To my dear (dare I suggest, captive?) audience: this is my final post from South America. Here I am in Buenos Aires, awaiting my taxi to the airport, and the adventure is winding down. It has been wonderful, but I am tired and smile as I think of coming home. But what of the return to Buenos Aires? BA represented warmth compared to the Antartic chill of Bariloche and I made the most of the weather by shop-shop-shopping my little heart out (you get tax back!...

Hey hey recruits...I could launch straight into the joys of being a snow bunny as I sit here in this bar and sip Irish coffee and thaw out but will have to update you on my days in Mendoza first: Met a very sweet Dutch girl and together we booked a cycling tour of a load of wineries seeing as Mendoza is Bodega Paradise. Me having not been on a bike for a good 12 years (probably more) was fairly comedy as we clocked winery 1, liquer company 2, wineries 3, 4 a...

Hidy ho folks, So here I am in sunny (slightly warmer) Mendoza, having arrived on overnight bus from Buenos Aires this morning. Best fill you in on the last few days then... Just want to point out Soph that I flew to BA - not quite as character-building as the bus, but I have more time in lovely Arg now. I too, am wearing cashmere because it is freezing but thanksfully not raining... Spent the first day in BA being totally overwhelmed by the simply garg...

Last posted from Rio a few days ago on the last official day of my Encounter (truck/camping thing) trip...we went out for dinner and had a nice time etc but had a bit of a damp squib of a night out - having rocked up at what was supposed to be a big club area, we found that most of them were shut...ok, it was Monday, but this is Rio! Spent the next day exploring the city on foot, or rather, scoping out the nicest bits of the city: the Copacabana and its neighbour...

Right. Here goes kids - one final push and I might just manage to get myself up-to-date having been struggling to keep up with myself for the duration of this trip, and now it's about to end! We left the wetlands in northern Argie and were heading up to Puerto Iguazu to see the waterfalls...only problem was that following a few days of rain, the main road out of Carlos Pellegrini mostly resembled a swamp, only fit for mudfighting. So we backed up and took a...