No new photos...

From thew moment i landed in Lima, i hated it. Im not a bit city person at the best of times, but Lima especially i didnt like. I never wanted to go back there, unless i absolutely had too. One of my good mates Jazz flew down from Mexico - to Lima. So naturally i went there to meet her. I still didnt like Lima. One day we were searching for a random market, and walked down some wrong streets. We got mugged twice, in 5 minutes. Not that i needed another reason to dislike Lima, but i had two more in a very short space of time. It was a very surreal experience, all happened in slow motion( like they always say) we were walking along and then noticed 5 teenagers walking quite close behind us...im thinking this isnt great. Then all of a sudden i felt this hand slam into my right pocket and another one fumbling for my left. They werent overly strong and i was able to kind of push them off and of fend them away, but with 5 pairs of hands against one, they eventually grabbed my camera(which was looped around my belt) and were able to snap the strap off and then they darted over the highway and out of sight. Dang! thought that strap was a bit stronger...very weird experience...other then shoving them away-kind of like an NFL defensive linesmen- i didnt fight back very severely. I know i can kick pretty hard, and i guess i could punch pretty hard as well...and i remember thinking i should just smash this guy in the head, but i didnt. And im still not sure why...surely you have the right to fight back if you are attacked...Another group came back to try again, managed to fend them off much better, but still lost my vans adventure hat. At the end of the day neither of us got hurt and thats the main thing... so sorry guys, all those photos that i promised...wont be ending up here. But if you scout thru a few pawn shops in Lima you might just find a 4gb memory card with a few of andys snaps on it...

fear not, i have replaced my camera with an old school film camera i got from a flea market, cost me 85cents...maybe dont hold your breath for photos from that either...

So ive been travelling with Jasmine for almost a month, having some great times, went north of lima to huaraz, and then have come south, the inland route and hardly seen any gringos. ACE! had some great bus rides one of the best was 137km and we did it in a tick under 8 hours (work that out folks, thats less than 20km/h ) we were sitting in the luggage section and the road was rough dirt the whole way. kind of like having a jackhammer as suspension. The whole way. There were a few corners that were a bit sharp for the bus, so old mate had to do a 3 or 5 point turn to make it around. One corner he had the nose hanging over a 50m cliff and he had to get a passenger to run out and put rocks under the front tires to prevent any rolling over that cliff while he attempted to reverse back. Once we even had to all get off the bus while the driver negotiated a massive ditch, with rock wall one side and cliff the otherside. We have spent almost 100hours on these types of busses and roads...so far, we still have a week to go.

Stayed in some great places, including a concrete garden shed ( hospedaje) at a bus station. No shower, no toilet (included a candle) and a nail and piece of wire as the lock. Nice. cant expect too much for $1.65 a night. It was actually Jasmines birthday that night, lucky i organised the penthouse suite. (hey, at least we had a candle for light)

Travelled south down through Satipo, Cuzco, Lake Titicaca and are now in La Paz Bolivia. Went to the Uros Islands at Titicaca, they are islands made of reeds and they just float around, about and hour off the coast. I heard there was an SDA church there as well (it floats) but our boat didnt stop at that island, so we hired this dude sitting there to row us in his little boat over there, it was great we got in front of the congregation and said g"day to them all on behalf of the SDAs in Australia, they loved it, and so did we. Great experience. Fell in the water both times, trying to get in and out of old mates little boat...

Tried teaching Jasmine to ride a motorbike in Satipo. She was doing great, until we got the wobbles and almost went off a 15m cliff into the river. luckily there was a mound of dirt we got stuck on and were able to see-saw on long enough to get under control and not end up having to buy old mate a new bike.

Now in La Paz, Bolivia. About 4 weeks ago they were on the brink of a civil war, but i think the situation has calmed down a bit since then - at least it looks like it has. Althought yesterday they was a peacefully demonstration march down the main street. about 100,000 maybe even more, im not joking. But it has been peaceful. Its a cool city here. Ill show you photos one day, but youll have to come round to see them.

Anyways rough plan is to drop Jasmine off back in Lima next wednesday (she flies out, im not just leaving her...) then surf up the coast to eucador / columbia and chill out for a while. Thats the plan, we´ll see how i go. heaps more cool stuff has happened but im tried of typing ill tell you later. hope this note find you well. take it easy kids. andy