01T23:43:00.000+01:00

Somehow I don't think I can do this post justice. The Trabant is such an iconic car that it is loved and loathed in equal measure often both by the same person.

Coming from the UK, it's easy for me to think of this as a "quaint" car that fits into the stereotype of Eastern Europe. Yes, I know we're more Central Europe than Eastern Europe but this is the car that's associated with Eastern bloc and was on shown on everyone's TVs in the West as everyone tried to get out of the East when the wall came down.

For some people, it's a symbol of the crap they had to put up with. For others, it's freedom on four wheels and a bit of plastic-wrapped plywood*. For me, while I know they're not that comfortable or good to drive, I absolutely love the design of the body and think it's a classic to be awed and adored. Right up there with other simple but clever designs such as the Mini.

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Because they're so cheap and there's quite a few floating around, they can often be seen pimped above and beyond their normal duty. I've seen bright purple ones with alloys and spoilers. I've seen them chopped up in to cabriolets. I've also seen them covered in moulded plastic to make it into a auto-dog (or maybe that was a Rover).

I saw this a while ago on Andrassy and couldn't resist taking a pic. Someone had used half a Trabant to create a trailer for another Trabant. It looked like a loving conversion with a quality finish. The tired Trabant has been written a death warrant many a time with newer, trendier cars coming onto the market and environmental regulations damning its 2-stroke engine, but with affectionate Trabbie lovers like this out there, I think we'll be seeing them around for a little while yet.

* From that link - Duroplast cannot be further recycled, and burning it produces toxic fumes, so disposing of the bodies of old Trabants is a problem. However, Duroplast's components are edible, and there are stories of pigs, sheep or other domestic farm animals consuming duroplast.

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Pedestrianitis

2007-01-31T23:51:00.000+01:00

For my area it started with the building, or rather digging, of the underground garage in front of the Basilica. Before that, the space was just a plain car park with doggy doo lurking around every tyre.

Once the funky, robot, underground garage was created, the surface was turned into a very pleasant cobble-stoned square.

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From this little acorn of an area, the pedestrian zones have spread. At first they claimed a small section of Hercegprimas utca. Then a smidgen of Sas utca. Now the powers that be are expanding the Hercegprimas stretch and zooming down Zrinyi to complete a walkway from the dome of the temple to the banks of the Danube.

It may have something to do with linking up the ultra-posh Four Seasons located in the old Gresham Palace at the end of Zrinyi, but I think the whole project will improve the 5th district and get people wandering up and down. Of course, it'll bring life to those streets as well as shops and cafes brighten themselves up to take advantage of the new thoroughfare.

So here's to pedestrianitis, the uncontrollable growth of pedestrianized streets, and may there be a cafe on every corner to sip a hosszu kave (in a glass) and watch the world go by.

* If this post contains mistakes or is generally crappy, I apologize and rest the blame on the beers and unicum consumed just a few hours before. At least the were good. However, this must be one of the freshest pics on the blog as it was taken just a few minutes before arriving home and writing this article.

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Avenue Activists

2007-01-30T21:14:00.000+01:00

It looks like not everyone is happy with the work being done to Nagymező. The signs advertise a meeting to be held on the Saturday of last weekend at the church on the corner of Nagymező and Király.

The posters from protesters are warning people that the trees on the avenue shouldn't be turned into toilet paper and they should be left alone so that they can be seen in real life and not just in photos.

I'm not sure if the meeting took place or not last weekend but it seems that maybe it wasn't necessary anyway. According to the news, it's unlikely that the underground garage that was planned will go ahead.

As I've said before, I'm all for underground parking spots but I also like my trees. Hopefully we can have both without building projects being turned into petty political spats.

First Snow of the Season

2007-01-29T08:27:00.000+01:00

The title isn't strictly true as I saw snow back in November in Komló in the south of Hungary back in November, but this was the first snow I saw in Budapest this winter. It was literally freezing on Saturday and the bitter winds brought in a light sprinkling of snow. It dusted the cobbles in front of the basilica for a few hours and then was gone.

I keep telling people who ask me about the summers and winters in Budapest that summer gets very hot and winter very cold. When they ask about snow, (the questions are usually coming from people living in the south of England), I reply yes, without fail there is snow. Even in the capital there tends to be quite a bit of snow that looks great at first but is then churned into grey slush by the people and cars.

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This year, I foolishly promised my niece that she is bound to see snow when she pops over in February. Then it turns out that this winter has been the hottest for the last 1,000 years. What are the odds? A thousand to one perhaps.

The "hottest year in 1,000 years" line sounds faintly familiar, but I guess if it is getting hotter each year then they can trot out that line all the time.

I was glad to see the snow at the weekend, even if it did only hang around for a few hours. It means there's a small glimmer of hope that I won't break my promise. This morning the temperature is about 5C at my window, the wind is howling but the sun is shining. As my bosses would say, "ratfarts".

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An Apple A Day

2007-01-26T08:42:00.000+01:00

I'm not sure it they are keeping the doctors away but one of our neighbours (probably not the one with the cat) has laid out a selection of apples on top of the kitchen appliances ~~stored~~ abandoned in our corridor.

A phrase I often hear from people in this city is that Budapest is a village. That's not meant to be a slur on the size or sophistication of the capital. The fact is that as I live my day to day life in Budapest I'm continually bumping into people I know. Or if I meet someone new, it's quite likely that I'll find out that they're connected to some other people I know from a completely different part of my life.

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It's been said that there is six degrees of separation in the world. Meaning, any person in the world can find a connection to any other person in the world by hopping through 6 people. I have a feeling that in Budapest it gets pared down to 3. It really can be freaky sometimes.

The apples seemed to me to be a more literal aspect of the village theme. I live smack-bang in the centre of the capital city that is Budapest, yet someone has been harvesting apples and setting them out in the cool corridor until they need them.

Incidentally, the apples are disappearing one by one, so the theory of the neighbour making one large batch of almakompót (apple sauce) or almasajt (erm... apple cheese) has been scratched. But the remaining apples must be scared out of their ~~pips~~ wits thinking about who's going to go next.

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Vörös és Fehér is Klassz

2007-01-25T08:27:00.000+01:00

Vörös és Fehér was a great little restaurant in the 6th district on Andrassy. It served tasty meals with an emphasis on quality wine. The menu was a bit pricey so I had only been when someone else was paying.

It was here that our group from the office gatecrashed a wine tasting evening (turned out pretty good) and also saw a naked woman with painted on clothes strolling down Andrassy on a weekday lunchtime while we were entertaining visitors from out of town. Needless to say, they were entertained.

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Hello Everybody my name is Klassz. I will be a restaurant and a winery one day when I will be ready. I offer you beautiful, tasty food and nice wine. Please feel free to come in! R.

Sziasztok! az én nevem Klassz. Etterem és Borozo leszek ha egzsyer kész leszek! Már megnyitottam finomat főzök és jó borokat szolgálok. Gyertek be! R.

So it seems that Vörös és Fehér is dead and in it's place is Klassz. Though peeking into the place shows no real difference to the interior and according to the writing on the ~~wall~~ windows, the aim is the same. Premium food with a leaning towards the wine rack.

I'll take a look at the menu if they pop one out onto the street and perhaps suggest it for a bit of experimentation but other than that I'll probably leave it to chew to review.

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A Crappy Quickie

2007-01-24T23:46:00.000+01:00

Just a crappy quickie to keep my daily postings record. I find that setting aside 30 minutes in the morning around breakfast time means I push out a post no problem. Until I don't have 30 minutes in the morning, then it all turns pear-shaped.

Seeing as I'm running out of time for this Wednesday, I thought I'd share something that I hope isn't becoming a trend. There's quite a bit of feces involved. Basically in the span of less than a week, I've trodden in a huge pile of doggy doo, been shat on by a pigeon and a neighbour's cat left a little pungent package for us on our doormat.

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Out of all the above, the doggy doo must have been the worst. It was just after a hike of several hours over the Buda hills. We'd reached civilization and as I took my first steps on the pavement, I almost slipped head over heels in something that must have been left by Dogzilla. As I was wearing my walking boots with chunky grip, it took me ages to get the damn things clean and sweet smelling.

I consider the pigeon dropping droppings fairly lucky. There's always the "could have been worse" thought that crosses my mind. I was lucky it wasn't a few centimetres to the left where it would have hit me smack on the head instead of on my sleeve. I was also lucky that I noticed it just before I went to wipe my forehead with said sleeve. It washed off easily and didn't smell. Definitely lucky that dogs don't fly.

Then there was the cat from a few doors down our corridor. Cute little playful kitten that meows outside our door when it feels like playing. Perhaps because I wasn't at home and able to play that it took offence and left a little message for me for when I got back. Oh well, at least it was solid.

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Filming in Budapest (V)

2007-01-23T08:37:00.000+01:00

It seems that Budapest is Hell to some people. Perhaps that explains the warm weather we've been having. Mexican director Guillermo Del Toro and crew are said to be filming the sequel to Hellboy in Budapest, cunningly titled Hellboy 2.

Now I thought Hellboy was one of the worst films I've ever watched. For me, it was so bad it was fascinating and I had to watch right to the end to see if there were any redeeming features and to test my endurance. But I'll admit, I never heard about the Hellboy comic character until the film so if people tell me I'm missing the point, then I'll probably agree.

There's not a lot of info about the second film and I'm not sure if they're really shooting in Budapest or out in the sticks at Etyek. However, if you see some mutant creatures running down the streets like all Hell has broke loose, it probably has. That or the stag & hen season has started early.

The Scottish Pub

2007-01-22T08:28:00.000+01:00

It's not the Scottish Play so I think that I can mention its name, Caledonia. The pub opened up at the tail end of 2006 and has already built up a good reputation and a lively crowd of regulars.

Situated just off Jokai tér on Mozsar utca, the bar is very central and easy to get to. You just need to know it's there as most people forget that the tiny Mozsar utca even exists.

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I wouldn't say I'm a local there but I've popped in for the occasional pint and chat with friends. Yes, they really do sell some of the beer in pints, which probably violates some EU law but seeing as a pint is 0.568 litres I don't think anyone will be complaining. Oh, and I'm talking about the good old fashioned Imperial Pint as opposed to that new fangled US pint which equates to a mere 0.473 litres.

The staff are warm and welcoming but the best thing about the whole place is that they sell Belhaven Best Bitter (in pints!) which tastes utterly delicious and reminds me of the great bitters back in Blighty. The best bit about the Best is that instead of charging some rip-off price (like Birdland charging 380ft for a 0.25 bottle of water but that's another story), a pint of this lovely liquid will set you back 600ft. Which, although more expensive than most beers, is not that far off from a watered down Dreher from Mediterran in Liszt Ferenc tér on the other side of Andrassy.

While I've been going on about the beer, I've neglected to mention the fact that they also do great food (so people tell me). I can't find a proper Caledonia website but their menu does appear on an xpatloop page. The steaks, burgers and all-day Scottish breakfasts have all been recommended to me.

So, they've got the food and drink covered and they've also covered the walls with a smattering of flat TVs for the sports fans. Oh, and it seems that Thursday nights is karaoke night. Karaoke isn't "my thing" but people were having a lot of fun and that's good in my book.

If you're around Liszt Ferenc tér and looking for an alternative option. Cross over Andrassy and stroll down Mozsar. You'll find a fantastic pint of beer down there.

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Blustery Budapest

2007-01-19T08:46:00.000+01:00

The sun has risen and a new day has begun. The world didn't end after all, which is what seemed would happen according to the number who warned me about the storms coming into Hungary last night.

I realise that, yes, the winds were pretty windy over a lot of Northern and Western Europe. They were strong enough to kill people with falling trees and blowing lorries off course.

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Hungary also recently messed up when the last bit of really bad weather blew in on St Stephens day last year. As it was a holiday the weathermen were taking it easy, people from all over the country had traveled up to Budapest to see the fireworks on along the Danube. Then the storm hit and people died.

To try to prevent the same happening again, it seems that the media went into a frenzy over the approaching Armageddon and every single Hungarian I met yesterday mentioned it to me. They suggested that I leave work early so I didn't get caught in it, get hit by trees, roofs, flying cows etc. I appear to have survived and according to the news, no Hungarians were killed by the thing so hopefully it's all blown over now.

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Sprok!

2007-01-18T20:03:00.000+01:00

Apart from being a great name (not to be confused with Spork), it's also great "furniture". I've put furniture into quotes as while the chairs, tables and cupboards that Antal Sprok designs can be used to hold your everyday things, they themselves are far from ordinary.

A chest of drawers is placed in the chest of a strange man or a little old lady. A lean rabbit poses with a backpack into which you can place your own things. Or perhaps you prefer the camel who rests backwards to create a chair for you.

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The furniture is all wooden sculpture and Sprok also takes it further with objects with no other purpose than to fascinate you with their fun creativity.

I first saw Sprok furniture when it was displayed in a Demko Feder shop on my way to work. It reminds me of the great originality of my old friend Dr. Pockless who turns out similar sketches over at Squint.

It appears that Sprok has a permanent display of his work in a Budapest gallery over at Kő utca 14, in the 2nd district and has an exhibition starting in the House of Hungarian Wines from March 3rd. I highly recommend popping over sometime to take a look at the weird and wonderful world of Sprok.

* Images "borrowed" from the Sprok and Squint sites. Please visit them for more of the same.

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Not An Uplifting Experience

2007-01-17T08:48:00.000+01:00

This is a sign that I am seeing more often than I should. It reads

"Rossz vagyok. Javitás sajnos csak reggel"

which translates into

"I'm bad. Unfortunately, fix just in the morning"

which can also be read as

"The lift has broken down yet again for the umpteenth time and so you better start hiking up those stairs. Might be repaired in the morning, might not, who knows?"

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Maybe I'm getting cynical and it's all in my mind but I'm sure that this is happening more frequently. It's a real bummer to see it when you've had a busy day at the office then stopped off at the shops to load up with food on the way home. It's a non-negotiable contract that you signed unwillingly to lug all your bags up 5 flights of stairs. Then again, think of the little old ladies that have to trudge up the steps. That's got to be hard.

People who get trapped inside used to have a alarm bell to ring with a push of a button. It sounded just like a normal doorbell so it was a while before I realised what it was when we first moved here.

Those who have to respond to the bell got fed up with the lift breaking down and the lift getting stuck. But instead of the house paying for repairing the lift properly or installing a new one they've just added another button and another alarm to ring. This one is linked to a telephone somewhere, so that you can chat to someone while you're imprisoned awaiting release.

I love the flat and the house that we live in. It's slowly improving bit by bit so I'm sure it's only a matter of time before it's in tip-top condition. The only problem is that by that time I'm probably going to be a wrinkly, old man muttering to myself as I carry my shopping up the stairs.

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Other Side of the Square

2007-01-16T08:34:00.000+01:00

After writing about postcards from the edge of Erzsebet ter yesterday, I realised that I never put out a post for the smart, new Erzsebet ter on the other side of the old bus station.

Workers spent a few months pushing and pulling it about in the second half of 2006 and then sometime back in September or October they finished it off and opened it up.

Read moreThese pics are from back then, which explains the lack of bulky winter clothes on the people wandering about. But to be honest, the weather has been so warm this January that it might as well have been yesterday.

The park has lost some of it's wild charm as they have pulled out a lot of bushes and put more paving down. It now appears very sparse and open.

However, some people will see that as a good thing as it's less scary to walk through at night with not a lot of places for nasty monsters to lurk.

Now, instead of an open gravel area where people would walk their dogs and just leave them to it, there's a fenced off doggy area. This should help keep the park clean but I often wonder how often (if ever) the canine cage gets de-crappified. It doesn't take long for it to become a concentrated camp of crap that is so bad, even the dog walkers refuse to enter.

Other improvements include a decent looking basketball court that's actually used (I even saw a group playing around midnight as I was walking home from the pub this weekend) and a good kid's playground with lots of fun swingy, swirly things.

The main statue and fountain has stayed put and I think they have improved the lighting of it. Strangely another statue of a shepherd playing music to his sheep was moved to the other side of the square, but at least they've kept it.

The old statue of Erzsebet that used to sit, hidden in the bushes was hauled away some years ago.

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Postcards From Hungary

2007-01-15T08:58:00.000+01:00

People were expecting a bit of tension around the 50th anniversary of 1956 uprising last year but I don't think anyone realised there would be full-blown riots. Last September a tape was "leaked" that had the prime minister admitting that he'd lied morning, noon and night about the state of the economy and that they'd done bugger all since getting into power to put the country back on track.

I won't go into the riots in this post. You can read all about it at the BBC, Wikipedia or even the "Riots in Hungary" site. They all have good coverage of it and the Riots in Hungary site has links to all the video clips and an interactive walkthrough of events.

While a lot of people vehemently opposed the prime minister and what he had done, they were equally disgusted by the riots and the idea of Hungarians fighting each other in the streets.

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A new installation at Erzsebet ter in the 5th district shows the results of a campaign by the government to get people's take on situation. The "Szeretem Magyarorszagot Klub" (careful, the film and music is set to autoplay) asked people to send in postcards with their thoughts. These postcards were then digitized and printed onto outdoor covers. Each cover sheet holds a load of cards and then they've put these sheets all around the main walkway of the square.

Some cards display just the simple "Szeretem Magyarorszagot" phrase while others are slightly more political and refer to the riot police, the prime minister or the leader of the opposition (both for and against).

If you're walking around downtown then it's worth taking a peek. Even if you don't understand the Hungarian, you'll get the gist of things with the pictures that people have drawn and the sheer number of cards. If you're not in the center (or even in Hungary) then you can browse through the cards online.

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Nagymező News

2007-01-12T08:45:00.000+01:00

One side of the "Hungarian Broadway" has already been renovated and closed to normal traffic. The wide section housing the Operetta and Moulin Rouge was re-paved, re-planted and restricted to just buses and taxis a couple of years ago.

It seems that the same sort of operation will be carried out on the small section of Nagymező that's home to another theatre, Két Szerecsen and my old greengrocers on the other side of Andrassy.

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That section of road has been closed since the end of last year and they have dug up all the pavements which must be a real pain for the businesses there. I took a closer look at the sign the construction company has erected and saw that they will be building yet another underground car park.

There's loads of underground car parks now throughout the city and I like the idea that you can still park your car somewhere relatively safe without the need for ugly multi-storey car parks.

I just hope it won't go the way of Moscow where they worry about the whole place collapsing into the chasms underneath. I guess Budapest has been dealing with that problem for a while in the Castle District.

I'm sure that it'll make Nagymező a nicer place to be and will hopefully extend the pavements so that the pubs, cafes and restaurants can creep out with their tables. I'm not sure if I believe the fantasy pictures on the website of Murus the construction company. For one thing, they seem to have omitted all other buildings and placed the skyline at street-level.

Oh well, we'll have to wait and see. It's going to be pretty messy there until they finish in the middle of 2008.

Link to more info on car parks in Hungary

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Boom Boom!

2007-01-11T08:09:00.000+01:00

Here's another car that you wouldn't expect to see on the streets of Budapest. Well okay, it's not on the streets of Budapest but in the entrance to a big supermarket but it's definitely not in it's natural habitat.

Basil Brush is a great character that was a feature in my early years. He was on British telly in the 70's and 80's, had a long break and then had a comeback in 2002 He's still going now with his classic "Boom Boom!" catchphrase. He may have a rounder, softer face, but that happens to a lot of stars. Hey, he's even got his own blog and vlog!

He's always been a bit of a dashing fellow about town and country so the Austin Powers' shagmobile could be said to match his character. If any male could be "foxy" then that would have to be Basil Brush.

I'm not sure how much it costs for your kids to ride with Basil, but when you wander in through the automatic doors of the Tesco at Váci út, you'll see an icon of British TV.

Oh, and if you don't fancy Basil Brush, there's also the more literary Mr Men giving chase just behind. But that's a different story all together.

Hungarian Hot-Rod

2007-01-10T08:26:00.000+01:00

There's a bizarre car around town. It's quite rare and I've seen it maybe 3 or 4 times. The last time being a few days ago and I remembered to whip out the phone and take a pic.

I was in a rush and forgot to get close enough to see what the make and model was. I remember it from some magazines or TV programs a few years ago so knew it was a production model from one of the big American companies and not some cottage industry car.

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Looking around on the net for cars that look "like a car from ZZ top", "dragsters" and finally "hot-rod" brings up the information that tells me it's a Plymouth Prowler (aka the Chrysler Prowler). In fact, there's a test drive article in Hungarian over at Totalcar (*).

Its appearance is so wacky and out of place on the road that I love it. Imagine seeing it in your rear-view mirror and you could be mistaken that you're having a close encounter of the third kind as aliens make their way down to their weekend house at Balaton. I'm not sure who has the money to really "play" with their cars but it seems that Hungary has some people out there willing to do so. I salute them.

Sadly, Chrysler replaced the futuristic Prowler with the muscled but more mundane Crossfire.

In 1998, the people of Tusla, Oklahoma thought the car was good enough or weird enough to bury a purple Prowler in a time capsule along with the City of Tusla financial report, some restaurant menus and a case of Weber's root beer. Perhaps the Prowler's styling will be standard enough for it to be more of a sales success when they dig it up in 2048.

* After writing this, I remembered that Mr Kzamm is connected with Totalcar. After a quick look at his site, I see that he's already covered the Prowler in his "When corporations build hot-rods" article. Sorry for the lack of originality. But it doesn't stop it being a weird-but-cool car.

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Just A Perfect Day

2007-01-09T08:34:00.000+01:00

It wasn't exactly illness but after the bout of unwellness on Saturday it was good to venture out for some fresh air on Sunday.

We had thought about getting back into the swing of things with a long hike with the Teljesítménytúrázók Társasága but decided that we would ease into the exercise a little more slowly. And besides, we had overslept and been lazy in the morning.

When we've been out for walks before with the TTT, they've always started no later than 9.30am. On Sunday we managed to get out of the flat at around midday. With the sun scheduled to set at just after 4pm, that forced us to keep the walk short and simple.

We hopped onto the red metro to Moszkva tér and then took the 56 tram up to Hűvösvölgy. From that last stop, it's easy to head off on several walks, short and long.

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We followed the route over Harshegy to a lookout tower (Kaán Károly kilátó) and then through the Budakeszi-erdő. A lot of people must have had the same idea as the paths were packed with people.

Okay, they weren't exactly packed but there were definitely more people than we were expecting in January. Obviously they had been listening to the same forecasts as us and were making the most of the unseasonal weather. The sun shone and we had to strip off our outer layers to stop the sweat.

After about 10km, we ended up at Normafa and from here we'd normally take the 56 tram back from the stop at the cogwheel railway but as we'd just missed it and the sun was still in the sky, we carried on all the way back to Moskva tér.

To treat ourselves, we took one of the new the 4-6 trams to Oktogon to pick up some cakes for home.

As we passed the clock at Nyugati Scala it was showing 11C in the dusk, meaning that it must have been well above that in the sun on the hillsides.

I've always liked a bit of snow in the winter but if this is what global warming is, then bring it on.

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The Random Chocolates and the Two Pint Hangover

2007-01-08T08:22:00.000+01:00

Perhaps it wasn't a true two pint hangover. I had been feeling a little bit rough before I even took a sip of beer on Friday night but I went to Klub Vittula on Kertesz utca anyway. The place has been around for a while now but it was the first time I'd been. Strange, as I know some people that are regulars there and it's not far from the office.

The reason for losing my Vittula virginity was to watch couple of bands play. The first being The Random Chocolates leading up to Mookie Brando and the Second Cousins. I'd seen both play before over at the Fregatt but they had been lacking drums and drums make all the difference.

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Vitulla is a narrow, smoky joint in a basement with the bar at the back and the stage at the front next to the entrance. The stage itself is tiny and decorated with what looks like a variety of colourful shower curtains. The result is actually very good. A cosy and friendly atmosphere with everyone shuffling around each other and a band that dominates the main room.

The chocs were on great form and got a good response from the audience. It may have been helped by the random chocolates being offered to the crowd. Once the real chocs were in front of us on the table (the sweets not the band) my stomach rumbled to signal that it needed food. Not wanting to fill up on beer, I scoffed a few chocolate covered nuts.

I was pleasantly surprised to see they sell Arany Facan (aka Zlatý bažant) which is very tasty and clean, so that was my first order. But the next pint was part of someone else's round and came in a large, unbranded glass and I suspect may have been Holstein which has been known to mess me about in small quantities.

So my two pint hangover was probably a combination of a slight cold, chocolate dinner and the dodgy second pint. Saturday was spent taking it easy. I can only imagine what would have happened to my hangover if I'd been to see The Random Palinkas.

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Timber

2007-01-05T08:31:00.000+01:00

I did say that the lights would be coming down soon. On my way home last night I caught sight of some wannabe lumberjacks taking down the big tree outside the opera house on Andrassy.

Instead of going for the full-on comedy value of taking an axe to the base and letting it crash onto stunned pedestrians coming out of the metro stop, they were sensibly taking it apart bit by bit like some large, green lego set. Albeit with a chainsaw and a large hydraulic lift on loan from the fire department.

One onlooker had managed to snatch a big shiny bauble and was bouncing the huge unbreakable ball on the new cobblestones they have there. Instead of taking my own souvenir I took a quick pic of the final tuft of Christmas standing proud on the top of the tree and left.

Light of Your Life

2007-01-04T09:07:00.000+01:00

One of the things that Budapest has been getting better and better at each year is their impressive display of Christmas lights. Up and down the main streets and in some of the open areas, they've wired up trees and posts to a bazillion little light bulbs.

It seems that each district has it's own budget and schedule for the lights and a clear distinction can be seen when going from one district to another. Follow the korut clockwise from the 6th to 7th to 8th districts and you'll notice the different styles.

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The street that has the most shock and awe value has to be Andrassy ut, with that huge avenue lined by trees and each tree sporting its own suit of lights. Even when the trees change from the big sturdy fellows between the Bajcsy and Oktogon stretch and the weedy new-plants on the remainder up to Heroes' Square, the effect is still magnificent.

My memory fails me but this may have been the first year for blue bulbs in the squares. Liszt Ferenc ter and Jokai ter were both decked out in snazzy blue light. The scene was replicated around the theatres and cafes on Nagymezo. The new square that appeared after the demolition of all the little shops on Karoly krt were also blue and sparkling.

It was a very pleasant sight and although I'm talking about them in the past tense, the lights are still up. However, having gone up at the beginning of December and with Christmas and New Year over, I'm sure they'll be coming down any moment now.

If you or your friends are thinking of coming to visit Budapest sometime, don't just stick to the summers (which are great by the way), why not try a Christmas break to get a bit of shopping in around the markets, scoff some street kolbasz, sip some mulled wine and get enchanted strolling down the street filled with lights.

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Makes Me Sick

2007-01-03T08:57:00.000+01:00

When I write for the Hungary Years, more often than not, I'm writing about what happened on my way to or from work. It's just a small 20 minute walk but there's quite often something that catches my eye. In fact, I'd much rather swap the activities and spend 8 hours walking the streets of Budapest every day and 40 minutes behind a desk. I guess that's another one of those post-holiday blues.

Yesterday was the first of the year and it wasn't without event. My office is based in an apartment block on the korut opposite a very posh hotel. It's a great place for an top secret post as no one would guess that there's a load of people on the top floor busy working away. I suppose there's a few places in Budapest like that.

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The entrance of the building is normally locked during the night but is always open during the day as there is a dodgy dress shop on the ground floor. This means there's no way to stop people from coming in through the main door. A side effect of this is that the hallway tends to be used as a tramps toilet. There have been countless times I've had to jump over a puddle of piss to get to the lift. Sometimes they're pissing in the corner (if they're good*) when I step out for lunch.

My first walk to work of 2007 culminated with me stepping through the doorway to a vision of a woman tramp lying down by a paraffin lamp (I think) puking the liquid yellow contents of her gut onto the floor. After I side-stepped her and her activities, I had to skip over the small lake of urine that she must have left a few minutes earlier.

I did have a twinge of guilt about leaving her in that state, but she was obviously "ok", not about to expire or even pass out. She was quite awake and active, just completely rat-arsed paying the price.

* If they're not good, then they piss directly onto the shop display cabinets and door or the second doorway to the lift.

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Garden of Cast Offs

2007-01-02T09:09:00.000+01:00

There's a peculiar garden on the corner of Munkácsy Mihály & Kmety in the 6th district. Perhaps it's known to most people but I only discovered it when I went to an appointment in the neighbourhood, turned up early and had some time to kill.

I strolled through the streets for a few minutes and was intrigued as to what this place could be as I wandered around the perimeter of the large building and grounds peering in through the railings at all sorts of odd things lying there.

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The large house seems to play home to an art school specializing in sculptures. The area around the building is scattered with discarded statues either unfinished or unwanted.

The scene makes for a bizzare vision with thin stick figures, fat naked ladies. From subjects waiting at a bus stop to broken kings resting in the ruins.

It's been a while since I was there and took these photos but if you're in the area I highly recommend a small detour to see what's recently been given the chop and thrown to the elements.

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Russian Coke (Florida Style)

2007-01-01T20:04:00.000+01:00

Russian Coke (Classic)

Ingredients:
- Slices of lemon
- Sugar
- Coffee (ground beans or Nescafe)
- Vodka

Pour out the shots of vodka. Place slices of lemon flat on the top of each glass. Heap the sugar and coffee into separate piles on the slice of lemon.

To drink, first eat the lemon and toppings, then down the vodka. Works a treat and makes me think of the Pan Galactic Gargle Blaster from Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy

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This fantastic drink was explained to / inflicted on me by a couple of old friends on an impromptu Kert Crawl to mark the passing of the Godfather of Soul that was James Brown. Although technically there was only one true kert involved.

I believed the drink to have been created by the friends but a recipe for Russian Cocaine appears to already be out on the net, so I don't feel too guilty about spreading the secret.

At a New Year's Eve party (that would be yesterday) I related the story of Russian Coke to a friend and then of course we had to make it; our cocktail creations having gone down a storm at the last New Year's party we poisoned. Unfortunately with no lemons around we improvised with tangerines, hence "Russian Coke (Florida Style). Of course, tangerines are definitely not oranges but it's only a small stumble in the imagination of the drunk. The tangerines worked well but the skins on the segments don't allow for sharp juice infusion that gives the Russian Coke (Classic) its kick.

With the vodka's shot we moved on to create another fruity Frankenstein's monster. I don't think this will stand the test of time but here goes.

Ingredients:
- Tangerine
- Cherry juice
- Orange liqueur
- Vodka

The trick with this one was to set it up in two separate glasses, balanced on top of each other (it's a drunken habit of mine). To drink, just eat the tangerine, down the cherry juice then chug the mixture of vodka and orange liqueur. Oh, and you have to do it without using your hands. Which is why I spent some of my time last night clearing up lots of broken glass. Oh dear.

Making up the ridiculous drinks was great fun but there's got to be some beer to wash the bad taste out of your mouth.

...

PS - An apology for neglecting The Hungary Years for so long. It's been a while and this resolution for 2007 might crash and burn but I'll give it a go.

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Aaron Spelling Memorial Kert Crawl & The Columbian Connection

2006-07-17T22:54:00.000+02:00

Bit of a long title but it's been a bit of a long weekend. Kicked off around 1pm when I went to Keleti train station to pick up a friend we met while travelling in South America. We met James (from Boston but family from somewhere in Colombia) at happy hour in the Mosquito Bar in Rurrenebaque, Bolivia back in October last year. He hasn't really stopped travelling since.

James is on the European part of his tour now and managed to find a spare weekend to pop over to Budapest. My challenge was to pack it full with stuff to do. I think it went okay.

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To jump right into it we took part in the Aaron Spelling Memorial Kert Crawl (formerly the Marlon Brando, James Doohan and Elmer Bernstein Memorial Kert Crawls). Starting 7.30pm at Szoda Udvar we also sampled the beery delights (and perhaps an Unicum oddity) at the Kiraly Kert aka the old Szimpla Kiskert, Szimpla Kert, Pixel aka that damn place that's far out, I've never been to and is now closed so let's take taxis to the next place kert, Old West Balkan the one behind Corvin that's about to close down, New West Balkan just a bit further along the road that's already open, Tuzrakter Tuzrakter.

It was a fine evening and the gang waxed and waned but there was a pretty decent crowd out that night. There had been ideas, when planning the route, to carry on to Margit Sziget to the relocated Hold Udvar (used to be in the university courtyards at Astoria) and Cha Cha Cha Terasz (the original underground one is still in place) but it was too far and too late.

So after a Saturday of sightseeing (Castle, Matthias church, labyrinth, Chain Bridge, a closed Vasarcsarnok etc) we Meafed it up at Menza and headed to the island to carry on the crawl. Hold Udvar is a great place with cool tunes and a vibe that can hook you. Not sure why we moved on to Cha Cha Cha which was terrible (though I've only heard good things about Cha Cha Cha Underground at Kalvin ter).

Distraught that the night might be dying in front of us we took a taxi to Rom Kert. A place that I haven't been to for years. Our clubbing contact told us it's a bit of a meat market that doesn't get going until a bit after midnight then carrys on bouncing till around 3am. We arrived at the jam-packed place just after 12 and had great fun partying away until the sun started to lift his head.

Sunday came with avengence so we hid from it until aroun noon then hopped into the car (ooh, haven't written about the replacement for the Opi yet) and made our way out to the Communist scrapyard (in a good way) that is the Statue Park. Very impressive. Then back into town and up Gellerthegy to the Freedom Statue and the fabulous views to the city from the Citadella. Back on the Pest side, we went into the Basilica and up to the outside of the dome to look around town from a slightly different perspective while the orchestra played on beneath us as they were rehearsing for one of the Budafest concerts in Szent Istvan ter.

We chanced upon another friend who was listening into the classical music and then all headed off for a meal at Karma in Liszt Ferenc ter. A fine evening but our stamina was running out so after the food it was just a stroll back to the flat where the lovely lady and I collapsed. James used the opportunity to call his family on Skype and get ready for his next stop in Vienna and beyond.

Definitely the fullest weekend we've had in a while and it's been great. I wish James good fortune as he continues his round-the-world trip. If you're interested you can read about his exploits on his blog. As for me, I'll get some rest before the next visitor turns up and try to get back into the swing of blogging again on The Hungary Years.

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Louis Vuitton in Budapest

2006-07-12T20:50:00.000+02:00

Looks like the posh new Louis Vuitton shop on Andrassy ut is up and ~~atom~~ open. First signs of something going on were the rows of parking places roped off on Andrassy this morning. Seeing as they cordon off those coveted car spots for almost anything nowadays, it must be incredibly annoying if you live around there (and own a car).

From the look of the crowds queueing up to get in, it was well received. Their website touts all sorts of luxury items from accessories to full outfits, plus jewelry and ~~watches~~ timepieces.

Maybe I'll have a peek at the luxury watches, bags and when I pass next time but somehow I don't think it's my thing.

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Guns And Roses

2006-06-01T08:33:00.000+02:00

Guns And Roses was huge in the late '80s and early 90's and it's always been a favourite in this household. The lovely lady deeply regretted missing their show in '88 so absolutely had to go to this one. Front man Axl Rose (probably the only original GnR member in the band) is getting on a bit. We estimated his age to be around 44. Mind you, that didn't stop him from racing about the stage screaming his lungs out.

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We wanted standing tickets but they were sold out so we lumped for the 14k seats which turned out to be not that bad at all. The lovely lady needed to get close to the action so she and another friend hoodwinked (is that still a word in this day and age?) a security guard and managed to get to the floor.

The warm-up act was Sex Action which I've been told was good but we weren't really interested in them so hung back at Captain Cooks and arrived late. Seemed like it was a good idea as while Sex Action finished around 9.30pm GnR didn't get onto stage until just before midnight. In fact, so many people were caught out by this that they left. Bummer.

Originally, I hadn't planned to go but won myself over. I suppose I wasn't sure what to expect so typically I wasn't expecting much at all. That might be why I absolutely loved the concert while the real rockers that had sneaked onto the floor were left unimpressed, saying that it lacked the energy and momentum that they had hoped for.

The set started off with Welcome To The Jungle, ended with Paradise City and there were plenty of the good ol' favourites shoehorned in-between. There were also a couple new songs from their upcoming album Chinese Democracy that although unreleased, Axl was sure that we must have all heard it as we own these things called computers and there's this thing called an internet. His record company must be proud of him to encourage thousands of people to go home that night, log on and search for the latest album to download instead of waiting for it to hit the streets.

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Wam Bam Thank You Mam

2006-05-04T08:36:00.000+02:00

Last weekend, while some people were checking out the fancy cars at the Budapest Luxusauto Show I nipped down to the Four Seasons to welcome in the Gumball 3000 Rally Wacky Racers. Believe me, it really was a case of the wacky racers. The itinery for Gumball 3000 is to start in London and finish in Los Angeles. 120 cars driving 3,000 miles across 3 continents in just 8 days.

Read moreThe cars were outrageous. Either fantastically rare, expensive, vulgar or a combination of all three. The finest exotica must have been the Ferrari Enzo that caught everyone's attention. A new Rolls Royce Phantom* probably took the expensive crown. The crown jewels of vulgarity was fought over in a rabid mish-mash of rapid cars but I'd have to give it to the Bentley from New Zealand bedecked in ads for Satan's casion in NZ, with a skull as a radiator cap optional hood accessories of a gattling gun and a windscreen adorned with a huge black dildo.

The cars rolled in every few minutes to the entrance of the hotel, unpacked the little luggage they had (you can't fit much into a Lambo), revved the engines a bit for the crowds then zoomed off round the block to end up in the car park in front of the Akademia on Roosevelt tér. That car park was jam packed with amazing cars. I counted an Enzo, 3 McLaren SLRs, the new Bentley Continental Saloon, the new Aston Martin Vantage, a couple of Lamborghini Murciélago Roadsters, Ford GT40. Normal Ferrari 430s, Lambo Gallardos and Porsche 911s just paled in comparison.

The stars in their fantastically priced cars were also meant to be in town but I only caught sight of Bam Mergara & Ryan Dunn from Jackass / Viva La Bam on MTV, plus sk8trboy Tony Hawk. There were some other familiar faces that I couldn't identify but that's about it.

Notable events included:
- Couple of Hungarian mafioso-looking guys turned up in their mini convoy of Gallardo and Hummer but gettng turned away from the Gumball carpark
- Nice Hungarian Bentley Continental Coupe that seems to have been unlucky enough to smash the whole right-hand side of the car.
- Hungarian police car turning up and then getting chased around in front of the Chain Bridge by a Ford GT40
- Watching Tony Hawk get mobbed (security was very very relaxed at the beginning but they put up barriers after that)
- Letting fireworks off the top of the Satanish Bentley
- Racers chucking a bucket of water from their hotel room onto the Satanish Bentley drivers below
- Listening to the air-ripping sounds of those exhausts. Even the VW camper van with the souped up engine

Full list of drivers and cars

* According to the Gumball blog, the Phantom was written off on the route between Budapest and Belgrade. Shame.

Some more photos...

Enzo

Bentley

Carpark

Mafioso

Bam & Ryan

Lambo Luggage

Satan's Bentley

VW Camper

Ultima GTR

Tastless

Lambos

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Recycling Scene

2006-04-12T08:36:00.000+02:00

Hungary isn't well known for it's green qualities, though I have written before about the bottle bins that are dotted around the town. I've also heard from a couple of different people that the bins are a farce as there aren't enough proper recycling facilities to actually deal with all the plastic and glass people throw away so it just ends up in normal landfill anyway.

I was reading another foreigner's take on Hungary and saw that he's very into recycling and a bit shocked at how people don't feel the moral obligation to do it here. You can read it here but be warned it's only a needle of a paragraph amongst a haystack of witterings.

More about chucking outIt might be because I moved here before the recycling took off in the UK (I now hear they have separate bins for glass, paper etc at each house in my home village) but I've always been impressed by the efforts of Hungarians not to waste anything in the first place. In the lovely lady's family, who are my main contacts to Hungarian home life, waste in general is frowned upon. The "waste not want not" theme is the same as my family too, so we get along quite well. The Hungarian grandmother would even go so far as to cut the plastic milk bags (you know the ones, the cheapest milk you can get, sometimes tastes a bit funny) into strips and then weave them into tough doormats. It works quite well and there's one sitting in front of our flat.

If it looks like someone can make use of something then it usually is. In Budapest there are lots of tramps feeding their palinka habit by pushing trolleys around town and collecting up anything they think might be worth a bit of cash. They deal mainly in cardboard that's left out next to the bins (it's rarely put in the bins). Old water and gas pipes are also picked up when they're thrown out but I think that's more of a jackpot win for the scavengers. There isn't a day that goes by without seeing at least one guy pushing his trolley along stacked high with cardboard and paper. Trying to get as much on before going to the depo where they'll get paid by the kilogram for it. I have no idea what the going rate for paper is, but from my Opi experience, scrap metal is 8Ft/kilo.

So my point is that while it looks like people don't recycle, I think they do. It's just in a different way. People waste less to begin with, then the recycling items they do chuck away are placed outside of bins for others to make use of. How sustainable this method is as the country gets richer and more "disposable" with hopefully fewer homeless, I'm not sure but right now I certainly don't feel guilty about throwing out my huge stacks of papers. I know they will be happily received by someone that needs the money from them.

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Budapest Social Club

2006-04-10T08:32:00.000+02:00

Last week was a week for socialising. The big boss was in town most of last week and drinks were on him on Thursday. Which destroys productivity on Friday but even though copious amounts of Corona was quaffed down at the expat favourite of Iguana, no one was too far gone the next day. I was particularly happy with how my body coped with it with no real feelings of hangover, just a need to sleep.

However, Friday was also a night on the town. Super-Kert Tuzraktér (formerly Tuzraktár) had it's opening night on April 7th. They had a good line up of bands but the one's we wanted to see were caracasUnderpop.

Read moreThey were excellent and definitely got the freezing crowds warmed up in the chilly cellar venue. Outside people sat around bonfires to get some heat or fill up with alcohol to keep the anti-freeze levels up. Tilos had DJs playing to provide some cool tunes but best of all was the kolbasz grill as there's no beating Meaf.

Saturday was a much more chilled out affair. I finally caught up on some sleep and awoke at a lazy 11am. The plan to look around at cars (still trying to find a replacement for Opi) went out the window and we had a relaxed breakfast watching double-bluffing super-spies in episodes of Alias. We then geared up for a trek (okay, bus journey) up to the hills to visit the Texan (and Canadian) and his famous BBQ. So we sat out on the terrace there, eating thick slices of grilled pork, mashed potato with sour cream and a side helping of lecso. Eeking out the warmth from the sunlight, sipping on frocs and chatting with friends. A fantastic way to recouperate.

Sunday came with an offer to go and see the opulent Orient Express that was in town for a just a few hours, but I had committed to fixing up the computer. Nothing wrong with it but on the way home on Friday I felt strangely compelled to buy a huge hard drive to rid me off all my low disk space problems (possibily brought on by lack of proper thought from the day after the night before). A simple operation but one that required shuffling around data between the two old disks before finally storing it on the new one. It ended taking up most of the afternoon but now I have a growling monster of a 300GB hard drive rumbling away by my right knee.

It was also election day on Sunday so the lady and I popped out into the sunshine once and over into the nearby school where she can vote. We then followed by a trip to the Danube which while receeding quickly is still quite high and the HÉV at Batthyány tér is not running. Then an impulse to indulge took us to the Europa Kavehaz on Szent Istvan krt where we got some cakes to go.

All in all a very pleasant few days and all that's left is to sleep for a few more.

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Top Turf

2006-04-07T08:13:00.000+02:00

Not sure what the reason was but I have my suspicions that the laying of this lovely green turf over the cobbles of the 6th district* was politically motivated**. Nonetheless, I was pleasantly surprised to have my normal walk to work broken up by a load of schoolkids mucking about on what seemed to be their new school playing field.

Unfortunately when I walked back that way after work the hoard of screaming kids had been replaced by a single screaming woman. No doubt she was a well-respected Hungarian entertainer who is a little past her sell-by date, but she was absolutely murdering all the songs she was ~~screaching~~ singing.

It may seem a cheap (or not so cheap) gimmicky trick to turn a pavement into a park but I love the fresh ideas that make people see their streets in a different light. Same goes for the good old Plage, which I hope makes a comeback this year.

* A lot of people think that the border between the 6th and 7th districts is Andrassy, but it's actually the lesser Kiraly. So this little square off Kiraly, between the post office and church, is 6th. Which is probably why they can squander their cash on fake grass.

** Turns out to be the SZDSZ party trick.

Napi Menu

2006-04-06T08:53:00.000+02:00

Is it possible I haven't written about the glorious Napi Menus that grace Budapest restaurants? I've done a quick search using the Googley thing at the top of the page but it turns up nothing.

The napi menu, is the daily dish at a Meafery. If you look about they're scribbled on most blackboards around Liszt Ferenc tér and most are good value too. Forget the rip off tourist menus that promise traditional gulyas leves and hortobagyi palacsintas. Stick with the basic stuff and you'll usually get in under a thousand forints. Well, that's optimistic at the tér nowadays, but you won't go much over.

Current favourites are Menza, Karma and ~~Leroys~~ Fresco. If the menu at Grand Cafe Grand Miro Grand (there's a "Grand" in there somewhere but not sure where) then you'll end up with decent 3 courser as it also includes a cake.

Oh and someone should have a word with Pompeii which put out this interesting selection of food. While the Larded Roasted Pork with Oniony Potato sounds artery-clogging-great, the Thick Brown Soup and Rice with Meat could do with a bit of tarting up on the language front.

Rising Tides

2006-04-05T08:29:00.000+02:00

If you're in Budapest and haven't already seen it, get yourself down to the riverside before the riverside comes up to you. I took a stroll down there on Saturday afternoon and the flooding looked impressive. Went again on Tuesday evening and it's risen even higher.

Water levels have passed 860cm and is still on the way up. It might even be able to break the all-time record of 867cm set in 1876. I took a photo of the marker at one of the flooded tram stops but I have no idea how to read it properly, so I'll just post it here.

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It's quite astounding to have the Danube so high that it completely covers the walls at the tram lines. In fact it almost touches the trams overhead cables and is getting close to filling their tunnels completely.

The authorities have cottoned on to the crowds and set up a Disaster Tourism map detailing a nice little walk you can have to take in "Interestig sights to see: the flood of the Danube." While the street sellers are raking in sales of salty pretzels and coke.

Spare a thought though for the poor people that work selling tickets for the boats. The office is completely flooded and only the tops of the windows and roof is visible. Hope they got all the equipment out in time.

Some more pics

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Political Broadcast

2006-04-04T21:52:00.000+02:00

It's obvious if you're living in Hungary but to those that may be out of the country and out of the loop, there's a national election coming up this weekend.

This means the town is covered in posters telling you who to vote for. I'm an innocent bystander in this battle as I can only vote for MEPs and not MPs.

There was a bit of a hoo-haa about the posters. Fidesz even changed their posters after they realised you don't really win votes by slagging off your own country. They switched from bitching about how crap the country's become during the last 4 years to saying how great it could be if they get into power.

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This past weekend was a flurry of activity with the two main parties organising rallies. MSZP chose Saturday to close half of Andrassy and paint the town red while Fidesz's orange men, women and children took over district V.

I'm definitely not into all the political goings on. You can read some more about it over at Pestiside. However, I will say that nipping out for vital ingredients for the Sunday lunch (grilled chicken*) was a surprising experience. Being the only foreigner in huge, orange, flag-waving crowds was a bit intimidating. But I guess it's all good fun.

* Rothchilds is truly a terrible place to shop with overpriced goods and they don't even have barcode readers. But on the plus side, some are open 24 hours and the one at Oktogon sells grilled chicken straight off the spit. Fantastic.

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Spring Sprung?

2006-03-23T08:22:00.000+01:00

A wonderful thing happened earlier this week. A traditional event in the Hungarian calandar where people cast off the cold grey winter and welcome in the bright new sunny season. I'm not talking about celebrations for the March 15th revolution or the just-around-the-corner Easter. I'm refering to tables sprouting up on Liszt Ferenc tér.

There may be blankets on the seats in case you get cold, but once their those chairs and tables hit the square, they'll cling on like limpets until September (or even October). A friend and I rejoiced with our first midday Meaf under blue skies. Alfresco at Fresco.

Read moreThe event was slightly sullied by a small pocket of grit exploding and spraying itself over our thankfully finished plates but these are risks worth taking. For the short-term, the tér is not just cafes, tables and chairs, but also prowling bobcats. That's not a euphimism for certain ladies (I think) but in fact the name of the mini-diggers and bulldozers, the type of which are reshaping good ol' LFT in a major way.

A few weeks ago I noticed a protest on the tér. It looked both pathetic and shocking at the same time. Pathetic as although there were TV crews from RTL Klub and Duna, there was only a handful of people holding placards and chanting. Shocking because it looked like someone was trying to bulldoze the square.

Turned out that the developers didn't have full permission to start the work. It had been picked up by the various political parties and they were making a fuss out of it. The work was stopped but later that day they were allowed to carry on.

There's a map at the ends of Liszt Ferenc tér that shows what they're planning. A series of walkways through the ~~dog toilets~~ green parts. The normal benchs will be chucked (I think) and replaced with seats afixed to the actual walls (so the dogs can pee on your shoulders as they get to business). I suppose the plan is to open up the square even more to squeeze even more tourists in. Or maybe the meandering paths are meant to make the place seem more magical. You'll have to make up your own minds when it's completed in the summer.

The paths are being worked on constantly so they should be finished soon. Until then, make sure you've got another diner/drinker on the outside tables to shield your own dish/drink from the curse of the flying grit.

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Bank Machine Mechanics

2006-03-21T08:27:00.000+01:00

Here's an interesting pic from the phone. It's from a bank on Andrassy a few weeks ago. It looked like someone had ripped the front off their cash machine, revealing all sorts of slots and wires just waiting to be tampered with.

Unfortunately there was a security guard standing next to it so fiddling about with it for the sake of furthering ~~cash~~ science was out of the question.

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It did make me think about how hard the ATM manufacturers are meant to be trying to protect these machines from hacker (by both software and by axe). I remember reading about all sorts of measures they take but then the fraudsters get even more imaginative. The basic method being the simple but effective Lebanese Loop and the more sophisticated ATM skimmer complete with hidden camera.

The Lebanese Loop and skimmers target the individuals. For targetting the big wad of cash held in the actual machine, well, you have to take the whole machine. I recall a spate of ATM thefts in the UK a few years back. The robbers would "borrow" a JCB from a nearby building site and then smash through everything, using the digger to scoop up the whole machine then carry it off in a truck. They've probably installed motion / tracking devices into them now but it doesn't stop some people from a good old smash and grab.

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On The Buses

2006-03-20T08:43:00.000+01:00

One of the excuses I have for my break in posting on The Hungary Years is that I spent a week snowboarding in France. It's great fun and I highly recommend it. Though perhaps it would be better to go somewhere a little closer.

I've been on some great slopes in Austria and I've also heard good things about Slovakia and Bulgaria, though maybe they don't have it sorted as much as the Austrians.

The last time I went to the Austrian mountains, it was about 8 hours in a car. Maybe less. It effectively means you can go there just for the weekend, leaving early on a Thursday or Friday afternoon and returning in a too-tired-to-drive-safely-journey on Sunday night.

France was a little bit further and the sensible thing to do would have been to take a cheap flight to Paris and then hop on the TGV down to Grenoble. Instead, as we were on a budget, we hopped onto a bus at Varosliget and then crawled there over what was meant to be a 16 hour ride.

16 hours on a bus would have made it the longest single bus journey ever for me. Unfortunately, fate decided to really stretch it out and make it into a 32 hour ride.

Just to put that into perspective, normally if someone travels for 32 hours, it means they are jetting off to the other side of the world. With a stopover in Hong Kong.

Read the timeline
Here's a quick catalog of our hold-ups:
15:30 - Departure time

16:30 - Real departure time. 1 hour late leaving as people are late turning up, they have too much luggage and the drivers are suspiciously checking the engine

17:30 - Drivers announce that the engine is knackered and we have to replace the "generator" (I think this translates into the "accumulator" in English). We stop at the exotic Budaors petrol station on the M7. At least there's a toilet (the one on the bus is out of order) and a McDonalds. Tip: If you're ever stuck at the McDonalds here, go to the kids playroom, there's tons of stuff to play with (cso-cso, air hockey etc) and you're bigger than the kids so you get to play more.

19:30 - After 2 hours of backbreaking work (the small cso-cso table is much lower and it really does give you backache) we set off again.

20:30 - The bus fills up a bit more as we stop to pick up more people at Szekesfehervar.

01:10 - Nasty Austrian border guards hold us up for well over an hour. At first it looks like they'll just let us through. Then they seen there's some non-Hungarians on board (me and some Romanians), so they as to see these passports separately. After handing them back and waiting an hour, they decide it's not enough and we have to get out and go past the passport window to get them checked individually. And I thought things were meant to get easier in the EU.

07:40 - BANG! Bus driver deals with a blow-out very well. Changing the inside tyre of the bus takes a bit of time though. At least they have a good spare on board. Everyone crowds round to see the huge gash in the old tyre made by what looks like electrical cable left on the road.

13:20 - Getting close. We pass by Torino and are told it's only another 2 or 3 hours.

17:30 - 26 hours on the road and the snow we've been hoping for has arrived. Only, there's a little bit of an excess. It's snowing so hard that they've closed our road up the mountain. We have to turn back and find another route up.

20:00 - Back down the mountain and figure out route. The new ETA is extended by yet another 2 or 3 hours (didn't they say that back at Torino?)

23:30 - Hurrah! Finally arrive at hotel. 32 hours after planned departure. All should be okay except for the fact that no one is at reception and the 3 apartments we've booked turn out to be only 2. No matter, we're so glad of any accomodation, we squeeze in and sort it out in the morning. The girl (and her boyfriend) that left her big bag with all her clothes on the bus aren't so lucky. The drivers refuse to drive out from their hotel (about 3 hours away) to deliver it so they spend the next day hopping on and off more buses to get it back.

The snowboarding turned out great. Weather was a bit hit and miss also. The avalanche warnings were at their highest level every day and the rescue helicopters seemed to be working non-stop. When the sun came out, the views were amazing. When the snow came, temperature at the top went down to -22C and visibility was reduced to nothing and it was difficult to see the slope. But it all added up to "the experience".

Now the above sounds like a nightmare journey, but to be honest it wasn't that bad. There was plenty of food and drink. Good old, home-made palinka was passed around and everyone cleared their throats in concert as the old guy in front coughed up his lungs in his last days (he did survive the week to inflict his diseases on everyone on the return journey). Though saying that, I think next time, it's either the plane and TGV combo or Austria.

In a short but relevent snippet, I took this snap of a tourist bus passing through Budapest. I'm sure it's fine in Czech, but would you really want your bus emblazoned with "Sad Tourist"?

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Better Late Than Never

2006-03-17T08:46:00.000+01:00

I wrote before about good old Két Szerecsen that was closed for renovations. It was meant to open back in February but there was a small delay. I walked past it the other day to see that it's finally reopened and found that the work wasn't just a splash of paint.

Didn't have time to pop in but hope their management and staff are the same people that make the place warm and welcoming as well as serving out great food and one of the best iced coffees in Budapest.

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The renovations seem to be quite extensive and expansive. At first glance throught the window you could be forgiven thinking that nothing has changed. The decor is the same. However, cast your eyes to the back of the main room and you'll see that they knocked through where the toilets used to be, creating a huge new dining area complete with gallery.

Where the toilets have moved to, I have no idea. Maybe they've even dug down into the cellars.

No matter. The extra space is great because it means that it should become more of a reliable eatery in terms of being able to get a table. Not that not getting a table is a big problem with the tér round the corner but still, it's one of my favourite places.

So book up and try out the cuisine, or perhaps just pop in for a coffee.

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Uborka PLU 4593

2006-03-16T08:44:00.000+01:00

Barring a few short months at dodgy Danko utca in the VIII district, I the first 3 years in Budapest at Kertesz utca. It was good as it's central, good for transport, has a good csarnok round the corner and didn't have the prostitutes, mafia, druggies and drunk homeless that Danko had.

I thought I'd mention uborkas today as I found one in my kitchen that is individually shrink wrapped and stamped. It made me think back to my time at Kertesz utca and the csarnok there.

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Back in '94, even though the shop was pretty big, they didn't sell any sort of fruit or veg or eggs for that matter. To get the fresh produce, you had to go out back and buy it from one of many independent stalls. Of course you had to make sure you brought your own bag or egg cartons as they didn't supply any.

I also remember the great feeling of when they first started stocking fruit and veg there so that there was no need to go out into the weather to get the rest of the shopping. Such convenience.

Now things have gone a step further. Perhaps it's part of EU regulations that every item has to be sealed and isolated from potential hazards. My uborka is no longer an uborka. It's a sealed vegetable product with reference number PLU 4593.

Of course you can go to the big Interspars, Tescos and Auchans to pick up such lovelies as pre-packed veggies for your soup. Or maybe you fancy the pre-grated cheese to save you the wrist work.

This post isn't really meant to be a rant at pre-packaged foods. Just another snapshot of then and now. PLU 4593 suprised me.

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KLF Moment

2006-02-09T02:33:00.000+01:00

A quick, stupid, possibly drunken post on a KLF moment. That being 3am eternal.

Just got back home after a good company do at ol' Iguana's. Great food, stuffed, and also filled with various types of liquor. The majority being a staple beer followed rapidly by Unicum and Tequila. Sensible amounts of water being squeezed in too.

Iguana's food was delicious as always. This time it came quick enough for me not to overdose on the jalapeno pepper poppers and spicy salsa.

On the way there it was a pretty cold walk. On the way back, my how it had snowed. And is still snowing. As of 2.40am, it's about 10cm deep on the street and still coming down thick and fast.

It's quite nice to walk around at this time in this weather. I've had two snowball fights. One with complete strangers. The snow is deep enough to cover the edges of the pavements and streets so I can blame my stumblings on the white stuff as apposed to the liquid intoxications.

If it keeps snowing at this rate, I'll have to put on the Serious Boots to get to work tomorrrow. Or is that today, just delayed.

No pics for this episode. My phone died of a depleted battery and announced it's passing, loudly, several times. Oh well, maybe the snow will still be around in the morning for a photographic shot.

Magnum B.P.

2006-02-02T08:33:00.000+01:00

Nothing much here. Just another Andrass ut quickie in the form of some Ferrari picks. Saw this lovely car (Ferrari 308 GTS I think) parked at Andrassy's low and odd numbers 2 nights running. Though strangely it wasn't there during the day. Maybe the owner's saving some money at the meter.

Okay, I know the car has a stigma attached to it in the form of Magnum's moustache but I still think it looks good and well done to the guy that bought it. It has Hungarian plates on it and I'm hoping that it's owned by an enthusiast rather than some bloke who bought it after a dodgy deal back in the Eighties.

Sticker Slapper

2006-02-01T08:35:00.000+01:00

Here's a short one. I noticed that someone's been very eager with these satellite stickers. They're stuck to almost every post along Andrassy. I have no idea what they're about.

When things like these appear, I'm intrigued. Which I suppose is what the person slapping them on wants. But I have no idea what they're about or how to find out. Which defeats the object, surely.

These things are often seen in the divey kert bogs, pasted in great numbers and wide varieties all over the walls. It makes for a colourful, modern display of random poster art while carrying out business at the urinal.

There, they sort of make sense or at least they seem to be at home. On a main street in bright daylight and in a repetitive slap, they don't look right.

Cafe Tér

2006-01-31T21:32:00.000+01:00

As I've said before, I like my cafes and restaurants. Don't eat out much these days but it's always good to know that there's a delicious meal around the corner if I fancy it. Also very useful for when visitors arrive from afar and need filling up with good grub.

I'll start the post off with a place where I have no intention of going. The old Est Cafe was gutted and remade into Barokko. The place with an unfeasibly large sign hanging off its frontage. If there's a legal maximum size for a sign in Liszt Ferenc tér, I'm sure they've gone over it. As I said, I don't plan in entering the establishment mainly because of the terrible times I've had at Est Cafe, but peeking in through the large windows reveals a move around with the bar and a huge plazma screen showing either Viva or Fashion TV. I hate Fashion TV.

Now, one of my favourite places is Két Szerecsen. The name translates as "Two Saracens", or if you're using the politically incorrect dictionary from Startlap it's "Two Darkies". Oh well, I think I'll choose the former.

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They've been undergoing a drastic looking rennovation during the Christmas period and while I remember a sign saying they will open in January, they're still very very unready. It looks like they'll be lucky to open in February but work is definitely going on so there's hope.

Some of the reasons why it's one of my faves and I hope they haven't changed it too much:
- Good service
- Tasty food
- Interesting specials
- Outdoor tables away from Liszt Ferenc tér crowds
- One of the best ice-coffees in Budapest

On the subject of cafes and dredging up a well worn theme on The Hungary Years, Fresco Cafe (formerly Leroys) on The Tér was in the spotlight this morning. Literally. They had commandeered the cafe for some filming. Couldn't see what it was about but there was plenty of activity going on and the car park out the front of the music academy was full of vans for lugging the equipment about.

As I'm not a real mover or shaker (more of a moccha and steaker) I don't know the full ins and outs of the change from Leroys to Fresco but what I can say is that bugger seems to have changed except the name on the front. The decor is the same and thankfully the food too. It can get a bit pricey in Fresco but they do excellent food and they also serve decent napi menus. It's becoming the mid-week Meaf venue of choice.

Of course, it's all just a stop-gap until good ol' Dupla comes back from the dead. At least there's it's sister Szimpla for an post-lunch coffee.

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Nespresso So So

2006-01-26T19:10:00.000+01:00

The Nespresso place opposite the Opera on Andrassy has finally opened. For months it has been teasing me with arty coffee posters making me dream of a time when my days are spent sipping coffee, reading articles and watching beautiful people pass by. It really does look slick and sophisticated.

Read moreI was looking forward to another cool cafe to open up so I was very disappointed to see what Nespresso really is. Okay, so it looks like there is a place where you can buy and drink coffee in there, but it appears to be as comfortable as the "IT" transportation device that South Park's Mr. Garrison invented. The rest of the shop is a shop.

So, it's not really a cafe at all. Just a place where people can buy hideously expensive coffee machines and the accessories that go with them. It's not really a cheeky twist of Nescafe and espresso but a full-on brand of erm... Nescafe and espresso.

Nespressos are little capsules of coffee that fit into the pricey coffee machines to provide that neat shot of caffeine. Different coloured capsules for different strengths or flavours of coffee. I didn't search before but I now see they have a dedicated site.

I know there are plenty of other cafes around, but as Liszt Ferenc tér has proven summer after summer, there's always room to squeeze in one more.

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Name That Day

2006-01-25T22:52:00.000+01:00

One of the things that's great about Hungary is it's love with Name Days. Never knew they existed until I came over here. Imagine my surprise when I learnt that there's yet another day you can get gifts outside of your birthday and Christmas. Fantastic. Okay, so you can't get gifts on the same sort of scale but I'm all up for a bit of extra chocolate, a pair of socks or aftershave (well, no, not the aftershave).

Read moreEach day in the calendar has at least one name attached to it. Some are obvious, like Éva on Christmas Eve (shared of course with Ádám) or Miklós on December 6th (day of chocolate), Szilveszter on New Year's Eve. The names are printed on the ubiquitous desktop paper calendars that are obligatory in every office.

This way you not only remember the name days of your friends and colleagues but provides a healthy discussion points on long lost names such as Petronella, Menyhért and Líviusz. Please also spare pity for Fanni whose name is unfortunate in both British and American English, and poor Albin whose name day crops up on February 29th.

Some foreigners can assume a new identity by taking the Hungarian equivalent of their name. For example, Michael becomes Mihaly, Paul is Pál, Mary turns into Mária. For me, Timbo became Timót. I've been told that it's not an exact match and that apparently there isn't a proper Timothy in Hungarian. Never mind, my new Hungarian name is set and now the gifts of sweets, soap and socks flow.

Timot day lands on Jan 24th, which was yesterday. I celebrated royally with a great (but sadly not óriási) Túró Rudi.

Mmmm.... Túró Rudi. Now there's another brilliant Hungarian tradition.

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Brass Monkey Weather

2006-01-24T09:03:00.000+01:00

Sipping my morning cuppa I took a curious glance out the window to check the little temperature gauge we have stuck to the outside of the window frame. Although it's a bright blue sky, the temperature in the shade at this point was -7C. Which is low. It can be thought of as very low as the temperature in our courtyard is normally a good 4 or 5 degrees above the heat on the street. This means that at approximately 8.30am it's -11C or -12C out there. That's cold!

Read moreLike the cat that's about to get it's comeupance, I clicked over to the Hungarian met office for a fab map of the country covered in chilly blue splodges. Current temperature -14.7C in Budapest. It also tells me that the warmest place in the country right now is at -9C while the coldest is a bone chilling -20C.

I read that in order to stop the elephants freezing to death at the Russian zoos in the current cold snap, their normal buckets of water were spiked with vodka. Acting like anti-freeze, the vodka should prevent them from icing up. I wonder if it's a good enough excuse to get tanked up in the office.

* Cold enough to freeze the balls off a brass monkey

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Pootling Pensioners

2006-01-18T08:49:00.000+01:00

When thinking of senior citizens in Hungary, most people conjure up the idea of frail, white-haired folks clogging up the post office collecting their pensions while complaining about how that pension is buying less and less, why the weather isn't like it was, how nothing is safe anymore, how the government is letting people down and what their latest grandchild is up to. Well, actually, that might be a bit of a pessemistic view of the old folks but we've all been there, standing in that particular queue waiting to pay our bills.

Read moreHowever, I think that most of the elderly are still young at heart and want to get out There to do their thing instead of just pootling about in some dusty flat. This theory is backed by spotting huge numbers (2) of sporty seniors out and about on the streets of Budapest.

I regularly see a sprightly man who must be in his late 60's tearing up the streets on rollerblades. And he's no slouch either. I can imagine he spent a lot of his life on skates (ice or roller) and has now moved on to in-lines. I thought he was the only one in town but the other day I witnessed a little old lady who had to be in her 70's speeding down Andrassy's pavement on one of those small collapsible scooters. I would have taken a picture but she was too fast. The sight was made more bizarre by the fact she was wearing her normal little old lady outfit and handbag. At least the roller-blader puts on some sporty garb.

It all gives me a little bit of hope that when I get to that age I'll be doing the same. It means I can put off the exercise for an even later date.

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Tourist Trap

2006-01-13T08:36:00.000+01:00

The phrase "Tourist Trap" doesn't really sound that bad. While Merriam-Webster describes it as simply a place that attracts and exploits tourists. Wikipedia takes a more friendly perspective.

Tourist trap, sometimes called T.T. for short, is a catch-all term for any establishment or set of establishments that have been created for the purpose of drawing travelers in to spend money. While the term would seem to have a negative connotation, such establishments are typically viewed by travelers as being fun and interesting diversions, with realistic expectations as to their true importance, or lack thereof. In the Southern United States, these attractions are often called "Yankee" traps.

Read moreWhile the lovely lady walked home the other evening, she met a couple of Brits who had been severely ripped off. New to the city, they'd gone to the most touristy places in town and ended up having beers in a place on Vaci utca. You can see where I'm going with this one. I'm not sure of the full details but it seems that after having the beers they were presented with a grossly inflated bill. Now it wasn't just an extra tip added on, or a few extra drinks. Instead it was a whopping 400,000ft bill. That's over 1,000 GBP and getting on for $2,000!

Gobsmacked by the cheek of it all, they refuted the bill. Then they were threatened. What they were threatened with, I don't know but it was enough for them to pay. Apparently their chances of just legging it out was scuppered by the fact that one of them was in a wheelchair.

Worse still is that they were so glad to finally get out of there that by the time they were recalling the story to the lovely lady, they had forgotten which precise establishment it was. This means that even if they go to the cops the next day, they're stuffed.

Unfortunately it doesn't seem to be that rare to happen in certain parts of the city. I told the story to a friend who brings in tourists and he wasn't shocked about it at all. An everyday occurance perhaps. He's of the opinion that even if the victims do go to the police to report it there's nothing that can be done and the police don't care about it. Apparently, if tourists are getting ripped off in this way, it's just bringing money into the economy. They're not bothered about the longer-term effects of frightening away visitors because of the horror stories.

It's basically theivery and should be treated as such. It's shameful that places like this exist.

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Friendly Websites

2006-01-11T13:14:00.000+01:00

I normally write about things from the real world. Physical things that really exist and you can reach out and touch. But I'm putting that on hold for this post.

Recently I received an email from a friend telling me about a site I should join. I knew they were a friend, not just because I've known them for a while but also because the automatically generated email told me so. In this way, I signed up to be a member of iwiw.

Read moreI'm not sure what iwiw stands for but the site's FAQ says that it's been around in various forms since 2002. Almost makes me feel left out for only receiving an invite at the end of 2005. Oh well.

The iwiw concept is Hungarian personal networking site, just like good old Friends Reunited. You get invited by someone you know, you add people from the site to your list and invite other people who aren't registered yet. Sooner or later you'll be bumping into (albeit cyberly) all those people you used to go to school, work, the pub with. Myself, I tend to stand at the back of the room and just read peoples profiles to find out what they've been getting up to with their lives. My profile is normally up-to-date but I'm not an active-seeker.

But with these sites come a few questions of etiquette. The idea is to form your group of friends so that you have everyone you like and want to keep in touch with. But what happens when someone you didn't really get on with drops a friendly invite into your inbox? Reject it and it's a flat dismissal of their friendship but accept it and you're slowly diluting your group into meaninglessness.

Here's another question. While using the "friends of friends" feature the other day, I happened upon someone I knew, or thought I knew. Then I realised that I've never met or talked to the bloke and only know him through his blog. It'd be pretty neat to add him and say hello but it feels so stalkerish that I just can't bring myself to do it. Then again, as I know who our mutual friends are, there's the possiblility of meeting in real-life by just going out and meeting the mutuals more often.

And there lies the conclusion. These friendly sites are all well and good for finding those long lost buddies, but if we all went down the pub more often they wouldn't be long or lost in the first place.

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Guerrilla Marketing In Budapest

2006-01-10T13:46:00.000+01:00

The big junction where Andrassy meets Bajcsy, Jozsef Attila is often the source for my posts seeing as that's where the diplomats fly by, the cars are crashed, roads dug up, cycle lanes installed etc. It's doing it's thing for me again.

Walking to work the other day in the rain I noticed what may be a new form of advertising in Budapest. I've seen similar things before elsewhere but not in Hungary. I noticed 3 men at the traffic lights on Andrassy wearing bright jackets and holding big boards. When the lights for the cars turned red, they marched out into the road and displayed their message to the captive driving audience. Just before the lights turn green, they scurried back to the side of the road, out of the way until the next phase of lights.

Read moreNow I'm thinking of several things here.

1) Well done to the guerilla advertisers. I'm all up for a bit of creativity. You've basically created advertising space from nothing. Used to think up these schemes all the time but never put them into action.

2) Sorry for the drivers that thought they only had to listen to the ads on the radio and not have them thrust into their faces at the traffic lights. Never mind. Perhaps you can console yourselves by accelerating hard when the lights go green and try to catch one of them. Oh wait, maybe you do that already.

3) Bright, yellow, reflective jackets? Good lord, has health and safety come to protect the lowly street workers? To be honest, this was the most surprising point. Soon they'll be putting barriers around men working down holes in the street so that people don't fall down them. Maybe.

4) Hurrah for the advertiser (who is probably the one who thought it up in the first place anyway). The company paying for the ads was a strip-joint round the corner on Nador utca. Oops, I might be wrong on that point. Could be something else. Nothing against those nightclubs, in fact I'm all for The Places and look forward to seeing The Candy Shop one day.

Note - Perhaps this method of advertising may already be patented. Just take a look here.

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Celeb Spotting

2006-01-09T18:43:00.000+01:00

The orange clad SleasyJet was the airline of choice to bring yours truly back from Blighty to Budapest. Chosen mainly because it was the cheapest flight between the two countries. I can't help thinking though that if I was feeling a bit more flush, I'd be paying that little bit extra to fly in an airplane with legroom and the chance of a couple of free whiskies.

Read moreI was surprised to see Koós János in the departure lounge at Luton. Surely an established Hungarian star such as him would have the cash to ensure a more comfortable trip. It's certain that Hungarian celebs don't have nearly as much opporutunity to make as much cash as they do in a lot of other places (UK, US) but I wonder how much money really is in the business.

He could have just been saving his forints like the ~~eccentric~~ sensible millionaires. He seems to be a hard worker and hard-earned cash is much harder to part with than the easy-to-come-by stuff. I too, loathe to hand over money for, well, pretty much everything. So, is Koós János a penny-pincher or a true pauper?

Or, it could be that he just wanted to visit Luton and see how orange it has become.

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B.U.É.K.

2006-01-09T08:58:00.000+01:00

It's a bit late but buék to all of you. Normally said within the first few minutes of the new year, I think it's still okay to greet people with it a few days into 2006. Buék of course being "Boldog Uj Evet Kivanok" or "Wish you a happy new year". Said in one short word, a bit like enthusiastic frog or a semi-stifled burp.

Christmas was spent away from The Hungary Years and Hungary itself. Back in Blighty there was much running around visiting people, pubs and purveyors of reduced price products (or in other words, "The Sales"). Plenty was ate and drank in the spirit of Christmas over-induldgence but there were a few walks around the countryside, parks and blizzard-swept, vertigo-inducing bridges thrown in too. Got up to the Lake District which was as ~~muddy~~ lovely as ever. Even so, the food has taken it's toll and so I'll be trying to walk even more around Budapest to shed the weight. Well, as soon as I've finished all the chocolate that was brought back.

I'll be back with more Hungary-related posts in just a bit.

Before I Go

2005-12-20T12:21:00.000+01:00

A quick post of odds and sods and pics carrying on the Christmas theme.

Read moreThe ice rinks are up. I can't vouch for them all but I'm sure the huge one Varos Liget is running (and probably has been since the beginning of November). There's also a fairly decent looking one on the roof of the Westend mall which I glimpsed last weekend.

Plus, while wandering through the streets one night I saw what looked like the beginning of an ice rink outside the parliament. I think the rink outside parliament is free for kids. Maybe.

The opera house had a huge TV screen on its main balcony last night. Though strangely it wasn't there this morning. Either they only put it up when it's dark, or someone's got themselves a huge present under the tree this year.

Oh, and of course the lights have been up in Budapest for a couple of weeks now. Each district trying to out-do the other. The illuminations on Andrassy ut look good.

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Merry Markets

2005-12-20T08:56:00.000+01:00

With the gift giving day almost upon us, people are now scouring the shops like mad trying to get the presents they need. Personally, I really don't like the feverish crowds that clog up the streets and malls. There's a sense of desparation about and quite a bit of pushing and shoving too. Luckily, the things I need to buy this year are fairly simple and don't require a lot of trawling.

Read moreIf you're stuck for present ideas then you could always try the markets that spring up every year. You can only really use the markets once for a present, unless it's a Secret Santa gift, in which case you're bound to find something tacky enough within your price range.

The wooden stalls sell the same items year after year without fail. Most goods are not good. Wooden bowls and plates, candles imbedded with dried flowers, honey imbedded with dried fruit, small wooden toys hanging from springs, figures of witches and birds to hang from the ceiling, cigarette lighters and an assortment of metalic goods from fruit bowls to hip flasks.

But don't despair, there are still some things that make a trip worthwhile. Practical stuff like gloves, scarves, hats, wrapping paper are fairly decent and then of course there's the food. Almost everywhere you can find Kürtos kalács (chimmney cake), gofri (waffles) and forralt bor (mulled wine). Plus, if you take a trip down to the Vörösmarty ter markets then you can get a thoroughly fantastic (though perhaps expensive) grilled kolbasz.

So if you have some shopping to do, stop by the markets for a break, a bor and a kolbasz. But please, be careful what presents you buy there.

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Bajcsy Bicycles

2005-12-14T08:47:00.000+01:00

I've written about bikes in Budapest before and I'm going to write about them again here. Some people see cyclists as pests to pedestrians and cars alike, but I have great respect for the people that pedal their way around the streets here. Most drivers in Hungary have a fairly low regard for their fellow motorists but it's almost zero for people on bikes.

Read moreThe cycle lanes that exist on Andrassy are risky places to be. Even though they're protected by small, flat metal mushrooms, most motorists treat them as optional, extra parking space. An area that can be used when they're in a rush and park diagonally, sometimes rolling up onto the pavement as well. Which is probably why a lot of cyclists just use the great, wide pavements and weave around the walkers.

The council must have got wise to this and formed a different plan. After Bajcsy út was resurfaced they decided to add a cycle lane. Not on the road, but on the pavement instead. The lane runs the length of Bajcsy and is highlighted using red tarmac.

However, they didn't just stop at crayoning in the lane. The powers that be have then gone a step further to erect railings at various points, though I'm not sure whether they are to stop pedestrians from wandering onto the lane or stop cyclists from wandering off. Plus, there are mini-zebra crossings so the kids can practise on cycle lanes before they get to the road.

I think the new lanes are good and although it keeps the bikes on the pavement, there's plenty of room. But the mini-zebra crossings are harmless but plain silly. What I really don't like are the stupid railings that pop up at seemingly random points. I'm 100% sure that I'll be nursing a groin injury from not noticing them one evening.

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Hó Hó Hó

2005-12-13T14:23:00.000+01:00

The white stuff is finally hitting the streets. After a brief flurry of snow last night I walked out the door this morning to be greeted with the city slush.

Read moreOne of the reasons I like living here in Hungary is that there are distinct seasons. No cold summer drizzle or warm winter days. In summer it's hot hot hot and in the winter it's hó hó hó. Though, in town that snow doesn't last long. Within a few minutes of touching down it's been trod on by pedestrians, driven over by cars and then there are the dogs.

The correct footwear is important. You don't want to be falling over in this stuff. Which is a problem for me right now as my faithful trekking boots that took a pounding from Patagonia to Peru finally fell apart strolling down Váci utca. It's time to get out to the shops and treat myself to another set of footwear with a good deep tread. Until then, my smarter yet slippery shoes will have to do. I just hope that I won't be hitting the streets too hard.

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Crashes & Bananas & Humanity

2005-12-07T16:31:00.000+01:00

I've been described as one of the few ~~bloody~~ blogging optimists about town but sometimes even I need some reassurance that there are some decent people out there.

Read more

The other day I saw a car accident at the corner of Bajcsy and Andrassy. Nothing special. The lights were turning red, and all the cars were in their usual dash to get across before being deemed too illegal. Unfortunately for the driver in a small, white Peugeot, the driver behind thought they could still make and slammed into the back of him. Now you might think that my knock against humanity came from the two drivers then sorting each other out on the street, but no, they behaved impeccably.

It was the policeman standing next to the road that witnessed the whole incident. After the crunch, instead of going to the drivers to make sure everything was okay and perhaps offer some words of wisdom / caution, he just gave them the thumbs-up. As if to say, "nice crash there, well done".

My faith in humanity was restored this morning as I bought some apples and bananas from the tiny fruit & veg place on Nagymezõ. Going in, I declared that I only had 350 forints in change and the dreaded 10,000 note. I simply said that if I went over 350 ft, she should tell me before she rings it up and I'll put some bananas back. When the bill came to about 500 ft, she said it wouldn't be a problem and I can just pay it next time I pop by. Wonderful.

Of course, I'll have to find a new fruit and veg place to shop at now that I've got my sneak profit of 150 ft, but it's worth it.

Note - The pic was lifted from a bizarre but great site called Boring 3D. Make sure you check out the archive.

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Electric Metric

2005-12-06T12:42:00.000+01:00

Our good old electric meter has been switched for a snazzy new one. I quite liked our ancient black metal meter (no picture, sorry) but I'm sure the new, snazzy, minimalist meter will grow on me. It seems that another thing that I'll have to get used to is the whopping increase in electric bills.

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After installation the meter starts counting up from zero. Which is nice. But I fear that it may be counting too keenly. After just a few days it became apparent that we're using about 50% more electricity than normal. Though I don't think we're using any more electricity than we usually do, so it's got to be the meter.

The lovely lady puts it down to a conspiracy by the utility companies. There would be an uproar if the price of electricity, gas and water suddenly rose by 50% but if they just keep the unit price the same and switch the meters to sneakily use more units, then it becomes a hidden problem that individuals have to discover and address.

Perhaps our previous meter was old and slow but you never know. One thing's for sure, I'll feel cheated if I have to pay more for using less.

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Death of Opi

2005-12-01T13:04:00.000+01:00

A sad post to start off the return of The Hungary Years. Good ol' Opi has popped his/her/its clogs and is now flapping its rusty wings in car heaven.

Opi was still going strong but unfortunately the technical certificate needed to run on the road expired. In fact, it expired while we were away and so got a shock when we returned. It meant that Opi was parked illegally for a few days and then driven under cover of rush hour traffic to the garage to get it looked at.

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We knew it would take some work to get it past the technical test but didn't know how much it would all cost. Being the cheap and fairly sturdy car that Opi is, we figured that if the bill came to 50,000 Ft or less then we'd go ahead and get it done. Any more expensive and we'd have to think about it. When the call came from the garage to say that the work would cost about 170,000 Ft, the answer was obvious. Opi's time had come.

Again during rush hour and running on fumes, we drove it over to the scrapyard. The scrapyard itself was fascinating. Masses of bottles for recycling, huge cranes delving into piles of cars, ~~scrapyard mafia~~ independent scrapies' lorries bringing in all sorts of strange metal and offering to buy our car. We refused the offers, drove Opi one last time to get weighed (a nice round 1,000kg) and then parked it in it's final resting place next to a fleet of battered Skodas. We turned our backs and said goodbye.

Some other pics from automobile death row:

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South America Summary

2005-11-29T17:45:00.000+01:00

Here's a post that gives links to all the entries made during Timbo's Travels in South America. I've gone through them all and added extra photos to show you what I was writing about. You may have already seen some from earlier posts but there's lots and lots of new ones.

Sunday, September 18, 2005
Not a lot to report so far

Friday, September 23, 2005
The Steaks Are High *

The Steaks Are High (2) *

Monday, September 26, 2005
Whale Watching and Seal Spotting *

Wednesday, September 28, 2005
Puerto Natales : Hacking Coughs and Gloopy Internet *

Pics!

Thursday, September 29, 2005
Photos from the CD (Rio, Iguacu, BsAs, Peninsula Valdes)

Monday, October 03, 2005
Puerto Varas - Snow Capped Volcanoes *

Wednesday, October 05, 2005
Puerto Varas (II) - The Lakes *

The Best 4x4xfar?

Puerto Varas (III) - Still Here

Saturday, October 08, 2005
Down and out in Bariloche *

Monday, October 10, 2005
Out and About in Osorno

Thursday, October 13, 2005
Simmering in Salta *

Saturday, October 15, 2005
The Pain of Internet Cafes

Some more pics at last... *

Sunday, October 16, 2005
Breathless in Bolivia *

Tuesday, October 18, 2005
Making Plans for ~~Nigel~~ Timbo *

Wednesday, October 19, 2005
Making Plans for ~~Nigel~~ Timbo (II) *

Monday, October 24, 2005
Rumble in the Jungle *

Tuesday, October 25, 2005
They speak Spanish in Bolivia, right?

Tuesday, November 01, 2005
Timbo in Bolivia *

Thursday, November 03, 2005
Unboliviable *

Bolivia to Peru Huu Huu *

Sunday, November 06, 2005
Creepy Crawlies

Monday, November 07, 2005
Okay, so you´ve got some pictures *

Sunday, November 13, 2005
~~Pavement~~ National Park Pizzas *

Monday, November 14, 2005
Homokos *

Tuesday, November 15, 2005
Boobies *

Thursday, November 17, 2005
Missing Passports *

Monday, November 21, 2005
Fly like a butterfly, sting like a ...

* indicates a post that has been updated with photos. You will need to click on the link at the bottom of the post to see the pics.

Fly like a butterfly, sting like a ...

2005-11-21T08:18:00.000+01:00

Bee stings hurt. They don't happen very often but just as I sat down in the Miraflores park to enjoy the great fresh bread we bought (bread with ham and onion baked into it) I felt something crawling on the back of my neck. So I brushed it away and was rewarded with an incredible stinging pain. Hurt like hell, but then went away bit by bit over the next couple of hours. Ate the bread in the hostel we were staying at.

As we were in our last days of the big trip we decided to not worry so much about money spent on taxis. We took a taxi into and out of downtown Lima instead of using the bus. Taxi was about 6 soles whereas a bus would have been about 1 each, so splashing out just over a dollar for all that comfort and safety. Well, not a lot of extra comfort and safety but it's definitely more convenient.

Before coming into Lima we'd heard that it wasn't meant to be that good. Everyone we'd met that had been here and even the guidebooks told us that it's a bit of a dump and should be avoided. We saw some really crappy places from the big bus we arrived on but Miraflores looks very nice and when we got into the centre of town we were pleasantly suprised at how pretty the buildings were.

Of course the centre and all the important official buildings are based around the Plaza de Armas (there's one in every town) and in Lima it's quite big. It was also off limits when we arrived as they were performing the changing of the guard at the palace nearby. But we got to walk around it eventually. Also walked around plenty of shopping streets and down to the San Martin square as well. To be honest, it looked very good and we were pleasantly surprised.

In the evening we ate fish (in-between flicking the invading ants off the table) and I tried Chicha, a purple maize beer (but not really alcoholic). Seen lots of people drinking it around here, but normally from old plastic bottles as it's home-brewed. This was the first time I saw it on the menu so I had to have a taste. It was very very sweet, perhaps I can compare it to strong Ribena or perhaps a Hungarian fruit soup. Anyway, definitely different, definitely not beer.

Would have like to have tried Cuy (Guinea Pig) as well but that's mainly a dish of the highlands and they price it up for the tourists around Lima, so I think that'll have to wait for another visit to Peru unless I fatten them up from the pet shop myself.

After all that it was an early night and an early start to make our way back to Budapest. We started the journey when we caught the taxi to the airport at 10am on Friday. The international airport, not domestic, which caused the taxi driver to up his fare by 50% en-route, which in turn caused me to open the door as we were driving along until he reduced it to something more acceptable). We finally arrived at the flat at 7pm on Saturday.

We had a 3 hour wait as we changed plane at Bogota but that went quite quickly as we had to sort out the mess with our rucksacks. The LAN Peru people at Lima told us that we wouldn't have to pick up our bags at Bogota and that they'd be transferred to Paris automatically. Rubbish. We had no boarding card for our next flight so we had to argue our way out of the transit area to check-in with Air France. However, the lovely Air France lady told us that it would be very rare for our bags to be transferred automatically in Bogota and we should check. So we had to argue our way through security (helped by a great guy who spoke English and had all the security clearance we needed) back into the baggage reclaim area. Found our bags just lying on the floor, picked them up and went back to Air France check-in. Got the boarding cards for the flight to Paris and to Budapest, plus assurance that our bags would be transferred automatically to Bp (they were telling the truth this time). Argued our way back into the transit area. The whole business took about 1.5 hours. Not bad. We even got to the world outside the airport (the taxi rank) while we were running around doing this, so you could say that we even managed to visit Colombia. Bought some coffee. The rest of the time we spent chatting to an old friend from school who we happened to meet there. Found out that she's been in Bogota for just over a year teaching English. Got some good gossip from back home. Strange how you meet some people. She recognized me after no-idea-how-many-years and called out my name. Cool.

The flight to Paris was fine. It was a bit hampered by a load of Colombian school/college kids on a big trip but they were fairly well behaved if restless. Couldn't sleep on the flight so watched lots of films.

The wait at Paris wasn't so great as Charles de Gaulle T2B is small and fairly empty. We passed the time just sitting in a crap waiting area chatting to another Hungarian girl that we'd just met. She'd been in Buenos Aires for 2 weeks on some sort of exchange program. We exchanged stories about B.A., the buses, the steaks the smog etc.

Then it was just a shortish hop back to Budapest. My phone was working after 2 months of not being charged up so we ordered a taxi and tried to dash outside to catch it. We were stopped by customs asking if we'd taken any drugs and which countries we'd been to in South America. They took a quick sneak peek into our bags and then sent us on our way. Managed to get the taxi and be zoomed back to the flat in the back of a nice BMW.

Freezing cold, we put the heating on full. Ran a hot bath. Called the parents to let them know we were back safe and then collapsed into bed. Slept for 12 hours straight before getting up the next day to hunt for food.

I'll try to do a summary later on with a selection of pictures. There really are a lot of good photos that need to be put next to the blog entries so it's easier to figure out what I'm raving about.

So ends Timbo's Travels in South America. Stay tuned as we revert back to our normal programming of The Hungary Years in a few days.

Missing Passports

2005-11-17T03:10:00.000+01:00

We arrived in Lima safe and sound. Just without some important things like passports, flight tickets and a wad of cash. No, we weren´t robbed, pickpocketed or "strangle-mugged". Instead we´d been very careful at Pisco and put everything in the safe. Then we´d been very forgetful and only remembered the package when we were well on our way to Lima on a 4 hour bus ride.

Drat! Oh well. We got into Lima, found a place to stay in the Miraflores district (after a lot of searching) then called the place in Pisco to tell them what happened. Good old Boris had it sorted. Well, good young Boris that is. Spoke to good old Boris his father at first and had a very strange conversation.

Today (Wednesday) we got up early and took a bus back down to Pisco. Picked up the passports, had some food then got back on the bus and came all the way back to Lima again. 8 hours on the bus. At least we managed to get a good bus company this time and got a working tv (no toilet though, and it left as at edge-of-town Pisco instead of the centre).

On a side note, Eva´s getting very good at bargaining with taxis. Getting to and back from the bus stops she managed to hack down the price very well.

So, back in Lima and we wandered around the Miraflores area. Went down to see the ocean (not down to the beach though as that´s meant to be very unsafe). Looked around a couple of good parks, a shopping centre and then back towards home to get something to eat. Apart from sitting 8 hours on an unecessary bus, it wasn´t a bad day after all.

Updated with photos (29-Nov-2005) - Click for pics

On the bus we saw lots of little huts in the desert next to the road. I don't think they were lived in, but who knows? Seriously, any idea what they're used for?

The park of love.

Old houses in Lima. They look great. Hope they last.

This ancient site is smack-bang in the middle of Miraflores, Lima. They only recently started looking at it properly and they still don't have proper government backing. Before they started the excavation it was used as a rubbish tip and for motor-cross. All the bricks you see are hand-made (no moulds), and it's absolutely massive (though only a fraction of the size it used to be).

They're finding new stuff all the time.

The naked Peruvian dogs are ugly.

Boobies

2005-11-15T16:22:00.000+01:00

Monday was spent at what's reffered to as a mini-galapagos island. The real name is Ballestas Island just off the coast from Pisco in Peru and has absolutely loads of marine wildlife.

You can see someone else's pics at Go2Peru to give you an idea of what it was like.

We went out there on a big speedboat and then toured around the coast (you don't get out of the boat) looking at sealions on the beach and watched them curiously bobbing up from the water to take a look at us. Thousands of birds. Some of the cliffs were black with them. Inca Terns, Cormorants, Pelicans and of course lots of Peruvian Boobies.

All those birds add up to quite a bit of guano and so in some places in was very smelly. However, even with all those birds flapping about, there was no guano dropping on us. Unlike in Pisco where the main square has trees bursting with birds and one of them got me on the way to a restaurant. Argh.

We also spent some time at the Paracas National Park and saw plenty of pelicans and even a flamingo or two (there are thousands of them when the time is right).

One of the consequences of going by speedboat to the island is that you can't wear a hat, unless you want to lose it. Zooming along with the wind rushing past, we didn't feel the sun. So both of us have red faces today. Not badly burnt, just looks like were blushing non-stop.

If all goes well, we should be off to Lima in an hour or two. Not sure what we'll be doing there as all the guide books say it's not that great but it serves as a good introduction to Peru. But we're on our way out. Just Lima and then we're off back to Bp.

Updated with photos (29-Nov-2005) - Click for pics

A boat is taken over by cormorants.

A huge image scraped into the hillside.

Seals or are they sea lions?

The hills are black with birds.

Loads of them.

"The Cathedral"

Homokos

2005-11-14T00:25:00.000+01:00

We survived Ica but only just. It wasn't the nasty streetlife that did us in but the wine and the ~~women~~ sand. Our short day tour of the area took us to a fantastic oasis. Very tiny and it's drying up so they top it up artificially, poor thing.

Of course surrounding the oasis is a lot of sand. Lots and lots and lots of it, with quite big dunes. This gave us the opportunity to try out some sandboarding. I thought it'd be similar to snowboarding but I was wrong. First of all, there are no lifts so unless you've splashed out on a beach buggy (we hadn't) you have to walk up a sand dune. Second, whereas snowboards just glide across the snow and ice with speed, the sandy variety needs a lot more persuation to get it going. I managed to do a couple of turns but it's just so slow. I think you have to have a very steep dune to get any momentum going. On the other hand, if you get bored, you can just sit on the board, point it downhill and then you can get a bit of speed up.

After the boarding I was covered in sand. My trainers were so full of sand it hurt my feet (honestly), all my clothes were covered in sand and my face, neck, arms, legs, in fact every part of my body was sandy. I think the earlier, liberal application of suncream also aided the adhesion. It's still all over me as I type this a few hours later. Can't wait for the shower.

After the sandboarding we visited a couple of vinyards and went wine tasting. First was the place that has won first place several times for it's Pisco wine / brandy. Tried several types from the famous Pisco Sour to the eye watering straight Pisco (over 40%). Bought a bottle of the Pisco Sour as that's yummy. Skipped the normal Pisco, think I'll stick to palinka. Mmmmmm..... palinka..... it's goooood. Another vinyard offered up some good wines. Very very sweet but that's what they go for around here, including one that was so strangely sweet that it tasted like bubble gum (or similar to the fantastic Inca Kola that they sell here).

After the tour we got ourselves onto a cheap bus to Pisco the town. Journey was okay as it was only about an hour and we had made sure to get the bus that actually goes into town and doesn't leave it's passengers 5km away on the outskirts (as most of the others do). On the bus we got to see lots and lots of desert. People were getting on and off but there was hardly anything for them to go to. They seemed to either live in a very basic hut or they just walked off across the desert to some faraway destination.

Getting off the bus in Pisco we were "pirana'd" by a load of people offering accomodation. It's the most aggresive it's been on the trip but it wasn't too bad. They were more into dissing their competitors and making fun than being nasty to us. However, they were very persistent and followed us around everywhere until finally found a place. Staying in Pisco Hostel which is on the main square. They absolutely promise us that there's hot water. Which is what everyone else does but we've been let down the last few times (last place didn't have it either) and tonight I really do need a good shower.

Tomorrow (Monday) we've got a day tour booked to get to the coast, get out on a boat and see lots of wildlife on the nearby Ballestas Island then go round the nearby peninsula (the name escapes me). Then we'll be off to our last stop at Lima. It's almost over.

Note: While logging into the great LogMeIn site, the browser offered me an email address it rememebered. So someone before me must be a user. A good feeling.

Updated with photos (29-Nov-2005) - Click for pics

The oasis

Sandboarding on the way down.

Sandboarding on the way up.

My trainers collected so much sand it hurt.

Wine tasting very sweet wines.

Pavement National Park Pizzas

2005-11-13T00:34:00.000+01:00

We thought we had a steal of a deal on the bus to Arequipa. Ticking all the right boxes of heating, toilet, tv etc. But of course they lied to us. There was a toilet but it was disgusting and the door didn´t shut. There was a tv but the ancient video player didn´t work so there was no point. The heating was non-existant. It was also meant to be a direct-ish bus, stopping only at Juliaca on the way but instead, as soon as it had left the station it picked up every single person it could until the aisles were crammed. Oh, and the rain leaked in through the roof. Lovely. Won´t be taking Ciba again.

Arequipa the town made up for the bus journey. We stayed in "Colonial House Hostel" just a few blocks off the main square and it was fantastic. Huge rooms, roof terrace for breakfast, great staff. Booked the Colca Canyon tour through them as well.

At this point I have to point out that although the roof terrace was great, and in fact the breakfast tasted great too, the breakfast was ultimately bad. After our early start for the two day tour of the canyon (staying the night in the nearby town of Chivay) I was very very ill. The breakfast came back up at a nice viewpoint (to quote, "Don´t be sick here, it´s a national park") and then anything I tried to eat or drink came back with a big rejected note about 10 minutes later. To add insult to injury, while I was vomiting up my mate de coca tea at lunchtime, I saw something big drop into the toilet. I had my hands holding the stuff in my shirt pocket so I thought it was something I had eaten before but upon flushing it turned out to be the sunglasses that were hooked onto my t-shirt underneath. Bummer. Ignoring the fact that the person before me had spent about 20 mins on the bog and that I had just sicked up a litre of mate de bile I reached in and rescued the specs, washed them in soap a couple of times, then again in some pocket disinfectant (kills 99% of germs in 15 seconds apparently). Somehow though, I just didn´t feel the need to wear them again.

After learning not to eat or drink anything and make sure I sit down at every available moment the tour wasn´t too bad. The canyon is just absolutely massive. In fact they say it´s the biggest in the world. We didn´t have great luck with the condors as we just saw one huge condor gliding just above the heads of the people at the other lookout. We saw a couple of others but they were high (in the air, not drugs).

With the tour finished we headed back to Arequipa, stayed for a couple of hours before setting off again to Nasca. This time we had learnt our lesson and booked a decent bus with a decent bus company Cruz del Sur. The difference was astounding. You didn´t even have to go to a platform, they had their own waiting room. You get drinks and food on the bus, a decent film, great service etc. So cossetting.

We arrived at Nasca around 5am on Friday. By 6am we had a room and a flight touring the Nasca lines booked. By 8am we were at the airport waiting to fly. Organization is happiness. Before going up in the plane we got to watch a video about all the different theories on the Nasca lines (there´s loads of very very big, very very straight lines, plus there´s several interesting shapes of a spider, monkey, hummingbird, whale, "astronaut" etc). After a bit of a wait while the different tour companies jostled for their flying windows we finally got to go up in a very tiny plane. It seated 6 including the pilot. That meant I got to be co-pilot, honestly. I didn´t have a joystick in front of me and I had to be careful I didn´t knock any of the other buttons and switched, but I was sitting right next to the main man as he shouted out the names of the different shapes we were flying over. The lines and shapes are great, though they were hard to photograph and I´m not sure how the pictures will turn out.

After flying over the lines I had my first food for more than 2 days. A great breakfast at the hostel´s roof terrace (another hostel, another roof terrace) but it turned out not to be a great idea. Still have a dodgy tummy even now and have to watch what I eat. No projectile vomiting or anything like that, just felt bad.

Oh, on the same day we did a tour around the area looking at a couple of museums, how they processed gold and some ancient aquaducts for irrigation. As I wrote that I could feel myself dropping off. I know it sounds boring but it was really very good, when the ex-miner showing his rocks got out his guitar and started singing Beatles hits, I was won over.

Bought a new pair of sunglasses to replace the toilety ones. Twice. First pair was great, huge buggy things that I really liked. Unfortunately a few minutes after walking out of the shop I realised they weren´t good as they really did have a fishbowl effect, warping the pavement in front of me and making me unsure of my steps. Shame. Went back to the shop and exchanged them for another pair of Oakey rip-offs (only 25 soles / $7). More flashy than buggy these ones.

The original plan was to go to Pisco next but after umming and ahhing for a bit we decided on stopping at Ica on the way. We were also planning on going by bus but a taxi driver suggested that it would be quicker to go by shared car. Well, it was an experience. A huge, old, American Dodge something-or-other driven by some old codger. We were the first to come forward for the car so we had to wait a bit for it to fill up with other people. And fill up it did. The bench seat in the front held the driver plus two passengers, then the rear bench seat held me, Eva, a silent guy and some guy that couldn´t stop talking, drumming his fingers or singing along to the great Cuban tunes that the driver had a huge stock of (have to get some Daniel Santos tracks). With Eva squashed on my lap and the guy talking about Puskas, Inca Cola and everything else, we blasted our way down the straight road to Ica.

One advantage of getting a car to Ica is that it didn´t just drop us off at the bus station but instead drove us around until we found a hostel to stay at. The first attempt at a room was a failure with the rooms not in good condition. It looks like we´re sleeping at the Siesta hotel. Sounds good, but I´m not sure what it´ll be like as when we checked in there wasn´t any electricity. But if there is electricity later, then there should be hot water. Which is nice.

Some quick words about Ica. I don´t know anything about Ica, I just knew that we were already on our way towards Lima but don´t want to spend too much time there so want to break up the journey somehow. There is a splendid looking oasis nearby with the possibility of sandboarding, plus some vineyards, so it sounded good. We´ve got a short tour booked for tomorrow to visit the above. However, there´s something strange about this town. It´s in our Footprint guidebook but it´s not mentioned anywhere in my Lonely Planet. I don´t think it´s in most of the other books either as there are hardly any other tourists here. After walking about we spotted two sets of tourists (5 people in total). Everyone looks at us as we´re quite different. A new feeling. Another thing. I think this is maybe the first "unsafe" place we´ve been too. In the hotel and the tour office, they advised us to stay off certain streets. No problem, that´s the case in most places, but in Ica, it´s restricted us to just a few blocks. A bit unnerving. Well, we´ll have an early dinner (if I can eat it) and then scuttle away to our room. If there are no more posts on The Hungary Years after this, then I´m probably lying in some Peruvian gutter.

Or maybe I just can´t get to an internet cafe.

Updated with photos (29-Nov-2005) - Click for pics

The view from the roof terrace at breakfast.

Baby Alpacas are so incredibly cute. They also have impossibly tiny mouths that have trouble eating a section of mandarin.

Where there are tourists, there's someone to sell them something.

Huge condor. Shame we were standing at the wrong viewpoint.

Cocla Canyon. Deepest in the world apparently.

Yep, it's real, not a statue.

Not putting up the whole Nasca lines picture set as it needs someone at the screen to point out the shapes. But here's a clear one of the hummingbird.

Our mean machine ride

A distinct lack of any speedometer in the dash, but it's better with a selection of cool Cuban music.

2005-11-07T00:02:00.000+01:00

Okay, so you´ve got some pictures in the previous post below, now here´s an update on what we´ve been up to in the last few days.

That hotel lied when they had hot water. There was none for that day as there were "technical problems". It was meant to come back at 5am but finally some warm water spurted out of the tap around 5.45am. Just in time for us to have a shower before heading out on the boat to the floating reed islands.

The islands were strange. Very squishy but sure enough, they float and are solid enough for people to be living there permanently. There were quite a few of them about each providing homes for a few families each.

After the floating islands, we got into the boat and headed off across Titicaca Lake to Taquile island. The island is way out and took about 3 or 4 hours to reach. Quite tiny too but has people living there in the remoteness, all wearing traditional clothes. Also interesting is that although it´s all rocky hills, they don´t use donkeys to carry stuff up, instead they just rely on themselves and do the backbreaking work themselves. So, all the people there are really fit or really crippled.

On the boat trip we hooked up again with some new people. An odd couple from New Zealand and Italy, plus an Argentine photo-maniac woman travelling with her mother. We seemed to get on well and so organised our trip to Machu Picchu together. It was a mixture of transport including bus, taxi, train and foot.

First we got the night bus from Puno to Cusco which apparently is not the thing to do as the chances of getting robbed are quite high. The guy that booked the bus for us was a bit of a character too. He promised us that there was heating, toilet etc (there wasn´t), he also said that after stopping at one town (where we would have to watch out for our luggage), the bus would go non-stop to Cusco. However, the bus stopped very frequently to let people on and off as they chose. Dodgy people would hang around the bus and people would hop on and off trying to ~~steal~~ sell stuff. I got about an hour´s worth of sleep.

Once we got to Cusco, the plan was to get another bus further up the road towards Machu Picchu, but the bus didn´t stop in the bus terminal, it was somewhere else. But as there were now six of us, we had bargining power with taxis. So we crammed ourselves and our luggage into a taxi (4 people in the back, 2 in the front passenger seat) and went to the bus station. There we found that the bus wouldn´t leave for a while and we could get there cheaper and faster by taxi. There was a bit of a discussion between our taxi driver and the bus driver as they competed for our fare but the taxi won in the end. We strapped the luggage onto the roof and the two of us had to sit in the "estate" part of the car looking backwards. It wasn´t too bad and on the road we saw quite a few other people in taxis doing the same thing.

Once we got to Ollayatambo, we were knackered. The taxi driver suggested we rent a room just for the day so we could dump our luggage. It turned out to be a great idea. It allowed us all to relax, have a shower and gave us a base while we organised the train tickets to Agua Caliente (the town just before Machu Picchu).

Getting the train tickets up the hill was an experience in itself as the queue is long, there´s only one window and there´s no information about anything anywhere. After snaring a guide from another group, we got the details we needed and managed to pay for our tickets (they refused some of the dollar bills as they were slightly worn). We took the cheaper night train up at 8pm and then came back down again 2 days later on the cheaper early morning train at 5.45am.

The train journey was quite nice, though it was too dark to see anything and I slept for most of the way as I was so tired. At the other end in Agua Caliente we were beseiged by an army of hostal touts. We just started walking and waited for the prices to go down. The place we stayed at started the offer at 20 dollars but gradually went down to 40 soles (about 12 dollars). We took him up on his offer and ended up in a smart hotel but it was still unfinished! No matter, there were good beds, big rooms, hot showers etc. It didn´t bother us too much that there were no chairs, cupboards, hooks or anything to hang our stuff on, nor was there any mirror anywhere and when it rained the next day, water pooled in next to the bed. Oh well.

So we got to the hotel just after 10pm after very little sleep and the plan was to get up around 4.30am, have a quick breakfast, buy tickets to Machu Picchu and then walk up the short path to the top.

I was so sleepy, but we managed to get up and out of the hotel, get the tickets and set off on the path. The path was very steep but the views were great. It was quite a bit of work to get up there but we managed it in just under an hour and got there before the crowds arrived.

Once up there, we took a walk to the Sun Gate, which is were most of the people doing the 3 or 4 day trek arrive. It was a bit of a walk up to that point but you´re rewarded with an absolutely amazing view back down to the main site. We also met quite a tame hawk who had cottened on to the fact that trekkers carry food and he wanted some.

We wandered around the impressive site for the rest of the day. We did´t have a guide but we caught snippets of information when we could. The site is pretty big but it´s easy to walk around and it´s fascinating to be there and think of all the things that went on there at that time while now there are llamas grazing in the main square.

Had a bit of a snooze around midday to avoid the sun and ended up leaving the site around 5-ish. Walking down the same path from the morning to get to the bottom of the hill.

While walking down we heard a great thunderstorm over one of the other hills, and just as we were getting into town it hit us hard. It completely drenched us and rained so hard that all the drains and gutters were overflowing. We stopped at a shop for some shelter and also helped them get all theirs goods inside out of the rain.

With it still pouring down with rain we ate in the unfinished hotel and got an early night as it was another 4.30am start to catch the first train back the next day. The train back was good as it was now light and we could take a look at all the scenery. Again, getting off the train we were mobbed by taxi drivers trying to get our business, but this time we took a small bus back to Cusco. The bus driver drove like mad and we got into town after about an hour (instead of the two hours it´s meant to take).

We tried a few places to stay and ended up in an okay-ish place. The Argentines have gone off to La Paz and onwards while the NZ/Italy couple are still with us (though in different hostals). We´ll stay in Cusco for the next couple of days. After a bit of a look around this afternoon, it seems to be a very nice place. Had a great second breakfast of steak, rice and chips (yep, that was a breakfast) for just 4 soles (just over a dollar). Walked up the hill to a viewpoint of the city and also took a peek in one of the big churches. A good looking town with a good friendly atmosphere.

After recuperating here, we´ll head on to Colca Canyon to see condors (oh, and the canyon that´s twice as deep as the "Grand" Canyon). Haven´t bought the bus tickets yet, but hopefully we can do that tomorrow (Monday) for leaving on Tuesday.

On a side note, here´s one for someone I know back in Bp. We spotted a motorbike in Cusco with English plates and a whole lot of luggage storage (and maybe a modified / enlarged fuel tank). Met the rider and his lady and it turns out that they shipped the bike from England to Canada and are riding it all the way down to Ushuaia at the bottom of Argentina. Impressive.

Updated with photos (29-Nov-2005) - Click for pics

Before you start the climb, you have to get to the path.

Stunning views as you climb up the hill.

The classic Machu Picchu shot.

Taking a look out from the Sun Gate.

Our tame hawk that begged for food.

Careful of the Llamas, they're big and the paths are not.

Another angle.

Caught in the rain on the way home.

Creepy Crawlies

2005-11-06T23:38:00.000+01:00

This is the creepy crawly special edition of ~~The Hungary Years~~ Timbos Travels in South America. We´re in Peru now on the last leg of our journey but the CD of photos is always a few days or weeks behind. Here´s a selection of pics from the pampas trip in Bolivia.

Not so creepy, but very crawly. What they lack in creepiness these caterpillars make up for in numbers. There were loads of them all clumped together on the side of a tree in the jungle.

Definitely creepy, definitely crawly. The tarantula lives peacefully in it´s tree until some jungle guide taunts it with a stick and gets it angry and chasing around after it´s egg sack.

Went pirana fishing with little lumps of meat. These critters nibble it clean off the hook in seconds, though this one wasn´t so lucky. It ended up on the dinner table. I swam with these fish as well though they were kept at bay by the friendly pink dolphins (who eat them).

Coming to getcha... Loads of alligators in the pampas. Sunning themselves by day and feeding at dusk. You see them sitting on the banks most of the time but then when taking the boat at night their eyes reflect / glow red in the torch light. Quite offputting.

Anaconda! Apparently quite hard to find but our guide tracked one down. Took a few hours of wading through swamps and fields and wondering whether the welly boots would hold out (they didn´t). This one was about 2 metres long which was a decent size considering they only make it to about 3 or 4 metres in these parts.

That shoe (mine) is a size 42 (or 8.5) and that huge cockroach sitting next to it is about half that size. It´s big. Found not on a jungle or pampas tour, but in the great Mosquito bar in Rurrenebaque. Wouldn´t want that in my sleeping bag.

No creepy crawly here, just showing the effects of a nasty mosquito bite. Couldn´t find the bite itself but my hand swelled up nice and good. Here you can see my left hand (on the right) doesn´t show any veins or tendons or proper knuckles as the flesh has plumped up to hide them.

Bolivia to Peru Huu Huu

2005-11-03T00:15:00.000+01:00

Copacabana started off on a bad foot after ripping us off for one of the worst pizzas ever (cost 30 Bolivianos). But it got better when we went to Sun Island and trekked across it for half a day. Very tiring but absolutely amazing scenery.

At the end of it we bumped into our first Hungarian traveller. He seems to have the perfect lifestyle whereby he´s built up his business in such a way that he only needs to be back in Hungary for about a month or so each year. The rest of the year, he´s travelling about and keeping in touch by just phone and internet.

Copacabana then redeemed itself by offering us a slap up feed of a dinner for just 10 Bolivianos (about $1.25). Excellent trout straight from the lake.

The next day we met up with our Magyar mate and climbed up the big hill in town to look down on everything. Again very tiring but rewarding.

Oh a quick note. It´s a holiday here and everyone´s flying kites over graveyards (and in the streets). Apparently the kites get closer to heaven so you´re closer to the dead people you´re remembering on All Saints Day.

After the climb and a drink at the beach we got on a bus and made our way to Puno in Peru. The bus actually stops in Bolivia, you have to get out, get your passport checked by both Bolivia and Peru authorities and then walk across the border to get back on the bus.

Poor bus didn´t really make it. Just as we were getting into town it started complaining and then broke down. After a lot of mucking around the driver managed to persuade it to hobble it´s way into Puno and then everyone had to get off and change. Except us of course as it was our last stop.

Checked into a hotel but it´s not too great as they only have hot water for a couple of hours in the evening and morning. Have to plan carefully.

We should be off to see floating man-made islands tomorrow (Thursday) then take a night bus to Cusco (or Cuzco) and organise a trip to Machu Pichu (though I don´t think it´s going to be the famous big trek).

More later (plus hopefully pictures).

Updated with photos (29-Nov-2005) - Click for pics

Colourful Copacabana with the huge hill that we climbed.

The sunsets were like nothing I'd ever seen before.

The view was free, just like the room it was viewed from.

Sun island was fantastic, but it was quite a trek.

Beautiful scenery

Crossing the border from Bolivia to Peru

Unboliviable

2005-11-03T00:00:00.000+01:00

A quick update to that extreme biking day from which I think I´m just about recovered (hands, back and bum hurt like hell) and my clothes have finally dried out.

Can´t show any pics of it yet (even forgot the cd with the older pics on it), but I can direct you to the site of the company that we went with.

Xtreme Downhill
Click on "The Death Road" box then you can click through pictures from the different stages on the right.

The crazy thing about the road is that although there´s about enough room to ride a bike and there are massive drops, poor road conditions, poor visibility with blind corners etc, it´s still used by huge trucks going both ways. When two trucks meet, one has to reverse up to a passing place, normally round a sharp bend. Really is insane.

The conditions we had were terrible, with lots of cloud (that you ride through, not under) and lots of rain which apart from getting you wet from the sky, flooded the rivers that run across the road (yes, there are 2 rivers that you have to cycle through and the water goes way above your ankle) and increased the waterfalls that you have to go through too.

The road is also quite rough in places. From our group we killed or maimed three bikes. One got a puncture (no problem), another had his back brakes fail (one of the guides took that one and rode it down without back brakes!), then I managed to shear a part of my gears of my back wheel (a bit of metal that feeds the chain onto the read gears) which would have meant the end but we had a spare bike so I took that.

A tough day that left me practically crippled the next day with a bad back but it was well worth it. Highly recommended but I don´t think I´ll be taking up mountain biking back home.

Updated with photos (29-Nov-2005) - Click for pics

The good road

The bad road (with the rain setting in)

Waterfalls across the road

You're already wet, so it doesn't matter. In fact, it's pretty, and pretty good.

Just don't forget to slow down for the sharp right-hander. That drop is real, and it's several hundred metres.

Lunch at a memorial for an Israeli girl that died while biking not so long ago.

If you look closely, you can see one of the buses that didn't make it.

A guide waits for the others to catch up.

The road is rough, and it's not exactly wide either.

Most accidents happen when two lorries meet and one has to backup to a passing place. Then it falls off when it goes round the corner.

My derailleur gets derailed straight off the bike (and takes some spokes with it).

Road or river, it's all the same here. Don't forget this is used by loads of lorries all the time.

Two toucans at the hotel at the end of the road.

Two parrots

Timbo in Bolivia

2005-11-01T00:53:00.000+01:00

We had a great time down at Uyuni. Met up with some good people on our tour (all squeezing into the same 4x4). We went down to Uyuni in a nice comfortable bus with food, tv, toilet etc. Then met the other people going on the trip, then headed off for 4 days (though everyone else just did 3 days as they crossed over into Chile).

We saw the biggest salt lake/flat in the world, amazing lakes of all different colours (red, green, blue), pink flamingos feeding, gysers letting off steam (and smells), huges swathes of weird rock in the middle of nowhere. All very good.

Had a bit of trouble getting back to La Paz as our tour operator had booked us onto the normal public bus instead of the nice luxury one. We had a bit of a ruck with them but by the time it was sorted out, there was no room on the good bus so we had no choice. So for the 12 hour bus journey back there was no food, no toilet, no tv, no heating (it gets very very cold) and very little space. When we stopped for our first toilet break, Eva was still outside (in the pitch black night) when the bus started heading off without her. I had to shout and protest for the bus to stop. Even after they understood me, they were still driving along asking how many people were missing. After that we kept our toilet breaks very short and close to the bus.

After having a word with our contact in La Paz, they compensated us with a free night in a partner hotel in Copacabana (the original one in Bolivia, next to Lake Titikaka). That`s where I`m writing this from.

Just saw one of the most fantastic sunsets from the lake shore. We`re off to the Island of the Sun tomorrow which is meant to be the birthplace of the Incas. Just there for the day and wandering about.

Oh here`s the extreme bit...

On our spare day in La Paz we mountain biked down the world`s most dangerous road (official). It was a tough day with about 75km of road, which sounds a lot but it 99% downhill. It started off with a nice bit of sweeping asphalt road, winding through the mountains above the clouds, looking down into the valleys. Didn`t feel dangerous at all.

Then we got to the end of the nice road and turned off onto the gravelly, rocky, muddy non-road which is the real dangerous bit. Biking it was a scary but going back up it in the minibus in the dark and through clouds was worse. Hopefully have some good pictures of it that I`ll post.

ARghhh.,..... out of time. Got to go. Maybe more later but this net stuff is expensive here.

Updated with photos (29-Nov-2005) - Click for pics

Train graveyard just outside of Uyuni

Nothing but salt, salt and more salt. Finer than the Salta salt though.

The layer of salt is quite thick but in some places air and water bubble up to the top.

An island of cactus plants in a dry sea of salt.

Weird caves

Weird graves

Follow that car!

Follow that train!

Flamingos in the pink

Desert fox

Can you spot the Viscacha?

Tree of stone

The dawn of the geysers

A rock garden

Donkey farmers

They speak Spanish in Bolivia, right?

2005-10-25T00:44:00.000+02:00

Two posts in one day, you lucky lucky people. And it includes a piccie too (though not a proper travelling pic, just a screenshot).

Just to give you an idea of some of the weirdness that affects internet cafes and general life here. Here´s a screen grab of the blogger comments screen that I got when trying to reply to a comment a few minutes ago.

Spanish is the official language of Bolivia but there´s several indigenous languages that are very common. You see them on shop signs etc, looking like Arabic of Hebrew. The guy using the computer before me must have preferred one of these languages and changed the setting. Of course, I´m not sure what to click to get it back to Spanish. Oh well.

Rumble in the Jungle

2005-10-24T23:39:00.000+02:00

We did manage to get to Rurrenabaque and it was a pretty intense few days. Just got back from there this afternoon (Monday). The place is fantastic. A very small town kitted out mainly for tourism now with plenty of places to stay, eat, drink and book tours.

Okay, let´s start at the beginning. The flight out went okay. A very small plane with space for just 12 passengers. Eva and I sat at the front with the pilot and co-pilot immediately in front of us. The co-pilot had to move his bags from behind his seat so I could sit down. It´s great sitting there as you can watch them go through their checklist and look at all the instruments as you go along. No procedures for what to do if the cabin pressure drops as it´s not pressurized. The pilot gets to have a small oxygen mask that he wears all the time and that´s it. Mind you, if anyone get´s an oxygen mask I prefer it to be the person who´s going to fly and land the plane.

Rurrenabaque is only an hour away by plane but 21 hours by bus. We flew over some amazing mountains completely covered in trees / foliage / jungle and then landed at the most basic airport I´ve ever seen or can imagine. The runway was a long field of grass and the building was just a couple of rooms. They dump your luggage on the grass and you get to pick it up yourself. There were toilets but, hmmm.... number 1s only I think. Oh, and of course there´s a few cows wandering around outside as well just to give the full rustic atmosphere. No taxis to town, just a minibus that runs when a flight arrives.

Got into town and went straight to Hotel Beni (it´s by the Beni river) as it was recommended in our books but it turned out to be a mistake. The room was a bit crappy but we´ve stayed in worse and it was for one night only (was going on tour next day). I think I got about an hour´s sleep between going to bed at 10pm and getting up around 6am. Because it´s so hot and humid there, there are no windows in the window frame, just mosquito nets. You hear everything, from the guy snoring loudly next door, to the bloke that´s fallen asleep and left his tv on full blast, to the karaoke bar down the street, to Eva waking me up to tell me there´s a huge cockroach in the bathroom (ooh, more on cockroaches later).

After we had checked in to Hotel Beni, we went to a couple of tour agencies to book a 3 day tour into the Pampas. It was $25 per day per person, not the cheapest one but they seemed professional and better than the one that didn´t have any showers or electricity. Actually, where we went just had a generator that they switched on in the evening for a few hours, but it was enough.

The Pampas tour starts off with quite a journey to get you into the thick of things. A 3 hour drive by jeep across terrible roads followed by another 3 hours in a small narrow boat (with the most incredibly uncomfortable wooden bench seats you have ever known). Our jeep was driven by a man that looked incredibly like Vicky Pollard / Matt Lucas (?), but he was great at spotting things on the road and managed to show us an anteater wandering about. We stopped for lunch at some roadside restaurant which had cats, dogs and chickens scratching around the tables.

By the time we got to the boats we had made friends with the other 3 guys in our jeep and then teamed up with 4 girls that made up the rest of our group. We all got into the boat and set off for a journey that would leave us amazed at the scenery and wildlife, and amazed at how much our bottoms could hurt.

The wildlife is the key thing for the Pampas trip and we weren´t disappointed. Even before getting into the boat we saw an alligator (or croc, I can never remember which one´s which) on the other bank of the river. There were loads of alligators, caymans, capibaras, birds of paradise, etc. Loads of weird birds. A small tribe of tiny monkeys and howler monkeys (they really have the most horrible howl that sounds like some sort of dinasour that freaks you out in the middle of the night when you don´t know what it is).

We had a great guide called Louis who took us everywhere and amused us with his guitar renditions of Hey Jude and showing us how to see the poison from the huge wasps buzzing around our common area. The main activities included erm... going down river a bit to get a beer and watch the sunset, star gazing, alligator eye hunting (shine a torch in the night and their eyes reflect bright red), treking to find anacondas (found a 2 metre one after much squelching around through stinky swamps and fields), pirhana fishing (caught one but it was too small and I threw it back), eating the big pirhanas, swimming with pink dolphins (the river is full of aligators and pirhanas but the dolphins eat the pirhanas, so if they´re there, it´s safe to swim). Oh and of course quite a few mosquitos. It was baking hot too so everyone was covered in several layers of mossie repelent and sunblock. Unusually, I got away quite lightly with the bites, though I had a reaction to a bite on my left hand that made my whole hand swell up. A truly great time that the pictures won´t do justice to. You can see the wildlife brilliantly but getting close enough (or getting the boat to be still enough) to take a picture is very difficult.

On getting back from the Pampas we booked into the Hotel Tucan, which although being the same price as Beni, was like a palace. Well, maybe a palace with no glass in the windows, hammocks, breakfast and a roof terrace. Excellent.

After the Pampas we booked a one day tour into the jungle. It´s not a lot and the books say it´s not worth it but we really enjoyed it. Saw a tarantula, lizards, catapillars, loads of butterflies and lots of weird trees that can either heal or kill you with their sap. Drank water from chopped vines, ate the driest meal ever, sweated about 20 litres, swam in a river in my underpants (careful how you read that bit, there was a river, we swam in it, we wore underpants), waited on the beach for the boat back that was 1.5 hours late (though we did go through all the party tricks including the broom handle / long branch around the body thing.

The group gelled together over the past few days and on the last night, those that remained (some went for a 3 day jungle trip) all went out for a meal then drinks at the Mosquito Bar and onto a terrible dive of a club. There was a bit of a kerfuffle in the streets on the way back to the hostel when a group of drunk locals took a shine to the girls but nothing really happened and we all got back safely.

The flight back wasn´t as smooth as the one there but that might have been due to the fact that we were going back up to a high altitude. A few people felt sick including Eva and myself. Seems to be getting better after a few hours now. Oh and coming back to this height also caused some problems with bottles of stuff (soap, shampoo etc) so we had to repack some things before leaving the airport.

Got back to our old hotel, though we´re not staying the night. We´ve confirmed our bus tickets and tour of Uyuni. We leave today at around 9pm, sleep on the bus down there. Trying to figure out what our next step might be. After Uyuni we should be going to Peru but we have to book our entrance tickets to Macchu Picchu and we´re a bit worried they might be sold out. Also wondering if we should come back through La Paz or make our way there by some other route. But right now, I need lots of sleep. Hopefully it will be a comfy bus and good roads.

So out of contact again for another few days probably.

-- Oh, I almost forgot to add the extra bit about cockroaches. I´m sure you´ve seen films where the someone gets into a rustic South American town and there are dogs and chickens running about on the streets, the bars look filthy and the glasses and cutlery are dirty, but the town is some pioneer stop so has lots of people passing through etc. That stereotype town is Rurrenabaque, all set against a backdrop of amazing green mountains. Back to the cockroach. In the mosquito bar (where all the gringos hang out, drink and play pool) we saw the biggest cockroach ever. Slightly different and slower than the roaches back home but at 15cm long, I was very impressed. Got a picture of it so I can prove I´m not exageratting.

Updated with photos (29-Nov-2005) - Click for pics

There's already been a post with creepy crawlies so go there if you want wildlife pics. Below are some general ones from the Rurrenabaque trip.

The plane

Space is a bit tight inside

The airport at Rurrenabaque isn't that big either

An anteater makes it's getaway

Basic boats get you closer to the action, and the water

Ours was just one of 3 broken down vehicles. The roads are that bad (if you can call them roads).

The tree that says, "don't eat me".

Making Plans For Nigel Timbo (II)

2005-10-19T16:45:00.000+02:00

Did I say it was hard to make plans in Bolivia already?

Didn´t get to Rurrenabaque yesterday. Turns out that the airstrip at R can´t handle bad weather like rain. Beautiful day in La Paz yesterdsay, but rain in R, so no flights. When we got to the airport we met people who had had their flights from the day before cancelled and had been waiting in the airport since 5.45am that day. They were ganging together to try to charter plane to a another town nearby R and then take the bus from there. The plane would only take 10 people so we couldn´t join them.

We waited around a little bit until it was sure there were no flights that day and then took a taxi back into town. Now here comes another Bolivian experience.

Turns out that there´s a bit of a gas problem going on at the moment. Bolivia supplies gas to several different countries (Argentina, Chile, Peru) and there have been protests about the supply to these countries and the supply to the domestic market. Basically, Bolivians can´t get the gas they need. If I read the news right, there was a protest a few days ago and the supply was frozen completely, the police were sent in to break up the blockade, some people were killed but the supplies were restored. Now enough with the background ...

Yesterday there were more protests about the lack of gas and on the way to the airport we could see tens (if not hundreds) of people queueing in the road with small gas canisters (like the ones in standalone gas heaters). But we got to the airport fine. On the way back the blockades started. The 3 lane road back into town was blocked where we wanted to go so the driver just swung into the oncoming lanes and drove that way (bit scarey driving the wrong way down a motorway). Then it became obvious that the normal road into town was blocked so we took some side streets. Of course, not really paying attention to which direction the one way streets were meant to be going. We got stuck for a few minutes at one place where I thought it was just going to be forever. Then after a couple more streets the taxi driver announced that there was no way to get to the hotel. He dropped us off and we walked about 4 blocks to our place (carrying full packs, going up hill at this altitude was a bit tiring).

We will try to leave again today. Calling up the airline to see if planes are flying. If not then we might go for another option that was offered to us this morning. Go by jeep (plus driver) straight to R. 12 hour drive instead of a 1 hour flight but it will at least get us there and give us some time to do a tour there. We´re already out of time to do a jungle tour, but we can still do a tour of the Pampas where the wildlife is meant to be fantastic.

Bolivia. A totally different world.

Making Plans For Nigel Timbo

2005-10-18T00:52:00.000+02:00

When they say it´s hard to make plans in Bolivia, it´s true.

Turns out we´re not going to Uyuni today, nor tomorrow. After trying to sort out buses (either fully booked or running from different towns for no apparent reason) and trains (blocked because of strikes in one of the towns), we gave up and delayed that trip for another week when the bus should be running properly.

This means we´ve switched our schedules and will travel to Rurrenabaque tomorrow. Of course that wasn´t too easy to plan either as the plane we wanted to take only flew on Mondays, Thursdays and Saturdays. The other airline company that flies there was booked, but it turns out that they had two spare seats on a later flight tomorrow so we grabbed them straight away (lucky too as when we said yes, another group was trying to get on that plane).

So now we fly on Tuesday afternoon to Rurrenabaque in a little 12-seater plane and then once we get there we´ll have to sort out some accomodation and a 4 day tour through the Pampas to see lots of wildlife. Maybe a jungle trip as well but there might not be that much time for it and they say that 1 day trips into the jungle just aren´t worth it. We´ll sort it out when we get there.

...

Another interesting thing for today. It turns out that today is the 2nd anniversary of the change of government. Let´s just say that the old government didn´t go too quietly and over 50 people were killed in the demonstrations. Our hotel is just off the main square and when got out this morning and turned the corner we noticed a definite increase in the number of police. Turned another corner and the roads were blocked with riot police in full gear (a couple seemed to be discussing how to get the most out of shotguns and teargas canisters).

Further down the road the people came, marching and chanting with huge banners to comemorate the people that died. There were lots of load (hopefully) firecrackers and the police were definitely on there toes (and the fierce police dogs were also jumpy).

The marchers were blocked from entering the main square where the presidential palace and parliment are. Instead they were re-routed down to the big main streets. Apart from the firecrackers it was all fairly peaceful, but it was an experience to witness. Also an experience to squeeze between the police and duck under one of the road blocks to get to the other side (it was the only way to get out in that direction).

...

Walked up to one of the lookout points in the city. It has the great name of "Killi Killi". Walking uphill is still a bit of a breathless experience but walking down again is like walking on air. Great views from the top. You can see the whole city crammed into the valley, sprawling from the depths and right up to the side of the mountains in a kalaidoscope of colours. Oh, and throw in a snow-capped mountain to top it all off. Looks great, and the air was clean up there too.

Got back down from the hill to take some money out and found that I´m already over my daily limit. Which it shouldn´t be, but maybe there are different rules for Bolivia. I wouldn´t be surprised.

All in all, La Paz is growing on me. Maybe it´s because we´ve managed to be more productive today but at the same time, take it easy in coffee shops and walking around. The good night´s sleep might have helped as well. The weather has been, let´s say, changable. It can be freezing cold at night, but nice and warm during the day. When we got out this morning, it was a lovely sunny day but in the afternoon it was pouring with rain, now in the evening it´s good again.

Right, off to get some food. Stomach can´t handle a lot of food nowadays. The glory steak days of Argentina are over. Now it´s simple sandwiches and maybe a muffin too.

Updated with photos (29-Nov-2005) - Click for pics

Police van

Stepped up police presence for the demonstrations

View from the Killi Killi lookout point

Breathless in Bolivia

2005-10-16T20:13:00.000+02:00

We´re now in La Paz, Bolivia and boy is it different. First of all let me get some boring travel details out the way.

We had a flight booked (back in Hungary) for Salta to La Paz, which sounds sensible enough. However, the route was bad. It was actually 2 flights; Salta to Santa Cruz and then Santa Cruz to La Paz. The first flight went via Cordoba (Argentina). This is like flying from Budapest to London via St. Petersburg. It was way out of the way. Oh well, we got here in the end.

We knew we were arriving late and weren´t sure how we´d get on in Bolivia so we booked a room ahead of time and then got a taxi straight from the airport.

Now, I´m just going to write this down as it comes into my head so I apologise if it´s a bit garbled.

The connection in Santa Cruz wasn´t that bad. We weren´t that sure what was happening to our bags but it did give us a chance to get some money out. Turns out our bags were having a good old time romping around in the mud. When we got them, they were absolutely filthy, and of course they made us filthy when we put them on our backs. Never mind.

Taking money out is a bit odd as it seems to be common knowledge that it´s hard to pay for stuff with a Bs100 note, but the cash machines only give multiples of 50 so you´re going to have loads of them no matter what you try to do. 1 USD is about 8 Bolivianos.

Before we got to La Paz we repacked our bags with altitude in mind. We´d heard stories of exploding shampoo and the like. So all the bottles of liquids went into the small carry on bags. When I checked them upon landing, they did indeed make a farty protest noise at being so bloated.

La Paz is apparently the highest capital city in the world. The airport is above it at over 4,000m is the highest commercial airport in the world. Carrying your bags out is a breathless experience. We got a taxi down the side of the hill to the town which is at a smidgen over 3,500m.

Almost forgot. When we left Salta the temperature was around 20-something C. When we changed planes at Santa Cruz it was 24C. When we touched down in La Paz it was 6C, and it felt it.

Checked into the hotel which is a bit of a grand term for a basic half-basement room with no heating (oh, yes, it´s cold). But they did have a toilet and shower with hot water (shower only, basin is only cold water). No towels or toilet paper but we´re prepared. Didn´t sleep too well though as it was noisy, freezing cold, I couldn´t breath properly and the pigeons outside our window woke me up around 5am. Oh well, not doing anything today, just taking it easy and getting used to the altitude. Sucking on cocoa leaves and drinking Mate tea seems to help.

We´ve booked a tour of Salar de Uyuni. It´s a 4 day / 3 night trip round great countryside and includes a visit to the largest (and yes, the highest) salt lake in the world. Apparently you drive across white salt with maybe a bit of water on top, making it seem like a true out-of-this-world experience.

Back to where we are right now, La Paz and my first impressions are, big, noisy, dirty, smelly, steep, poor, breathless, tiring, bustling.

The hotel is just off the main square, Plaza Murillo (named after a revolutionary president who was dragged out of his home and hung in the square). The square has got the parliment and presidential buildings on the sides and when we were there this morning they had a great military brass band belting out tunes. Some guy in a white uniform sang a great song and the tune could have just been some Henri Mancinni (?) film classic, it was so cool.

We then walked downhill to the main road which was partly closed due to more celebrations and stalls etc (not sure what they´re celebrating yet). The streets are full of people selling stuff from stalls (part of the celebrations) but then there´s also a load of people trying to sell you all sorts of crap on the streets, some are begging, some offering to clean your shoes. There are lots of the stereotype old bolivian mamas with leathery faces and weird bowler-type hats.

The shoe cleaners are scary. They wear full-face balaclavas (maybe to stop breathing in all the chemicals they use, but not sure). They walk through crowds and they look like really dirty guerilla fighters or something. Tried to get some pictures of the people on the street but they´re not too keen and they don´t look like people I want to cross.

The streets are full of police in full military garb. Not sure if that makes me feel safer or not. I think I´d like to think they weren´t needed. When we were down on the main street we saw one drunk guy get shuffled (manhandled) off the streets to somewhere unknown. We´ve heard that it´s probably best not to deal with the police if you can. Apparently quite corrupt but on the plus side, that means that you can buy them if you get into trouble. Hope we don´t find out if this is true or not.

That´s my brain poured out for now. Maybe another post before we do our 4 day tour, but most likely to be silent until we´re back.

Updated with photos (29-Nov-2005) - Click for pics

Police band in the La Paz main square. Parliment in the background.

Che's pretty big here.

A street seller rats on me, pointing me out to a shoe cleaner.

2005-10-15T16:22:00.000+02:00

Some more pics at last...

Puerto Natales

Torres del Paine National Park

Another one from Torres del Paine

Osorno volcano

Bariloche lakes from the top of the ski lift

Vina del Mar, looking out onto the Pacific.

That´s pretty much the order we´ve been traveling in.

Currently in Salta which is a great place. Yesterday was spent going around in a 4x4 (yes, a real Landrover Discovery this time). Our guide plus another couple went all over the same sort of route as the Train to the Clouds. Saw amazing coloured cliffs, salt lakes, llamas, and of course plenty of clouds.

Salta itself is beautiful with great buildings, churches etc. Also lots of cafes to chill out in. Will take another look around now before heading off to Bolivia this afternoon.

Updated with new photos (29-Nov-2005) - Click for even more pics

Following the train tracks.

Cactus in ruins

Ruins at 4,000m

Salt flats near Salta

Getting the salt for your supper

Driving through the clouds with hairpin bends and almost zero visibility

Multicoloured Mountains

Elephant feet apparently

A steak so big that the camera has trouble focusing on it.

The Pain of Internet Cafes

2005-10-15T01:45:00.000+02:00

The hostel computer can´t behave itself as it is so old that it doesn´t have usb ports. That meant that I couldn´t download the pics from the camera.

Went around the corner to a proper internet cafe and spent about an hour (well, about half an hour then left it with a guy there and came back later) getting the pics off the camera and onto a CD.

Ran out of time to put pics up yesterday so popped in now with the CD to do it. Turns out that there´s only one computer in the whole place with a CD drive and some kid is using it.

I really am trying to get the pics up. It´s just a huge, frustrating pain sometime.

Simmering in Salta

2005-10-13T16:01:00.000+02:00

It´s been a hectic few days or maybe just hours that seem to be like days. We´re now in Salta. It´s hot. We´re back in good weather country and it´s meant to be about 34C today. Dug the shorts back out.

We managed to catch the bus from Osorno to Santiago and traveled through the night (quite comfy and got food plus films as well). Santiago was big and smoggy but worth the visit. Spent one day wandering around town and climbed up a rocky hill right in the middle of it. The next day was spent getting to Valparaiso and Vina del Mar. Beaches on the Pacific Ocean. Great. Got my feet soaking wet again by a rogue wave but still good.

Then flew via Buenos Aires to Salta. The plane from BsAs to Salta was delayed by a couple of hours. Though it gave us some time to phone ahead and reserve a room at a hostel and sort out Eva´s drink problem.

We had a bottle of Picso Sour from Chile. Half full/empty. It was in Eva´s small bag. She plonked it down outside BsAs airport while we waited for the bus and then a few minutes later someone gesticulated that the bag was leaking. Everything was soaked in Pisco Sour. A distinct smell plus a large degree of stickiness. The bag was also ripped inside. We transfered everything to plastic bags and dumped the original.

Dried everything out in the hostel and we´re off to buy a new bag now.

I´ll try to write more about Bariloche, Santiago, Valpairso, Vina del Mar and Salta later. Not much time right now.

Photos, yes I know. I might be able to sort something out later today if the hostel computer behaves itself.

Updated with photos (29-Nov-2005) - Click for pics

Santiago Smog as seen from the Santa Lucia Hill

And here's that hill

A view of Valparaiso's port

There was a huge photo exhibition in Valparaiso celebrating the human body. Here's one example.

Vina del Mar's beaches were nicer. Though I wouldn't want to swim in the water.

Waiting at the airport, a hornet says hello.

Out and About in Osorno

2005-10-10T00:23:00.000+02:00

Osorno isn´t the best place to be out and about in really. Although it´s meant to be a largish town in Chilean Patagonia, there isn´t a lot to do here. Especially at 6.30pm on a Sunday afternoon.

Oh crap, the computer says it´s 7.30pm.

Turns out that the computer is right and we changed our watches for no reason. Maybe there was a daylight saving time while we were in Argentina? That means our bus leaves in an hour and we have to get to it.

Was going to write a nice post but have to dash now. Shame, I was in the middle of downloading pics to the pc and it was a good netcafe too.

Down and out in Bariloche

2005-10-08T00:11:00.000+02:00

Okay, we´re in Bariloche now, or to give it´s full name, San Carlos de Bariloche. Back in Argentina again after 6 hour bus ride. Not bad bus at all really. Had a bit of a wait at customs and the bus had a bit of a wait for me as I really had to "go" at the Chilean side.

Weird thing. When we traveled over the border from Argentina to Chile, the two checkpoints were very close together. The bus literally drove a few metres and we got out again. However, traveling back through the Andes pass, the checkpoints were about 30 mins drive from each other. We were a bit worried that the two checkpoints had been rolled into one and we hadn´t given back the proper papers after leaving the country (you get fined if you don´t have your entry papers to hand back when you leave).

Got into Bariloche at 8.30-ish at a bus terminal just outside of town. Had to figure out how to get the bus into town (not a big problem, just go stand where everyone else is standing). Oh all the information places were shut as well so we couldn´t go there for hostel recommendations.

Got into town and made our way to a hostel that we´d been trying to book over the internet but failed as the pages were dodgy and kept crashing. The hostel turned out to be at the top of a big hill (Bariloche is quite hilly). After clambering up with all our bags we got to the hostel only to be told that there was no space left. The guy gave us somewhere else to try but that was also packed out. The girl at the second place took pity on us and called around a few places but .... they were all full.

Turns out that although we´re a bit out of season, the town is full (and I really do mean full) of school kids in big groups. Loads of teenagers packing out all the hostels and hotels.

We left our bags at the 2nd hostel (we had one hour to get back as the girl would go off duty, oh and it turned out that it wasn´t 8.30, but 9.30 as we´d crossed to another timezone which we forgot about). So with the bags stored, we rushed through the streets trying pretty much every single hostel and hotel. The results were quite depressing as they were either completely full or they were way out of our price range. At one cheap hostel the "nice" man directed us to the place over the road which was about 5 times more expensive. Ridiculous.

We were wondering about going into dorm rooms at one hostel when we tried a tiny hotel on a corner street. It had a double room, with bathroom, tv etc and it was incredibly cheap. 50 pesos (about $17 USD). We took a very quick look at it and although it was a bit shabby we decided it would do so we collected our bags and moved in.

A few minutes after moving in we realised why it was so cheap. It was horrible. The hotel was run by erm, very young people which may or may not have been the reason why the room had obviously not been cleaned since the last person was there. The bed had hairs all over it, the bin next to the toilet was full of used toilet paper, and the bathroom had more mould than I had ever seen outside of a wine cellar. I´m not kidding, it wasn´t just a few spots in a corner, it was full on fur everywhere. They wanted paying per night, but we had no money. In the morning we asked where we could find an ATM (cashpoint for the UK people) and headed off to get cash and find somewhere else. Within about 1.5 hours of searching the streets again going to every single hostel and hotel we found another place. Hotel again (not hostel) and it was a bit more expensive at 65 pesos ($22 USD) but we really needed to get out of that first place.

That Thursday we spent most of the day getting back to normal. Just wandering around the town. Took a quick walk up a hill for a view down onto the town and water. It´s a very beautiful place. Completely geared up for tourists and skiers though.

Some things that Bariloche is famous for.

Sking Apparently some of the best slopes in South America.

Chocolate They make tons of the stuff here and there are chocolate shops on every street selling all sorts of chocolate. Tried some on Thursday. Very good. Just pointed at several different types of small chocolate bars until we were done then they just charge by the kilo (36 pesos / $12 USD per kilo).

Ice cream Haven´t tried this yet as my throat is still a bit sore and it´s freezing cold.

Today (Friday) we got up and took bus 20 to nearby Llao Llao. Well we tried to catch the bus and finally succeeded after about 30 mins and walking a few kilometers. There are only bus stops on one side of the road (not ours) so you´re never sure if you´re meant to wait there or not. Doesn´t really matter in the end as you can just flag one down if you´re in a good spot and the driver sees you in time.

Llao Llao has a spectacularly posh and exclusive hotel. So exclusive, we weren´t allowed near it. We managed to get to the car park, saw some geese on the lawns, saw a hawk or kestrel or something plus some guests learning archery. That was it. Anyway, the real reason we went to Llao Llao was to walk around the peninsula it has jutting out.

We had talked to a tourist info lady the day before who had given us a map and drawn points of interest on it. Turns out that the map was very very bad. We made our way around okay and saw everything we wanted to see but the routes weren´t signposted or marked and the map was just plain wrong.

Views of the lakes were great. The walk to the non-existant tea room wasn´t so fantastic. We did find a restaurant that shut one minute before we got there and wouldn´t let us in. And we also found a house that would make a perfect tea and cakes place right on the lake shore (and next to the bus stop on the way back) but alas it was dedicated to "Clocks and Dolls". I guess they know where the demand is.

Ended up walking a lot. I mean A LOT. Will have to wait till we get back to Bp to find out how much as the map is useless. Got back into town after a crazy bus drive. The driver starts off, with the door open while I´m only half on the bus, then counts change as we tear through sharp bends with oncoming traffic. Our legs were trembling after the walk and being thrown about in the bus so we sought comfort in hot chocolate and cakes.

And now, because we´re back in Argentina, we´re off to eat huge slabs of tender steak.

Yes, I know, no pics. We haven´t been back to the hotel since the walk and I didn´t bring the camera cable with me. Maybe tomorrow.

For someone else´s pics of Bariloche, click below:
Bariloche.com
Bariloche tags on Flickr

Updated with photos (29-Nov-2005) - Click for pics

Giant lakes

Giant steaks

Giant beers

Puerto Varas (III) - Still Here

2005-10-05T18:20:00.000+02:00

Argh, still here. Missed the first bus of the day but managed to book one for later on. Killed time by leaving the luggage at the bus offices (locked up) then went for a walk, then back to the hostel for a cuppa and bit of internet.

For some pics of the region and the place we stayed click below:
www.compassdelsur.cl

Off to get some lunch.

The Best 4x4xfar?

2005-10-05T13:59:00.000+02:00

Here´s one for the 4x4 fans.

An interesting thing I noticed is that in the towns down far south (from El Calafate and down) more and more people modify their cars. I guess it´s a "small town" thing where there´s not a lot for the local youth to do but get their car and spend most of their time in it. When the next big town is about 4 hours drive away, you get to know your car quite well.

There were tons of 4x4s and pickups but also quite a few European-ish cars of hyundais, vws etc and several of these were pimped out with garish colours and huge carbon fibre-style spoilers/wings on the back.

An update to last night. Got down to the bus companies that were still open but were unable to say if there will be space on the buses to Bariloche today. Got to get down there in a few mins to see if it´s possible. Also emailed the hostel were we want to stay but didn´t get a reply. We´ll sort it out when we get there (if we get there today).

For the people at 3am. It looks like the new version of IT Reach is out. Well done. If anyone passes by my PC, please switch it on. You know, just in case I get the urge to check my work email.

Time to dash off again.

Puerto Varas (II) - The Lakes

2005-10-05T01:57:00.000+02:00

We were originaly thinking of taking the scenic route to Bariloche in Argentina (we´re in Chile) but heard that it would cost $160 USD each. Taking the normal bus is just $20 USD. So we will wimp out and get the bus. However, it´s possible to go the scenic route for most of the way in Chile anyway as a separate trip. Costs just under $50. So today we did that.

It was a very touristy trip with lots of erm... old people. We had a bit of a kufuffle with tickets as we reserved them the day before and picked them up just before departing. However, there was something strange with our tickets so a man took them away up to the office and left us standing on the street for a worrying few minutes.

Managed to get on the bus and leave at 9am. Had great weather for it and as we left town we could see the volcano in all it´s glory. Then wound through beautiful countryside for 1.5 hours. Stopped for a bit to see a waterfall then carried on to a boat.

The boat (catamaran) took us and the wrinklies for a cruise across the lakes for another couple of hours. Gorgeous scenery. Got off at the other end and went for a walk in the woods and hills. Had a bite to eat and then went back to the boat to do it all again in reverse.

All very nice and not too streneous. They were trying to sell all sorts of activities during the trip, from horse riding to the "canopy" trip where you slide down wires hanging between trees. All sounded good but all were very expensive for what they were and they kept going on and on about it. We stuck with our walks.

Sorry for the lack of pics. The computer here is a bit underpowered and I don´t think it´ll be able to handle taking the pics off the camera. I just powered up Paint and it told me it didn´t have enough memory. Poor thing. Also, flickr is messing about. I uploaded a photo but it doesn´t seem to appear. You 4x4 fanatics will have to wait for your treat.

That´s it. Should be off to Bariloche in Argentina tomorrow but we haven´t bought the bus ticket yet and it´s 8.20pm already. Hmmm.....

Updated with photos (29-Nov-2005) - Click for pics

From the back of the boat

More volcanos

And again

Puerto Varas - Snow Capped Volcanoes

2005-10-03T15:29:00.000+02:00

Just a quick update. I´ll try to do a bigger one with pics later on tonight.

We took a bus from Puerto Natales (beautiful) down further south to Punta Arenas (would be beautiful if they didn´t treat it like a rubbish tip) and stayed the night there before getting a plane (already booked from Hungary) back up north to Puerto Montt.

However, we heard / read that Puerto Montt wasn´t a great place to stay so we hopped straight on a bus to Puerto Varas. There´s only one bus from the airport into P.Montt but from P.Montt there´s about 20 minibuses all lined up beeping their horns trying to get your business. So the bus to P.Montt cost 1,100 each but then the bus to P.Varas which is further away cost only 700 each. Monopolies, terrible.

P.Varas is a town next to a big lake with snow-capped volcanoes in the distance. Though they were covered by cloud when we got in and it{s a bit overcast today.

Staying in a nice hostel place. Left our bags at the tourist info place then wandered around town checking out places to stay. Tried about 5 places before this one. All were either way too expensive or way too grotty. Here we managed to get our own room but sharing bathroom (but there´s only a couple of other people here). I think we´ll stay here for 2 or 3 days before moving on.

Cough / cold is getting better, slowly but surely. Just had nice breakfast with strong suggary coffee. Time to head off.

Updated with photos (29-Nov-2005) - Click for pics

Snow-capped Volcano

Compass del Sur, our wonderful hostel.

Photos from the CD (Rio, Iguacu, BsAs, Peninsula Valdes)

2005-09-29T23:46:00.000+02:00

Okay, remembered to bring the CD with me this time to the net cafe.

Before you see those (I´m still trying to login to flickr on this incredibly slow connection), I´ll bore you with the no-news I have for the day.

Puerto Natales (where we are right now) is in a stunning location. All the buildings are pretty run down (but pretty all the same) but it´s set next to an amazing lake with huge mountains on the other side. Makes for a great wander around. Which is all we did today.

That and went to the doctor´s to get something for my cold. 10,000 Chillean peso to see the doctor and another 7,000 for the perscription. Had a terrible night last night but seems to be getting better now. Was also a bit of a Blair Witch Project night as something seemed to be scraping up and down the walls of our room (which is basically a prefab shed divided up into about 5 rooms in someone´s garden). Then the dog started barking outside the window in a very protective way and didn´t stop for the rest of the night. Good dog. I don´t want to get eaten by scary giant porcupine llamas or whatever they have around here. Actually, they have very nice black-necked swans on the lake.

Looks like we´ll both go on the day tour of the park tomorrow, but while Eva strides out from the bus every now and then, I´ll stay wrapped up and warm on/in it. Haven´t asked yet, but will try to get a discount.

So here are the photos from the earlier part of the trip. We´ve got loads of photos but you´re only getting a taster here. Putting the photos up is quite time-consuming (this post has taken about an hour with this connection). We also have some cracking photos that we´ll save till the end.

Enjoy ....

One of Rio from Sugarloaf Mountain. Excellent view.

Jesus Christ!

Iguacu falls. Now imagine that this view stretches all the way around the corner as well.

Buenos Aires. Just a quick street pic that reflects how colourful South America can be.

Whale watching on the Peninsula Valdes. The male was horny but the lady was having none of it. She kept rolling in the water to make him prove himself.

The females look normal, but the male elephant seals are huge. They all look dead but really they´re just resting. Though we did see one with a nasty wound that was getting pestered by hungry gulls.

P.p.p.p.pick up a penguin. You probably could here. There were quite a few around and very close. Not really the season for them at the moment. A few hundred here right now but down south in a couple of months there will be hundreds of thousands.

As we were just a group of 4 people we had just a single 4x4 instead of a big bus. This meant we could stop at any time to get out and take a look around.

Pics!

2005-09-28T23:55:00.000+02:00

Okay, try these.

I was able to pull some pics direct off the camera as I had the cable with me (bought a spare in BsAs).

These are fresh photos from yesterday (Tuesday 27th) on the glacier. No explanations here, no time and probably not necessary.

Puerto Natales : Hacking Coughs and Gloopy Internet

2005-09-28T22:41:00.000+02:00

Been out of touch for a bit. Had a mobile phone signal in the last couple of places but couldn´t send SMS. Down in Puerto Natales now and absolutely no signal here. Oh well. Internet has been a bit of a hit and miss affair too. Tried a netcafe in El Calafate which was about 4x more expensive than the other one´s we´ve tried. Had a terrible keyboard and the connection was so bad that I just wasn´t able to reach some sites (e.g. blogger). When we complained, the guy just shrugged his shoulders and said it´s the same for all of the places in that town. Great.

To be honest, I wasn´t too keen on El Calafate. Don´t get me wrong, we came here for the glaciers and they were amazing (more about that later), but the town seemed to be very pricey for what it offered.

I may also have been influenced by the terrible cold/flu I have right now. I believe it´s going away but yesterday was very bad. I think I picked it up after standing close to the Iguacu waterfalls, getting soaked and then sitting in airconditioned rooms, planes, buses for a few hours. Yesterday I could hardly eat anything (painful to swallow), blocked up nose, head about to burst and a hacking cough that just wouldn´t stop. Plus I was getting very very cold.

So of course the best course of action is to stand on the deck of a boat, ride it out in icy winds to a massive glacier, don crampons then trek across the glacier for a few hours. Maybe not, but that´s what I did anyway. The glacier is huge in a way I don´t think the photos will explain. I was also surprised at how blue it all was. With the light shining through thinner parts of the ice, you get great colours. And then there´s the loud cracking, popping noises as huge chunks of ice fall off into the water below. The odd thing is that everyone´s waiting for the next chunk of ice to fall and listening to the sounds (which really are very very loud), but the volume of the noise doesn´t seem to correspond to the size of the ice chunk. Ok, I´m wittering on now.

The glacier trek was finished with whisky on the rocks with the guides. A nice touch. As soon as we got back from that trip, I took a shower and went straight to bed. I felt terrible. Eva went out for dinner with the two Belgian brothers we´d hooked up with back up at Puerto Madryn.

So we went from Puerto Madryn (whales, penguins, elephant seals etc) to El Calafate (glaciers, overpriced restaurants) and took a bus (about 5 hours) down further south to Puerto Natales. Here´s the place to go trekking in the national park of Torres del Paine. Most of the treks take several days and you can either stay in hostels inside the park (bloody expensive) or camp (cheap). Originally we were planning a few days in the park but I´m more concerned with getting well again, so it looks like we´ll rest up a couple of days and then just do a quick one day tour and not sleep in the park.

Oh just a point of interest. The tourist information places have normally been very good, but here, although they seemed helpful giving a list of nearby hostels it turned out to be crap. 2 of the places weren´t open and absolutely none of them had rooms anything near the right price. We wandered around a bit and then went into one of the hostels that approached us after we´d got off the bus. It was a bit more than we wanted but after visiting about 5 other places, it was obviously worth paying the extra for a bit of cleanliness and comfort.

Photos, yes photos are on the way. We got them burned to a CD in El Calafate which was a bit of a mistake as if we´d waited a couple of days then it would have been a lot cheaper to do it here. Oh well. Anyway, we only popped into the netcafe now on the way back from the shop (I needed my hot tea!) so don´t have the CD with me. I promise to bring it with me next time.

I´ve also got a load of stuff to write up from my notepad that I jot notes into while on the road / in the sky. Maybe that will come soon too.

Thanks for the comments guys and hope all is well whoever and wherever you are.

Updated with photos (29-Nov-2005) - Click for pics

Most of the pics for this entry are already up in another post but there are some new ones just below.

Waterfall in the Torres del Paine park

Lakes so clean and calm that they look like mirrors. Plus an incredibly expensive hotel.

A bizarre landscape of mountains, beach and icebergs

Punta Arenas was the furthest south we got. Not much there but they do have a nice cemetry (full of Scots) that looks out onto the Magellan Strait.