Days 1-6, here Hours chugging along slowly in the Volkswagen, piled on top of each other as the monotonous desert roads slide past the windows. Long pauses to cool a rapidly overheating motor. Hours more broken down and waiting in the drugging heat for the local mechanic of a dusty anonymous town to appear from [...]
In Atacames, in northern Ecuador, I swapped my Argentine copilots for a Colombian band. I waved Ari, Ale, and Diego on their way Colombia-ward, and from that day on had the van full of tambores and the cheerful Carribbean rhythms of cumbia. We took the roof off, the sun shone down on us, and the [...]
Montañita Take several surfers, a bundle of slow-travelling South American musicians and artisans, mix in a heavy dose of rum and a little sex, sun and sand. Pour it all out by the side of a beautiful Ecuadorian beach and you’ve got something that looks a lot like Montañita. I spent a lot of time [...]
#ColombiaOrBust didn’t go exactly as planned: I made it to within a few hours drive of the Colombian border with Ecuador and regretfully turned back, leaving my Argentine ches, Diego, Alejandro and Ari, to head on without me while I began the long haul back to Cusco in time to meet Mum when she arrives on [...]
“Bad news, guys. The engine’s doing that thing again.” It’s 4:30 am in the morning and we’re at a service station in a place called Huacho, somewhere between Lima and Trujillo. This is not news we want to hear. The five of us plus dog that are heaped on top of each other in the [...]
