And so the trip of a lifetime comes to an end. Sometimes it's hard to process everything we've seen and done over the last 6 and a half months. We can't believe how lucky we are. From developing to developed countries, from sea level to mountain tops and from both the inside and outside of planes (!), the views and cultures we've experienced have made this an unforgettable journey. As if all this wasn't enough, we've met some really amazing people - locals and ...

After a busy couple of days in Foz do Iguacu, we took full advantage of a day without plans in Paraty to visit the beach. Unfortunately the clouds over Paraty took full advantage of emptying all the water in the atmosphere over us for most of the time we were there. Still, the sea was warm and we were by the coast, and soon to be in Rio, so we were still pretty happy. The next day we travelled by bus and boat to Ilha Grande, a beautiful island just south of Rio,...

After our night bus to Foz do Iguacu, we got straight on with seeing the falls, firstly from the Brazilian side. There's not really a lot of words adequate to describe the whole effect this place has on you. It' absolutely beautiful walking through the rainforest seeing waterfall after waterfall and they just get bigger and bigger as you go along. Iguacu falls lie on the Argentinian-Brazilian border and most of the pictures you see are from Brazil looking over t...

Hot and itchy are the two main adjectives that best represent our disconsolate group at this time, here in the Pantanal. Almost as soon as we crossed the border into Brazil, the landscape became lush and tropical - really beautiful and very different to what we´ve become accustomed to after such a long time at high altitude. Unfortunately for the Pantanal, the wet season is coming later and later these days, so everything was much drier than we expected. After ...

The main reason people come to Potosi is to visit the Silver Mines, where working conditions are grim and life expectancies markedly reduced. Before going down into the mine, we were advised to buy gifts for the miners we would meet along the way: 96% alcohol (not a misprint!), cigarettes and sticks of dynamite (for mining, not leisure) were suggested. No wonder people don´t live for very long - as if the environment weren´t bad enough, the coping mechanisms do...