OurBiggerPicture

You might expect this post to be about some of Buenos Aires’ fancy restaurants and perhaps a performance at the world renown Teatro Colón. It is not. It’s about cooking cephalopods in a tiny New Yorker’s Recoleta apartment and a chance meeting with some musicians on bicycles. Yes, I said cephalopods. First a little about the city of Buenos Aires. Chances are you know someone who’s been here and raved about it. We certainly do. I had high expectations for this city. Expectatio

"Head on a swivel. Always remember, head on a swivel". Those words are our mantra the minute we step out of the train station in Amsterdam. Bicycles wiz by in every direction, their bells dinging menacingly at the constant flow of clueless tourists stepping off the curbs. The bike culture here is such an interesting way of life. Almost everyone we talk to commutes to work by bike. Life here is conducted on the bike. Business men and women ride in expensive suits, briefcases d

Touching down at Schipol Airport, I mentally prepared myself for a whole new existence out of the camper. I was looking forward to living in a house, seeing the familiar faces of my family and the comforts of “home”. What struck me right away was the order of things. It looks so clean and nice. Everything seems to work here, and the order not only creates a more quiet place in my mind, but it also feels quiet. And peaceful after the chaos of the Peruvian roads. The order of

The route to Cusco takes us up over 15,000 feet through the Peruvian Andes, where small villages of herders occasionally dot the landscape. It seems an inhospitable place to live, so far up in the sky. But we begin to see green, not just brown, and we are finally in the mountains. Here we also finally see the rare vicuña, a wild South American camelid that lives in the high alpine areas of the Andes. Their long necks, gentle eyes and downy coats instantly draw me in. We drive

We made our way south along the coast, and decided to pull into the tiny town of Ayampe to overnight. Ayampe consists of one main dirt road, about a mile long, from the PanAmerican highway to the beach. Another dirt road runs along the water. Inviting little open air restaurants and hostels are scattered in among the foliage. A smattering of young travellers roam around and there is a low key surfer vibe on the beach. It was very chill compared to Canoa and we liked what we s

More than half of the country is not covered in the Lonely Planet guide for Colombia because of security issues. The guide says the security situation is unstable in those areas, and in many places tourist infrastructure simply does not exist. Violence has plagued this country for five decades, one of the word’s longest-running insurgencies. The reasons for the fighting are complicated. The guerrillas of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known as FARC, claim to be f

Costa Rica is said to be a great country for adrenaline junkies. We’ve had a few adrenaline rushes since we got to Costa Rica, and not all of them have been pleasant. The first one was during our border crossing from Nicaragua into Costa Rica. A few days before we crossed, we read about a guy who had overstayed his vehicle permit in Peru by one day - and the border officials impounded his motorcycle. He was in a mess trying to get it back; red tape, fines, lawyers, etc. I sa

Paula and I entered El Salvador on Saturday, July 18th. We had a smooth border crossing with our friends Janice and Gregor, and were thankful they advised us to take a less busy crossing with them on the CA 8 instead of the busy PanAmerican crossing. Our rigs at the border entering El Salvador...a little underwhelming which was just fine for us. Janice and Gregor were checked inside and out. Our guy only looked at our VIN. There is no rhyme or reason at these borders. And we

Productivity, Relaxation, Yoga, Kiting, Reality vs Expectations. Basically, me....rambling. When we have the interweb, I love it with my whole heart. I love being informed with up to the minute updates on the markets and news and stock prices. I drink it in with the satisfaction of, of well, being up to date. Other than checking in with the finances and emails, I am really wasting a whole lot of time under the guise (my guise) that I am doing something productive or worthwhi

Life on the road is all about balance. It is for us anyway. Busy town life needs to be balanced with nature. Roughing it complimented by a little comfort. That's how we rationalized our next stop anyway. After we left Todos Santos, we rolled into Cabo San Lucas for a quick stop at Walmart for supplies. Then we saw all those nice hotels on the beach, and well…we checked in. We both had rumbling stomachs; and the call of a really good shower was just too strong. Plus, it was