bus tagged posts

In Asia, Japão 2014 On  01/12/2014  No comments

Sorry, this entry is only available in Português.

In America, Guatemala On  24/04/2013  7 comments

Guatemala City, or Guate as they call it there, was my arrival place in Central America. In general, when I travel alone, I avoid stay long time in big cities, so I had only 2 days in town. During this period the city was had always some sort of fog, as it was screening the sun, it reminded me Lima, in Peru.

Guatemala is big, about 4 million people in a country of 15 million, therefore, great part of the action happen here. It is divided by zones by numbers, streets and avenues are also named by number. For example, I stayed at Zone 13, 15 av. “A” 5-30. This way of naming streets and neighborhoods gives me the idea of being planed, that they followed an urban plan. It is had to imagine this kind of nomenclature on Brazilians cities where cities grow randomly and streets come out of nothing.

Another point that caught my attention in Guatemala was the “Americanism”, starting with the way to name streets, like in the US...

In Asia, Adventure, Diving & Snorkeling, Thailand 2004 On  13/12/2004  One comment

We arrive in the city of Krabi and went straight to Ao Nang beach. A pleasant beach, full of hotels, bars and restaurants. The beach is crowded with boats that, frequently, offer to take you to an island or interesting beach. We strongly recommend the 4-island tour. It is one day in a long-tail boat island hopping (Poda Island, Chicken Island, Tup island and Phranang cave). The boat trip is slow, what makes it an enjoyable trip so one can calmly observe the nature, rocks, sea, and other boats… Everything, without having the idea of being in a hush to arrive somewhere.

The Krabi region of is well known by rock climbers and divers. It is surrounded by rocks for climbing and waters for diving. Here it is the famous Koh Phi Phi, the island where it was filmed the movie “The Beach” with Leonardo DiCaprio. We benefit from that going to the Phi Phi area for diving. We had been diving for 2 day (4 immersions) in a place called Maya Bay and Koh Bida Nok...

In Asia, Thailand 2004 On  30/11/2004  No comments

We did two tours to the north of Thailand. The first one was a day trekking. We went on a minibus for one or two hours. Then, we walked for about an hour to a hill village. There lives the Hmong tribe, originally form the region of Tibet and Mongolia. Later they went on refuge in China and during the 50s and 60s many came to Thailand, while others went to Laos and Vietnam. It was a quick visit, and it caught my attention a sign saying “2 photos 5 baht” and also to see they were selling Coca-cola.

From there we went to ride elephants. It was 45 minutes riding the animal around the forest. It stopped to eat all the time. And in the end of the tour, the guides sold bananas so we could feed them. The elephants were like a vacuum cleaner strongly sucking the banana. We also visited a hill tribe called Karen. A great part of the Karen people lives in Myanmar (Burma). In this tripe the majority of the women were dedicated to sewing and the men to produce musical instrument...

In Traveled places, Cycling & Diving in Catalonia 2003 On  09/06/2003  One comment

Lately I have been missing the ocean so much. I’ve watched on TV a documentary about whales and I got a incredible desire for diving. In a bookstore, getting some books for the university, I bought a book by Garcia  Marquez called “The Story of a Shipwrecked Sailor”. I got home, sat down the sofa and just left when I had finished the book. It was really good, I could feel the sea.

In order to satiate this will of being in the water I decide to spend some  weekends diving in Costa Brava. The first place was Lloret de Mar. I got a bus early in the morning to get there with time to do two immersions the same day.

From the bus station I went straight to the dive center. There I met 3 Portuguese guys from   Porto. We went on a boat to a dive site called Bolets. The sea was calm and the water cold. The visibility was “sort of” good. We saw many small fishes and a lobster...

In Europe, Eastern Europe 2002 On  22/07/2002  No comments

Sorry, this entry is only available in Português.

In America, Bolivia 2001 On  11/08/2001  One comment

The tour starts in Colcachi, a city by the salar in which the main activity is salt extraction. We saw the salt process, the withdrawal, the drying and the wrapping up. Later we visit the salt hotels. They are all constructed with salt blocks: walls, chairs, beds. When we went back to the car, it didn’t start. We had that to push it.

We drove to “Isla Pescado”, the original name was Inca Huasi, that means ¨House of the Incas¨. There I decided to stay for the night. In the island, the only inhabitants are a couple that takes care of the place. I slept in a room offered by them. I had gotten a permit by the Turist office to sleep and photograph the island. Next day I continued the tour with my group. We went back to Uyuni to get a 4 wheel drive car. Next stop was San Cristobal, a small village where we slept.

Second day we woke up early, we had an 8 hour trip to “Lagoa Colorada”...

In America, Bolivia 2001 On  02/08/2001  One comment

On my arrival in Sucre, I caught a taxi with more 3 people to know Tarabuco,  65km distant. Every Sunday this small town has a popular open market. It is crowded with tourists and people walking around and buying. We spend three hours in this town with a strong aboriginal influence. Then we came back to Sucre. I believe that Sucre is one of the richest cities from Bolivia. It was the place where I could see a bigger number of middle class people. It used to be the town where many Spaniard who explored the mines of Potosí lived.

One of the attractions of Sucre is to know the footprints of dinosaurs. These are in a cement factory. The first footprint was discovered 14 years ago, but they had only started to study and preserve the footprints 7 years ago. Tour is well organizing, they have a truck that takes the people to see the footprints in different parts. The guide explains the place very well and speaks an excellent English and Frenchman (a rarity around here).

Another attractive ...