After 2 bus rides, a taxi, another bus ride, followed by another taxi, then another bus ride followed by a flight, then, a long wait in an airport then another flight followed by another taxi Kate and I found ourselves in Morocco, and what a pleasent surprise it is. Even the endlessly annoying touts have been a breath of fresh air after South America.
The Moroccans really put the Spanish to shame. Their architecture, style and design really bring home the uncreativeness of the Spanish. Considering the Spanish had 300 years of Moorish influence there really is no excuse. In Morocco where there is beautiffuly carved wooden doors and wonderful ceramic tiles, in Latin America there is a plastic chair and the ubiquitous plaza de armas.
It's the third time for me here and seems to be a lot more relaxed than other visits. Progressive new king Mohammed has done away with daddy's harem and introduced a whole host of reforms including the penalty of jail for any touts who harass tourists too much. The result is a comparitively peaceful walk through the Bazaar.
We flew into Marrakech, and the centre piece of the city is the Djenna El Fna which is a huge square filled with every kind of busker possible. (with the exception thank god of any human statues). Snake charmers, storytellers, acrobats, musicians, monkey handlers, witchdoctors, dentists, tourists and the occasional woman.
It all makes for a very noisy concoction of Moroccan mayhem. They also set up rows of delicious foodstalls with fried eggplant, kebabs, tajine and mint tea. After the Americas, the food here is to die for.
After a couple of days in Marrakech, Fatima and I headed off to the Atlas mountains for a little camel safari and more. Firstly we headed out to Ouzzazarte ( pronounced wazzazarty) scene of some scenes from Gladiator, Lawrence of Arabia amongst others
Most of the buildings out here are made of mud brick in the shape of a Casbah which means fortress. Our group did inded Rock the Casbah and consisted of a couple of Italians, Singaporeans, Americans, and a Canadian
The highlight was camel riding in the sahara up near the Algerian border at a place called Merzouga. We slept in tents banged some drums and counted shooting stars whilst drinking berber whiskey (mint tea). Life isn' t too bad at the moment
After the tour we set off for Essaouira a laid back Morrocan ex hippy town on the coast. Jimi Hendrix wrote Castles in the sand here and one can hear the ubiquitous whisper of hashish upon strolling the narow alleyways. We've got ourselves a little apartment and are taking some R and R before our flight to London on Saturday, probably loaded up with way too many Morrocan handicrafts. Bring it on Mustapha
Hop in a taxi in Bangkok and ask to go somewhere and you'll probably be laughed at. First of all thai is a tonal language and all attempts at mentioning the name of your destination to different pitches is enough to cause an international incident. Should you manage to actually make your intended destination clear the reply will usually be a No way man, are you crazy . The traffic is so bad that to get virtually anywhere will take at least an hour. Even down the road. Worse still that to avoid an unscheduled visit to the jewellers, tailors or massage parlour is virtually impossible. Sometimes the tuk tuk drivers don't even listen to your intended destination and just take you straight to the places where they get commission. The prize quote was when one tuk tuk driver offered the philosophy You like bangkok...then you like traffic jam man. The pollution here is absolutely shocking as well. We spent 70 minutes on a tuk tuk and both came down with sore throats and really bad headaches. Such a pity about the traffic here as it's such an interesting city. I especially like some of the food available below on khao san Road
It's great to be back in Asia though. We are now in Thong nai Pan beach on the Island of Kho Pang Ghang and after all our travel recently it's great to stop and chill out. In the last month we have travelled in 6 countries with 27 hours on planes, 2 hours on trains and 83 hours on buses(not mentioning those bangkok taxi rides again). Yes the body is starting to take on the appearance of a seat. Lucky they have Thai massage here but unlucky that theres a typhoon heading in our general direction and that it's been overcast on all the Thai beaches in the last 3 days. Also unlucky is that half of essex, blackpool and hull have discovered Thailand. Theres nothing more common than a common pom is what Kate's mum says and must admit starting to believe her. At least we're nowhere near the tsunami coastline. So hopefully Xmas and new years eve here in our very relaxed bungalow will be a real treat. But after last night when we complained to the woman in the bungalow next door with her 2 year old baby knocking back beers and shouting her discusting mouth to quiet down her reply was What ...this is Koh fucken Phang gang... was tempted to tell her pink and purple streaks on a 45 year old is not a good look but refrained. Should be interesting... oh well paradise wouldn't be paradise without a war with the neighbours. Merry Xmas everyone!!!
Our hosts were Emma and Dan and their baby daughter Winston Churchill who was permananetly outraged at us being there and gave quite a few emotive speeches about the fact. Emma was actually the person responsible for introducing Kate and myself and she spent the entire three days telling every passerby who would listen. 
It was great to catch up with them and all the old pals from London including Matt on the Monday night who you may recognise as have acted alongside Christopher Walken in that Famous Italian flick I was once was a drunk teenage sailor. We had a great catch up at Gordons Wine Bar in Embankment which is quite a bit like the Bastille in Paris only so smoky that you have to throw out all your clothes afterwards. 
Our whirlwind London 3 day tour also included the Xmas lights of Regent street which have been monopolised from some dinosaurs from the Ice Age and also an insight into 22nd century retailing at the Apple Store. Yes for a nightclub come futuristic shopping experience like none other take a look if you're passing through. ( not for those not suffering from Attention Deficit Disorder I might add). Other than being dark by 3.30 pm, extremely crowded and fairly cold there is nothing else to add about old blighty. ( except it's still bloody expensive...our fare from the airport to Emma and Dan's and the cheapest available transport at that time of night cost 55 quid or 130 Australian dollars or 11,357 yen but whose counting)
It's a stage of every busker come street hustler imaginable, in the morning they float in, lay down their wares and start hustling for money, of course tourists are the number one target but this is also a square for locals no doubt about it. The daytime is the domain of the snake charmer, the henna ladies, the orange juice sellers, the street dentists, the bellydancers, the fortune tellers and the witchdoctors. Come mid afternoon and the square starts to liven up with an acrobat troupe from the North of Morocco, a storyteller as old as his stories and the tribal dancers. There are people singing, banging drums, hawking magical cures, juggling fire or simply asking for a spare dirham. As darkness sets and the Muezzin calls his faithful, the food stalls set up selling everything from Goats head soup to boiled snails to pigeon pastillas. 
Always there are the colourful water sellers, the tea stalls, and the nut stalls all shouting out to the passing tourist "what country you from," hey Kangaroo" Mr Fish and chips" " hola" "oregato". Any Moroccan who doesn't have at least 5 languages here really doesnt cut it. A man darts in front of you with a whispered hashish, an old lady pushes her granddaughter in front of you pleading for a spare dirham, and a cat manages to steal a chicken wing much to the dismay of the matriarch running the food stall. 
It really is a magical place and the action goes on well past midnight as the songs, stories, music continue before it slowly dies down and becomes the haunt of well groomed young men looking for some action. Everyone enjoys the square and it has become the centre of Marrakech life. Thank Allah that they didn't turn it into a car park in the 70's. The world would have been a much poorer place. 
The Moroccans really put the Spanish to shame. Their architecture, style and design really bring home the uncreativeness of the Spanish. Considering the Spanish had 300 years of Moorish influence there really is no excuse. In Morocco where there is beautiffuly carved wooden doors and wonderful ceramic tiles, in Latin America there is a plastic chair and the ubiquitous plaza de armas. 
It's the third time for me here and seems to be a lot more relaxed than other visits. Progressive new king Mohammed has done away with daddy's harem and introduced a whole host of reforms including the penalty of jail for any touts who harass tourists too much. The result is a comparitively peaceful walk through the Bazaar.
We flew into Marrakech, and the centre piece of the city is the Djenna El Fna which is a huge square filled with every kind of busker possible. (with the exception thank god of any human statues). Snake charmers, storytellers, acrobats, musicians, monkey handlers, witchdoctors, dentists, tourists and the occasional woman. 
It all makes for a very noisy concoction of Moroccan mayhem. They also set up rows of delicious foodstalls with fried eggplant, kebabs, tajine and mint tea. After the Americas, the food here is to die for. 
After a couple of days in Marrakech, Fatima and I headed off to the Atlas mountains for a little camel safari and more. Firstly we headed out to Ouzzazarte ( pronounced wazzazarty) scene of some scenes from Gladiator, Lawrence of Arabia amongst others
Most of the buildings out here are made of mud brick in the shape of a Casbah which means fortress. Our group did inded Rock the Casbah and consisted of a couple of Italians, Singaporeans, Americans, and a Canadian
The highlight was camel riding in the sahara up near the Algerian border at a place called Merzouga. We slept in tents banged some drums and counted shooting stars whilst drinking berber whiskey (mint tea). Life isn' t too bad at the moment
3.Machu Pichu, Peru Yes it´s as good as everyone says 
7. Cadmalca, Peru Building a stove for a Peruvian family was a great experience and got us to an area of Peru few tourists visit
9)Iguassu Falls Brazil truly spectacular sight and better than Victoria Falls in my opinion 
10) La Paz A crazy Bolivian city at very high altitude and with dried llama foetus for sale, it´s unlike any other city I´ve ever been to 
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4) Easter Island , Chile. Attacked by a territorial hawk whilst cycling on the Island. The bird came for me three times and the final assault felt like someone slamming a phone book on my head.
6) Cadmalca Peru teaching the local Primary schoolchildren English in very bad Spanish 
7) Galapagos Islands, Ecuador Walking around on an Island where the possibility of stepping on an Albatross or 10 was very real indeed
10)Ollytaytambo, Peru. Grabbed by a drunken Grandmother and forced to dance for half an hour unable to leave a very bizarre drinking den 
4) Bolivian Buses. Can somebody tell me why all the buses in Bolivia leave at 7.30 at night and arrive at their destination at 3.30 in the morning so you can spend the wee morning hours cold, hungry looking for a hotel that´s open in a dangerous part of town.
10) 80`s music. Laura Brannigan, Dire straits and Phil collins well and truly live here in South America. Ask someone about English rock and they´ll reply with I love Elton John, ask about Australian music and it´s all about Air Supply. Not that there´s anything wrong with Air Supply...in fact I have a new appreciation of their music. 
So what to say about billions of tonnes of water pouring out of every nook and cranny you can shake a camera at. For us the highlight was a boat trip into the falls themselves which resulted in us getting completely soaked and having extreme difficulty breathing whilst being underneath the aforementioned billions of gallons. Lots of woo hoos and yeeee haaas made for one of the most fun days to be had. 
The days comedy moment came after I purchased a packet of chips(crisps to you English geezers) but was unfortunately spotted by a coati (pronounced koarrrteee). Coatis for you non South American Mammal afficionados are an extremely annoying and quite dangerous racoon rat like animal that I loathe. They have an extremely large mouth and even larger teeth that are usually scrounging for food 24 hours a day. So, just after a very hungry Ed purchased his crisps he found himself being chased by not one but 4 of these little buggers. No amount of yelling, sidestepping, cursing or attempting to make myself look bigger did anything to deter the little buggers. So to the soundtrack of Kates hysterical laughter I succumbed and threw my packet of crisps to the devils. I hate them... But revenge was mine when later I found one of them robbing tourists of their sandwiches in the canteen and armed with my latest weapon ( a birkenstock) I chased the little bastard halfway down the falls. Brothers in arms unite..death to all Coatis. 
So here we are in Iguassu, Brazil and unfortunately our latin American world has caved in on it´s head. Suddenly we´re forced to say Obrigado instead of Gracias. Brazil is a whole different world. 160 million people... more than all the other South American countries put togethor. The country is bigger than Europe, there are more murders here than in South Africa, and it takes a long time to get anywhere. 85% of the worlds portugese speakers also live here... so there. It´s also expensive and especially so during Xmas and new year. In Rio they are asking 50 dollars US a night in an 8 bed dorm. So we have decided to say Vamos to Brazil ( or whatever the portugese equivalent is and hello Morocco and Thailand Via London. Yep tomorrow we hop on a bus to Sao Paolo( God help us) then fly to Marrakech for some mint tea and how much for the carpet. 10 days later we fly to London for 3 days for a bit of Christ it´s cold here followed by a flight to Thailand and show us where the cheap cabana on the beach with the hammock is please. Can´t wait. 
One of the most popular things to do in Buenos Aires is visit Tierra Santa, a religious based themepark right next to runway 2 of the domestic airport. 
This place has got intelligent design written all over it. Here you can experience "the biggest animated nativity of the world". From the "incredibly real Jesus sitting at his table with his 12 apostles to enjoy the last supper" to the "impressive 18 metre high Jesus Christ with 36 mechanical movements¨. The latter, being a monument to the resurrection, which one can see re-enacted every 20 minutes. 
To an enigma like soundtrack our Christ rises from the hill to the rapturous applause of everyone below
There´s the wailing wall, the museum of religiousness, the muppets house, even a mosque. Throw in a few Romans, a couple of Virgin mary´s, Mother Theresa and you´ve got yourself a tourist site like no other. ( well this side of the Dead sea anyway).
You can even buy beers, chat to some pharisees, suck on a date palm, and watch some quality belly dancing in one of the many live shows. ( her navel was of course covered up). 
This place is seriously popular as well, the buses were lining up outside with camera toting tourists ready to feast on felafel and or wander down craftsmen way for the chance to purchase an ornamental Jesus park urn. We all felt like we were in an episode of the Flintstones and have to say that I hope no one in the hills district of Sydney catches on to whats going down over here