Okay so my last entry was before I left La Paz in Bolivia. The next month(ish) went a little something like this:

We headed first to Santa Cruz in NW Bolivia, which meant 17 long hours on a bus. This was quite a comfortable bus by Bolivian standards, of course there was no working toilet so it was more bladder control practice, but it was more spacious than normal. Our spirits dampened somwhat however when a family of four got on the two seats behind us and there was some little s**t tapping my head when i was trying to sleep at 5am. Santa Cruz itself was different to the rest of Bolivia and pretty chilled so we obliged b lying around for two days doing nothing but eating ice cream.

Next we flew to Rio. This haul was relatively painless as the recruitment of Brazilian flight attendants was shamelessly aesthetically based. Worth a mention. As for Rio, it was pricey to say the least: about the same as England for the basics, but a bit cheaper for clothes etc. Hence we only spent two days here in a really cool hostel and managed to cram in plenty: Copacabana and Ipanema beaches, statue of Christ, and a massive street party in Lapa (a region of Rio) the first night.

From here it was time to relax properly on Brazilian beaches- three days in Ihle Grande. The beaches were ridiculously pituresque and we finally got tanned (for Charlotte this means a slightly off white colour), but the relaxation was hampered a bit by a cleaner that insisted on leaving our door and windows open everyday once she had finished- literally just unlock and open everything and walk off. Constant flashbacks of that ad campaign in England ´dont advertise your home to criminals´ran through my head as i had visions of her inviting men with black and white stripey t-shirts into our room for a viewing. Another headache were the ridiculous inflated tourist prices - the first night we ate in a `price per kilo` restaurant which seemed reasonably priced until their scales claimed that we had eaten a mere 12kg between us! Still, the beaches were nice and we left the island with all our stuff.

After a night in Agra Dos Reis spent wondering around looking for hostels that didnt exist anymore with a self appointed Brazilian tour guide called Douglas who loved all things English and loved talking about Oxfordshire despite never having been, we got to Sao Paulo and promptly missed our connection to Iguazu. However, despite the horror stories of Sao Paulo we found it pretty good. The food was excellent (Charlotte was actually asked to leave the Breakfast buffet after eating fruit for about 2 hours) and the people were generally quite friendly. I even got to practice the rugby skills trying to get us to the bus station on the metro with our backpacks- I did actually floor the guy in front of me (accidentally and with a push not a punch) on the 1st tube but we had to give up after we held the tube up for 3/4 mins cos we couldnt get charlottes bag in the door.

Anyway, we eventually made it to the bus station and then Iguazu and spent the textbook three days here- Brazilian side of falls day one, Argentinian day 2, relax by the pool at our hotel day 3. i think the 400 photos tell this story better than me (see Chars blog).

Next stop Buenos Aires...