Rio de Janeiro Rio has been suffering a massive dengue epidemic this rainy season. The authorities, not having acted fast enough to protect vast areas of the city, particularly the favelas, from the spread of the mosquito-borne disease, were having to set up army field tents to deal with the overflow from the hospitals. 90 people had died in the city alone since the beginning of the year, with over 220,000 infected. Having been re-assured that the main touris...

The Falls Foz do Iguacu We caught the mid-afternoon bus to Foz, due in to Campo Grande at 5am. Sleep was fitful as we tried to keep half an eye open for the town where we needed to change buses. Crossing the vast open plains of southern Brazil as darkness descended, our way was lit by a lightning storm trapped in a single cloud on the horizon. Itaipu Dam We arrived in Foz at 7am, planning to visit the Itaipu Dam before getting on a bus across the Argentini...

Campo Grande & The Pantanal Uyuni's airport was nothing more than a one-room hut made of salt bricks at the end of what, in any normal airport, would be the runway but here was a track, barely distinguishable from the surrounding dirt. We queued up to have our names ticked off the passenger list and our luggage weighed with a spring scale. We were lucky. The person in the queue behind us, despite having a ticket, was not allowed to board because the weight l...

Tupiza, Triathlons, and Tyre Changes Tupiza lay at the end of another shabby bus journey, highlighted by pick-axe assisted tyre changes, and unknown tinkering with the chassis, but did serve to introduce us to Ed and Nicky, future jeepmates. Tupiza is not much of a town but is set in a rainbow-rock landscape, where tourism is on the increase, as an alternative to the more popular (but pig-ugly) Uyuni. As yet, though, there are few concessions to tourists - findi...

Down, Down, Deeper and Down The road to Potosi, the "highest city in the world" at 4800m, was on a small, shonky, bus - none of the luxury cama-buses of Peru, here. Rather, it was jam-packed jalopy with whole families squeezed into 2 seats, breastfeeding in the aisle, and a young lad relieving himself though the window of the moving vehicle (fortunately, our window was closed so there was no re-entry!) Potosi is famous for one thing, and has been for ...