Hi guys,

Since writing the last blog we have had many advetures!! To start off with the 7 hour bus journey ended up being an 19 hour epic journey!! It started off fine but then an hour into the journey the bridge that we heard could be a problem crossing was infact no longer really a bridge as most of the middle section of it had been torn down and chucked into the river by the local farmers who are protesting against the government but aparntly fairly so we couldnt be too annoyed with them!! So when we arrived at the bridge some of the locals who also wanted to cross it were trying to rebuild the bridge with tree logs, we decided to muck in with them and help carry the logs to the bridge and help them rebuild it!! At about 8am and an hour later there were now enough logs that there were no longer any holes in it so a couple of the locals decided to it was tme to cross the bridge!! The first 6 reasonabley sized lorries made it over the bridge not convicingly but they made it!! Then a masive coach tried to cross the river.....it eventually made it over but it broke the top of the bridge and knocked everyones lugged that was on top of the lorry into the river which was very amusing....it also snapped a couple of the logs on the bridge!! It was then our turn to cross the bridge we made a couple of running repairs and although we handnt quite finished them our bus driver thought it was time to go for it!! We made it half way across but then on of the planks of wood came up with the wheel!! We managed to sort the problem out but then the bus fell through part of the bridge and 3 of the wheels were resting on the metal supports and the other wheel was on wood....and this stage we had a major problem!! 3 hours later we managed to jack our bus up far enough we could slip bits of wood under the wheels of the bus so we could then get our ourselves off the bridge!!

We thought this would be the end of our troubles.....a couple hours down the line we then ran into a town of people that wouldnt let us past unless the painted political progaganda onto the side of our bus!! If we tried to drive through then they were going to rock and stones at our bus!! Whilst the bus driver was trying to negotiatie the bu journey through we decided to play football with the youngeters of the town this seemed to calm everything down....so we got through with just a bit of red paint of the side of our bus!! Now surely it was a sage journey to Puno....this was not the case tho a couple of hours later we came across a couple of old ladies chucking rocks onto the road! we had to pay them to get past, move the rocks and then move them back afterwards!! This was thankfully the end of the dramas and we eventually arrived in puno safe and wel!!

The next day we visited lake titicaca!! We went to a couple of the islands and then that night we went to a homestay at one of the islands! As soon as we arrived to the island we had a football match with the locas arranged we played for over an hour at over 3500ft!! We did come out victorious at 11 - 8!! After this we stayed with our families and had a nights traditional entertainment and food whilst getting dressed in traditional clothes!! The next day we visited the reed islands where in lake titicaca the islands are completly made out of reed, and so were there boats on which we had a ride on!! Lake titicaca was amazing and looked more like an ocean rather than a lake because of the sheer size of it!!

After Peru we then moved onto Bolivia....to Le Paz the capital!! Here we chilled out for a couple of days, we wanted to cycle the worlds most dangerous road but unfortuantly we didnt have enough time there to do this! From here we moved onto the salt flats for 3 days! They were amazing we took loads of amazing pics many of which are already on facebook! We visited a hot spring and went swimming in it and saw some gezzers!! In addition we stayed in a salt hotel which was amazing if not a little chilly!!

After this we went to Sucre where we had 3 days to chill out and recover from the salt flat experience! Here once again we chilled out for 3 days! Then we moved onto pitosi where we visited a salt mine and exploded some dynamite which was awesome and went to explore the mines!! We only had one night here before we went to Santa cruz which was slightly more westernisd than most of us were used to! Here again we chilled out expect for another football match against the locals in which lasted an hour and 40 minutes with the temp being around 30 degrees! Everyone at then end was knaccured!

After this we got the night train to Brazil where we are currently. We went to a place called the pantanals, which is a swap land. Here we went pirranha fishing, safari and night safari, as well as horse riding in which one of our group got kicked in the foot by one of the horses which was really funny!! We managed to get gallap even though we only had a 2 minute intro into how to ride and control a hourse.....in the end it was all very amusing!!

Currently we are in bonito and we went to a water type park with a zip wire etc it was really good fun!

Hope everyone is doing well back home.....we have only 20 days until we return home!

Lots of love from us

Lloyd and Nathan xxx