After a couple of days in Lima, sightseeing, tenpin bowling, and eating way too much, we drove on to Paracas National Park. We ended up stopping for lunch about 3km from our campsite so a few of us took the option of walking the rest of the way. It's a desert park on the coast so rocky and sandy with no trees in sight. It was cool to walk up a rise and see the truck parked in the distance with little people putting up tents around it. At that point we were thin...

Punta Sal was nice. Lots of sun, walks on the beach and whale watching every afternoon. We left early after our third night there to drive to Huanchaco, another beach town, where we stayed the night then had a morning visit to the Chan Chan ruins. The ruins are still being excavated and restored, there was scaffolding and tarpaulins all over the place but it was interesting to learn about the people who used to live there. Apparently Chan Chan is a newer name m...

23/9/2010 Just back from three nights in the jungle. After a long drive from Otavalo we stayed a night in a hostel in Tena with views of the Napa River. The next afternoon we took a boat to the Arajuno Jungle Lodge on the river of the same name. It was an awesome place, we stayed in little cabins, everything was solar powered, the dining room was open and looking out over the river, and a cheeky monkey would steal your food when you weren't looking. The monkey...

I'm back on the road again! Yesterday we left Quito in the morning and drove to the equator line. There were a few activities to do there, they told us a bit about some animals in the area and showed some pickled ones in jars, followed by some info about tribes in the area, including showing us some real shrunken heads. On the equator line we did some experiments, one where we had to balance an egg on a nail head, I have a 'diploma' to say I did it, and another...

15/9/2010 I've had two days in Quito now. Didn't achieve much the first day, just wandered a bit from the hotel down into the city. Found it hard not speaking Spanish, even the hotel staff don't speak a lot of English, and I had to be careful to remember my way back as it would have been very hard to ask for directions! Started meeting people who are going to be on the trip in the late afternoon, there are about seven of us here now, two from England, four Aus...