Los Angeles - Lost angles

Los Angeles (USA)
18 FEB - 22 FEB 2011

I'd been to Los Angeles twice before, once when I was five years old and the second time when I was 16. I hadn't enjoyed Los Angeles as a city on the last occasion, I found it to be particularly decentralized and in my mind it had nothing particularly appealing about it other than cheap manufactured amusement and entertainment. It had a ‘run down’ sense about, kind of haggard, particularly dirty and if you didn’t have yourself a car then ‘best of luck’ in trying to make your way around the city. I thought all this to myself as we drove into West Hollywood from the airport. This however was Jets first time in the USA and therefore it was also his LA debut. With all my impressions tainted by two earlier experiences I couldn't very well go and spoil the surprise for him by telling him exactly what I thought, could I? Don't worry, I was cool about it, I didn't but damn did I want to!

Staying on Melrose Ave in West Hollywood we appeared to be quite central to all things Hollywood related and also therefore the nightlife and night moves of the Sunset strip. Leaving ourselves to recover a few hours from the harrowing experience of 'when babies attack' aboard flight VA008 from Sydney, we ventured out into the early evening streets of LA in order to see what it had to offer. What you notice almost immediately whilst in this urban wasteland is the proliferation of cars and the distinct lack of pedestrian traffic. What we also noticed is that LA had decided quite uncharacteristically to put some kindly weather on for the Sydney boys and with Frichot being his usual Aquarian self, he saw it in his best interests not to pack a jumper or jacket for a Winter sojourn through North America. Sometimes I wonder as to how Aquarians make there way through life, well, that's until I notice that somehow they always manage to land on their feet and therefore for me, being a Cancerian, sometimes I just need to cope with the fine tuned art of ‘chillin’

Our first port of call in this town of angels was Pink's diner. It is one of the favourite places for the LA connoisseur of all things ‘midnight delight’ and hot dog related. On first viewing their menu looked epic! Any combination you could think of was either thrown onto a bun or wrapped in a tortilla with either one, two or three hot dogs piled high with ingredients such as chili, bacon, chicken or pork and lathered in liquidised Monterrey cheese, guacamole, sour cream, ketchup, mustard or any numbers of sauces. The end result of this cardiac arrest in waiting is a meal of monolithic proportions that resembled a car crash of competing ingredients. To tell you the truth, on first sighting the results looked evily fiendish, the exact way that you'd want to commence your culinary journey through the gastronomic delights of LA. Cutting a swathe through the food explosion on the plate was interesting, fluorescent colours startled the eyes, strange mixes of condiments confused the taste buds and the residence that the completed dog occupied in our bowels stayed with us for at least several days post the apocalyptic event. Still, it was an LA experience to be had and in a certain way savoured. If this type of food was to be the way of the future, on this trip at least, then I'd better make the most of throwing myself in at the deep and getting use to it.

Pink's Diner - West Hollywood - Los Angeles - U.S.A

Your food comes with a bill from the cardiologist

Melrose Ave - Los Angeles - a 'Love shop', obviously!

As our first evening in LA moved on we made our way down to Sunset strip in order to check out the LA scene. The Strip is home to such places as the Viper room, The Roxy, Whiskey a go-go, the Ruby bar and the Rainbow bar. Jet had decided that for this evening we'd set up camp at the Rainbow bar, I guess for the off chance the lead singer from Motorhead would make an appearance, not as far fetched as it sounds either as apparently he is known to frequent to place quite regularly. So as always we did what comes naturally to us, we found ourselves a place at one of the three bars in the establishment and started drinking. As a place or a venue to hang out on a Friday evening I guess the Rainbow is OK. In that sense it’s got to be said that I'm a little different from the way Jet operates. He can pull up to a bar anywhere and strike up a conversation with most anyone within a matter of a few minutes, I on the other hands don't mind my own company and could easily sit down the end of a bar holding up and end for hours, probably not a bar like the Rainbow, it would probably need to be some place that had a pretty decent cocktail list, mood lighting and some a sweet lounge groove, but hey, you get my point. In any case, within no time at all we were chatting with people from Sweden, from states all over the USA and even the odd person that was born and bred in good 'ole LA. You see, now that's the way Jet always ends up saving my arse. Whilst I can't strike up a conversation to save my life when I'm eventually drawn into one I can usually maintain it and more often than not feel better for the chat. For quite a few hours we actually had a pretty good time with our new 'LA crew' until all of a sudden a blinding flash went off in the house, the likes of which I'd never seen before. Jet and I looked at each other and then checked the time, 1:30am! What the hell was going on? Was this some kind of drug bust or something? Apparently not! As we were quickly advised by our fellow cohorts, LA has a 1:30am cut-off for all alcohol service. The deal is that last drinks are called just before 1:30am and then you're meant to be out the door come 2am. The reason we were given for this, or rather the reason that the State of California has provided for this as direct result of the number of drink-driving accidents/fatalities that the city has had to endure in previous years. Nobody actually knows the statistics on whether or not this early morning close down has actually changed the result significantly but knowing that LA is distinctly a driving town it obviously put rhyme behind the reason of such a law. To powers of observation and deduction all this really meant was that people would be coerced into drink faster and in turn would be out on the roads at the same time in order to cause more accidents, although there's no data to support that hypothesis either.

Frichot with his Rainbow crew - Rainbow bar - Sunset Strip - LA

On the strip

Being escorted out of the Rainbow bar by a somewhat forceful security presence, Jet had his first encounter with a star of note, well, depending on what movies you're into. Apparently Ron Jeremy and his 16 inch none too insignificant buddy were in the house enjoying drinks and for a brief moment Jet passed his gaze the two locked eyes. I'm glad that it's all that they did. In any case as we busted out of the Rainbow we headed south down Sunset strip in order to see what else was on, which ended up not being too much. We did stop in a place called Mel's diner for a while and made our way through a healthy meal of chicken wings and fish & chips, just the treat for anyone that's moderately health conscious. Rolling in on the back of the deathly dogs from Pinks this was going to be just the thing to rid ourselves from the evil excesses from LA.

[Mels diner, the prelude]


[What to do in a LA cab at 3am]

Mels, what more needs to be added?

When Frichot starts pulling his wing chun moves on the street its time to...go to a strip joint...

Not that the evil excesses really stopped with food consumption, oh no, LA wouldn't justify itself with such a tag if only food was involved. Delving back into our memories from earlier that evening Jet had made it well known that at some point he'd be wanting to take on an LA strip club. As I said to him at the time and as I've said to many people, I don't know why but for some reason strip clubs just aren't my thing, there's really nothing appealing about them to me. On this occasion I admit however as to putting the idea to Jet for two reasons, one was to get out of the cold as it was damn freezing at 3am and the second was in order to let our first night in LA roll on, how can you justify a 3am curtain call on your first night? So we went and as predicted I had an average time but Jet seemed to enjoy himself, which considering the fact that this is his trip, it was alright with me.

Sometime close to 5am we arrived back at the Orbit hostel and crashed out, night one in LA both run and won with fairly reasonable results. When you're traveling however you can't rest on your laurels and really you only end up being as good as your last night out (insert cliche here), our lost angles just meant that it was going to be 'go time' again tomorrow.

[Johnny Rockets - LA. The ultimate in 'healthy living']


Sign says, stay away fools…

Cities can be amusing places huh. There's movement, weirdness, loneliness amongst vast oceans of people and there's also city icons. An icon, be it cultural or architectural says something specific about a place and whether it's good or bad at least it gives a city its trademark. In LA of course it's the Hollywood sign and somehow like two hopeless moths to a flame Frichot and I were drawn to 'the' representative sign of a city that specialises in take-away fantasy. I'm not sure when it was in our walk from Melrose to the Hollywood hills that we decided to actually make a visit to 'the sign' but all that I know was that our search for a better photo of this icon just drew us closer, and closer, so much so that our little walk ended into an epic 7-8km hike up into the Hollywood hills from our starting point in West Hollywood. Not that we didn't feel a little better for the exercises as our previous evenings excesses needed to be walked off somehow but when the rain started pelting down during the course of the walk neon signs starting flashing all around us, 'Bad idea boys - Bad idea boys'. A bemused local actually stopped to chat with us just as we reached our goal, although she stayed in the confines of her warm, dry vehicle. I could just see that look on her face and what it was spelling it, 'Bloody Australians, they really are a nation of idiots!'. Why yes ma am, yes we are.
 
 

We weren't even halfway there at this stage!

OK, 'Hollywood sign', check - now lets go home!

 
Universally appealing
 
The last couple of days of our LA sojourn were spent at at theme parks. The first being at Six Flags - Magic Mountain, where the 'all you could eat' roller coaster fest was just what I needed to get my adrenalin going again. Unfortunately my partner in crime is a little soft when it comes to roller coasters and he took a knee on this day, but really, what is there to fear that seems to be inherently present in attacking such fearsome tracks of doom as The Viper - [The Viper, up close and personal] , Rolling Thunder, Superman: 'The Ultimate Flight' or Bugaboo (OK, so that last one is soft). The only disconcerting part of the day was the endless well wishes and requests to have a 'Six Flag day'. I mean seriously, what kind of mental person came up with the concept such an irritating tag line that had to accompany every single transaction? Buy a drink, get some change and then get given a 'Thankyou sir, and have a Six Flag Day'. What the hell does that even mean? Have you run out of toilet paper in the bathroom sir? 'Here's 10 more rolls, and have a Six Flag Day'. Is there a superior type of etiquette or protocol that should accompany the Six Flag Day? Are these people suggesting that I should strive to reach the pinnacle of human existence by aspiring to have myself a day of six flags, is that what we should all be aspiring to?
 
 

Again, one of those photos that speaks for itself - Six Flags amusement park - Los Angeles - U.S.A

 
The dilemma of the ethically and morally perplexing questions posed by the Six Flag staff still haunted me the next day at Universal Studios. Thankfully for Frichot this was more of the scene that he was use to and I think this was his favourite day whilst in LA. I did manage to slyly get him onto a couple of roller coaster style rides, the result of which had him screaming like a little girl. That made my day!
 
 

Universal Studios - Los Angeles

A Pharoah like this would have scared the shit out of me!

 
[Universal studios - The Haunted House]
 
 

 
Thankfully our few days in Los Angeles ended quickly enough. Point blank, I have never been a fan of Los Angeles and it did nothing to win me over on this occasion either. Thankfully our next stop was going to be Las Vegas, a playground for the big boys, playas, wannabes and of course, The Frelisher show!

Sydney - The art of doing

Sydney (Australia)
18 FEB 2011

Staring off into the never ending possibilities of another excursion, this time to North America, both Jet and I had decided that our last night in Sydney should be spent investigating the bottom of beer glasses until the sun rose on our date of escape. Projecting fun and good times
forward in that inevitable fashion that derives purely from optimism and a dash of all things macho we aimed up at 'clocking' the game in (Donkey Kong) speak and attempted to make it to the Virgin Australia check-in counter without a flayling eyelid or half a snore sounded. That was the plan.


Commencing at the Courthouse on Oxford St somewhere around 7:30pm we meandered through the streets of casual conversation for several hours as actual and virtual friends docked for a casual ale in aid of our all night vigil. Playing a tight game in the first few hours of drinking both Jet and I were pacing our run to the finish line which would inevitably be bathed in the glorious light of a fine Friday morning. As we outgrew our stay at our first place of residence, the Courthouse, we found that most accomplices had dropped off for the evening, this being a school night and all. However Janelle, our master and spiritual guide in all things spirit related was however in full support of our endeavours and offered suitable encouragement as we strolled down Oxford St in Friday's early hours. As the lights of the Nevada bar beemed a neon haze metres and metres from its actual point of entrance in a weird type of premomition of what we would encounter hitting the lights of Vegas as it arose out of the Mojave, we were drawn into its eerie, seedy clutches.


It's usually at places such as the Nevada bar that time loses its meaning and your only point of reference as to the duration of your stay is counting the number and type of drinks you believe you consumed. It's an odd game to play but somehow it makes more sense than actually deducing whether the minute hand is actually 15 mins away from 12 and whether the hour hand is laying somewhere between 2 and 5. Drinks were concocted, drinks were mixed and I'm sure a lot of numbers were dialled by yours truly on JJ's phone for reasons still unbeknownst to me. It's the second time that I've felt compelled to steal JJ's phone and drunk dial both her friends and members of family in the early hours just out of sheer enjoyment. For some reason the recipients of the calls don't find the deal as amusing as I inevitably do at the time, go figure!?


At somewhere over the 4am mark there were many facets of our initial 'magnificent' intentions that had caught up with our optimism and we were all of a sudden stomped out of our bliss with size 15 forms of the new craze in town, 'reality'. Sleep deprivation was riding hot on the heels of solid inebriation and only short distance behind a alcohol induced grease request that was being demanded from our stomach via a brain that was in it's very own world of struggle.I always find it incredible how the stomach can outrank the brain in terms of decision making in those situations. It's always as of the brain says, 'Hey dude, you make the call, I'm totally spaced out and wasted at this moment to really care what we, as a team, are going to consume'. With a Hungry Jacks  stay under our belts and a bed beckoning us into its fold, Jet, JJ and myself made our way to JJ's safe haven of eternal peace and rest. The need for sleep had beaten our game plan of awaiting the Friday sun.


Evil, evil, evil alcohol. Why does it sneak up on you in those early morning hours? What did I ever do to hurt it? We play games sometimes, we enjoy each others company and then all of a sudden it feels the need to smack you over the head six times with a baseball bat when you least expect it. That 9:30am alarm was about as entertaining as watching an 10 episodes of Days of our lives back to back. In those first few minutes I entertained the idea of pulling out of the trip altogether in the hope that several more hours in bed with assist in saving me from permanent brain damage. This plan of attack didn't work. In a stellar effort however JJ had managed to make her way out in the early hours and came back to home base with heavy doses of caffeine, what a champion! By that point somehow both Jet and I made a sufficient enough recovery in those next 20-30 mins that we were able to drag our luggage to the car and then laid comatose for the drive down to the airport, which JJ again was more than kind enough to provide.

VA flight # 1 to Los Angeles right under the last flight that I took out of Sydney on June 24th, 2010 - Aerolineas Argentinas flight AR1183 to Buenos Aires....hmmm, is Noumea by next stop?

Frichot - just before the torment commenced!

Saying our goodbyes at the terminal we walked through to the Virgin Australia check-in, clocked in for our VA008 flight to LA and settled back into the comforts of our seats as the plane lifted off from Charles Kingsford-Smith. Things were starting to come together in those first few minutes of flight until a wail drew my immediate attention to the row behind me, 'f**k, two toddlers! F**k', I knew exactly what this would mean to our hangovers! I turned to Jet and commented, 'I bet those little bastards are going to scream all the to Los Angeles! And you know what, they bloody well did! Son of a b*tch, it was like a tag-team screaming match between the two little gremlins, how the hell do they get any satifaction out of letting loose those long drowning wails and high pitched screams for hours on end? I'll never figure it out! A perfect advertisement for why kids are not in any of my future plans! What's more I think the parents were probably as retarded as the kids. I recall one mind numbingly dumb conversation where the mother was trying to convince her daughter ,Tilda (see Matilda), that she would be leaving her seat for just two minutes in order to walk up a few rows and speak to their father. The mother assured her daughter that the nice stewardess would look after her for those two minutes. The screaming and carrying on that eventuated from that mental conversation was one thing but the fact that the mother went on trying to convince her daugher for at least 20 mins in the following manner was totally another;


'Tilda, it's just two minutes, I'm going for two minutes, OK?'



'NOOOOOooooo, WAH, WAH'



'Tilda, just two minutes, can you just stay here with the lady for two minutes?'



'NOOOOooo, WAH, WAH'


Now repeat that conversation approximately thirty times over and you'll figure our why I felt like giving that mother a full blooded backhanded dose of 'wake the hell up'!


By the grace of all things supreme and powerful we escaped doing anyone any serious injury and landed in Los Angeles some 13hrs after leaving Sydney. If we had learnt anything in those early hours it was certainly a lesson in what not to do when preparing for an international flight. Somehow the whiskey sour Wednesday I had prior to disembarking in June last year had escaped my memory!? Still, here we were and la la land was awaiting just beyond customs, time to roll out.

The wing and a prayer tour

The Frelisher team attack the USA, Mexico and Canada
February/March 2011

Sitting back in the light of an early morning in La Paz, Bolivia, praying that my wallet was still in 'missing' status within the confines of the Wild Rover hostel room and wondering what the hell my next move was going to be, I never quite imagined that it would lead to this.

Making my way back over the Pacific in early December I traced through a whole passage of events that had led me away and that had led me back home, all of them good decisions and all of them having lead to some interesting and wonderful experiences. Unfortunately my journey to South America had been gazumped at a critical junction. Bolivia had not quite squeezed the money out of me as much as it disappeared literally like a thief in the night, never to be heard of or seen again. As I've mentioned in earlier posts, the plan was to get into Peru at some point and then in the final stretch of the journey head into Brazil with Rio de Janiero being the final destination. At that time the idea was, or rather what I had intended to do, was catch my friend Jet in Rio for one last wild throw of the dice, experience what Rio had to offer and 'review' carnivale for whatever it was that it could possibly offer a gringo crew like us. That ofcourse did not eventuate.

Fast forward a few weeks and I'm back in Sydney, lazing around generally, not really wanting to go out and find work at the moment as theoretically I should still have been out on the South American continent macheting my way through the Amazon somewhere near Iquitos or wherever else it was that I intended to catch some tropical disease. My great mate Jet rolls up one afternoon and conjures up his own plan to make an attack on some of the lands that make up the continent of North America. 'Ok' I said, 'I'm listening, please continue!'. As Jet therefore goes onto explain, the fact that I came home early and he didn't make it to South America to catch up with me obviously left a burning hole in his calendar that could only really be treated by heading off to another destination that he was interested in conquering. Whilst his idea of taking on the USA, Mexico and Canada sounded moderately appealing, they weren't destinations that were residing high on my 'to do' list (please see Peru, Brazil, Cuba, Oman, Yemen, Turkey, Nepal & Mali for upcoming A year full of Saturdays adventures) but.....but....the fact that I'd be travelling with an awesome friend sold me on the deal quite easily. The fact that in his infinite kindness and generosity that he found it in himself to actually pay for me also, well that something that's unheard of. So to Mr Jet Frichot I say this, thank you pendejo, for all your Aquarian quirks you're still alright by me, no matter what anyone else says either to you or behind your back!! 'Oh yeeeeahhh'!

So the idea was born and the little seedling rattled around our heads for something like two months until somewhere at the start of February Jet said to me, 'You know, I've already booked my leave, are we actually going to book some tickets and sort our visas now? And hey, what about money?' All this coming a week before 'showtime'. A few G'nT's, a few tequila bombs mixed with God knows what and a little internet activity had us booked, locked in with visas, fully funded and had JJ a bet down promising to wear a tutu, comboy boots and a Stetson (if I could find one) at our next sojourn to a whiskey sour Wednesday at the Shady Pines Saloon.

...and so it came to pass. On Friday, February the 18th, 2011, the 'Frelisher'  touring party lifted off from Kingsford-Smith, hangovers in hand and with an insignificant 13hr flight across the Pacific to the City of Angels. What happens now is really anyone's guess!

Europe-Morocco-South America wrap up

It's a wrap - Europe/Morocco/South America

24 June 2010 - 02 December 2010

 

 

As has become standard for me when I've ended a trip I've taken to doing a last summary or a 'greatest hits' review whenever I managed to complete the final entry on the 'how, why, when and whatever else may have been alcohol related' blog series of my most recent escapades. Sticking with tradition and therefore adopting the same template that I've used in the past, see also;

[Morocco-Europe wrap - June/July 2008]

[Laos wrap - April 2009]

[Vietnam-Malaysia wrap - December/January 2009/10]
 

I bring you the close out of the Europe-Morocco-South America experience within my still continuing domain of Life in a year full of Saturdays, which unfortunately is also quickly coming to an end but still has a little life in it still.

Europe-Morocco-South America - 'The Final'

 

Favourite places:

 

1. San Sebastian (Spain) - this place contains everything that is good about Spain. Beautiful scenery, fantastic nightlife, great people and attitude, most restaurants per capita. It's unbeatable. Had a fantastic time here with Jay and Dina plus my favourite band rocked the Anoeta stadium for which I was fortunate enough to have been front row!

 

San Sebastian - Spain

San Sebastian - Spain

2. Madrid (Spain) - It runs a close second behind San Sebastian. Whilst there's a lot of competition between Barcelona and Madrid as to who 'owns the rights' to being the best city in Spain I think Madrid beats its Catalunyan cousin by a fair margin. Style, sophistication and a great sense of fun, Madrid is the place to be!

Just off Plaza Mayor - Madrid - Spain

3. Buenos Aires (Argentina) - It takes a little while to get the hang of BA, to figure out what it's about and how it operates but when you did it just suckers you in whole. It is a vibrancy and feel that is infectious. While some towns may have looks to die for this place has character, charm and more importantly, soul.

Buenos Aires - Argentina

San Telmo - Buenos Aires - Argentina

4. Marrakech (Morocco) - I told my parents before they arrived here that they would hate it initially but that when they'd left they would end up loving it, and they did. This place is a cacophany of sounds, smells, sights and taste. It's in your face all of the time and it's brilliant!

Overlooking D'jemma el fna - Marrakech - Morocco

Marrakech - Morocco

5. Chefchaouen - This is a great little town in the Rif mountain that lies in the north of Morocco. On first viewing it feels like a town in the Greek islands has been transported to somewhere in the Alps and then you realise that you're surrounded by an all sorts mix of Arabs and Bedouin. It's chilled, relaxed and very unique.

Chefchaouen - Morocco

Chefchaouen - Morocco

Most Surprising:

This is a close call between Tallinn (Estonia) and Riga (Latvia). The old town in both cities are listed as UNESCO World Heritage sites and both are filled with bars, good vibes and all things surprising. For me I think that Tallinn might have to shade Riga, just by a whisker.

Tallinn - Estonia

Coolest place for a night out:

1. San Sebastian (Spain) - it just has everything you could possibly want in a relatively small area.

2. Buenos Aires (Argentina) - it's just cool, end story.

3. Paris (France) - The City of lights has it all, bars, restaurants, galleries, great Summer evenings...

Favourite Hotel:

Not that I stayed in too many on this excursion but the Riad Boussa in Marrakech easily won the day. It was sea of tranquility and calm in a town that is chaotic and hectic. I will never forget our first night of arrival and the panic stricken faces of my parents that all of a sudden disappeared when they passed through the doors of this place.

Riad Boussa - Marrakech - Morocco

Nightview - Riad Boussa - Marrakech - Morocco

Best place to get totally lost:

1. Amazon jungle (Bolivia) - this one is a 'no-brainer'. If you want to get totally lost then just walk into the jungle and see how well you'll do once you're off the marked trails!

2. Fes (Morocco) - About 9000 small streets and alleys in a space of 19 squares kilometres, keep walking, take a few turns and you're away to losing yourself in a spectacular town.

3. Marrakech (Morocco) - Not quite as difficult as Fes but it can pose problems for the navagationally challenged!

Amazon basin - Bolivia

Find your way out! Go on, do it! - Fes - Morocco

Best place to drink and get totally lost:

1. Riga (Latvia) - I had one 'special night' in Riga where I lost something like 4-5hrs one morning. I left the bar at close to 3am and walked into the hostel at between 7am & 8am. It was a 15 min walk back to the hostel, albeit a convoluted walk. Still, Riga is a great place to have a drink and if you want, a great place to get lost in!

This is my last known location on that fateful night - 4hrs later I made it back - Riga - Latvia

2. Santa Maria (Bolivia) - This place is 9kms from Parque Ambue Ari in the Amazonian basin. I didn't actually get it wrong here but there is potential to get things awfully wrong and you don't even have to try.

3. Barcelona (Spain) - Drinking and then attempting to walk through the Barri Gotic is a rewarding challenge, you can lose yourself in the maze of the Gothic area for hours and have a lot of fun!

Best drink:

1. The Tio Tio - Captain Hook's bar (Barcelona - Spain) - not sure what was in it but damn it was good.

2. The Boliviano - Locot's (Sucre - Bolivia) - it's a traditional mojito but with a Bolivian twist. Infused with cocoa leaves, have a few of these and you'll be swimmingly dialled for a while. A must have!

3. The Whiskey Sour - Yono's (Paris - France) - Nowhere near as good as the Shady Pines Saloon bar in Sydney but when you're operating on happy hour convenience and are just about to have the best meal of your life, well yeah, it works!

Best Meal:

1. Chez Robert & Louise - Marais - (Paris-France) - hands down the best meal that I have had in my life and now provides me with the answer of what I would order for my last meal on earth if I was at anytime required to do so. Blood sausage, pork pot belly and the greatest rib steaks that you can EVER imagine. A place only for a 'meatatarian' ofcourse!

The rib steak - freakin' LEGENDARY - Chez Robert & Louise - Paris - France

Old school - Chez Robert & Louise - Paris - France

2.  Dar Damana - (Fes - Morocco) - This was another return for me. The last time I was in Fes Khalid picked me off the street and I ended up having tea with him and then returning for dinner. This time I took the parents and JJ for a Moroccan feast. Khalid was again there and strangely remembered me! Typically Moroccan food in a great setting. You can't beat that!

3. San Telmo - Buenos Aires - Argentina - I'm not sure of the name of the place that Dina and I stumbled into but the beef was incredible!

Best video:

Well, I hardly took any video footage on this excursion but the Swedish dynamic duo, Frida & Jenny, put together a string of highlights that came out very well - *Spoiler Alert*, watch out for the incredibley handsome guy that starts appearing from around 3:28.

[Frida & Jenny's trip]

Favourite/best photos:

It's all very subjective when it comes to any sort of artistic endeavour. There's a few photos in many that I took that I really like. They may not be the best of the bunch but here they are.

1. Bono - Anoeta stadium - (San Sebastian - Spain)

My favourite shot of the trip for many reasons. It was such a great night and San Sebastian was a fantastic place and I was fortunate to have shared my time there with two cool people.

2.  Koutoubia mosque from Cosybar - (Marrakech - Morocco)

Marrakech is just so full of colours and I think this shot to Koutoubia mosque does it justice.

3. JJ in some random bar - (Paris - France)

I think this is a pretty cool portrait...and she doesn't think that she looks good in photo's!!?


4. Eiffel tower - (Paris - France)

It's iconic and to tell you the truth I have a preference for catching things in black and white these days.

5. Meteora (Greece)

Meteora is a remarkable place. I think there are probably better shots but for some reason I keep coming back to this one!



Best shot taken by someone that's not me!

JJ just took the camera off me, pointed and took the shot from the second level of the Eiffel tower. It turned out to be one hell of a shot!

Coolest moments:

1. U2 @ the Anoeta - San Sebastian (Spain)

[U2 in San Sebastian - link to previous post]

2. Being in Barcelona when Spain won the World Cup for the first time, what a great night!

[Spain win World Cup! - link to previous post]

3. Rage Against the Machine - Endesa Costanera - Buenos Aires (Argentina)

[This night in Buenos Aires - AWESOME - RATM 13 OCT 10]

Sketchiest moments:

1. Dicing with Yuma - Parque Ambue Ari (Bolivia) - having a puma rip into your leg and then thinking that you're throat may be next is probably the sketchiest moment I've ever had in my life!

2. Taking goods out of San Pedro prison (La Paz - Bolivia) - having fun with inmates and then have your mates walk out with some prison made goods was kind of odd, and a little sketchy.

3. Crossing up on the Death Road (La Paz to Coroico - Bolivia) - for one brief moment I thought that my breaking technique was going to have me imitating super man for a good 50mtrs.

Uncoolest moment:

The moment that I actually realised that I would be heading for him. Sitting in that hostel room in La Paz as it me was an awful experience.

Best comeback:

Vladimir waking up at 4:30am with a severe hangover after a big night out in Stockholm. Not only did he manage to recover but he managed to drive us all the way from Stockholm to just outside of Bratislava before finally having a rest, some 25+hrs of driving. It was insane and it was a hell of a comeback.

Most random ...but still cool event:

I had been telling Janelle about this shady character called Abdul that I had met in Fes two years earlier. He and his cousin had guided me around Fes before setting me up for a bit of a fall, or so I thought. I told JJ that I'd love to see this guy again but that it would be more than unlikely in a place the size of Fes, and I was right...however...as we were awaiting a bus in Chefchaouen, on our way to Tangier, Abdul appeared out of nowhere! It was completely random and to see a guy that you had met two years earlier in a completely different town was bizarre and strangely cool!

Total flights: 13

Bus rides:  13

Ferries: 3

Trains: 1

There we have it, Europe/Morocco/South America all wrapped. I look forward to delivering you more when the Frelisher tour (On a wing and a prayer) of the US-Mexico-Canada (2011) kicks off on February 18th, 2011! Catch you then!!

Buenos Aires - Quelle belle mort

Buenos Aires (Argentina)
30 NOV - 02 DEC

Some people say that life is what happens around you when you're busy thinking or perhaps it may lie in the existence of time where you as an individual spend thinking about things that you may say or may not say, things that you may or may not do. There's a song by Dave Matthews called the 'Space between' that seems to echo those sentiments, '..the space between the bullets in the firefight is where I'll be hiding waiting for you...the space the wicked lies is where we hope to hide safe from the pain'. I guess in the same manner it's been the personal goals or checkpoints that I made for myself in the last few years that gave me enough leeway to not really consider the life or the time that took place between those points. The last 5-6 months on the road thankfully gave me enough time to be able to reconsider that mentality.

Whilst the way that I had arrived back in Buenos Aires perhaps should have made for perhaps a disappointing or sad occassion, it's not the way that it turned out. Dina and I spent our last day once again enjoying our time and experiencing once again those places that made BA special to us. I know that both of us felt that in coming back to Buenos Aires we were in a way coming back home. It was comfortable, familiar and it had such a good feeling about it that you couldn't help but have a smile on your face as you were sitting on La Avenida Boedo consuming your third or fourth glass of malbec as the rays of the afternoon sun caught you in its warm embrace.

Late afternoon shower - Buenos Aires

Later that evening we headed down to San Telmo in search of some good 'ole Argentinian beef, not really a challenge. I had myself a brilliant morcilla and enough BBQ'd beef to satisfy my carniverous craving for weeks...and then just like that, it was all over...

Nearly six months after having headed out of Sydney on the back of a wicked whiskey sour Wednesday I was commencing my final day on this fantastic journey. In almost a homage to all things early morning related and the way that we had travelled around for the last two months, D inevitabley was running late for her connections to the airport. As she furiously packed, looking in dismay at all the items that remained outside her bag and in turn wondering as to how she would be able to fit them into her already bursting breaches, I strolled down to the local cafe and ordered up a couple of cappucino's "Dos cappucino's para llevar por farvor", "Si senor, uno momento". There's something cool about this place and I still haven't been able to put my finger on exactly what it is. Ofcourse there's the language,culture, spirit of the people, food and a way of doing things that's uniquely Argentinian but then again I've been to quite a few countries that have these unique qualities than in turn haven't affected me in the same manner. As best as I could figure it, the place has soul and as a 'gringo' I'm happy to have had the opportunity to have experienced that for a while.

Urban art attack - near Plaza Mayor - Buenos Aires

As 10am rolled around I did manage to assist in getting Dina to the airport express bus station via Retiro station. Typically she was cutting it fine and it was probably the last bus that she could have jumped onto whilst still making check-in for her flight to Auckland. As the bus rolled out of the station and we pulled faces at one another I reflected a little on the last couple of months. Travelling with D had been somewhat of a 'happy fluke'. We'd known each other for about fours years but hadn't seen one another for four years, we were acquaintances and nothing more. Before heading to Europe this time around I had it in my mind that I'd stop in on D in Berlin, have a few drinks and have a laugh, and that certainly happened, but when D decided to join me on my South American adventures it kind of came out of left field. It's then very much in the hands of the God's has to how you work out as travelling partners once you're committed. I've had instances where I've travelled with friends where being in each others company for a large portion of time has caused immense friction and has resulted in a request to draw swords at dawn, this experience however just worked. We got along really well, it was absolutely cruisy and I've got to say that I feel really fortunate to have shared my time in SA with someone as cool as D. I guess I just got lucky :)

It was a beautiful morning in Buenos Aires as D's bus rolled out towards the airport. My flight wasn't leaving until much later that evening (actually 1am the next morning) and hence I had BA to myself that day. I walked down from the bus station near Retiro via Plaza Mayor to San Telmo. I must have walked around San Telmo for hours. It was one of those days that just felt right, a fitting way to part company with such a great place. I didn't feel sad or ripped off by the, it actually felt good, I had a smile on my face and I knew inside myself that sometime in the near future I'd be back to finish off what I had left behind.

Making my way back to the hostel in Boedo I picked a couple of bottles of the local brew, Quilmes, and hoped that I'd be able to catch Jorge before he took off to whatever he did in the afternoon. Jorge was a Colombian guy that we'd met at the hostel a month earlier. We still hadn't quite figured out what he was doing, about as much we could figure was that he was a student that had spent time studying in the US and was now studying in Buenos Aires. Fortunately I caught him just as he was walking out the door and I said, 'Hey man, I was hoping to have a drink with you, can I convince you to hang around?'...his response was 'Sure man, I'll just go across the road and get another bottle'. So there we sat for the afternoon hours, drinking away, enjoying the sunshine and each others company. It was a great way to finish up my time.

Somewhere approaching 8pm I made my way back to Retiro train station and then jumped a bus for the airport. My time in Argentina was up and the adventure that I had commenced months before was now hours away from ending. It had been a hell of a ride and one hell of a rare opportunity that I'd been presented with, one that I was thankfully smart enough to have accepted. A few hours later as Aerolineas Argentinas flight 1182 disappeared into the night sky over Buenos Aires, banking to the left and heading west towards Australia, I wondered how long it would be until I made my way back to this beautiful place. Knowing me and my restless nature I could be fairly certain within myself that it wouldn't be too long and what's more I could be fairly certain that the next adventure was sure to be just around the corner.

It's always Quilmes time in Argentina!

D with our buddy Mafalda - San Telmo - Buenos Aires

 

La Paz to Buenos Aires - Shaken, not stirred

La Paz (Bolivia) to Buenos Aires (Argentina)
27 NOV - 29 NOV

"You are honest but have no scruples. Your instincts and intuitiion are more powerful than your intelligence, which is far above average. When you get afraid, you don't panic. Danger acts almost as a stimulus to you. You think more clearly and make better decisions when driven by the survival instinct"

What's written above is a description by G.M. Stuart of Belgrader Dusan-Dusko Popov (1912-1982), who was Ian Fleming's real life role model for his spy hero James Bond (Mr 007). So, what has this got to do with anything that I may have to offer? Well, I have kind of an amusing story to tell which isn't actually mine but is the 'real life' account of my travelling partner Dina Jezdic who found herself in an amusing predicament whilst attempting to make her exit from Bolivia. I'll write the account in same manner in which is was told to me at about 2am on the 30th of November when I arrived in Buenos Aires after bouncing across the dirt roads of South America for 60hrs. To get to the story however I need to provide just a little background as to my own path and the state I arrived in upon making my return to Buenos Aires.

Two days prior to leaving La Paz my intention had been to head north to Lake Titicaca and then onto Machu Picchu, that was until some kind opportunist lifted my wallet from the room in which I was staying. Several phones calls, a Western Union transfer and 48hrs removed from the incident, I was in the main bus terminal of La Paz with Dina and Nick both of whom were also looking for a way out of their own. Dina had actually planned to leave La Paz on this day and was heading to Santa Cruz in order to catch a flight to Buenos Aires, Nick on the other hand was taking the planned route that I had just given up. My intention was therefore to jump a bus ride south from La Paz and then catch Dina in Buenos Aires two days later. As fate would have it we were going to find ourselves arriving in BA on the same day and more than likely leaving for home on the same day also. So almost as quickly as I had entered the bus terminal I found myself a ride south within 15 mins that was heading out immediately. I said my goodbyes and I was gone.

Now from what I could figure out the planned duration of the ride was going to be between 48-50hrs. I know that it sounds evil but for some reason I have the capacity to both sleep excessively and read excessively on bus rides. I just zone out and really don't find them to be too much of a chore. This journey however was to be the exception. The ride surreptitiously unfurled into a painful, mind bending expedition of mental endurance that in its last hours had me rocking back and forth in my seat and pounding on the windows in the hope that my internal cauldron of molten frustration would somehow psychically spew over and transfer itself to the driver in order to aid him in getting his expedience on!

The backwoods of Bolivia - on the way to Vilazon

The first signs of what would become my future of anguish and frustration arrived when the bus from La Paz sidled into the border town of Vilazon an hour late. The 10am connection to Buenos Aires had already departed and the next ride out, I was confidently advised, was going to leave at 2pm. For some reason I trusted the assessment and hence in my gringo naivety found myself sitting in a small office until 5pm waiting for the '2pm' connection. When we did actually depart our first exploits was a short drive,  all of 500mtrs to the Bolivian/Argentine border, what I assumed to be a relatively simple formality as Dina and I had crossed into Bolivia at this very same point a month earlier in just a few mins. On this occassion, with half of the Bolivians on this bus for 'some reason' not carrying adequate ID, the crossing took 3hrs! It was PAINFUL! At sometime nearing 9pm we were herded back onto the bus and were allowed to proceed into Argentine territory. The ride however did not improve. With a sissy little toddler seated across the aisle that cried and screamed whenever someone sneezed, to the 40kph limit that the bus driver stuck to for hours upon hours, to the endless Argentine patrol checks, there was no fluidity of movement, it felt like an endless lesson in the art of patience. Both a lesson and a battle that I was certainly feeling myself beginning to lose. As the arrival time in Buenos Aires came and went without so much as a courtesy apology I knew that we were still  literally hours away from making our destination. As the afternoon sun dropped out of sight the night set in and the shitty kid across the aisle wailed incessantly, it felt like she had been put on this earth with the soul objective of breaking me. Somewhere close to 1:30am the bus rolled into a northern BA bus terminal, 12.5hrs later than I had expected to arrive. I immediately jumped a cab and made a b-line for the hostel in Boedo where D and I had commenced our adventure two months earlier. As I walked into the room I looked at D, threw down my bag and explained my soul destroying experience - the response that I received from her however just blew me out of the water. The story of which goes a little something like this....

This border crossing took 3hrs!!! Have a look - Argentina near side, Bolivia far side...and 3hrs for what!?

A few hours after I had left La Paz Dina had managed to find herself a connection to Santa Cruz upon where she would be catching a plane to Buenos Aires in two days time, at roughly the time that I should have been arriving in BA. The ride from La Paz to Santa Cruz is approximately 18hrs worth and for the first 14hrs had been relatively uneventful. At some point along the road however there had been a patrol stop/check and the bus was searched by armed police and sniffer dogs. As the police boarded one of the dogs stopped close to D and she gave him a little bit of a pat before moving on. I'm not sure if this was seen as suspicious or not, and not that it mattered in the end as further up the aisle an Australian traveller was now becoming the target of the dogs sensitive detection device. With a brief search of the Australian's belongings it seemed that something suspicious was found and he in turn alighted from the bus with a couple of spritely Bolivian police to keep him company. The way Dina explains it, once he was off the bus simply pulled away and the Australian was left on the lonely desolate roads of Bolivia with what seemed a certain amount of explaining to do. The directors of Banged Up Abroad will be making a visit soon I'm sure!

So really, what's in the bag Dina? What kind of spy gear do you have?

Now Santa Cruz is neither an aesthetically spectacular or stimulating city. Even though it's the most populous city in Bolivia the feeling that you generally get is that someone has painted over it with a large pallette of shadiness and sleaze. It sits on the edge of the Amazonian basin and seems to constantly be inundated with heavy, humid weather. As Dina passed her way through the bus terminal on arrival she headed out into the constant throng of people and traffic that occupy pride of place at the terminal entrance. Making her way to a line of taxi drivers she found to her dismay that time after time they were turning her down for a ride into the city. It was only the last driver on the rank that accepted her fare and obviously the accepting party had to be the one had a large dose of crazy emanating from his pores. As they sped out of the bus terminal D was thinking as to how strange it was that it was only this driver that had wanted to accept her fare, that was until the point in time that she also realised that this guy was now breaking land speed records through the streets of Santa Cruz and could quite easily have them killed with a false move on the road. Asking the driver to slow down on several occasions seemed to have no affect as the lunatic just kept on moving like a man posessed. The only point in time that he stopped was the point in time when he was forced to stop by the direct result of an accident that put his vehicle out of commission. The police of Santa Cruz were then called to the scene and Dina in turn was taken down to the local station in order to provide a statement, or so she thought.

In disguise, obviously!

Down at the police station however the questions that Dina found herself fielding were not those she expected to be answering as an innocent party that had just been involved in an accident. Three 'police officials' made there way into a holding room where D was seated and proceeded to question her as to where she was going and why 'she' had been wanting to get there in such a hurry. When she explained that the taxi driver had undertaken the 'dangerous driving' course off his own bat they dismissed the reasoning outright and prompted her again for a better explanation. They then moved to the 'coincidental' circumstances by which she had found herself on a bus with an Australian that had been caught out by a patrol for carrying drugs (aha, so that's what happened to the guy - surprise). She explained that she didn't know the person and that it was just purely a coincidental. It was a coincidence that the police were certain would point to much bigger things. This line of questioning continued until they asked her as to whether she had been travelling alone, which ofcourse she hadn't, and how again it seemed very convenient that her travelling partner (aka me) had taken a totally different route to Buenos Aires. This wasn't suspicious at all they said.

As the questioning continued the police decided to sift through her belongings and came across two passports. One being her predominant New Zealand passport and the other being her unused Serbian passport. Ofcourse this drew even more attention and raised eyebrows from the Miami Vice boys of Santa Cruz who felt certain that they'd just trapped someone of note in their poorly maintained fishing nets.The legitimacy of having dual citizenship  just didn't strike a chord with the CSI troupe who pushed the questioning behind her need for two passports until such time that they decided to press Dina on why she was actually in South America and what she had been doing prior to turning up in their country. Dina explained that she had been a Phd student studying in both Prague and then Berlin before deciding to make her way back to New Zealand after falling  for a Kiwi guy that she had met in Berlin several months earlier. Not unexpectedly the police said that her 'cover story' of being a student that travelled in Europe and to the US for conferences to be extremely convenient and somewhat of a 'far-fetched' story that was neatly packaged for her benefit.

Conducting covert operations in Colonia with her 'contact'

During the time that D's belongings were being investigated her phone was also seized. In another string of coincidences the police found that there had been only two people contacted on the SIM card she was using, a 'contact' from New Zealand and a dealer in Santa Cruz that had been picked up by the police in the last 3-4 days. The dealer in Santa Cruz had in fact been the 'guy on the street' that Dina, Nick and Jade had found 10 days earlier to supply our Parque group with some party time goods. The New Zealand 'contact' was in fact her boyfriend who was only able to call/text on a Bolivian acquired SIM. As she explained the situation to the police and advised that she had no idea of who the dealer was (and I'm sure that at point in time she didn't) they pressed her on the 'cryptic' text messages that had been sent to her so-called boyfriend and put forward the hypothesis that the intimate nature of these texts were actually a code that she had organised with her 'contact'. If things were looking bad at the start of this inquisition know they were edging over the bounds of reasonable doubt, well, the South American version in any case.

Expert navigational skills - the hallmark of a great spy!

It was at the point in time that the police stipulated that they would be conducting a strip-search.  Dina obviously flipped out at the thought of a six foot stupid Bolivian hick 'conducting' a search and called for an abogado (lawyer) to come in, which thankfully she was able to find. At this point it seems that they all went through the details of the story once again before the Bolivian police came out and put to her point blank what their 'skillful' detective work had managed to uncover in the last few hours. It appeared to them that all the coincidences boiled down to one of two certainties, that she was either a DEA agent or a spy! As Dina looked incredulously at all parties they put the hypothesis to her again and waited for her to make an admission, which ofcourse was not forthcoming. At this point the lawyer asked the 'investigators' as to whether she was actually being charged with anything, which ofcourse they were unable to do with just purely coincidental circumstances. The lawyer then put it to them that if that was the case then she was free to leave. As D left the premises the main 'investigator' made a comment to her in a manner that shecould only characterise as equivalent to being something out of a C-grade Hollywood movie, something akin to 'I'm sure we'll be meeting again very soon!'.

Irreverent or DEA agent? You be the judge!

That evening Dina spent a very sleep deprived night in a very dodgy Santa Cruz hostel, hoping and praying that her progress through customer and her flight out of the city in the early afternoon the next day would be uneventful. Thankfully, to a certain extent it was, although she was actually strip searched after clearing customs by a female officer, a hassle which apparently she didn't have too many any issues with but something I kind of flipped out over when she told me.

As she concluded her story we kind of sat in silence for a few moments. I shook my head and said something close to  'Well makes my bus ride sound like a kiddies party doesn't it? It's a hell of a story though, you'll be laughing about this in a few months time'. Dina kind of shook her head in the manner that one does when they've just been put through this kind of surreal situation.  We sat back for a while and continued to chat about what had happened  for sometime and as we did my own mind raised that little bit of doubt as to whether the Bolivian police hypothesis was actually correct. Dina couldn't be a spy, could she? Then again, I'm sure that many people dismissed Dusan-Dusko Popov as a spy also, to their own peril - those bloody Belgradese, with them you just never know now do you??!!!