End of an era

So that’s it, this is my last post on Honeymoon.

We leave tomorrow ready to start our next adventure as husband and wife. We think we have a car lined up, we have a long list of cottages we want to view in and around Bath, I have a business plan ready to take to the bank and a friend working on my logo as we speak.

Over the last six months we’ve ridden horses and elephants, been on tuk-tuks, ships, boats, planes, helicopters, bicycles, speedboats, taxis, sky-trains, mopeds, ski-lifts, buses, tubes, trains, luges, trams, campervans, flown and walked on glaciers, got drenched by a gigantic waterfall, climbed centuries old temples, watched New Year fireworks on a Thai beach, snorkelled, fallen into freezing ice, seen glow worms, eaten Thai noodles, Cambodian noodles, Ozzie BBQs, NZ lamb, Argentine beef, drank sangsom rum in Thailand, Syrah in Australia, Pinot Noir in NZ, Pisco Sours in Chile, Medio y Medio in Uruguay and Malbec in Arentina had a one on one with a famous Buddhist monk, nearly been ordered out of a country, driven the Great Ocean Road, seen geysers, lain in hotsprings, driven across a sand island in a four wheel drive, surfed(ish), sandboarded, drank our way across the world’s best vineyards, slept in everything from a bug ridden bamboo bungalow to a state of the art private pool villa, got pulled off a bus and searched for no reason whatsoever, lost a credit and found a credit card, ate Crocodile for Christmas dinner, milked a cow and drank the milk 2 seconds later, got ridiculously close to emigrating, fortunate enough to narrowly dodge cyclones, floods, bush fires and earthquakes, had far too many encounters with rats and spiders, experienced a ‘traditional’ Welsh Tea in the middle of Patagonia, cheered at rugby and football games, dodged the blood and sweat at thai kickboxing, broken an ipod, lost an ipod-unfortunately we didn’t lose the broken one. It’s been an amazing trip, more than we could ever have imagined.

We are starting our next adventure exhausted, exhilarated, happy and in love and it’s because of you, our wonderful family and friends that we have had the most amazing six months of our lives. We are forever grateful to YOU.

The next adventure starts tomorrow, we’ll be seeing you all soon...now how many films can I squeeze into a 14 hour flight.......

Mr and Mrs Ross xx

Last stop, Buenos Aires

When we did manage to get a bus back to BA we checked into our rented apartment. Yep that’s right, our very own little pied-a-terre here in Buenos Aires. It’s only a studio flat but after six months of hostel rooms and campervans it feels like a mansion! It’s lovely to be able to cook without worrying if the last person washed stuff up properly or if there will be enough plates to eat off. A massive thanks to Cazza and Pete, JB and Tanya, Sarah and Will, Scott and Chloe, Chi and Anita and Elgan and Fi for Wedding Gift no.23

Our week here has flown by, we leave tomorrow!
We’ve really enjoyed BA, mooching around the various ‘barrios’ (areas). We visited the amazing Recoleta cemetery where Evita is buried and it is a like a mini city- I said to Ed it’s like the next stage up from a retirement village. It’s laid out in little streets and each is like a teeny tiny house, madness.

Main Plaza
Gorgeous Rose in the Rose garden



Me getting a little spooked at the cemetery

We’ve taken in art at the Latin American Museum, whiled away an hour in a beautiful rose garden, scoped out antiques in the San Telmo Sunday market and seen the city go from autumn to winter over night! Seriously we spent one day in short sleeves, too hot in jeans wandering around a pretty park and the next day we have all our layers on and its freezing! Winter is definitely here in BA now.

Sunday night saw us go to a football game, River Plate vs San Lorenzo. It was a wicked night out, the atmosphere was electric, these Argentines get rather passionate about the game and we were in the civilised section of the crowd! There was a young boy next to me saying words no one should know at his age and he was screaming them at the top of his voice right next to his dad! Who was doing exactly the same thing in a lower voice, and you should have seen the crotch grabbing! Anyhow, it was a giggle to be there, so far removed from the gentlemanly rugby games i’ve been to in the past!

footy fans

Last night, thanks to Wedding Gift no. 22 and Hazel, Jenny, Matt and Rose we spent the evening in a beautiful art deco theatre watching a Tango show. Amazing dancing. We’ve seen street performers dancing here but to see the show was spectacular, a very fun night out and now I want to take up dancing again!


Amazing stage setting

Water, water everywhere

The very beige-ness of overnight bus food.

Another eight hour coach ride took us back to Argentina and this time to the very popular site of Iguazu Falls, in the northeast of Argy. We were both very excited to visit. After an hour drama over a lost credit card (some lovely Argentine had handed it into the bank-we need to give some good karma back!) We spent the day wandering around the walkways, playing with the butterflies and trying to avoid the starving Coatimundis! Thanks to Kate, Jonnie and Wilf for the wonderful Wedding Gift no. 20. The falls were absolutely spectacular, we took a boat ride to get super close – and completely drenched! We spent all day there just soaking up (mind the pun) the atmosphere and views, it had rained heavily the previous day and so the falls were very full, we saw Coatimundis (a bit like big racoons), Toucans, a tortoise and parrots and butterflies galore. It was a fabulous and very special day.

Me taking snaps of a Coatimundi!!


Before the boat trip....

The boat trip

After the boat trip, drenched

Our last ever overnight bus took us back south (26hours!!) to a wonderful Estancia thanks to the lovely in-laws, Penny and Ian and Wedding Gift no. 21. It was a part of the trip we were most looking forward to and it did not disappoint. We spent three days riding our horses, playing with the dogs and eating far too well – breakfast, lunch, afternoon tea, and huge dinner all with a vast amount of Malbec. It was bliss, a real chance to savour our honeymoon and enjoy the last moments of it. On our last night the owner, David, joined us for dinner and we found out our bus to BA was fully booked so ‘oh no, what a shame’, we had to stay an additional night, so we milked cows, rode horses, played with dogs and ate even more-what a pity ; )

Our gorgeous fire in our bedroom at the Estancia

Surprise stop, Uruguay

Having had our fill of overnight buses we cheated and took a flight from El Calafate to Montevideo in Uruguay. Uruguay had not been in our plans but it sounded fun! Uruguay, we discovered thanks to our lovely taxi driver from the airport, is the same size as Wales with the same population size, so Ed felt right at home!

Gluten free meal on plane=rice cakes and for desert? more ricecakes!

We spent ten fun days soaking up the sites of the capital city Montevideo with its fabulous Gaucho museum, went on to the beautiful Punta Del Diablo which being out of season was like a ghost town! Thanks to Wedding Gift no.19 and Kate, Nigel and Lyra and the Bridesmaids we upgraded our room to a sea view and it was fabulous, waking up to see the waves. We ate well and drank well and soaked up our last beach time on the trip. Next beaches will be beautiful Pembrokeshire and Dorset coast-just as gorgeous but not nearly as warm!

hmmmm yum, Parilla!

Lapping up the sunshine and sand dunes

Beautiful sea view, thanks to the Smiths and Bridesmaids x

We then decided to travel through Uruguay back to Argentina rather than get back to BA so it was an eight hour coach up to Salta for Ed’s birthday. By this time we were quite accustomed to the local specialities of Chivito (ED) a breaded steak sandwich and Medio y Medio (SARAH) a half and half mix of sparkling white and white wine, not the most sophisticated of drinks having sampled Argentine Torrontes, NZ Savignon Blanc and Ozzie Chardonnay over the last few months but it became my guilty pleasure, not least because they only sell it by the bottle and Ed refused to drink it ; )
So, Ed’s birthday came around and I took him off to the local thermal pools, a kind of centre parks of a place with dozens of pools all different temperatures. It was a fun and relaxing day out, being a Sunday it was full of locals and being Uruguay and a fairly random spot in Uruguay we only saw one other tourist! It was a giggle of a day. Happy Birthday hubby!

End of Patagonia

Easter Monday saw us head off for the day to Chile’s Torres Del Paine National Park thanks to Wedding Gift number 18 and Auntie Peggy, Jean and Derek. Unfortunately the weather was awful, the wind was so strong it literally pushed me over twice. It was amazing! We went to a handful of viewpoints but there really wasn’t a great deal to see. But it was great to really experience the Patagonian wilderness. Right at the end when we were leaving the sky suddenly opened up and we were lucky enough to finally see some mountain peaks. So it was all lovely in the end.

Wrapped up against the elements!

We then took a four hour bus ride to nearby El Chalten where we spent a couple of days doing day long hikes-they told us they were well sign posted so we braved it after our El Bolson drama! The area was beautiful we saw some of the best Autumnal trees I have ever seen. And as was the case with Torres Del Paine, the clouds lifted just as we were leaving (literally while we were waiting for the bus back to El Calafate) and we got to see the beautiful Fitz Roy mountain peak-Argentina’s version of the Matterhorn!

Gorgeous Autumn leaves

Ed the Gaucho

Yesterday we had another brilliant day out this time pretending to be Gauchos thanks to Wedding Gift Number 17 and the lovely Auntie Jean.

We were picked up by Luciano a local who owns an estancia here in southern Patagonia. Unfortunately the weather was not on our side. We arrived to have traditional Mate tea, which I felt tastes like a really really strong green tea, I loved it. It also has a special type of Caffeine that really gives you a kick. Argentines drink Mate all the time, maybe that’s how they can go out for dinner at 11pm and manage to get up for work the next day? Traditionally it is served in a small bowl like cup and drank through a straw as inside is a load of mate leaves and a small amount of water.

Enjoying my Mate

After this we saddled up the horses, I asked for the calmest one, Pluma (Feather) as I am by no means confident on or near horses and away we went with Ed on Rubio (Ruby). I had five layers of clothes on but it was freezing and then the rain came. It was bitter cold and it was a shame that the view wasn’t very visible due to the rain and mist but in the distance you could just about make out the snow capped mountains. We had a giggle, the horses were amazing and views that we could see were spectacular but the weather got the better of us and the walk was cut short, which just allowed more time to eat steak in Luciano’s small horse shed. It was absolutely delicious and a good way to get warm again!

Getting soaked but happy!

It’s Easter Sunday today and we are having a lazy catch up day-hence the writing. Off out for a walk and hopefully some nice food then tomorrow we head off on a very long day trip back to Chile to viist Torres Del Paine National Park. We have everything crossed it will be good enough weather to get some good views.....

Happy Easter from Mr and Mrs Ross x

Cold and Colder

Another long over night bus journey took us to our most southern (and coldest) destination of El Calafate. After a fairly lazy week or so we packed up our week here with tours.
So on Easter Friday when you were all enjoying balmy weather and munching on Easter Eggs Ed and I went off to visit the Perito Moreno Glacier. After loving Franz Josef in New Zealand we were both really excited to see this glacier. We decided to save our money and just view the glacier this time rather than climb on it (which having spoken to unhappy others that have paid the extortionate fee to walk on the ice was the right thing to do). So a massive thank you to Moochie for wedding gift number 16!
We took a bus to the entrance to the national park and then jumped on a boat, the weather was freezing, not helped with the rain and drizzle but the view was spectactular. The boat got up really close to the glacier and we stayed out for as long as our frozen bodies would let us. After the boat trip we took a walk around the ‘balconies’ which give amazing viewpoints out to different sides of the glacier. It’s such a wonderful time to be travelling in Argentina as it is Autumn here and the trees are turning their beautiful shades of yellow and reds, it looked so special against the icy blues of the glacier. It really was spectacular, Perito Moreno moves at 2 metres a day so as the afternoon comes round and the sun warms the ice pieces break off, we were lucky enough to catch a couple of chunks fall off and the noises from the breaking and cracking is superb. It really was a wonderful day. The weather literally changed every fifteen minutes, from cloudy and sleety, to beautiful bright blue skies, to mist and fog but it all added to the mystery and awe of the place.

Mr and Mrs on the top of the boat, glacier behind us

Amazing sight and sounds