Spain - Segovia & Toledo

We took two day trips from Madrid, to Segovia and Toledo.

Segovia -

Gothic cathedral:
Alcazar castle:

Plaza Major:

Vera Cruz church, erected by the Knights Templar in the 13th Century:

Aqueduct, built at the end of the first century by the Romans to bring water to the city:

Bill´s sixteen year old niece Brittany is travelling with us in Spain for ten days (That´s her in the picture with me above). It´s fun having her here. We have noticed, though, that she always walks half a block behind us. We were wondering whether we were walking too fast, until we finally realized that Brittany is doing the ´I don´t know those people in front of me, I am here by myself´ walk. Remember pretending not to be related to our parents when we were teenagers? Have we become that uncool?

Toledo - Medieval city, full of Gothic architecture, with Muslim and Jewish influence:

Spain - Madrid

We went to see a bull fight at Plaza de Torros. I had been to a bull fight once before in Mexico City, but had forgotten how bloody it was! Though I still thought the American woman crying hysterically was being melodramatic.

These are the people that first come out to the ring, stabbing the bull enough to make it mad and weak.Then the matador, with the smaller red cape, makes an entrance and finishes the bull off. Here is a video clip of the matador finale (WARNING: CONTAINS GRAPHIC IMAGES OF SLOW AND VIOLENT ANIMAL DEATH. Really not for the squeamish.):




Borrowing the words of Hemingway (that we read not from the original story, but from our guidebook): ¨The bull fight is not a sport in the Anglo-Saxon sense of the word, that is, it is not an equal contest or an attempt at an equal contest between a bull and a man. Rather, it is a tragedy; the death of the bull, which is played, more or less well, by the bull and the man involved and in which there is danger for the man but certain death for the bull.¨

The rule at a corrida is that you can´t leave in the middle of a bull fight. I didn`t know and got yelled at by some angry Spaniards.

Retiro Park (Madrid´s Central Park):
Gran Via:
Plaza Mayor. We are doing a lot of coffee drinking at cafes:



The palace and cathedral:
Lunch: I ordered this tapas thinking it was potato casserole. It tasted more like very chewy fish. When I was done, I asked the waitress what type of fish it was - nope, it´s bull intestines:
The Spaniards party late! This is a picture taken from our first hotel room at 6am - you can see the drunk and loud people still hanging out:
We moved hotels the next day. The new hotel has a funny owner - he knocked on our door at 1pm and asked ¨are you gonna see Spain or sleep all day?¨ We had jet lag! (And being on the road for 4 months, we tend to sleep a lot.)

Carpincho Petting Video

Bill Speedo Pictures and Central & South America Recap

Despite some voting irregularities (those of you that voted more than once - have you no respect for the democratic process?), Bill has accepted the majority opinion. Here are some Bill speedo pictures:After almost four month, we are finally leaving South America and headed to Spain. We had a great time here and picked up some rudimentary Spanish along the way. We will definitely be coming back!

1. Number of countries visited: 9 (Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Costa Rica, Peru, Bolivia, Argentina, Uruguay and Brazil)

2. Favorite country: Peru, with Argentina a close second

3. Favorite city: Buenos Aires, Argentina, with Cuzco, Peru a close second

4. Number of hotel rooms stayed at: 48 (this includes the day in Tulum, Mexico when we paid for two hotel rooms in one day because I refused to sleep in the first hotel room for another night)

5. Number of times I puked due to motion sickness: 1 (on the bus to Arequipa, Peru)

6. Number of times Bill puked due to the consumption of too much aged rum: 1 (in San Pedro, Guatemala)

7. Total pounds lost between us: 18

8. Number of days we suffered from diarrhea: 20

9. Number of times Bill stepped on dog poo: 1 (Colonia, Uruguay)

10. Number of times Bill and I got into an argument: too many to count

11. Some strange habits we seem to have developed:

1. We are now obsessed with plastic bags. We never throw them away and when we get a good, sturdy one, we argue over who gets to keep them.


2. We sniff all clothes before putting them on. Even when the clothes have just come back from the laundry mat and we know for a fact that they are clean, we still sniff them to enjoy the clean, fresh aroma.

Bonus Item 1: This is a video clip of me trying to pat a carpincho (the carpincho is in the middle of the screen in the shadows):

[See next post for the video - I can´t seem to get Google video to embed as part of a post]

Bonus Item 2 - Bill´s haircut saga.

Bill first went to the hairdresser and she gave him this Dumb & Dumber style cut:

A week later, Bill went to another hairdresser to salvage the hair, and she gave him this Full Metal Jacket cut:

Brazil - Ilha Grande & Paraty

To get to the island of Ilha Grande, we took a ferry over from the mainland town of Angra dos Reis.

Walking to the ferry dock in Angra dos Reis:

Ilha Grande is lush green, with hidden, undeveloped beaches - your typical island paradise. Every morning, we walked down to the dock and took a ferry to different beaches on the island:

Ferry ride:

We hiked to this waterfall:

The whole island did not have electricity the first night we were there. The hotel gave us couple candles:

We also visited Paraty, an old Portuguese colonial town. The historical center is well-preserved and closed to vehicles:

Brazil - Rio de Janeiro

We had planned on busing it here from Foz de Iguacu, but being the lazy backpackers that we are, we couldn´t stomach the idea of another 16 hour bus ride. So we flew here instead.

We are renting a studio apartment in Copacabana, half a block away from the beach, for $50 per day:

This is a good deal, considering $50 is how much a private room at a youth hostel costs here. The reason for the cheap price, I think, is its location - our apartment is directly across from this suspicious strip club:

We don´t mind though. We figure the bouncers from the club are additional security for us; plus it provides hours of entertainment for Bill to look out our window and watch the action around the club.

Copacabana Beach (the very fit couple in the picture is not us):

Downtown (no worries, I won´t let Bill wear this shirt in the US):

Cristo Redentor overlooking the city:

Santa Theresa, an artsy neighborhood in the hills:

Museu Chacara do Ceu - an old church ruins converted into a gallery:

Lunch - Feijoada (black bean stew with pork and sausages):

Brazil/Argentina - Iguazu Falls

Iguazu Falls sit on the border of Argentina and Brazil. First, we went to the Argentinean side of Iguazu Falls. It is currently school vacation time in Argentina and it was insanely crowded. We practically had to stand in line to get a view and people elbowed each other to take pictures - terrible:

Hiking trail:

The Brazilian side of the waterfalls was much better - it wasn´t crowded at all and I thought it provided more of a panoramic view:

Bill went to see the Itaipu Dam, the biggest hydroelectric power plant in the world. It provides 90% of total electricity for Paraguay and 30% for Brazil (I didn´t go - I was sleeping.):