Atacama antics?

Actually we are now in Antofagasta de la sierras in argentina, and if you look at a map of this huge country it is inevitable that we would end up here. We have 1 hour before this internet closes to try and get some pictures on for you . ( There is some high intensity perfumed spray cleaning going on ....not much better than my rotten trainers smell )

 The Coffee Lure. My favourite part of the day. Jon can now entice me out of the tent. At over 4000mtrs its worth staying inside til the sun is up.
( p.s Have loaded all the pics back to front...so not only is blog already out of date its backwards too !)

 My new project. Coffee table books do not do justice to the amount of rubbish that is littering the world. It can look quite pretty from a distance.

 Camping near the coast....desert camping is always lovely.

 Miss this bit if you are squeamish. Been having big problems with permanent non-healing lower lip blister. Sticks to top lip in night ....gruesome bloody separation in morning.....(have pic but not suitable for general release ).This is a selection of remedies that do not work . Now ,under medical advice ...thanks Kath....trying antibiotics. Not convinced it is working yet despite full force optimism .

 This is unfotunately what happens if you drink too much salty water

 Whoops.In case you did{nt get a good look before

 Cacti with lichen growing on them . Wierd .Probably only in coastal deserts

 Jon getting a cacti fruit in case things get desperate later

Just to prove we did get to the pacific coast.All my pics of pelicans and penguins are blurry ....but you may get some at an inappropriate time in another blog. Fingers crossed this will publish...will try for a more stylish and well ordered one next time.Adios for now

One Month in

 

 jon is trying to remain calm in the face of the eternal struggle with technology. Since it is clearly impossible, there might not be many entries !

DAY 1 Only a fool would set off from Buenos Aires across the flat pampass in the mid summer heat. A perfect project for us then. First day . A bit hot.A bit lost. A bit of a dead dog smell. Just about to make the decision to go the dirt road route. Guess how good that was .

The pampass was more beautiful and interesting than expected. Whilst it was definately FLAT... the bird life was incredible.

An armadillo. Unfortunately have´nt seen a live one yet.

Spot Cav......Found out the Tour of San Luis was happening, so did a huge detour to get back to it. Had a chat with Mark though ! (best mates now )

Quite a lot of desert riding . Camping out is beautiful but its like sleeping on a hot oven as the ground does,nt cool. We always get thorn punctures as soon as we leave tarmac

A bit of an adventure . Crossing the high Andes . We had just enough food for 3 days and it took more ! We are experiencing problems keeping our shorts up. (I´ve put a tuck in mine !)

Dropping down into Chile. These roads are quite bonkers and yet ¨normal¨: people drive routinely across the border in their family cars.

Keeping entry short and sweet . Now in Vicuna Chile (really ! ) and off to coast to see penguins (really !).

jon may do a special "mechanical observations " feature another time .Something to look forward to then ,eh .

fun fun fun

Well what an exciting start to our trip!
first... delay on the first flight got us running al the way across the airport.. i fealt like Mo Farah going down the travelator !!! But in true Nic and Jon style made it just time, phew.
Then a long and sleepless flight!!
Arriving at Buenos Aires at about 7 in the morning..
good news to start with..... Welcome to Argentina... yes they let us in?
next good news.. here are the bikes.. this is looking good.
only the bags to come..... only the bags to come....
no bags!!!! Looks like the were not as fast as us and our bikes in Amsterdam!!

so you find us now in a hostel in Buenos Aires waiting for the bags to arrive. Ho Hum!!
can think of worse places to be,!

should get the bags back in the morning.. then we will see what goes on ....

Ready for the off

All packed and waiting for our lift towards the Airport.. its the normal routine... Have we got everything?? Will we be there on time?? How do we get out of the Airport?????
Keep tuned to find out..

Ready to Go??????

BAgs are packed and bikes in the van.... so ready for the off!!!!

Here we go again

Well.. lest see, its been 4 years (over) since we got back.. allots happened, but basically we have sorted things out so that we can start enjoying ourselves again....

So the new plan is to go to Argentina with our bikes for 3 1/2 months, just to see if we still like cycling....

Same bikes, same tent, but..... a new stove, still to be field tested but we have high hopes.

Not sure how well we will keep the blog going but watch the spaces to see how we do.

More to follow, I'm sure.

The final blog......arriving home!

Even though we had planned to sneak back home on a Monday morning,we were still intercepted by fiends [this should read "friends",but this is probably as true a description of Morgan ,at least in terms of cycling].Here is Morgz leading us up the last hill. Only 400mtrs from Home !

As we had been away so long some folk had no memory of us at all, and were not at all sure they liked what they saw. Campbell is already a cycling "fiend ";[ he was the youngest cyclo-cross competitor at the Borrowdale shepherds meet.] Well,the assembled audience outside our house [Mum,Lucy,Morgz and Campbell,Jane and wee Johnny,Lena,Pauline,John,and the postman ],were treated to a fine display of our aquired cycling skills. Both of us fell over in the ford right outside our house,Jon first ,then me.....very slippy it is !and soaking wet we were. Luckily for us the actual moment has not been captured on film .

Arriving home was all a bit of a blur...where's Mum gone? Young Johnny has materialised from non existance before we went away...how did that happen?

This is a map of the trip.We left on 26th July 2009,arrived home on 1st Nov 2010,and cycled a total of 29,215 kms, [even though a Kazak border official told us that a bicycle "is NOT a means of transport "] .The train bit across Russia was probably about 6000kms [and if we hadnt taken it we would only just now be leaving Russia,which as it is definitely winter there now is probably just as well we did ]

What have we learnt.? That the world is a truly wonderful place ,and people EVERYWHERE are incredibly kind and generous.We all should insist that it is looked after better ,and shared out more fairly.

We may have to get back on our bikes and check out some more of it ..........

THE END.