Hildes reiseblogg

Da var reisen min slutt, gitt.

Sitter her naa siste dag i Canada og tenker tilbake paa de siste fem maanedene, som har gaatt forholdsvis fort men vaert ekstremt innholdsrike.

I morgen setter jeg meg paa flyet til Norge...

Det virker som om det var aar og dag siden jeg og Hege landet i Cancun, og jeg har opplevd utroig mye siden da. Saa her kommer en liten oppsummering.

Mexico

Favorittsted: Tulum, et lite backpacker pradis med flotte strender og kule mennesker. Litt dyrt, men saa verdt det!
Jeg har sett fire forskjellige ruiner (Tulum og Palenke i Mexico, Copan, Honduras, og San Ignaco i Argentina) og laert endel om Maya-kulturen.
Favorittøl: Sol, men drakk mye mojitos ogsaa...
I Mexico hadde jeg den beste lve musikk-opplevelsen jeg noen gang har hatt. Les mer her. Og kuleste badeopplevelse i strykene til Agua Azul.

Jeg likte ruinene i Palenque og fikk et spesielt forhold til SanCristobal da det var denne byen jeg var alene i for forste gang.

Jeg ha blitt glad i fisk! Det har jeg aldri vaert for, men naa har jeg skjont at fersk tilberedt fisk er knallgodt (saerlig marinert i hvitlok!) Saa fisk kommer helt klart paa menyen naar jeg kommer hjem.
Det har alt i alt vaert en ekstremt vellykkettur, uten store problemer.

Guatemala

Jeg foler jeg nok kunne ha utforsket Guatemala litt mer i og med at jeg var der i 4 uker, men er got fornoyd med oppholdet. Spansk kurset var bra, Amparo, med sin utrolige gjestmildhet var helt klart min beste vertsmor paa denne turen, og jeg ble kjent med mange bra mennesker, som Gerdo og Tessa og Siri, Miles og Nicholas.

Antigua bod paa de klart beste vulkan-opplevelsene. Jeg saa ekte, flytende lava og var 3700 meter over havet!!!
Salsaen har jeg desverre ikke praktisert mye av etter at jeg forlo Antigua, saa de som haaper paa salsatimer naar jeg kommer hjem blir dypt skuffet...
Ellers tenker jeg tilbake paa isteen og nachosene paa CafeSky, June og Jim fra Brooklyn og maaltidene til Amparo...
Favorittøl: Gallo

Honduras
Jeg opplevde mye mer av Honduras, og likte meg godt der. The Bay f Islands var noe turistifiserte, men jeg er glad jeg ble kjent med Jesse fra Canada, og katamaranturen vil jeg aldri glemme!
Husbyggingen var knall og Alex og Rhianna ble mine supergode venninner. Av prosjektne jeg jobbet med var nok dette det prosjektet jeg likte best.

Og selvsagt, fosseturen i Pulhapanzak er stopt inne i hodet mitt!

Favorittøl: Salva Vida

Nicaragua

Helt klart favorittlandet mitt paa turen og det landet jeg helst drar tilbake til dersom jeg drar tilbake til Mellom-Amerika. Folkene var hyggelige, det var billig, ikk saa turistifisrt og landet har minst like mye aa by paa av natur og strender som de andre landene.

Fvorittøl: Tona.

Costa Rica

Turens soleklare hoydepunkt! Selv om Nicaragua er favorittlandet, hadde jeg det helt klart best i Tamarindo, Costa Rica. Surfing er noe av det morsomste jeg noen gang har drevet med, og The Beach House og menneskene jeg traff der gjorde oppholdet til noe helt spesielt.

Argentina

Var noe helt annet igen. Det var en ganske stor overgang fra de smaa, fattige landene i nord til dette store, moderne landet. Buenos Aires var en knallkul by og bedre enn noen europeisk by jeg har vaert i. Prosjektet i Posadas var veldig laererikt, men byen selv var ikke saa mye aa skryte av.

Canada

De to ukene jeg tilbrakte i Canada var veldig annerledes. Naa var jeg liksom ikke backpacker mer, men bodde iet hus og deltok i mer dagligdage aktiviteter, men det har vaert en kjempefin avslutning paa turen og en knall oppladning til aa komme hjem.

Alt i alt, jeg maa si at menneskene jeg har mott er det som har gjort denne turen for meg. Jeg var ikke forberdt paa aa mote saa mange fine mennekser med saa like verdier og holdninger som meg og som jeg kunne ha mange fine og interessante samtaler med. Det er nok menneskene jeg har mott som staar for de sterkeste minnene og opplevelsene.

Til slutt, takk til alle som har lest bloggen min og fulgt meg paa turen.

So I decided to take a spontaneous detour to Sylvan Lake, Alberta, Canada on my way home. At that was a good decision. I have had two really nice and relaxing weeks that has prepared me for the hard working life that waits for me when I come home.

Sylvan Lake is a very big and beautiful lake, and the town is sooo nice! Quiet and peaceful but with enough things to do.

I have been staying with Jason that I met in Costa Rica and his flat mate and her dogs, Diesel and Tonka. Two very cool dogs!

Here I have been able to relax and watch TV (which is something I haven’t done in 5 months!) but I have also been checking out the town and spent quite some time sunbathing by the lake. Yes, the weather has been very good. Almost everyday since I arrived has been sunny. 

Jason plays golf a lot and therefore dragged me out on the golf course the first few days, then I got hooked and in the end I think I was the one dragging him out to play golf. 
I played a little golf in Norway last summer, but have never been too big on the game, but now I am. Pretty much every day I have been swinging a golf club and I really got a hang of my swing now (although I still am a pretty bad golfer….) and I was surprised by how addicting the game is! I am now as hooked on golf as I was on surfing in Costa Rica! Pretty amazing, eh? It’s not like the sports are very similar…but in a way they are. There are always little things, details, that you can adjust to improve yourself and both the sports are pretty unforgiving: Surfing, I could catch a great wave, then fall off the next one, golfing, I can play great at one hole, then mess up the next hole completely!

It’s frustrating, but I love it!

So I have been hitting the driving range or Top O’ the Hill a lot.

In addition, one night I was really lucky and got to play a soccer match for Jason's flatmate's team, The Hustlers. That was so cool! I haven't played a real soccer match in years, so I was a bit nervous (in Posadas I did play a lot of soccer, but never a proper match). But it went well, we won 2-1 and I had a great time!

Although Canada is a big country, I have only seen a small part of it, but really liked what I have seen so far. In many ways it’s similar to Norway, same kind of trees, flowers and birds, but at the same time different, of course.

Jason also took me to his family’s cabin in Ma-Me-O beach by Pigeon Lake. That is another beautiful lake and the cabin is right on the beach (got to have sand between my toes again!)

The cabin has no water, so I had to go into the lake to have a “shower”. It was f-freeezing! (but hey, I’m a Viking, right??). We also played a lot of golf when we were there, and the cabin has its own little private “driving range”…

I also helped Jason trimming the trees and the hedge. Apart from that, I spent quite some time in the hammock…got to love a hammock. 

We had quite a bit of excitement one day, though, as there were a fire close by and helicopters filled their barrels (or whatever that thing is) with water from the lake.
They did it all day.

And that’s it! Time’s up. Five months of travelling is now over and I’m getting on the plane back to Norway tomorrow.

Thanks for reading my blog and for all the comments! Stay in touch!!!!!

Well, there is no secret that Argentina is known for steaks and wine. I had plenty of both and a lot of other local specialties as well. So this blog update is dedicated to the Argentinean food and drinks.

On my first night in Buenos Aires, I of course went out for a steak dinner and it was amazing – and huge! I got a plate with a fairly big steak with melted cheese on top, salad, chips and fried eggs on top of my chips. Now that’s a lot of food! And that was to be the standard size of the meals for the next four weeks…

The best steak I had was on the tango show in BA. I have never tasted a steak so good ever before. But that was also the most expensive meal I had on my whole trip, but the food with the wine and the show, it was worth it!

In addition to steak, there is another typical Argentinean dish called Milanese. It is breaded meat or chicken. I had a lot of that too and in general, there has been a lot of red meat and deep fried meat during the last few weeks. Towards the end I was craving chicken, rice and veggies!

The wine of course I got to taste quite a bit of, and although I know very little about wine, the wine, I drank some very nice ones (but idiot-me never wrote down a name and can’t remember any name…). Beer however, I do remember a name, Quilmes! Very nice beer. In Argentina, when you order a beer in a restaurant or in a bar they actually give you big bottle, almost a liter, in a ice bucket! Which is not what I’m used to! First time I experienced this I was having lunch with Lee from England after checking out the cemetery in BA. Lee didn’t order anything to drink and I ordered a beer thinking they would bring me a glass or a small bottle. The they came back with this huge bottle and poor Lee had to help me drink it (I don’t think he minded it too much though). Anyway, once I got used to the big size-bottles I kind of liked it. It is a very social way of having a beer with friends…in Norway you can't even order jugs...

Then it’s mate. Mate is a kind of herbal tea that Argentinean people drink A LOT of. They have a special cup that they fill with herbal leaves and add hot water. Mate is so important in every day-life of an Argeninean that they have to bring the cup and a thermos with hot water with them wherever they go.

I never became a big fan of mate, but didn’t mind it either. The first time I had mate, I did completely miss the social aspect of drinking it though…I was offered mate by my “sisters”, the girls I lived with. We were sitting on their porch drinking mate and talking. I took the cup with mate and drank it all myself, then I realized that you’re supposed to have a sip and pass the cup around…oh well…

Mate contains caffeine and is quite addictive, but mate did not become my serious addiction when I was in Argentina – Dulce de leche, on the other hand, did turn me into an addict!

It was heaven in a plastic box! Soooo good! Dulce de leche is a caramel spread that was just perfection! I put it on rolls, on banana (it tasted like banoffy-pie) or just ate it straight from the box.

Even though I played a lot of soccer when I was in Argentina, walked a lot or went jogging along the Costanero, I really felt that living healthy in Argentina was quite a challenge!

The last two weeks in Posadas was very nice. After the first week I was more comfortable in my role as a coach and really started to enjoy it towards the end.

On the third weekend, Larisa, Daly and I went to San Ignacio, a small town about an hour from Posadas, and checked out the ruins from the days of the Jesuits. They were very Beautiful.

That weekend new volunteers arrived and it was great to meet some new people. We went partying at Power, which is one of the biggest clubs in Argentina and has 12 different rooms. It was good fun!

I also spent some days at the beach, had lunch at the Costanero, and of course, Larisa and I made sure we never missed out on ladies night at Cristobal, where everything is half price for women, but only if they are without guys. That pretty much meant that if any of the volunteer-boys wanted to join us they had to sit at another table…

Heather (Australia), Larsa, Alex (England) and I went to Parguay one day. We pretty much just got on the bus, wnt over the bridge, got our passport stamped and hung out a few hours in a town called Encarnacion. It was an okay town, not much to see or do, but we had lunch there and checked out the markets before we returned.

And before I knew it, my time in Argentina was up. And I was heading north – no not home, but to Canada. I decided to take a detour and stop in Canada on my way home and spend to weeks in Sylvan Lake.

But let’s start with Posadas, where I’m doing my soccer project.
I have been here almost two weeks now, and it’s been great. Posadas is a small town that reminds me of Fredrikstad in Norway. It has a small city centre with shops and cafes, bars, restaurants and a cinema. It is situated by the river and along the river there is a nice area with more restaurants and a man made beach (it’s not very nice, but is at least somewhere I can go sun bathing. Haven’t tried swimming in the river yet and doubt that I will). Across the river, Rio Parana, you can see Paraguay...

The project is pretty interesting! I help coaching three teams, all with boys aged 7-14. The boys are all from very poor neighbourhoods, but they are great kids (although they do not always listen to me).
I find coaching quite hard, but challenging. I kind of like blowing my whistle and have the kids doing what I tell them to, and of course, I get to play soccer a lot, which is great!
I love how this one little kid who, when we’re playing, is standing by the opposite goal and shouts: “Mira! Mira!” He is probably about 7 years old, and hardly ever gets the ball, but still shouts...

I have also been to the other projects here. I have been to the refuge a couple of times and played with the kids there, and to Puma, an animal shelter, where I saw jaguars, puma, emus, gators, turtles and wild pigs. It was really cool!

Veronica, the coordinator, and her husband, Marcel are doing a brilliant job taking care of us volunteers. They hang out with us a lot on their spear time and are always available for us if there is anything we need.

My first week there were only two other volunteers, Larisa (Romania) and Daly (Ireland). Now Heather (Australia) and Massimo (England) has arrived and today, two more are coming. But Daly, Larissa and I have had a great time hanging out together. And this weekend we went to the Iguazu Falls.

We went Friday morning and arrived in the afternoon, booked into the Iguazu Hostel Inn and hung around there in the afternoon playing pool and ping pong. In the evening, the three of us, our roommate Charles (South Africa) and an Israel girl went out to dinner at a really nice restaurant. We went back to hostel to party (our room was next to the pool bar so there was little point in going to bed early...)

The next day we checked out the falls (with a tiny little hang over...) with Charlie and Andrew (Australia). The falls were just incredible!!
There were lots of giant falls and we walked around for hours to see them all. They were so amazing!

We also went on a boat ride to get a close encounter with a couple of the falls. The experience didn’t beat Pulhapanzak, but was still pretty cool (got wet and hangover gone).
However, we missed out on the Devil’s Throat, the biggest waterfall. We arrived 15 minutes late for the last train to take us there. Oh well, I was pretty satisfied with waterfalls by then anyway...

The Iguazu Falls is a nicely developed national park with lots of animals. However, we mainly saw racoons, some birds and butterflies. The racoons were pretty cute in the beginning and we took lots of photos of them. But I suppose they’re a bit too tamed. They would hang around the restaurants and jump up on the tables and eat people’s food. Not very nice, but good entertainment...

Around the waterfalls were lots of butterflies and one of them sat on my hand for a while. It was so beautiful!

There was a bbq and samba show at our hostel. The bbq was all you can eat, and really good and the samba show – well it was pretty fun. They gathered everyone to dance and I had to put away my NISSE-syndrome (Norwegian Inherited Stiffness Syndrome) and “shake it”. It was good fun though. Larisa, Daly, Charles, Charlie, Andrew and I spent the rest of the night playing drinking games, doing handstands (!) and dancing.

Sunday we relaxed by the pool in the morning and went for what was supposed to be an adventure tour in the afternoon that was supposed to include canopying, hiking and abseiling down a waterfall.
We sat off in an army vehicle turned tour bus with 20 other tourists and made our way into the wilderness.
The hiking was a 20 minute walk where we stopped every 10 meter to learn about a tree...

The canopying was pretty fun; I have never done it before, and enjoyed it (although I wish I could go faster). I loved “flying” through the treetops though.

Then there was abseiling down a waterfall. It could have been fun had we been allowed to control it ourselves, but we were pretty much just hanging on the rope attached to us while two guys managed us down. I got a shower from the waterfall though, but the abseiling I did in Australia was better.

Then it was back to Posadas. We arrived 2 am Monday morning was pretty tired.

This week, there has been raining a lot and the temperature has dropped dramatically the last few days (Monday it was 26 C, today it’s 12 C). The soccer was cancelled the first few days of this week, but is back on, and with the help from a new volunteer I’m looking forward to my last week before I head to Canada.

Okay, so I'm a bit over the Norwegian AND English updates, so from now on there will be updates only in English (I mainly think in English these days anyway...)

I stayed a few days in Puerto Viejo and nice little reggae-town on the Caribbean coast of Costa Rica. I didn't do much there aside from relaxing. Puerto Viejo reminded me a bit of Tamarindo with all the hostels, restaurants and bars, but had quite a Bob Marley-feel to it. Lots of Rastafarian-people and weed. It was a cool place.

However, the weather was not too good while I was there. It was cloudy every day (except for the day that I left) and one day it rained pretty much the whole day. Luckily I did get to spend some time on the beach which was pretty nice one although no surfable waves.

I met some cool people, like Liam (Ireland), Jason (the artist/poet from Manchester), Brad and Darren (surfers from San Fransisco) and some Finish and German girls that I can’t remember the names of....oh well...

The first night I stayed at Hotel Puerto Viejo, but didn't like it much so the next day I moved to Cabinas Yukas. I really liked the place (although it was not The Beach House). I stayed in a room with beach view, and the place had a porch with a hammock (very important). Jason, Brad, Darren and the Finish and German girls also stayed there and two nights in a row Jason cooked us really nice dinners.

I also met up with Rhianna in Puerto Viejo which was awesome! We got drunk together on guara shots one night and had a great time (miss you mate!)

One day I walked to a beach called Punta Uva with Jason and two Canadian girls (forgot their names as well!). It was quite a long walk, but definitely worth it! The beach was amazing. In general I really liked the beach in Puerto Viejo. Behind the beach there was a line of trees that really gave you the paradise-feeling and made the beaches seem more secluded. Also, some places, the trees were growing over the beach and the water. It was really nice!

After a few relaxing days I got on the bus to the airport and got on the plane to Buenos Aires! I stopped over in Lima on the way. The flights went well, although I was pretty sick of travelling when I arrived in BA (bus + two flights in 24 hours).

I arrived in Buenos Aires 4 am and made my way to my hostel, Hostel Suites Florida, which is situated on the main shopping street, Florida, in Buenos Aires (what a brilliant location!) Although check in wasn't until 2 pm I was able to borrow a bed in a room so I could get some sleep after my long journey, which I really needed ("good" films were shown on the plane so I didn't get to sleep much...)

Later that day I walked around in the shopping street, shopping. I needed a new pair of Hawaianas and a new pair of sneakers. One of my sneakers mysteriously disappeared in Puerto Viejo (maybe it walked away) so I needed a new pair, and really, Buenos Aires is a perfect place to go shoe shopping!

I also went on a bike tour to the southern part of the city. And I got to experience the friendliness of the people here. I arrived 20 min late for the bike tour and the group had left. Then one of the other bike guides took me to meet up with the rest of the group and gave me a bit of a private tour. He was really cool. A former circus artist who is going to Canada to try and make it as a contemporary dancer...

I met up with the group in Boca, the birthplace of tango. Also, the soccer club Bocas Juniors was the club Maradona played for when he was young. A very interesting place in other words. Boca is a really cool part of Buenos Aires. It used to be a harbor and people would paint their houses with left over painting from the boats that docked there. Therefore, the houses have lots of different colors and the main street Caminitos, has lots of street artists, tango dancers and souvenirs (and of course, lots of tourists)

I really liked Boca though, despite the touristy part. Everywhere people tried to get me to go to their restaurant to eat, but it was quite funny when one of the "bouncers" turned out to be a huge fan of the Norwegian black metal band Dimmuborgir. He was wearing a Dimmuborgir shirt, black boots, had long hair and tattoos. He showed me Norwegian coins and was soooo excited to talk to a Norwegian (who by the way does not listen to Dimmuborgir). I didn't eat at his restaurant.

A few days later I came back to Bocas with Jordan (Canada) and Miguel (France). We sat down to have a meal and watched a tango show, and Jordan and I challenged each other to do a super fast tango lesson. It was pretty fun, but also embarrassing as we did it in front of lots of tourists eating or passing by...

But back to the bike tour, I also saw the ecological park, rio Plate (a brown, polluted river) Puerto Madera and Plaza 25 de Mayo with the Pink House where Evita once made her speeches to the Argentinean people. It was a nice tour and the guide was pretty cool, although it was a bit scary riding the bike through the traffic, which is pretty crazy in BA. But I only hit one car...

I also visited the famous cemetery, where Evita's grave is. I went there with Lee (England). The neighborhood, where the cemetery is, is almost just as much worth visiting. It's a really nice area, lots of tall, nice looking buildings, but it's not claustrophobic, and lots of parks. It's one of the most expensive areas in BA.

But the cemetery was nice too. It's where all the rich and powerful are buried, well actually, they're not buried there...the cemetery consist of small mausoleums, little chapels, and the coffin is placed inside with flower, pictures, candles and other things (in one there was a photo of the family of the dead - and the dog!) It was an amazing cemetery, but I also found it a bit creepy. I guess I prefer people being buried (6 feet, get them out of my sight )

The same night I went to a concert with the Israeli girls in my doorm. It was a drum-band called La Bomba de Tiempo. I have never been to a concert like this, but it was really good!!! I had a great time.

Speaking of drums, one day, when I was walking the streets of BA, I started talking to this guy, Andres, from Uruguay, and we walked around together. We suddenly heard drums and he took me to a back alley where the drums came from and watched a drum-band go by. They were from Uruguay, something I would never have known had I not been hanging out with a guy from Uruguay. Lucky me.

One day I went to Palermo, another very nice area of BA where there is an amazing park. It was so beautiful and quiet and had the biggest rose garden I have ever seen! I walked around there for a while, and then went to the Evita museum.

The museum was quite hard to find and I had to ask for directions at another museum. There was a lady there that lives close to the museum I was trying to find and she ended up walking me there. She is an artist (but used to work in IT) and was really nice and interesting (people in BA are so nice and helpful!)

That night I went to a tango show! I got a bit tango-crazy since there are people dancing tango in the streets and you hear tango music pretty much everywhere (were there are tourists at least). The show was really good. It included a nice dinner as well (the best steak I've had so far) and I shared a table with a nice couple from Hawaii. I had splurged on the most expensive option and for a while I was worried that I'd be the only one under 50 years old, eating dinner and watching the show, but more young people showed up, luckily.

The show was amazing. I saw some real good tango, and there was a good band playing and good singers. Halfway through the show there was a part with more traditional dancing from Argentina, which was also pretty good and there was a grand finale with "Don't cry for me Argentina" and the Argentinean flag. It was good!

Inspired by the show I decided to do a tango lesson the following night. The lesson included wine tasting, a dinner and a visit to a milonga, a night club for tango dancing.

The lesson was at the lobby of my hostel and it was a bit embarrassing trying to dance tango in front of the people I would have breakfast with in the morning. But I learned the basics of tango which was fun and I met Andy, a very funny guy from England. We struggled through the tango together and got the hang of it after a while.

The milonga was pretty cool. There was a live band playing and people of all ages were dancing tango. They also played some traditional music and it was fun to see the whole dance floor being filled with people dancing this traditional dance.

But the milonga was also a bit intimidating. The way the guys ask girls to dance is very unusual for a Norwegian who is really bad at dancing...the guy looks at the girl and tries to make eye contact. Then he does did little nod, and if the girl wants to dance with him, she nods back. If not, she looks away...scary!

In the end, Andy talked me into doing some tango moves in a dark corner. It was a fun night!

Then I had to get on the bus to Posadas, up north, to start working on my project as a soccer coach. I got on an overnight bus that was a real good bus experience. The seats could recline far back, almost like beds, and we were served dinner and breakfast and received blanket and a pillow. It was like being on the first class on a plane (not that I've ever done it...)

In Posadas I met up with the i-to-i-people, and I'm spending the days trying to be some kind of a coach. It's very hard and challenging. But good.