The weather in San Pedro is more typical of the Atacama desert, and it has the picture-perfect setting to boot; unlike Walthamstow, they have a volcano at the end of their high street:
Thursday 26 November 2009
San Pedro De Atacama
Just sat through 10 hour coach journey to reach San Pedro de Atacama in Northern Chile, the base for our trip into Bolivia. Amazing scenery en route ... through wide salt flats, high mountain passes, tiny adobe villages ... and changing weather; The weather for the entire trip was wall-to-wall sunshine and heat apart from the city of Jujuy, where a cloud-seeding experiment seemed to have gone horribly wrong (please excuse the poor focus and lack of balance to the composition, but our bus was sinking):
The weather in San Pedro is more typical of the Atacama desert, and it has the picture-perfect setting to boot; unlike Walthamstow, they have a volcano at the end of their high street:
The weather in San Pedro is more typical of the Atacama desert, and it has the picture-perfect setting to boot; unlike Walthamstow, they have a volcano at the end of their high street:
Wednesday 25 November 2009
Salta
Salta's a nice place. We´re staying in luxury hotel for the first few nights (see our lovely roof-top pool). This not only allows us to relax after our long journey, but it also provides us with a chance to get terribly sun-burned, and also provides an unfavourable contrast to our tent.
We hadn´t thought that much about what it would like when we got here. As it turns out, Salta is hot. It was about 37 degrees on the first afternoon and we´re beginning to wonder what cycling in this heat will be like (like cycling through hell, we imagine). Salta is also surrounded on all sides by desert.
We hadn´t thought that much about what it would like when we got here. As it turns out, Salta is hot. It was about 37 degrees on the first afternoon and we´re beginning to wonder what cycling in this heat will be like (like cycling through hell, we imagine). Salta is also surrounded on all sides by desert.
Tuesday 24 November 2009
The Journey to South America
Bikes taken to pieces and packaged into their 'special carry boxes' (see attached illustration).
Fortunately, the checking-in clerks at Heathrow, Sau-Paulo and Buenos Aires all looked horrified when we approached, looking like homeless people going on holiday, so they dealt with us very quickly. (NB - taking a bike to pieces, sellotaping it into a smaller but equally heavy and cumbersome shape, then carrying it in a rubbish cardboard box, knocking over every child and old person you pass ... is not fun)
All in all though, the whole journey all went incredibly smoothly apart from the last ten minutes when we got caught in an enormous electrical storm just outside our destination airport (Salta). We stopped being impressed by the 'extraordinary colour' of the clouds when they started flashing, and the plane went a bit wobbly. Pilot did a sharp u-turn and we got chased by lightning for 200 miles in the wrong direction until he found a safe place to land. This meant being left in the wrong place, and our first night's accommodation was Tucaman airport's floor. Then the airport's power failed, hence the complete darkness surrounding the boxed bike above. Saved us a night's accommodation though.
Finally got to Salta the following day and put the bikes back together. True to form, we had a few 'spare bits' left over. Only limited damage to the bikes from the 3 separate flights; bent front racks on the panorama, and a few scrathes and loose nuts on both (bikes, not us).
Fortunately, the checking-in clerks at Heathrow, Sau-Paulo and Buenos Aires all looked horrified when we approached, looking like homeless people going on holiday, so they dealt with us very quickly. (NB - taking a bike to pieces, sellotaping it into a smaller but equally heavy and cumbersome shape, then carrying it in a rubbish cardboard box, knocking over every child and old person you pass ... is not fun)
All in all though, the whole journey all went incredibly smoothly apart from the last ten minutes when we got caught in an enormous electrical storm just outside our destination airport (Salta). We stopped being impressed by the 'extraordinary colour' of the clouds when they started flashing, and the plane went a bit wobbly. Pilot did a sharp u-turn and we got chased by lightning for 200 miles in the wrong direction until he found a safe place to land. This meant being left in the wrong place, and our first night's accommodation was Tucaman airport's floor. Then the airport's power failed, hence the complete darkness surrounding the boxed bike above. Saved us a night's accommodation though.
Finally got to Salta the following day and put the bikes back together. True to form, we had a few 'spare bits' left over. Only limited damage to the bikes from the 3 separate flights; bent front racks on the panorama, and a few scrathes and loose nuts on both (bikes, not us).
Thursday 19 November 2009
SpandexDreams public launch
After existing for quite some days on the more underground internet scene, we have finally launched 'SD' to a more mainstream audience; it was only a matter of time before we got discovered anyway. The SD team wanted to mark the occasion so here they are. I forget their names but they are all important:
Please excuse the borrowed title picture, but we haven't got there yet, so no lovely snaps of our own. This image however did seem to fill a gap, add a splash of colour, whilst also encapsulating the somewhat nebulous spirit of the cyclist.
Tuesday 17 November 2009
Going Live
Just set up flickr account to keep a record of the trip. To test it out we have uploaded some photos from our Welsh practice run. Wales nearly killed us but I understand that the Andes are in fact much much smaller so we should be OK. Tina the hen is hosting our pictures on Flickr; here is the beautiful hen herself:
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