solo travel – Maz On The Road

Two Wheels, One Gondola (Me, Myself and I at Sun Moon Lake)

March 28, 2026March 28, 2026Posted in Asia, Taiwan, TravelTagged backpacking, solo travel, Taiwan, Travel, travel blogLeave a comment

What a mysterious name! I had prebooked the bus from Alishan to Sun Moon Lake after locals told me everything would be booked up for the upcoming Lunar New Year. It wasn’t really necessary as the bus wasn’t full but I actually quite enjoyed having a few days with everything booked and just following my own itinerary! It took about 3-4 hours on a comfy bus with a gorgeous view, to reach the SML bus station. The transport centre was actually on the other side of the lake to my hostel (Owl Hostel) and all buses stop at 17.00. A man approached me and asked “Ita Thao?” I said no, assuming this was the name of someone he was picking up. He asked me again like he really thought it was me. I said no again. After realising there were no buses (it was 17.30) I went to enquire about a taxi. The same man appeared and asked for the address. “Ita Thao!” he said. Turns out that’s the name of the village where the hostels are: he probably thought I was mad or very stupid. But he paired me up with a Chinese woman and her mum and drove us all around to the other side of the lake at half the price of a standard taxi. At the hostel there was another guy checking in who was on the same bus as me and he had paid twice as much so I did feel a bit smug.

I went to wander around the harbour area where a small night market had set up. I got some vegan tofu sticks with a spicy sauce and a bag of freshly cut liquorice flavoured guava for dinner.

*Night market goodies: liquorice guava, moon grapes (not sure what they were), another unknown fruit and BBQ tofu*

The Owl Hostel also had free proper coffee and lovely rooftop to enjoy it. It was extremely clean and well organised. You’d expect it to be fully booked but it was really quiet as have been most places so far, although it was the first hostel in Taiwan where I met some other Western travellers to go for dinner or hang out on the rooftop with. Everyone agreed they have had mostly solitary experiences travelling in Taiwan. It’s just not on the usual backpacking route.

The owl (as in the bird) is significant here. They are considered to be the sacred spirit animal of the Thao indigenous people. Similar to the sunrise and sunset outings in Alishan, a rite of passage at Sun Moon Lake is to hire a bicycle and cycle around the lake. There are also temples and a cable car to keep anyone busy for a couple of days.

If there is a cable car then I have to take it. The “Sun Moon Lake Ropeway” goes up to the Observation Tower of the Formosan Aboriginal Culture Village. It took solo travel to another level – not only was I allocated my own gondola but I was asked to choose which one I wanted. I chose the one with pink cherry blossom as this was clearly the one the attendant wanted me to pick.

It takes 7 minutes to reach the top, and time goes very slowly when you have it all to yourself. I had expected that there would be at least a viewpoint at the top or something to look at, but it’s literally just a station where you get off, and a turnstile for paid entrance to the ‘Culture Village’ which looked more like a theme park to me. There are fences blocking out the view so other than a few souvenir shops there’s literally nothing to do except turn around and go back down again. I still enjoyed it for the novelty of choosing which gondola I wanted and the views over the lake were beautiful. It felt pretty high up, so probably not one for anyone not keen on heights.

Gondola views

I decided to take the boat over to the other side of the lake instead of cycling the whole circuit, and to treat myself to lunch at a backpacker cafe. I soon changed my mind about not seeing any other Westerners after listening to some annoying, loud American backpackers discussing their latest tattoos and paying over the odds for a coffee.

There are bicylce rental places all around the place and it’s easy to negotiate a half day for a really nice bike. I really enjoyed seeing all the other solo travellers whizzing past on their bikes – you can’t really get lost, although I managed to go the wrong way through the town. I had been a bit nervous about cycling with traffic but this soon goes away!

The scenery is really lovely, especially as there’s a dedicated cycle path for most of it over wooden pathways, through some shaded areas but never far from the blue water. It passes the huge Xiangshan “recreation area” with its modern architecture and oat milk ice cream for a little break. There is no need to lock your bike here, in fact you don’t even get a lock with the bike. It’s amazing to just park up, leave the bike (I also left my hoodie just so I’d recognise the bike again), go for a wander and not worry about it being there when you get back.

The Xiangshang section of the route’s claim to fame is that it’s listed as one of the “Top 10 Most Beautiful Bicycle Trails in the World” (not sure what the source is for that). This section connects the Shuishe Dam to Visitor Centre, a highlight being the 400m “Waterfront Bikeway” that is elevated above the lake. I probably could have carried on all the way around the full 20 mile loop but I only had the bike for a half a day so got the ferry back across in time for a sunset beer on the roof terrace, some takeaway tofu soup and an evening stroll.

If I came back to Sun Moon Lake I would stay longer as it’s a nice place to chill for a bit, and there are more temples to visit. But I’d booked my next leg of travel in order to get to Taipei for my flight to Hong Kong for Chinese New Year. The next morning after breakfast at a little stall that sold toast and peanut butter for less than £1 and who gave me a free cup of homemade sweet soya milk to try, I got the bus back around to the transport centre to board my pre-booked bus straight to the Western city of Taichung, to spend the afternoon there before a pre-booked bullet train to the capital.

*I didn’t notice this sign until I was a quarter of the way in and wondered why everyone was walking*

It was Friday 13th and three things went wrong. Firstly after a smooth bus ride there, where by chance I was sitting behind the same Chinese woman and her mum who I had shared a taxi with on arrival (we said hello and waved goodbye), I was halfway to stashing my bag at Taichung train station when I realised I didn’t have my coat. I needed my coat for Hong Kong and for when I got home and it’s the most expensive item I had with me. I practically ran to the tourist information office at the train station who advised me to go in person to the bus depot, but not to worry they had a lost property. This is Taiwan after all, where people leave their laptops on cafe tables while they go to the bathroom. Sure enough after putting my bags in a locker, I explained the situation at the bus depot with the help of Google translate (at first they thought I had missed my bus), they phoned the driver and happily told me “the driver has seen your jacket”. I waited ten mins until he dropped it off.

I didn’t have the energy to see anything of Taitung, it was hot and I was now carrying around a coat so I made the most of some downtime in a cafe. Back at the train station a few hours later, the second mishap occurred – I went to get my bags from the locker and it asked me to enter the passcode from the receipt. The receipt that I didn’t actually take when I closed the locker that morning. There was a rather strict sign stating that there was a fine for losing the code but again I explained the situation and a nice lady opened it up for me with no cost.

Thirdly, I was waiting on the platform that evening for my reserved train and thought it was a bit odd that the train was late – trains are never late here. Despite asking for directions earlier, I had somehow gone to the wrong platform and waited like an idiot for a train that had already departed from the other side. But the guard said no problem, if you miss your reserved train you can just get on the next one in the unreserved carriage. It was actually full this time with everyone going home for the New Year so I had to stand for part of the one hour journey, but I was so grateful to be on it I didn’t care.

Trying to cycle and video at the same time

Disasters averted, I arrived back in Taipei after a whirlwind 2 week trip around Taiwan and checked into a party hostel filled with 20 somethings on their first backpacking trip …

The Day I Caught The Train: Sea of Clouds, Giant Trees and Solitude (Alishan National Park)

March 26, 2026Posted in Asia, Taiwan, TravelTagged Alishan National Forest, Asia, backpacking, hiking, nature, solo travel, Taiwan, Travel, travel blogLeave a comment

The next few days of this trip were the ones that needed some advanced planning. Firstly the Alishan National Forest: the most iconic way to get to this forest high up in the mountains in the centre of Taiwan is to ride the scenic Alishan Forest Railway. This is a narrow gauge railway that runs through the Alishan mountains and high-altitude forests. However, getting a ticket for this is like getting a ticket for the Sri Lanka Ella train all over again (throwback to when Original Travel Companion Helen and I tried and failed to even get on the train, being the only ones left standing on the platform after the locals piled in). Tickets are released online 60 days in advance but sell out immediately. A blog called “Taiwan Obsessed” has been invaluable in telling me how to practically do things. It mentioned that you might need to try over 100 times to buy the ticket online (no joke), or a better option might be to buy a bus ticket as a backup and try your luck to get a train ticket closer to the time. To buy the bus ticket, you go to a Family Mart convenience store and use an ATM-like machine, all in Chinese, to print a receipt which you take to the counter and pay for in return for the bus ticket. I managed to do this only by following screenshots from the blog, matching them up to the Chinese text on the machine, of which there were at least 7 screens to click through and some blind faith that I was actually purchasing a bus ticket.

With bus ticket in hand I for once arrived early at the bus stop before the 8.30 departure. I had almost convinced myself that taking the 3 hour bus up to Alishan would be perfectly fine – it’s faster by two hours, cheaper and the scenery would still be beautiful, and the train was probably overrated…. But from the bus stop I could see the Alishan Forest Railway ticket booth. Surely it was worth a try? I ran over and asked the lady if they by any chance had any tickets for the train today. You’re very lucky, she said, we have one window seat left. It takes five hours as it includes a one hour lunch stop at Fenqihu Station. I handed over the money and got my golden ticket.

*Golden ticket, Alishan map, Hotel notices*

I headed back to the train station and when the ticket attendants asked me “Alishan train?” as they had done every time I passed though, this time I said YES which a huge smile on my face. The historic train trundled into the station at 10.00 and I took my single seat by the window and settled in. It was hands down the best train ride I have ever taken and worth every Taiwanese dollar of the extra £14. The train gradually climbs up from 30 metres above sea level to 2,216 metres, goes through 47 tunnels and over 72 bridges. The narrow gauge railway line alternates between hugging the edge of the mountain (looking out the window was literally looking down into the valleys over the mountain edge) and cutting through the middle via the tunnels. It even has some English commentary.

Three hours flew by before we reached Fenqihu Station at an altitude of 1,400 metres. My heart sang as I got off to explore Old Street with its weird and wonderful snacks. I tried the sweetest and most intense ginger tea (see photo below for the ginger being roasted) and picked up the traditional bento box for a picnic lunch looking out over the mountains. It didn’t even feel overcrowded as the train holds just 80 passengers and runs only twice per day.

*Delights at Fenqihu Old Street: Greens, Ginger Tea, More Ginger and Something Unknown*

Everyone has lunch, followed by coffee and a local donut then gets back on the train for the last two hours of the journey. I had a chat to a girl who didn’t realise it took 5 hours and was doing the world’s shortest day trip – she’d have to get the return bus about 30 minutes after arriving. Alishan does take a bit of advance planning because there are two things that you absolutely have to do. Firstly go to a viewpoint for sunset, and secondly in the morning everyone, and I mean everyone, gets on the train again to a sunrise point close to Zhushan Station to watch the sun come up through the clouds. As well as follow as many trails as possible of course. So staying overnight is the way to go, although accommodation inside the national park is both expensive and pretty poor value compared to the rest of Taiwan.

View from the train

I decided to stay one night and absorb the extortionate cost of £70 by eating instant noodles for dinner for a few days and buying my coffee from the highest 7-11 convenience store in the country. Staying inside the park means you can join in the sunrise and sunset trips, and have easy access to all of the trails – sometimes convenience is worth the cost.

The higher up we went the more interesting the journey got. The bends became a series of switchbacks, as the turns were otherwise too tight for the train. This means the train moves forward into a dead end, then reverses direction until the next switchback when it changes direction again. Arriving at the main station, music was playing from loud speakers and it felt like being at an Alpine lodge.

*What goes down must go back up again (with luggage)*

The train ticket includes entry to the park and the hotel area is about a 10 minute walk away, down some very steep stairs that are a lot less fun to walk up again with luggage. The Gau Shan Ching Hotel was alright considering some of the pretty terrible reviews – yes it’s dated but it’s clean and yes it was very cold (the sign on the wall said the heating is turned on when it reaches 8 degrees!) but it was a chance to wear all of my clothes at once and the novelty factor of a wakeup call for sunrise. I hadn’t known that you have to buy your sunrise train ticket the day before at 16.00 from the train station ticket office (the exact departure time would be confirmed later in the evening to make sure we get there in plenty of time). With sunrise ticket purchased, I wanted to make the most of the couple of hours of daylight left, so armed with a lovely map I jumped on the tourist shuttle bus and headed straight into the park.

As with everywhere I’ve been in Taiwan, this national park is extremely well organised. You just need to turn up, get a map and make sure you know how to get back out again. Inside the park I was blown away by the size of the trees. They are in fact Giant Trees and it’s impossible to capture their size on camera. There are a number of hikes ranging from shorter strolls along boardwalks to the more challenging which take three hours each way – all have magical sounding names. In fact the whole place is magical. For example, the “Three Generation Trees” and the “Pagoda of the Tree Spirit.”

The “3 Generation Tree” is three generations of Cypress trees that have sprouted from the same root. The 1st generation being the roots lying on the ground, estimated to be 1500 years old. 250 years after the first generation died, a seed drifted onto it and grew into the second generation, and the third generation sprouted another 300 years later. And the “Pagoda of the Tree Spirit” was built in 1935 to “comfort the souls” of the 77 loggers who died on the job as well as the spirits of the 100,000 trees that had been felled.

The lady at the information desk gave me a tip on where to watch the sunset, behind the small Ciyun Temple. There were only a few other people there so it was incredibly peaceful (other than a gigantic hornet type creature that the people who were there confirmed came straight for my head). It was also the most stunning sunset I have ever experienced and that is no exaggeration. The clouds form a sea over the forest, and the sun gradually goes down beneath the clouds but is still visible.

My photos look like they have been edited or enhanced but they have not – it genuinely looked just like this. Since watching the sunset is a rite of passage at Alishan, it doesn’t matter that you need to walk back through the forest after darkness has fallen.

In other facts about Alishan, the Ginkgo tree is considered a living fossil, thought to originate at least 270 million years ago. Its cell-regeneration means that old and young trees remain equally healthy and produce the same fruit, they are also resistant to drought and disease making them close to immortal. One of my favourite trails was the Giant Trees boardwalk which connects 36 ancient, giant Formosan red cypress trees, over 1000 years old. The “number 28 giant tree” is the tallest and oldest tree on the Giant Tree trail. It has a girth of 13.1 meters and is 43.5 meters tall, estimated to be around 1,095 years old. Again it was impossible to capture the size of this on camera. We also have the Sacred Tree (Shenmu) – this 3,000-year-old tree collapsed in 1997 but it’s remnants are preserved near Shenmu Station. And the oldest standing tree, the Shuishan Giant Tree over 2700 years old. There are so many Giant Trees it gets a bit confusing.

There are several restaurants in the recreation area, also slightly overpriced but convenient. Something I hadn’t tried yet was the Hot Pot and one of the restaurants was serving a veggie version, so perfect for dinner. I sat next to a friendly couple who helped me cook it – the waitress simply turns on the individual stove that everyone has at their table and puts down a plate of various raw vegetables.

Hot Pot cooking away

I tried to get some sleep before wake up call at 4.30 am, an hour before the train at 5.30 but it was very, very cold. Getting up, I was freezing but it was really fun to head out in the darkness with everyone else, grab a coffee (you’re allowed to drink on a train here unlike on the metro systems) board the wooden train and follow the crowd to the lookout area.

After the sun has risen all the food hawkers open up their stalls serving hot coffee, ginger tea, steaming buns or sizzling Taiwanese pancakes. Being only 6.30 am I decided to walk back and get in another hike before checking out of the hotel, avoiding the crowds who were mostly taking the train back.

The was also time to try a local snack of two whole sweet potatoes, which makes for a tasty and filling stop gap (but not nearly as delicious as the sweet potato in Japan!). My favourite food in Taiwan has been the spinach and ginger, which a lady at the next table told me is blanched before it’s fried, getting rid of the earthy taste. I have lost count of the times I’ve had lovely conversations when sitting on communal tables.

Alishan also has the first cherry blossoms in bloom, which is wonderful to see. It has been an almost spiritual experience here, exploring the trails, experience sunrise and sunset mostly on my own – there are plenty of local tourists around at the viewpoints so it never feels isolated, but few Westerners and the majority of the trails are pleasantly empty.

After two days, all too soon it was time to get the 3pm tourist bus all the way to my next stop – the mysterious sounding Sun Moon Lake …

Taitung: Nature and Neolithics

March 1, 2026March 20, 2026Posted in Taiwan, TravelTagged backpacking, solo travel, Taitung, Taiwan, Travel, travel blogLeave a comment

Taitung was an addition to the itinerary after reading about a national park where you could hike with monkeys and soak in hot springs. I liked Taitung as soon as I got off the train. The sun was shining and there were cute figurines in the garden around the train station. I treated myself to my own room in the lovely Giraffe B&B for £20 a night including breakfast. This got me a beautiful room with two beds, shiny white bathroom and a TV set to BBC news. The housekeeper let me in and asked via Google translate what time I wanted breakfast. It’s located along with the other more budget options close to the train station and regular buses run the 15 minutes to the downtown area.

Taitung has a lot to offer – I could easily have spent more than the couple of days I had. Close to the downtown area there is a big coastal park where walking and cycling paths connect the beach with the city. Follow the paths further and you reach the massive forest reserve with its lakes and bird watching. It’s a popular cycling route and renting a bike would be really nice. The indigenous culture is also much more visible here – more on that later.

To get to the downtown area there are regular buses that take about 20-30 minutes as they literally go all around the houses. Taitung just has a really nice vibe to it. Even the dogs are chilled out. They appear to be street dogs as they are freely wandering around town but they have collars and look cared for.

I found a lovely little vegan food stall called Vegine with a limited number of seats where the owner cooks whatever vegetables and noodles you select from the shop and like at many of the stalls, her children took a break from playing to help bring the food to customers. It was so good I went back twice and ordered two lots of the fried tofu. I’d go back again just for that.

I was about to get the bus back to the B&B when I heard music and discovered a low key night market with a local band playing songs I hadn’t heard before mixed in with some Bon Jovi covers and people from the nearby islands selling local food, crafts and jewellery. Scones filled with hot brown sugar seemed to be the thing. I had wanted to visit the two islands, Green Island and Lanyu (Orchid) Island to learn more about their indigenous culture, but local advice was that it’s too windy in winter and regular boats aren’t running.

*Entrance to the Jhihben Forest Reserve*

The next day I went down to breakfast at the pre-arranged time to find the housekeeper had already put out a plate of food including a chunk of meat and a salad, neither of which I wanted to eat. I explained I only needed the bread and fruit and set off on a day trip via local bus to the Jhihben Forest Reserve. I hoped to stop at the hot springs in the area on the way back. As was becoming usual, I was the only westerner around, with just a few passengers on the bus but the journey was easy enough. After paying the small entry fee you get given a map with a few aptly named options for hiking, like the ‘Brave Climber’s Trail’ and a key that indicates level of experience and effort required. I went for the ‘Forest Bath’ and ‘Scenic Trail’.

Hiking in Taiwan is amazing because you get the trails almost to yourself but there are enough friendly families around and it’s well organised so it’s very safe. Aside from all of the ‘beware snakes and wasps’ signage. Everyone I passed said ‘Welcome to Taiwan’ – a big reason that travelling in Taiwan in general is so great because it’s not overrun with other visitors, there are no tourist prices and nobody rips you Local people are interested to have a chat and go out of their way to help.

The first thing I noticed were the butterflies. There are 100 species in the forest and they swarmed around me, it’s quite magical. As soon as I got higher up into the park I saw the first mammal of the day, the gorgeous ‘Reeve’s muntjacs’ which I watched with a family several times along the trail.

Next up were the Formosan Rock Monkeys. These cute little monkeys were just hanging out in the trees in their groups eating their fruits, rather than trying to steal your food.

Monkeys

The forest is an absolutely idyllic spot. You need a couple of hours to explore the park depending how many trails you do. One part was closed off due to damage, I assume from some sort of natural disaster. The prime spot for the monkey viewing had signs about passing through quickly due to risk of rockfall but the monkey watching was too good a chance to pass up.

There are no food or drink facilities inside but there are toilets and water fountains – in fact there are water fountains everywhere in Taiwan. You never need to buy water. I made the mistake of following Google maps to the hot springs. This meant I got off the bus at a temple car park next to the river which was definitely not a public hot springs spot. I asked some ladies visiting the temple but they misunderstood and thought I wanted to paddle in the river.

By then it started to rain and the only thing I could see was a hot springs resort hotel. They weren’t open until later on that day by which time I’d have missed the bus back – the buses ran at very irregular hours. There is always a solution particularly when you have a strong currency on your side. The nice lady at the hotel made several suggestions including taking a “private spa” for one hour and getting a taxi back all the way to Taitung. This hadn’t even crossed my mind but it cost less than £10 to be driven back door to door. The lady stressed that this type of spa was naked, so I had to use Google translate to confirm that it was indeed a private spa and I wouldn’t be sharing with anyone. It was a truly luxurious experience which would be outrageously expensive if hot springs even existed in the UK.

When I got the bus back from town to my B&B after the long day, as often happens in Taiwan, a lady started chatting to me. She knew some English and told me she was in her 70s and on her way back from meeting up with her sister in a mountain town to see the early cherry blossom blooms. When she learned I was travelling alone around Taiwan she said that’s wonderful, and told me ‘YOLO – you only live once!’. I also had a concerned text message from my B&B saying “We noticed that you didn’t enjoy our breakfast. Would you like a vegan meal?”.

In contrast to the nature, I would highly recommend a day exploring the history of this area visiting the very impressive History Museum and the Peinan burial site. You can do them together but likely need a taxi due to the erratic bus schedule, though the Peinan site is walkable from the train station.

The History Museum takes you through from the creation of Taiwan from a geological perspective through to the movements of the Polynesian people up to the present day culture with influences from all over Asia. What makes Taiwan interesting is the tectonic evolution, namely the collision of the Eurasian and Philippine Sea Plates. According to the museum facts, the Coastal Range is still moving at a speed of 6-13 cm per year relative to the Central Range. During the Ice Age, the Taiwan Strait became land because the sea level dropped, allowing the migration of plants and animals into Taiwan.

Taiwan is also a know as a “place of convergence” due to it’s location – many different ethnic groups and objects have passed through, including the trade of Jade, glass beads and sweet potatoes with China, Southeast Asia and the Austronesian people. The museum has some really good exhibits of indigenous culture. Austronesian people make up less than 2.3% of the population according to when the info was written but they make up 7% of Taiwan’s military and 60% of special forces.

Without turning this into a history lesson, the Peinan site is also fascinating. This a prehistoric culture, with people settling here 5000 years ago. In 1896 a Japanese scholar visited Taitung and photographed the stone pillars. But it wasn’t until 1945 when the Japanese carried out the first excavation. The Peinan Culture is believed to have been active from middle to late Neolithic Period with people leaving the site approximately 1900 years ago – nobody really knows why or where they went though there are theories they went into the mountains.

In 1993 the huge group of slate coffins were excavated – this is the largest excavated slate coffin burial complex in East Asia with over 200 unearthed, including single-body and multi-body burials.

What I liked about this site is that you can walk right around the excavation and look at the walls, the stairs, the ladders, pottery vessels … This brings it more to life. And of course aside from a group of Chinese visitors who were just leaving, I had all it to myself as usual. Next stop, Khaosiung.

Carry On Buses (a bizarre solo experience in Hualien)

February 24, 2026March 20, 2026Posted in Taiwan, TravelTagged Asia, backpacking, solo travel, Taiwan, travel blog1 Comment

The first stop on my route east around Taiwan was Hualien, a couple of hours away from Taipei. The main attraction of this city is the nearby Taroko Gorge which sadly remains almost entirely closed to visitors due to the 7.2 magnitude earthquake in 2024. I had heard that Hualien was a bit of a ghost town and unfortunately the rain didn’t help the already strange vibe of the place. I imagine in better weather it’s lovely with its mountain backdrop but all I could see was low cloud.

The “Hualien Wow” hostel was really good, right opposite the train station and the bargain price of £10 included toast and peanut butter for breakfast. The hostel may have been Wow but Hualien was not. Even the well known night market was a washout – with no buses running that I could find, I walked the 30 mins each way in the rain (the hostels lend you umbrellas or you can just rent one on the street) only to buy some inedible tofu sticks and a pot of sweetcorn. Most of the food on the street markets is fried in some sort of cooking oil that smells rancid – the whiff of it makes me feel sick.

An extremely earnest woman at the bus station information stand told me there was not much point in visiting Taroko, especially in bad weather, as only the visitor centre was accessible. Instead she highly recommended an 8 hour day trip up and down the east coast. The next day it wasn’t raining so I decided to take her advice – it was either that or leave Hualien without doing anything, as there was actually nothing else to do. I arrived at the bus station (conveniently right opposite the train station) 15 minutes before one of the 3 departures of the day hoping I’d still get a seat, and was greeted enthusiastically by an attendant manning the desk. He gave me a ticket from a machine with the number 1 on it, which I thought was a little strange. At 9.30 on the dot a minibus bus pulled up and a little old man got off with a clipboard, wrote down my name and contact details on the first line of his sheet, ushered me into the first seat and off we went. I was the only passenger. It became apparent he didn’t speak any English when he spoke into a translator on his phone in a comedy monotone voice to tell me he would be my guide. It’s ok, I thought, I’ll be getting off at each of the 7 or 8 different stops and can do my own thing.

After about ten minutes his phone told me in its robot voice to get my camera ready as we were going past the world’s biggest building made of Lego (I think), followed by a mountain in the distance that he was very insistent I got a photo of. I obediently got my phone out but had no idea what I was meant to be capturing. What happened next was interesting. Some military tanks drove past with soldiers in camouflage gear standing on top arranged in a circle facing outward with their machine guns pointed right at us. It looked like a scene from a movie. There are some military bases around so I assumed (hoped) it was some sort of drill. I asked my guide who suddenly refused to talk, shaking his head and making a “no comment” sort of gesture. He obviously didn’t want a record of any mention of the military on his phone.

*Waterfall through hole in the bridge road*

We arrived at the first stop, the world’s only fire station that is actually built like a fire hydrant. It’s cool, but you don’t need more than 5 mins to have a look and take a photo. Oh no, said my guide, the departure time is in 25 minutes – I must look at the temple next door, use the squat toilet, then we will take photos and “I’ll show you some wonderful illusions”. I then realised he was going to accompany me on every stop and I’d be participating in the world’s most ridiculous photoshoot. It was going to be a very long day.

Here is me infront of the fire station after he whipped out a hand held mirror and took a photo that gave the illusion of a water reflection. I feigned delight and said oh wow, so clever! He then took a panoramic with me running in a circle so there appeared to be two of me. “Do your parents know you have a twin in Taiwan?” he asked. Once was quite amusing. But at each stop in the drizzle, it got old very fast.

Today was the only day I didn’t bring any snacks. By the time we got to the fishing village for the lunch stop I was starving and it was now pouring down with rain. His instructions that “We will eat lunch at a local fish restaurant and the bus will depart in 90 minutes“ was not what I wanted to hear. I translated that I wanted vegetarian food and suddenly he spoke a few words of English – “OH MY GOD” he said slapping his head, suggesting I walk up the hill as there was a shop that “might sell bread”. The tiny shop at the top did not sell bread or any sort of snack I could identify and the missing-toothed shop owner seems to have no idea what I was asking for – but he did gesture further up the hill. Turns out at the very top there was a restaurant with “Welcome” written in English, several vegetable based options and a lovely lady and her little daughter greeted me with “would you like a beer?”. Yes please.

*One of the few interesting things he pointed out, a fossil*

My guide was a stickler for the official “bus departure time”, which wasn’t for another ten mins so when I got back we had to stand in the rain looking at a mural of whales on the wall and playing a guessing game of which species each of them was and do I have whales in my country. After lunch he told me “This afternoon will not be fun. It is raining”. No kidding. If I wrote about every excruciating stop we made this would be a very long post. I will just mention the best (or worst) three:

1. The Nissan cave. We stopped at the Shimen recreation area where a long path leads to a stunning rocky coastline and a cave. But it was raining, the rocks were slippery and the sea looked ferocious. Ever so often the waves threatened to cover the rocks where we were standing. The guide was in full photographer mode by now. Try following instructions in Chinese to recreate specific poses when you have no reference as to what they are. It’s only when I saw a photo in the recreation area explaining that “The sea-facing opening is called the “March Cave” as it looks like a March (a Nissan car model)” that I realised I was supposed to be driving a car. After I fell over on the rocks trying to reach the next spot I was getting annoyed and told him no more photos. This just annoyed him and he told me crossly that “an American tourist got an amazing photo in that spot”. Good for him.

2. The cliff rescue. For someone who looked about 70 he leapt up the rocky slope to the top of the rocks. After looking over the edge I decided I really didn’t want his photo to be the last one I ever took. But getting down was harder than he made it look, so much so that I got stuck. To add to the ridiculousness of this entire day there was a family a bit lower down who sent their approximately 10 year old son up to fetch me. Unfortunately he appeared to be scared of heights. The poor boy started screaming (no exaggeration) as he tried to reach me while his parents laughed their heads off and took photos of us both. My only regret is that I didn’t video it. The guide just looked disgusted that I didn’t want a photo on the edge.

Not actually as dangerous as it looks

3. The bum shot. Best of all, or worst of all, at an otherwise average viewpoint he started positioning my arms and told me to hold my nose. Again I had no idea why until he showed me the photo. Like other tourists on his camera roll, I am supposed to be pointing at a mountain in the shape of a bottom and holding my nose at the smell. Is that even funny?

I couldn’t hide my annoyance at the end when he wanted me to do the mirror trick myself and I failed the test. He snatched it back and his phone shouted “No! Never drop the mirror!”. The final straw was when I was trying to enjoy my ginger tea whilst praying for the departure time to come around and he asked where my husband was and informed me that he was 66 and not married yet.

I didn’t realise I wasn’t meant to actually climb it til he shouted “No!!!”

Hualien is probably best left until the Taroko Gorge reopens, or perhaps I missed something. Unfortunately I just wanted to get out of the place so I went straight to the train station to secure my train ticket down the coast to Taitun the next day.

“*Running from an earthquake” – getting run over more likely*

*The one viewpoint he didn’t accompany me, too many stairs*

Glimpse into the North (South Korea Part Two)

January 21, 2025January 21, 2025Posted in Asia, South Korea, TravelTagged Asia, backpacking, solo travel, South Korea, travel blog1 Comment

Let’s start by that saying as far as strange tours go, this was up there with the best of them. The Demilitarised Zone is a strip of land cutting the Korean peninsula in half, forming a ‘buffer zone’ approximately 2km wide on either side of the Military Demarcation Line, the divider between the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea) and the Republic of Korea (South Korea). The zone itself may be ‘demilitarised’ but the areas on either side are very heavily militarised indeed. Within the DMZ is the Joint Security Area (JSA) where negotiations take place and until recently it was possible to visit the spot where North and South Korean soldiers face off. This is important to know before booking, because the JSA closed to tourists in July 2023 after an American soldier attempted to cross the border from South to North without authorisation. Tours to the DMZ continued, with a couple of options that generally include a walk through one of the infiltration tunnels, a visit to an ‘observatory’ / visitor’s centre with telescopic viewing platforms set up to provide the coveted glimpse into North Korea and a stop at one of the suspension bridges, which are a fun way to stagger the group arrivals to the DMZ. The other thing to know (which I didn’t) is that various bridges and tunnels are closed on different days. As it turned out, the tour I initially booked was closed on Mondays so I ended up on this one, which I actually would recommend as the guides were great and it wasn’t too crowded – ‘2nd Tunnel and Y-Shaped Suspension Bridge‘ via the GetYourGuide platform. I set off at 6.30am for the meeting point at Myeondong subway station, a 20 min walk from my hostel.

*Map of the DMZ and 2nd infiltration tunnel*

The roads were dark and quiet other than some office workers starting their day but Seoul is a very safe city. Finding anywhere open for breakfast at that time was impossible so I settled for a coffee and and a bread roll filled with sweet red beans from the 7/11 convenience store, a good way to use up some of my T-Card balance. I arrived at the subway station and spotted a group of blank looking tourists sitting on some benches. A guide with a clipboard introduced herself as Lucy, gave me a tag to hang around my neck with her name on it and sent me over to join the others. There’s always an annoying person or two in group trips (as the saying goes if there isn’t one, then it’s you) and sure enough two middle aged Australian men joined the group after unnecessarily loudly having a go at Lucy for changing the meeting point (she didn’t) and asking us all if we had received the location details on time (we had).

Video from the bus, entering the DMZ

Bus tours are a very popular way to see South Korea and in fact the only way to see the DMZ, which needs to be booked in advance with your passport details. Lucy and her fellow tour guide Joey didn’t believe in any rest on the bus – this theme continued on all of the bus tours I took in South Korea. Sitting up front meant I had no choice but to listen to the non-stop commentary aside from a 20 min break where Joey announced ‘ok you can take a rest now, sleep well’. It was actually very informative, and if I’m not forced to listen then I will switch off. Meanwhile our suit and sunglasses wearing driver Mr Sony provided a cheerful hello and thank you each time we embarked and disembarked the purple bus. Interestingly, Joey said that until she became a tour guide a few years ago, when she was living in London and working in Pret, she hadn’t given much thought to the question of unification between the North and South. Her father recalls North Korean citizens being referred to as animals during his own school days and her mother still considers them ‘the enemy’. It’s only now that she’s working in tourism that her view has shifted and she has come to view them as normal people mostly working as farmers and living below the poverty line, and she now sees unification as a good thing.

*Y-Shaped Suspension bridge, taken from the observation deck*

Our first stop was the ‘Y-Shaped Pocheon Suspension Bridge’, which at 410m is the longest suspension bridge in Korea, as the name suggests forming a Y shape over the Hantangang River. The advantage of starting the tour so early is that you’re the first group to arrive – the observatory and cafe were just opening up and the bridge was quite literally empty. The real reason there are multiple suspension bridges in this area is because they were once used as a defence line, but nowadays they are fun to walk over and provide some lovely views of the autumn colours.

Perhaps the most unsettling thing about this tour compared to other war memorials and places of historical interest, is that usually the conflicts, or at least the wars, are in the past. Whereas this conflict is most definitely in the present. It was also disconcerting to hear the ‘rivalry’ referred to in a lighthearted manner, i.e the raising of flagpoles higher than the other one, and the blasting of K-Pop and Gangnam Style music – both sides broadcast various music / messages / material into the area over loud speakers. It was only recently in the news that thousands of balloons filled with rubbish (according to news reports, possibly also containing human waste) were sent over from the North and dropped on the South.

Back on the bus and off to our second stop, the “2nd Infiltration Tunnel” and, unexpectedly, a Crane centre (the bird variety) which we had a look around whilst Lucy sorted out some admin. The tunnel is one of four constructed by North Korea, intended for a surprise attack. The information in the visitors centre explained that some South Korean soldiers heard banging noises leading to the discovery of the tunnel in 1975, which had already been abandoned. It’s about 2m by 2m and could apparently accommodate up to 30,000 armed soldiers per hour, along with vehicles, artillery and tanks. I’m not so sure about the tanks – I soon understood why helmets were mandatory, as the ceiling is really low in places and the only sound was that of people bumping their heads every minute or so.

Strictly no photos were allowed inside the tunnel, but it’s fairly well lit (the artificial lights allowed plants to grow despite the dampness). Our guide said there was some type of mineral on the ceiling – I forgot exactly what, but it’s meant to be lucky to touch it – but all I touched was slime. There are some benches for weary tourists at the deepest point, after which the tunnel is barricaded off and you need to turn back. It’s a bit surreal to consider that if you did continue on, you’d surface somewhere in North Korea, which presumably wouldn’t be a tourist attraction. Or would it?

This day trip was 10 hours long (another common theme with the bus trips) and included a basic buffet lunch. Eventually we made it to the highlight of the trip and main reason for coming, the Peace Observatory. Lucy and Joey warned us not to take any photos of the South Korean guards, who would apparently all look very young (this was true). After a short train/cable car ride up, we all filed into a cinema style room (no photos inside either) and watched a short video which could itself be described as propaganda with it’s horror music style soundtrack. Positioned around the floor to ceiling glass windows were telescopes, some with digital screens trained on the DMZ and beyond into North Korea. We were told that whilst no photos were allowed outside either, nobody would check our phones which could be taken as encouragement. The adolescent looking soldiers helped focus the lenses on what was described as Propaganda Village – a village on the North Korea side which they say is fake. I did spot a moving truck, and Joey got very excited at a blob she said was “a North Korean”. She said this like it was some type of rare exotic species. I wondered were there lenses trained on us from the other side? Outside was even more surreal as over the wind I could hear a message being broadcast very loudly from the speakers, which the soldiers said was a message of peace. I have no idea what it was, as it was in Korean. But I found it fascinating wandering around the terrace, using the telescopes to look past nomads land. I would be slightly wary of posting any footage on social media, even if I had taken any.

*Tanks outside the visitor’s centre (spot the name tag)*

After some photos with the tanks and a visit to the shop selling 10kg bags of rice – also free green tea and samples of purple rice cake (this is prime rice growing territory) – off we went to yet another stop, the abandoned Woljeongri station. This is the now dilapidated last train stop before the border. It was a great photo opportunity and fairly eery with the remains of a carriage just rusting away on the tracks, which now lead to nowhere and the distant sound of K-Pop being broadcast from the South Korean speakers.

Korean K-Pop music in the background

Not far from here, and the final stop on the tour, is the last building constructed in North Korean architectural style, the Korean Workers Party Headquarters. Constructed in 1946, the three story building is falling down but there was still a a team of gardeners tending to the bushes. I didn’t get any more information on this, but imagine it’s an influencer’s dream photo spot in the Spring.

*Cheorwon Korean Workers’ Party Headquarters*

Finally it was back on the bus and a couple of hours drive back to Seoul. It was certainly an eye opening day, and once more it was too late to find a proper meal. These long days are tiring – I managed a walk around the night market in Myendong and a cheap veggie spring roll before retreating to my pod for some sleep before my morning flight to the South Korea’s answer to Hawaii, Jeju Island…

Caballos and Colonia

April 29, 2023November 26, 2024Posted in South America, Travel, UruguayTagged backpacking, caballos, horses, solo travel, Travel, travel blog, UruguayLeave a comment

After leaving Cabo Polonio on the jeep in the rain, we arrived back at the visitors centre. Our next stop was only a 15 minute drive north so with the next bus not for a couple of hours we took a taxi to Los Chajá ecolodge, on the edge of the small beachside down of Barra de Valizas. This place was recommended to me by another lodge that I wanted to go to (vegetarian, horses, specified they were “not a dude ranch”) but was closed at the moment. We fell in love with the place as soon as we got there – we had a beautiful thatched roof chalet all to ourselves, one of only two on the property and directly surrounded by twenty horses munching on the marshland.

It was such a stark contrast to the last hostel that the lovely owner, Laura, must have thought I was mad exclaiming “oh wow there is a fridge! And a kettle!”.

This is the sort of place you could come back to for a week, you can cook in your own kitchen and eat on the porch with the dogs (Laura and her partner Mauro just rescued a set of puppies as well as their two older dogs) and horses who will try to steal the breakfast that Laura brings over in the morning.

Most of all we enjoyed making hot chocolate with soya milk in the evenings and quizzing each other on South American mammals (there were no English books in the library!). Turns out I have a weirdly specific knowledge of how many teeth a certain type of anteater has. In order to have a hot shower you had to light the gas hob, turn on the kitchen hot tap, run to the bathroom and turn the hot shower on, then turn off the kitchen tap and hob. These instructions were actually written in the welcome booklet. This made me nervous as I was still mentally scarred from the Cabo Polonio gas leak.

On our way back from buying supplies at the little supermarket, as the sun set car drove up the road towards us, turned around the mini roundabout and stopped. A very friendly smiley couple wound the windows down and offered us a lift, asking if we were staying at the lodge. Not wanting to accept a lift from strangers, we declined and they drove off back the way they came. This felt like a very safe place but why did they drive up then turn around and how did they know where we were staying?!

The next day we went horse riding within the Cabo Polonio national park along the beach. First of all Laura made sure we greeted our horses (Arthur and Brisa) and could control the direction and speed the Gaucho way. No pulling on reins or kicking, just use one hand to gently steer and your voice to go faster or slower.

The beach was absolutely stunning, just us and Thea the dog, and maybe one or two people we passed along the four hour round trip to the Buena Vista viewpoint where we dismounted to climb up.

Making shadows at the top of the viewpoint

Riding through sand dunes, along the beach and through Wild West type desert landscape was incredible. As we led the horses through the steeper parts of the dunes we noticed they also try to step in existing footprints as it’s easier, just like we do. We passed a herd of cows on the beach but the best part was seeing the group of horses who had just popped down from the village to the beach on their own to enjoy the weather. They were just hanging out by the water until our dog Thea had a go and they galloped off into town – I’ve never heard actual thundering hooves before. Vix’s horse almost went with them.

We also loved brushing and feeding the horses – if this place offers a volunteer program I’m there!

We did almost destroy the place though – in the same five minutes, the bottom fell off the sink and water went all over the floor, something happened to the gas heater and the room filled with gas and then the cover fell off the air vent. We opened all the windows and turned everything off before calling Laura, who was out on a ride. When she got back and saw both the bathroom sink and gas no longer worked she looked slightly worried and moved us to the other chalet as the other couple were just leaving. As they waved we realised they were the same nice couple that had kindly offered us the lift last night and they were not in fact after our kidneys.

There is only one bus out of this place per day, at 15.00. With checkout in the morning, and everything closed and deserted for the low season, we wandered down to the beach and made more doggy friends before catching the supermarket before it closed to buy avocados and wraps for our staple meal (thanks Vix!). We did, however, find the only bar open in town and enjoyed a Patricia lager with some locals who welcomed us in and even offered to turn their music down. The owner said we were beautiful like Patricia.

We waited at the bus stop as the daily bus trundled into town, turned around and came back to pick us up on the way out. With no real internet for several days now we hadn’t booked any accommodation nor were we sure if we could make it all the way to Colonia. It was about 5 hours back to the capital city of Montevideo, where we literally jumped off, ran to the ticket office and got ourselves onto the Colonia bus ten minutes later which was full of teenagers going on a night out to a club. We were absolutely starving by the time we arrived and spent the entire 3 hour journey on the bus Wi-Fi trying to find anywhere that would let us check in after midnight – turns out most places expect you before then 🤦🏻‍♀️

We found a hotel that responded just in time and walked the few blocks through the quiet cobbled streets of Colonia – in a huge contrast to Brazil where we couldn’t do that in the daytime! The journey was worth it to wake up in Colonia, as beautiful as I remembered it being ten years ago. The only thing that has changed is that there were loads of old cars, Cuban style, last time I was there which seemed to have gone now aside from a couple outside a restaurant.

Our hotel didn’t have room for us the following night which turned out to be a blessing as we moved just around the corner to an apartment in a the most gorgeous original colonial building. We booked it at 10.50 and arrived at 11.00 to find the lovely Fred, an artist who struggled to hear sometimes over his hearing aid, just finishing preparing the room. To stay in one of these buildings was amazing and we made use of the pretty garden. We had already walked past the door and taken photos of it, before realising that was in fact our new home.

The day was spent wandering around the streets and eating too much fried food in a restaurant on the sea with live music (a man pretending to play guitar and singing “Mi Corazon” with some dramatic gestures in between solar charging his equipment on the table). As well as trying to get cash – my bank card also had to be cancelled as someone had tried to swipe it in Cabo Polonio, possibly by holding a card reader against the locker, so I spent an hour trying to explain to HSBC “the local bank” that no I could not pop into a local branch as I’m in Uruguay, and no I cannot verify a payment if they can’t tell me any details, and locking me out of the banking app “for security” was the least helpful thing they could have done. We withdrew a load of US dollars on Vix’s working card to hopefully avoid needing any more ATMs for the rest of the trip.

We still haven’t found the party – we did find a rock bar with promising art work, but when we asked what’s on tonight they said they have a reggaeton DJ at weekends.

You can easily “see” Colonia in a day but it’s a lovely place to enjoy the atmosphere, walk along the coast and stroll around so you could equally easily spend a week here. But I was really keen to return to Buenos Airies again which fitted in perfectly with the ferry across to Argentina …

British Girls on a Ride and The Wasters (Uruguay Part 1)

April 24, 2023November 19, 2024Posted in South America, Travel, UruguayTagged backpacking, cabo Polonia, Montevideo, solo travel, South America, Travel, travel blog, UruguayLeave a comment

After five lazy beach days, we took a cheap flight from the island of Florianopolis, Brazil to the often overlooked capital of Uruguay, Montevideo. I have been to Uruguay once before but only on a day trip from Buenos Airies during my first trip to South America over ten years ago. At the airport in Sao Paolo where we changed planes, we noticed people taking selfies with an older man – naturally we had to get one too, having no clue who it was. He turned out to be Martinho da Vila the 85 year old Brazilian samba star.

In Montevideo we stayed two nights at the Yorki Haus hostel, run by a German man and a French man. We had a prison style room at the very top of the building with a gorgeous rooftop to ourselves.

An annoying family had taken over the kitchen, which I didn’t mind until I spent ages making coffee using our £10 Starbucks ground coffee (literally the only coffee in any supermarket without added sugar) then as soon as I turned my back to spread my £10 peanut butter on my toast The Dad poured the rest of the coffee and took it for himself.

Seeing the capital city at the weekend was great. We found a great little bar just down the road that served veggie sandwiches and cocktails and played Latin rock, and during the day we walked the few kilometres down to the old town along the beach amongst locals jogging and exercising on a Saturday morning. Like much of South America, it doesn’t get going until the afternoon. We browsed the antique shops and had an amazing lunch of grilled vegetables before making our way back via the supermarket to stock up on food for the next few days when we would be “off grid” in the hippy town of Cabo Polonio.

Having looked up rock bars in Montevideo, thinking surely we’d finally find a night out in the capital, we got an Uber across town to the “best rock bar in Uruguay”, the Roxx Bar. When we arrived at a deserted residential looking street, we asked the driver if the place even existed. The driver asked the one man hanging around outside, who explained the that he was also waiting as the owner was a “a bit late opening up”. It was already almost 11pm so after waiting for a while we decided that even if the owner did turn up, it would just be the three of so maybe not that exciting. Luckily we found a friendly welcome and a live punk covers band at Clash City Rockers bar down the road, even though it was cash only so we had just enough money for two beers between us.

Next morning we set off early to the huge and modern Tres Cruces bus terminal to get a 4.5 hour bus northeast up the coast to Cabo Polonio. It’s a scenic journey and we passed a few places we’d have been happy to get off and explore. When you get off at Cabo Polonia bus station, there is a visitors centre where you hang around for a while before a large jeep type vehicle takes you all through the sand dunes to the village, three times a day.

Whilst waiting for the jeep we made our debuts on Uruguayan daytime TV when we were asked for an interview about our visit with host Mario – although half of what we said wasn’t translated, somehow my name was changed to Alice and I have no idea where the “British Girls on a Ride” tag line came from 🤦🏻‍♀️ It’s available on YouTube although I haven’t yet got over the cringe factor enough to watch it (what was the point in asking if we are planning on coming back again when we haven’t been there yet?).

Cabo Polonio is about 9km off the main highway and there are no proper roads there. The driver had to take a run up over one mound and we passed some military looking types that were well and truly stuck in the sand. We finally reached the Lobo Hostel Bar, which we had chosen for its sociable setting and billing as the local bar – seeing as we were there off season and we didn’t want to be totally isolated. We accidentally went to the nice welcoming looking guesthouse next door, with music playing from the restaurant and tables and chairs outside – I later realised they only turn the music on and put the chairs out when the morning jeep arrives with new visitors. I never saw it open again.

Neither of us have particularly high expectations for accommodation. In fact we have pretty low standards. When the woman running the place, Celia (we think that was her name) showed us to our attic room up a ladder with only a rope to hold on to, lockable only by our own padlock, we took it as part of the adventure. We loved the window that opened directly on to the little rooftop that we had to ourselves. We loved the wind turbine next to the roof. We didn’t mind the fact the blanket on the bed was full of leaves, until we got bed bugs. I gave Celia, aka the Hunchback of Cabo Polonia, the benefit of the doubt when she shortchanged us even though another backpacker told us she’d done the same thing to her friend. We tried to cook our pasta on the frankly disgusting stove that stank of a gas leak and made me feel sick everytime I went near it. The only thing the Hunchback really said was how ugly the newer houses were (we thought they were really pretty) and essentially how tourists were ruining the place.

But we drew the line when we went down the ladder to make dinner in the kitchen we had paid to use, to find pieces of cardboard on the floor soaking up an oil spill, a “do not use” sign on the sink though there was nothing wrong with it and the fridge had been unplugged. The Hunchback was from then on referred to by Vix (whose socks were now soaked in oil) as Oil Slick Mcgoo when she tried to blame her other guests for spilling the oil and leaving it. The oil was never cleaned up over the three nights we were there, it just stayed all over the floor next to the open flame (if she’d turn the gas on and lend you a lighter).

There is a very old fashioned supermarket in the village, which weighs fruit and vegetables the old way and is open all day other than around 3-5. The empanadas looked suspiciously like the ones from yesterday, every morning, but we were just glad they took Visa since with one of my cards already lost to cloning and no ATMs in the town we had limited funds. No problem – the shop sold a great selection of wine and anything over £8 they would accept cards for. Win win (until my Visa was also stopped a few days later for a dodgy contactless transaction which was either the shop or the hostel trying their luck).

On our first night we went with another girl to try to see the glowing Bioluminescence, a type of plankton, in the water. This was a total fail but it was fun to walk around the lighthouse at night in the pitch black other than the lighthouse signal itself.

Bone, fossil or rock outside a “new” house

There are certain characters you encounter over again when backpacking. “The Waster” is one of them. They are usually European backpackers who have stayed too long doing nothing or maybe “volunteering” / skiving at a hostel, typically looking horrible and miserable. The man “working” at the hostel was definitely a Waster.

April being low season, it was a total ghost town. The next morning I tried to make us both coffee in the morning but The Hunchback had thrown the cafetière in the bin. I asked The Waster and he reluctantly gave me another from their own fully functioning kitchen. After a lot off faff trying to get it going and avoiding the oil spill and carbon monoxide poisoning, I knocked the whole thing over and was about to spontaneously combust myself when Vix calmed me down and we got the hell out of there. With nowhere open, we found an old man who opened up his tiny cafe to shelter us and two other other desperate tourists from the rain and served us coffee on a little silver tray with shaking hands.

The dogs of Cabo Polonio deserve a mention – friendly and sociable, they each have their own patch. As we walked though the village each day we would meet each one in turn, from the Hostel Dog who hung out on our rooftop and probably gave us fleas, to the Town Dog half way across the village that seemed blind, to the gorgeous blue eyed Lighthouse Dog that accompanied us on our search for the seals.

Improvised wine glass to avoid dirty hostel cup

There is a large area of “new” houses on the other side of the village, but not a single person in sight. One house had what looked like a massive spinal bone out front, one had an old bomb and most had some piece of unique art embedded into the walls.

Having given up on cooking at the hostel, we found the one more expensive restaurant that took Visa and lived it up with a lovely vegetable stir fry. Totally worth it for the view and a comfy place to hang out and drink (we went back every day). Vix even went into the sea and swam with the tiny creatures whose heads we had seen from the shore but never could find out what they were (dolphin / turtle / baby seal depending upon who you asked).

Our rooftop came into it’s own at night- this was the clearest sky I’ve seen in a long time, with the Milky Way visible end to end. I also loved having the chance to switch off from your phone with very limited electricity, and candle light in the evening means you can enjoy the night sky. But we were sitting in darkness in the hostel as the candles in the plastic bottles burned out while The Wasters cooked up a storm in the fully lit up “restaurant” kitchen next door.

Avocado, tomato and bean wraps on the roof – no cooking required

It poured with rain as we left on the jeep a few days later, after making our way back to the Visa restaurant only to find it closed and begging a man there to make us an instant coffee. We only left our stuff in the hostel for an hour, my big bag which was locked and putting our smaller bags in a locker. When we returned from coffee, both combination locks had been tampered with. Our feeling was that The Wasters either tried to get in or just turned the codes to mess with us, something I have never experienced at a hostel before. It’s probably a good thing we did our TV interview before our visit!

Breakfast- miniature bag of cornflakes from our bag of snacks and £3 instant coffee

You’d expect some Filthy Hippies at an off grid community and I love the idea behind Cabo Polonio and self sufficiency but the the place we stayed had no recycling and was just filthy, which goes against the values of an eco town. But the area itself is absolutely stunning with miles of unspoilt coastline and the nature is amazing – definitely worth a visit for a few days if you stay in one of the nice guesthouses. It’s also nice to be there off season when you can enjoy the peace and quiet.

Jeep ride out – only one poor guy was on the inbound jeep as we left

Saying goodbye to Cabo, we continued the off grid theme as we headed to a horse “eco lodge” just a few miles up the coast…

Floripa – Canoes, Caipirinhas and Capybara!

April 24, 2023November 19, 2024Posted in Brazil, South America, TravelTagged backpacking, beach, Brazil, Florianopolis, Floripa, solo travelLeave a comment

Three weeks in and brand new travel companion Vix has flown out to Sao Paolo to join me for the next four weeks. Vix and I met at a some dingy London rock bar and also share a love for travelling. Helen and I eventually got to the MADA hostel about 10pm after the epic taxi ride that took four hours instead of six due to the excessive speed and overtaking on blind bends. At least on a bus you can read a book or sleep! Unhelpfully the entrance road to the MADA hostel is closed entirely after 8pm, meaning Vix couldn’t get past the gates and we had to walk around the block via dark empty streets which defeats the object of staying in an hostel close to the action in Villa Madalena.

With too much choice of noisy bars we ended up gate crashing what seemed like kids birthday party. Everything I tried to order on the menu was unavailable so we settled for some chips which instead of coming with a chimichurri sauce like the menu suggested, came with a little bowl of what tasted like vegetable stock powder. Better than Helen who got curry powder. But we were excited to see they had one of the 360 spinny video things which we were the only adults to have a go on.

Wanting to get straight to the beach and having said goodbye to Helen, the next day Vix and I booked an overnight bus south to Florianopolis. The free day also gave me a chance to actually see some of Sao Paolo and we spent the perfect afternoon wandering around Batman Alley, checking out the graffiti and going on a spending spree at the market. Who knew I needed a top with cashew nut flowers on it?

In the evening we stumbled on a plant based restaurant around the corner while we were waiting’s for the bus. This was an even weirder dining experience as we were the only customers in there and the waiters were dressed up in overalls like oversized toddlers. Vix caught one particularly surly old waiter gesticulating at her like an angry Italian, and then as she continued her spending spree by buying some a coffee cup with a saucer shaped like a leaf and the friendly overalls man spent a very long time wrapping it up like the Easter bunny, she clocked the angry overalls man walk past me after washing his hands and flicking the water at my legs. Luckily I didn’t see this.

The Sao Paolo bus terminal is like no bus station I’ve seen before, with airport style check in counters and endless shops and facilities. As ever a simple question seems to generate much discussion, as we asked the information desk where our bus company desk was, the two staff had a long discussion and examined our tickets for a while before directing us just around the corner and saying “go with God”. Not really what you want to hear when you are getting on a 12 hour night bus.

We tried to sit in the clean seating area but the cleaners physically moved us on – the woman picked up Vix’s bag and moved her. The other seating areas absolutely stank- unfortunately the areas that were not cafes or shops were acting as homeless shelters. Vix notes that we would need to be on crack to keep up here. The “cama” (bed) bus was also like no other, with almost fully reclining seats, pillows and blankets although I still can’t sleep on public transport 🤦🏻‍♀️. It did cost almost £100 after all the service and tax additions! The bus also makes a few stops at huge service stations where you could eat and stretch your legs.

We had stocked up on food and drinks – first Vix opened her cashew nut drink and immediately closed it as it stank like rotten cheese. Then she opened her mango juice and it fizzed like bicarbonate of soda. Only when we read the ingredients did we realise it was super double concentrated.

We arrived in Florianopolis (nicknamed Floripa) around 10am and got an Uber to the island side, staying in the Barroa de Lago where there are lots of hostels . It’s still low season though so aside from the groups of Argentinians, most of whom seemed to be volunteering at the hostel, it was pretty quiet.

Lots of people had recommended Florianopolis and I could immediately see why. It’s way more relaxed, with little coffee shops and beach bars and it felt much safer at night. We initially booked three nights but extended to five as we loved our private room in the hostel with a balcony and the outdoor space and bar downstairs. Staying a few nights somewhere means you can actually use the kitchen facilities and cook your own food – novelty! Avocado wraps and tomato and lentil pasta never tasted so good.

There is actually loads to do in Florianopolis and you could spend a couple of weeks here and move around different parts of the island.

Vix and the little surfer boy in the background we may have pretended was our adoptive son

At the beach people are ready to sell you grilled cheese, churros, drinks and even roll out racks of clothes and bikinis. You actually don’t need to bring anything. Like stupid tourists we got burnt and spent the next few glorious weather days hiding from the sun – we crossed the bridge, walked through the jungle path to the natural pools to a stunning sunset point.

One day was literally spent drinking banana caprinhas on a tiny beach over the bridge. This is the best drink I have ever tasted in my life. Another day was spent purely on getting laundry done, drinking oat lattes at what became our favourite café hangout with the lovely Flor.

I had really wanted to see the world’s largest rodent, the Capybara, in the wetlands of the Pantanal (one of the reasons why I voted for that over the Amazon) but aside from the fleeting glimpse at night I haven’t been in luck. Turns out Vix has an obsession with Capybara too. We even asked the hostel barman where we could see one and he mentioned there might be a family of them somewhere down the river at night.

The staff at the hostel were lovely but all volunteers from Argentina and none been there more than a couple of weeks so unfortunately pretty useless when it came to providing basic information like what to do. Luckily we found fisherman Luis down by the river and he said come back in the morning and we could have two shiny green kayaks for £6 each for the day. Next morning he was nowhere to be seen and someone else tried to sell us just one kayak for a worse deal. But we persevered and eventually somebody else went off and found Luis (he’d had too many caipirinhas the night before) and he came through on his deal. Off we went in with a little map and his instructions to go inland (ie not into the sea) and where to stop for a good caiprinha.

The river is really beautiful and we passed by pretty guesthouses and the occasional boat, and a man sitting on the riverside who shouted across that we had provided the mornings entertainment when the wind picked up and Vix was hanging on a mooring dock for a rest and each time I stopped rowing to take a photo I’d end up a good few metres back again. By this point it was clear the map had no relation to reality. After a couple of hours we needed that drink so we rowed up to a classy looking riverside restaurant and the waiter pulled us in with an rope so we could climb up to the deck. After we’d sat down and ordered a £20 Mushroom Moqueca and a man started playing guitar, I noticed everyone else was smartly dressed – as Vix said, we are on somebody else’s expensive holiday and we’ve rocked up in green rental kayaks.

We decided to make an afternoon of it and ordered a few Negroni’s then the most magical thing happened – I looked up and saw not one but a whole family of gentle Capybara with two babies just getting into the river for a swim. The rest of the diners must have thought we were mad the way we leapt up from our table almost crying at the sight.

With the wind on our side we rowed back in the half the time with a takeout box of leftover food the restaurant packaged up (which I nearly lost as somehow Luis thought I had offered it to him and he tried to take it but Vix snatched it back) and for a strawberry capririnha on the beach. That turned out to be pure cachaha (the local liquor) and undrinkable even for Vix. We got back to the hostel still excited from the Capy sighting but when we told the barman he just told us off for accidentally bringing in alcohol from outside. I suppose nobody was as excited as us.

Probably because it’s low season now, there is zero night life. When we asked the capybara barman where’s the party he just laughed and said “it’s a Monday “. The beach bars close at 17.00 around sunset and the only restaurant around was a Japanese buffet which had some life with a guitarist playing some Red Hot Chilli Peppers covers – maybe that’s where the party was all along?

There are some hikes to a nudist beach (gave that a miss, still have bad memories of Budleigh Salterton) and other trails we would have explored if we had stayed longer. The local bus costs £1 and takes under half hour to get into the town which is great for a browse around and we walked back past the sand dunes and kite surfers.

Looking like I’m about to flag down a ride in Arizona

The initial plan was to bus it down the coast into Uruguay but with the cost of the buses almost the same as a flight and two more days in Florianopolis rather than Porto Alegre and Chui we took the easy route. Next stop, the mostly unknown capital of Uruguay, Montevideo….

Ilha Grande to Paraty

April 20, 2023April 20, 2023Posted in TravelTagged backpacking, Brazil, Ilha grande, Paraty, solo travel, South America, travel blogLeave a comment

As we left Rio, to make the bus and boat journey to the island of Ilha Grande easier, we booked a three hour transfer from the hostel desk. Two hours later we were still in the minibus and just pulling up at the airport to collect the last passenger (the airport that is only half hour away to start with) courtesy of a very annoying family who were not even at their hotel at pickup time let alone ready to leave, then had the audacity to ask the driver to stop at a cash machine. When we finally got everybody on board the driver had have enough himself and declared we were stopping at a restaurant for 30 minutes. By the time we got to the port we had missed the boat plus we had noticed that everyone else paid on the bus and paid five pounds less than we had. The bus driver bought boat tickets for everyone, gave them to one girl to look after for all of us and instructed us to line our luggage up in the middle for some unknown reason. At least there was a police guard to protect the sitting ducks.

By the time we made the half hour crossing on a boat that reminded me of a lifeboat, and arrived on the island six hours later it was dark. And I mean dark – the island power was off. Of course we had booked the guesthouse furthest from the beach and there were no wheelbarrow luggage helpers here. At least we had our head torches to help navigate the sandy lanes and we found our home for the next three nights.

We walked back down to the town to find some food and were looking at the menu at a busy restaurant when a man wandered over from the street, holding a plastic bag, and said something we didn’t understand. I hazarded a guess he was asking for money and said no thank you which was a bit awkward when he turned out to be the waiter. Thus commenced a bizarre evening where he took our order then forgot about it and we played 6 games of Monopoly Deal before getting a horrible meal. When I asked someone else that I assumed was a waitress for some water, she repeated back “you want water??” with an incredulous look as if I’d asked for the most ridiculous thing imaginable. By the end we still weren’t sure if the original man worked there or not. But the island’s power came back on and everyone cheered.

In the morning we saw how beautiful our little guesthouse really was, with hammocks and a pool and a lovely breakfast lady squeezing fresh juice who spoke no English but used Google translate to talk to us. We were the only guests in the whole place so had our own private breakfast buffet of fruit and rolls and cake. After some planning the night before, we set off on the most popular hike across the island to Lopez Mendes, “the most beautiful beach in Brazil”, billed as it’s a tough 3 hour, 6.1km hike (“expert” level) with limited supplies on the way. We bought a picnic lunch of sandwiches (unfortunately they toasted them) and enough crisps and water to survive for a week.

In actual fact this is a really beautiful hike through the jungle, only passing a few other people, and not really difficult at all if you have a reasonable level of fitness. I especially enjoyed the tiny section that required a rope which we presume gave it the “expert” rating!

The trail passes by the smaller and in my opinion more beautiful beaches of Praia de Palmas which had just a handful of tiny guest houses and would have been a lovely place to spend a night, then continued to Prai de Mangues where the boats come in. We saw some gorgeous little monkeys in the trees, scared away by the Argentinian group with their flasks of maté and loud voices shouting “hay un mono!!”. Not any more there isn’t.

When we got to the actual Lopes Mendes beach it was anything but deserted – it had kiosks selling beer and food and lifeguard stations, and we seemed to have timed our arrival with a cruise ship. It may not have been the most beautiful beach in Brazil but Helen jumped some waves and we ate our cooled down toasted sandwiches after picking out the wilted lettuce, unable to buy a beer as we didn’t have enough cash (no ATMs on the island so maybe the annoying bus family had the right idea). In my opinion the hike itself is the highlight rather than the destination.

Like most people we got the boat back at 3.30 instead of hiking the return trail – which we almost missed as we were waiting on the wrong beach. The boat ride was really nice in itself and is the perfect way to see some of the island without spending money on an actual boat tour!

We had another slightly weird dinner with another waiter we weren’t sure actually worked there and five games of monopoly deal before getting our drinks, but it was one of my favourite days in Brazil so far.

We finally had a lazy morning by the pool the next day before doing the short hike to some ruins of a jail that was used for quarantine. You could easily spend a good few days here hiking the various island trails – though we were yet to find a beach with enough sand to sunbathe, we did find one with a very annoying hippy couple playing terrible recorder.

On the way back to Sao Paolo, which would conclude Helen’s trip and mark the start of the next leg of my journey, we followed the backpacker trail via the little colonial town of Paraty. I had done zero research on this place so had no expectations but it’s well worth a stop with it’s preserved town centre and jungle backdrop. It also has a really interesting history, with the Portuguese arriving in the 16th century and it became a busy port town built on slave labour.

Much of the town gets submerged under the tide water – good thing we were wearing flipflops aside from when navigating the cobbled streets (Helen fell over). The streets used to be lower than the houses which gave it the name of the Venice of Brazil. Sadly the old roads were rebuilt by child slaves and the “good” stones replaced by cheaper uneven ones, at a higher level meaning the houses flooded. I can’t remember most of the history and have no internet access to look it up but I do remember that the three main churches were once totally segregated for whites, blacks and mixed race people and there was also no sewage system so the houses and churches closest to the sea got the raw deal.

We were there for Good Friday meaning we got up again at midnight (one of Helen’s better ideas!) to see the ritual of a effigy of Jesus holding a huge palm, being carried through the streets followed by a large crowd holding lit torches. We ended up in the parade for quite a while before we could get home again.

And that was three weeks in Brazil, as we waited for a six hour bus to Sao Paolo – a bus that never turned up so we ended up sharing a rollercoaster of a taxi ride with an Argentinian family who were otherwise about to miss their flight…

Return to the Mountains (Montenegro Part Two)

September 8, 2021September 11, 2021Posted in TravelTagged backpacking, Montenegro, solo travel, Travel, travel blogLeave a comment

The silver lining to going around in a circle to get back to Montenegro was meeting Monique on the bus that I hadn’t intended to take. We bonded when she donated 50 cents for me to use the toilet (hole in the ground) at good old Podgorica bus station as I didn’t have any money left, having traded the last of my Albanian Lek with the bus driver in order to purchase the ticket for the next leg of the journey. Monique also shouted me a coffee as we waited for our second bus which would take me to the city of Bar and her to Ulcinj (that town that we had been less than 45 mins away from the same morning). It always amazes me that when you’re travelling it’s perfectly acceptable to swap numbers with a stranger and invite them to hang out the next day, but if you did that in the UK you’d probably get a very different reaction.

My final stop in Montenegro was ‘The Grove’, the only accommodation I had booked before leaving the UK as I had a feeling it would be my kind of place. The Grove is a beautiful converted olive mill nestled between the mountains outside of Stari Bar (the old town of Bar). After the usual half hour walking around in the heat with my bags looking for an ATM I couldn’t be bothered to wait two hours for the local bus nor haggle with the taxi drivers so I paid the rip-off price of €10 to get straight out of main Bar (there’s nothing really to see there) and up to the village.

The Grove has to be one of the most stunningly unique places I’ve had the pleasure of staying in. Incredibly spacious with a huge shared kitchen and a two storey open lounge area, the selling point (and it was actually up for sale when I visited!) has to be the massive garden with its own spring (pure drinking water), firepit and pizza oven. Add a few cats and chickens wandering around as well as a beer fridge operating on a trust system and you’ve got an instantly sociable setting.

The current owners Chris and Zoe also go out of their way to make it a friendly place, organising hikes to waterfalls and getting the fire going at night. This was the perfect base for 5 nights of doing nothing.

Group singalong by the fire

The next day instead of doing nothing I jumped back on the bus to meet new friend Monique in the smaller coastal town of Ulcinj. Beach days are better with friends and a female friend means you can visit Ladies Beach… despite the seedy looking signs this is not the Montenegro Stringfellows, it is the nicest, most comfortable beach setting that I experienced in Montenegro. The key feature of Ladies Beach is that no men are allowed – sorry guys! Two bouncer types sitting at the entrance were presumably making sure only people who looked like women entered. There are even green sheets hanging from the trees that blend in with the forest to make sure there are no prying eyes. Down the stairs awaits a gorgeous secluded cove with turquoise, sulphur water and caves to explore, sunbeds dotted around the rocks with a €4 price tag and a restaurant with a waitress who will bring huge plates of watermelon to your spot. I’m not sure this could get any better, with women of all ages and ethnicities feeling comfortable to wear swimsuits or nothing at all.

Ladies Beach – not actually a strip club

Ulcinj itself has its fair share of souvenir shops but this is offset by a lovely fortress, as is usual in Montenegro. There is a distinctly romantic theme to the sunset bars which we enjoyed with a cocktail and a wander through the cobbled streets until I had missed the last bus back. Apparently once it gets to 9pm the taxi companies have closed, but luckily Monique’s hotel was run by two amusing brothers in their 60s, one of whom disappeared into the night and eventually came back with a man prepared to drive me home, who was actually an economics graduate who lost his job in banking in the pandemic and now helps his father driving taxis.

Sound on for romantic tunes

‘Money Heist’ themed bar in Ulcinj – no idea why

Stari Bar is the old town of Bar – Stari meaning old – and has my favourite fortress so far. It costs just €2 to enter and is deceptively huge. Monique is the Queen of Instagram photography i.e. she takes sneaky shots when you genuinely are unaware so I ended up with what are likely to be the most flattering photos I’ll get for some time.

The fortress is well worth a visit, there is the remains of the tower to climb, the church and ruins of the palace, all with amazing mountain views of course.

The thing about staying somewhere special like The Grove is that it tends to attract like minded people. There were always people to hike to a rock pool with, or share a home cooked dinner in the evening.

Naturally we had to climb down for a dip

A day in Montenegro is not complete if you don’t swim under a waterfall

And that concludes Montenegro for me, having backtracked through the country twice I have seen all I need to and feel I accidentally saved the best until last. I’m leaving for Serbia just as the UK puts Montenegro on the dreaded ‘red list’ and just when tourism was picking up, as are lots of other visitors who funnily enough would prefer to spend two weeks in the neighbouring countries and enjoy the September sunshine rather than give a couple of thousand quid to the UK government in a ‘quarantine hotel’…