Bolivia (1) - Man vs Mountain

When someone tells me that I 'cannot do something', my first instinct is to prove them wrong...then probably insult them and their hairstyle. So when an Israeli soldier with a lame-ass ponytail told us the harrowing story of his encounter with an 'unclimbable mountain' in Western Bolivia, we decided to alter our route and give it a shot.

A graveyard (foreground) unnervingly marks the way to Huayna Potosi (background), which at 6088M tall, towers over La Paz - the highest capital city in the world

Venturing south through Peru into Bolivia, we reached the bowl-shaped capital, La Paz.
The mountain - Huayna Potosi - is only a few miles away so we asked some tour-guides to lead us up. Locals laughed at us when we told them we planned on scaling the 20,000ft beast which had claimed the life of a German tourist just 3 days before.

We didn't exactly look like mountaineers; we had spent the last three weeks in hospital beds with Amazonian parasites and salmonella, shitting our guts up and tripping balls on cheap Bolivian Morphine generics. Now we were facing a climb way higher, colder and steeper than anything we'd attempted thus far...

We had to get in shape.

Every day, whilst Dave napped, Ali and I ran through the streets of La Paz.

Riot Police stand guard...                                                            ... while protesters unite in song

We ran through black-markets, mile-long fruit-markets and markets selling stolen car-parts and TV remotes, past stray pigs, crazy people, homeless people, crack addicts, rioters, miner-strikes, policemen with rifles and schoolgirls with backpacks.

And after 2 weeks exercise at high altitude we were ready.

Day 1: We set off early in Jeeps. At the base of a colossal glacier we geared up and learned how to use our ice-picks and crampons. Very basic stuff. Dave stumbled off a 12 foot vertical wall of ice. It was hilarious.

We arrived at Base Camp and spent the night there; 4700 Meters - nearly as high as Mont Blanc.

Ali 'massive dong' Danzig knows no fear

Day 2: Our assent took us up the boulder-strewn East face to High Camp; a three hour climb which would have been piss-easy if not for the altitude and the 22 kilo packs we were lugging around. Inside them: essentials for the climb. Boots, ice-pick, crampons, harness, ropes, thermal suit, a shitload of socks, 2 litres of water and about 500 mini Oreos.

I would have taken way more photos but it took 5 minutes to take off those stupid fucking mittens.

Looking down upon the glacier front

We arrived at High Camp; 5130 Meters. It was great to see this on the kitchen wall:

A note left by Ben and Jez two months earlier

There were about 10 other people staying there too, also hoping to reach the summit for sunrise.

We went to bed at 6pm.
We would start the climb at 1am.

-2°C in High Camp

Ideally I would begin the toughest physical challenge of my life after a full night's sleep. As it happened, Ali and I lay awake for a torturous 6 hours. The air was so thin that every time I dozed off I would wake up short of breath and have a 3 minute coughing fit, and the room was so cold that I slept in 7 layers and still thought my nob was gonna shatter if I rolled over.

To make matters worse I desperately needed a shit, but journeying to the toilet involved a 2 minute walk through a blizzard, which I just couldn't hack. To put it in perspective, at this temperature it doesn't hang: it perches.

The Climb: At midnight our guides came in to wake us up (mine was Philipé - a short, stocky, cube-headed fellow who spoke no English). We had breakfast, suited up and started climbing at 1am.

30ft icicle formations line the route

Looking back at it, the hours which followed seem almost like a dream. Walking in absolute darkness, only able to see what was illuminated by the small circle of light coming from my head-torch; not even a horizon or a summit in the distance, just Philipé a few steps ahead tied to me with a rope. Other than our own footsteps in the snow there was no sound whatsoever, and for times we would walk for an hour without saying a word. At the huge risk of sounding like that irritating fatty on the TV - what's her name? Oprah? - I suppose 'spiritual' is the best way to describe it.

As we climbed higher the mountain got steeper and the air got thinner and much colder. With no noise and nothing to look at it was almost a strange, perverted meditation to keep putting one foot infront of the other for 5 hours. Nearing the summit I started to have a mini-blackout every few minutes, regaining consciousness just as I fell. Any movement was pretty painful, but every time we stopped it became too cold and we would have to carry on. 'Breaks' consisted of an Oreo and 10 pushups to keep warm.

I remember looking back towards High Camp and seeing nothing in the blackness but 10 tiny floating specks of white light in pairs; they were the other climbers (and their guides) following our tracks in the distance...

'The Ridge' (taken on the way down)

The last half-hour of walking was along this 2ft wide 'ridge' with a near-vertical drop on either side. Had I fallen off the edge, Philipé would have jumped off the other side with the rope connecting us in the middle. He didn't tell me this though, and the sun hadn't risen yet, so I wasn't even aware of the danger. When I looked down all I could see were my feet. Probably a good thing cos I'm shit-scared of heights and a fear-induced shart into my 1-piece thermal suit would have been an absolute disaster at this time.

On the summit

At 5.36am we reached the summit. I collapsed and coughed up a mouthful of blood, to the great amusement of Philipé (who somehow had more energy now than at the start).

At 6088 meters, over two thirds the height of Everest, the temperature had plummeted to -25°C. I tried to drink some water but my bottle and its contents had frozen. I took out my camera to get some photos but the lens had frozen solid too. I had to lovingly massage it until it unthawed.

Sun rising

Almost as if it had been waiting for us, the sun burst out from under the horizon to reveal the Bolivian Andes in all their glory. 

Philipé in the gold of day

As I lay there in the snow, bloodstained, overcome by physical and mental exhaustion and watching the sun rise below me, I think I may have had my very first 'religious experience'.
I quickly pulled myself together though, realising that my brain was severely starved of oxygen and I was suffering from altitude sickness. I was an atheist again, just 30 seconds later.

After sunrise we walked back the way we had came; only this time I could actually see (and photograph) what we had passed on the way up...

 It took just 2 hours to stumble and slide back to High Camp, where I found Ali whinging about a migraine and Dave sound asleep. They had turned back before the summit, due to severe altitude sickness and 'extreme desire to sleep' (respectively).

Ice-fall at 5500m

For less than a hundred quid I climbed a mountain and got a free T-Shirt thrown in.

...so someone tell that Israeli to get a fucking haircut.

Peru (1) - Peaceful Hikes and RABID DOGS ATTACK!

From Lima: a freezing cold bus journey through glaciers and treacherous mountain paths into a roaring red sunset; we find ourselves in Huaraz, a dusty mountain town in the West-Peruvian Andes historically plagued by earthquakes, avalanches and an unbelievably boring nightlife.

Chillin' - with the locals

We are the only 'whiteys' in the town. We walk to our hostel through rubble-roads and bustling markets; 2000 year-old obese woman scream 'GRINGO!' at us as we pass, then curse us in ancient tongues if we don't give them spare change. Dave got cursed by the wrinkliest woman on the planet and as a result had hilarious 'repeated mares´ for the next week (until we found a 'lucky seed' in the Amazon...but more on that later).

Just some absolute fucking nutcase walking her alpaca

After 5 minutes of walking we were completely out of breath; at an altitude of over 3000m (and completely un-climatized) we had to actively search for oxygen molecules in order to survive. Undeterred, we decided that the next day we should hike up 'Huascarian' (the highest tropical mountain in zein veld) to Laguna 69, on the basis that it has a hilarious name and is supposedly very beautiful. So we bought copious amounts of altitude medication and got to it.

Walkin da' pig

The view from the bottom

The hike itself took around 6 hours and was absolutely knackering, what with us not being used to the high altitude, and having eaten 4-course meals for breakfast, lunch and dinner nearly every day in Peru beforehand (great soup, a massive plate of chicken and rice, a disgusting flan dessert and unlimited pear-juice is served in almost every restaurant and costs 4 Soles, or 90p a head).

After some awesome views, 9 mild heart-attacks and innumerable cramps between us, we did eventually make it to the top. What we found there was more than worth it; as we turned the last corner an unimaginably sapphire-blue lake came into sight. So blue in fact that it looked almost as if it had been photoshopped into the mountain for our amusement, or that God ran out of water and used Powerade instead. I may in fact have rubbed my eyes in disbelief and shouted 'Whaaaah!?' (but I can't be sure as it was a while ago now).

The lake is actually blue because of massive amounts of Algae in the water

On the way down Davy and I hung back from the group and ended up taking a 45 minute detour back to camp because this giant evil Bull was blocking our path and wouldn't get out of the fucking way no matter how many tiny pebbles I threw at it.

'The stare-down'  (Dave lost)

On the upside we did come across this fairly awesome tree as a result.

That night we decided to celebrate our triumph over nature Gap-Yah style, so we splooshed out on alcohol (3 quid was easily enough), got smashed in the room and 'hit the town'. But after 3 hours of walking around in deserted streets, looking for bars and being (literally) grabbed and scratched by prostitutes we decided to call it a night. The most interesting thing that happened was I fell face-first into a 3 foot pothole in the road whilst telling a drug-dealer to 'seriously fuck-off'.

The only way to have fun in Huaraz

The next day the weather was awesome so we hired some mountain bikes. The teenager we hired them off wished us luck and left us with one piece of advice;

'On way back to town, be careful of rabid dog: they attack you when you ride! You pick up rock, throw rock at dog, and dog leave now'.

(Mis)taking him for a fool or a prankster we paid for the bikes, tied them to the top of a local bus and took them to the bottom of a nearby mountain. We rode up it for a couple of hours taking occasional breaks to stroke llamas and poke tarantulas with sticks on the side of the road. Or vice versa in Ali's case.

In Huaraz....bike rides YOU

The ride down was great, but inevitably didn't last (given how little we paid for the bikes). Ali's back axle shattered into pieces and was unusable.
As we discussed our options (which were few) the first truck we'd seen all day drove past us and we waved it down.

The driver and his mate were equipped with a bunch of tools and helped fix up the bike so we could at least roll it to a nearby lodge (also the first lodge we'd come across all day) - so it looked like luck might be on our side after all.


It was not.

The lodge

Dave and I waited with Ali for ages at the lodge for a taxi, but it began getting dark so we rode off down the mountain together (Frodo and Samwise Gamgee anyone?) and watched the sun set over yonder hill.
Everything was super.

Then the shit hit the fan.

As we rode through a tiny village in the absolute pitch-dark we heard a most terrifying sound. Ten or more dogs barking from every direction, and getting closer. Very quickly we realised that the slack-jawed local who rented us the bikes had been telling the truth. The barking got louder and louder until eventually the pack caught up with us. The dogs (if you can call them that - they were more like shaggy mutants from fucking outer space) sprinted right alongside our bikes and dived at our feet and legs, foaming mouths open, teeth out and diseased tongues-a-lolling. Naturally we absolutely shat ourselves, but the faster we pedalled the more aggressive they became. We couldn't stop to 'pick up rock' (for fear of being mauled to death) so we rode down the mountainside without pedalling, sat with our legs stretched out in front, and whilst Dave hysterically screamed ´HELP ME ED HELP ME PLEASE!' I tried to decide whether I was crying of laughter or just genuine terror. I also tried to decide whether I was in fact having a nightmare, given that I was being chased by packs of aggressive rabid dogs in the pitch dark on a crappy bike...
I was reminded of the opening scene from Waltz with Bashir (which I recommend as a great film, on a pleasant side note).

One mangey mutt came so close that I decided it was worth a try, so I swung my foot out with all my might and booted it right in the face with the back of my heel.. It yelped and rolled over a couple of times and then gave chase again, but I did feel slightly like James Bond, or perhaps Alex Rider (even cooler).

For about 20 minutes we rode through towns and the same thing would happen in every one (although I never did get in another kick). The trauma finally ended when a van drove by and the driver offered us a lift back to Huaraz.

I have never been so terrified for my life, but at the same time I have never laughed so hard or for so long, so to this day I still have mixed emotions regarding the ordeal.

Next we ventured into the Amazon Basin...

Guns and Sunrise in Yosemite National Park

From San Francisco we took a 5am bus to Yosemite National Park, and the driver hooked us up with an incredible lodge right under Yosemite Falls.



the view (en route)

Here we met the great Ben Scott from Australia, who laughed at everything I said and spent 45 minutes choosing which sandwich to buy in absolute hysterics. It all made sense when I discovered he had munched 2 acid tabs at 6am that morning.

 

Ben (on his ´Detox´)

That night we decided the only logical thing to do would be to build a massive fire, so after a quick skim of the 'Yosemite Dos and Dont's handbook' we took 4 extremely flammable towels from the lodge and ventured into the wilderness. We found a great spot under more stars than I knew existed and got a pretty decent fire going.

Things could only get worse...

It can´t have been more than 2 minutes before a real-life Ned Flanders Park-Ranger shone his torch in my eyes:

´´Have you been drinking alcohol or utilising recreational drugs!?´´

I thought we were screwed when this dweeb turned up, and I was right.

We apologised for the fire, put it out and did everything we were asked, but soon King-Kong-esque ´backup´showed up and for the next half hour we were treated like escapees from Azkaban. Supposedly a load of crystal meth smugglers hide out in National Parks around Cali and Death Valley, and Park Rangers here are the most armed police-force in the US, each carrying on them 2 handguns, an M16 and a pump action shotgun in the back of their van.

I wouldn't have laughed at his tight green pants had I known this.

...acrobatic interlude.

We were issued a $350 fine and after a hilarious 4-way game of Rock-Paper-Scissors (which didn't do wonders to prove our sobriety) the fine was issued in Ali´s name. I asked what would happen if we didn't pay the fine...

´´Sir...You are the master of your own destiny!´´

 ...was the informative response.

The whole ordeal proved to be worth it though; trekking up the Falls the next morning for sunrise was one of the most awesome and rewarding experiences of the trip.



Yosemite Falls; the highest waterfall in the USA.
Water freezes half way down, lands as snow, melts, then falls another 700ft.

 

Sunrise from atop the falls



After much debate we decided not to pay the fine.

As a result, Ali has a warrant for his arrest in every National Park in the USA..

...Shouldn't have chosen Paper.

Fire and Acid in the USA: A month of disastrous mishaps...

...and great breakfasts.

(with free refill coffee) at Lori´s Diner

Our journey begins in San Francisco, one of the most beautiful and charming cities I've ever visited. We were staying Downtown (near Union Square) - rightly notorious for being overrun with tramps and crazies, though they ended up looking relatively sane when compared to our 6ft 4 Korean hostel owner (Eric) who didn't sleep for 5 days and only ate speed tablets for every meal.

Fucking piece of shit loser cunt (and some homeless dude)

San Fran presented too much to take in given the short time we had; the city itself is absolutely stunning and too often I found myself dorkily half-jogging to catch up with Ali and Dave after getting left behind taking hundreds of photos. 

1962 Plymouth Valiant

Supermassive black-cars, Ocean Beach and Lombard Street were amongst the highlights, (photomagraphically speaking).

Sunset over Ocean Beach

Lombard Street (the windiest street in the world)

We spent a fair amount of time in Haight Street, the 'Camden Town' of Frisco, where if you mooch around for long enough trendy hippies will offer you a free spliff, or hot homeless women will give you shrooms, or friendly advice, or both. 

Walking across the Golden Gate was cool; attempting to hitchhike back for 45 minutes, failing, and then realising we had been standing under a giant sign which said ´NO STOPPING AT ANY TIME´ was not...

Although I did love the place, I left feeling slightly uneasy. The sheer number of people who live in San Francisco without a home was genuinely shocking; be they 'Rock' who showed us around the entire city with more enthusiasm than I could ever hope to have, or 'Q-Quinten', who whipped out his nob and pissed on a parked car whilst I was talking to him. Nowhere as wealthy as the United States can justify such utter neglect for its own people.

Next on the agenda was Yosemite National Park - I will try to update ASAP, but am flying into the Amazon Basin in 30 minutes, so - rain check?

'The lightning Storm' - An entry from my inter-railing diary

Sunday 1st August

I write this from a cafe in St. Anton, Austria, cos Jeremy skis here and suggested it as a jolly jaunt; to which we agreed. 

On arrival we spoke to the hot blonde woman at the tourist office who advised us not to go up the mountain as it was illegal and dangerous. She had nice tits. We dropped off our bags and headed up. 

Up

It took like 4 hours to get to the top - along the way we filled up our bottles with freezing mountain-stream water which was probably about 90% elk piss, and sophia farted in sams face and then laughed for about 30 minutes. What a classy lady. 


Eventually, after an arduous trudge, and me getting shocked by a deceptive electric fence and not realising until my hand smelled like a barbecue, we found an amazing camping spot on a flat piece of land with a 180 degree view; I've never seen such an great view in my whole life. 
Took loads of crappy photos. 

sittin' rock

We watched sunset from 'atop the sittin' rock' and it got pretty cold and pretty dark pretty quickly.

Sophia went mad at me for shouting 'FUCK YOU NATURE' at the mountain and said it would bring 'bad karma'. 
Lol. Moron...

....

We all woke up at around 1am to the loudest thunder in history. It was raining really heavily and there was lightning about every 15 seconds. Alex and Sophia were screaming and crying as if they had just dropped their hair products down the toilet. I made about 500 crappy puns to calm the mood/mask the fact that I had just crapped in my pants. I also screamed at Allah to 'do his worst' but the superstitious bunch did not appreciate my humour at this time. 

Eventually the rain and thunder stopped and Sam's heart started. 

...

At 2am we woke up again and this time the storm was even more 'in tents'. There was a HUGE wind. Sam had farted.

We grabbbed the walls of the tent cos they were flappin' around all crazy-like and I was sure it was about to tear. If it had torn we would have been absolutely fahooked. We were also pretty scared about actually getting struck by the lightning itself and going up in flames: to distract ourselves we counted how many seconds there was between the lightning-flash and the sound of thunder and I had to explain about 500 times why 5 seconds = 1 mile. This didn't help to calm us down (cos it was 3 seconds away). 

Sam thought it would be a great idea to hold his penknife in his pocket: that way, if the tent got struck by lightning, he planned to 'cut his way out'. Pretty st00pid idea if you ask me, since he was now holding the only metal object for about 100 miles. In a lightning storm.

Sam also did his 'goat which yells like a man' impression which was absolutely hilarious.

Jeremy got really scared, did a small pee pee his pants and then claimed that 'the tent leaked all over me bruv allow this'.

How unfortunate that it leaked all over his crotch. From inside his pants. And was yellow. And smelled like piss. And was piss. 

The sound of thunder was incredible - it echoed all the way through the valley so we could literally hear it go from left to right. Eventually the storm passed and we went to sleep. 

We woke up and looked outside but it was really foggy. The fog moved way faster than we could run (and with superior endurance). Me and Jeremy ran a few hundred yards up the mountain to touch the snow, which was cool. 

At about 8am we were in the tent and heard a guy say 'HALLOH?' from outside - it was an Austrian farmer who owned loads of cows on the mountain. He was almost too friendly - wearing a massive coat and he had a walking stick which I was immensely jealous of. He had 2 'Australian Sheepdogs' which were SO cute and after a brief chat all three of them bounded off merrily up an almost sheer rockface, which gave us some (misguided) confidence in our own climbing ability. 

Eventually we got back to the town after a long-ass trek through hail and rain. We got dry and changed and then had a massive meal - spagetti bolognese, a frankfurter with this amazing mustard (which sam thought was 'yellow sauce' and then got genuinely grumpy for not realising it was mustard) half of sam's carbonara, most of sophia's spagetti and some of alex's soup. 

And that's all I have to say about that. 

Europe by Rail (3) - Apeman lost in Venice / Italy in pictures

 - Milan - Bologne - Parma - Vezano - Forte Dei Marmy - Pisa -  Florence - Lake Garda - Venice -

Jeremy passes on in Piazza Del Duomo 

Milan is incredible - but to summarise: beautiful city, didn't like the people, got drunk and climbed the monuments, had a fight with the hostel owner because he turned off the orange juice machine. Here are some photos:

Forte Dei Marmy: We travelled several hundred miles for the sole purpose of taking a photo in a place called 'Forte Dei Marmy' and despite missing trains, eating a shitty meal and spending a day in a dilapidated ghost town....we all agreed it was worth it:

Forte Dei 'Marmy'

'Spending up to 11 hours on a train on a diet of McDonalds milkshakes and granola bars will lead to extreme flatulence in males and aggressive response in females' - this warning should be written on the back of every inter-rail ticket.

Farting on Sophia's face (somewhere in Italy)

Friday 30th July

Venice

St. Mark's Square

Being the apoid-yahoo that he is, Jeremy gave his phone and wallet to Sophia to look after, and then got lost in the main square. We looked for him for a few minutes. Alex and Sophia discussed the many ways he could die, Sam ranted about how irresponsible he was and I looked for a nice fish restaurant, which I found. It was delicious.

St. Mark's Basilica

 On our way back to the hostel at around midnight, Sophia saw a short old woman in a red coat and started, quite literally, screaming with genuine terror and sprinting in the opposite direction. Having always been secretly terrified of Venice because of that movie 'Don't Look Now', and being a massive pussy by nature, I instinctively screamed twice as loud and followed her.

Gondolas in Venice

6 hours after we lost him, we found Jeremy at the hostel. Expecting some inspiring stories of introspective adventure, I was disappointed to hear the most exciting thing that happened was that he bought a plastic bag from a street vendor for 1 cent.

Photos from Florence and Lake Garda:

Scene from 'Don't look Now' - SPOILER - (but now you see what I mean)

Next we travelled into the austrian alps....