Name: Flavio
My name is Flavio Greco ( the Greek, even if I have no connections there...)born in Italy, Turin, on October 1975 (congratulations for the ones good in math for figuring this out on ur own..).
I am affected by the travel bug, I think it got me when I spent one year as exchange student in the States, school year 92-93, yez...a long time ago.
Since then I set a target to put at least a foot on each of the continent before I reach 30....So here I am seeking my target!
I have been living in Dublin for the past 6 years.
I moved there to escape the military service, that used to be mandatory. The plan was to stay 3 years and then move on, but I liked the place, met loads of friend including Ken my travel mate, and I stayed until the end of June of this year, when I started this trip.....
visitato *loading* volte
And the day to leave the American continent has come...
In the past three months we found out:
But above all we found out what our next career will be: Bus driver!
Travelling is a though business: early mornings, hours to kill waiting, funny transport and accomodation, the luggage gets heavier and heavier, the weather can be ur enemy, 
....but we live once and the world is kind of big so pack ur bags and leave now! 
As for us, tonite we will fly over the south pole to reach New Zealand and will lose one day of our life...The plan is to stay put for a while trying to get a job to help our battered bank account....
...to be continued.....
Here we are in Santiago in full spring time (if u r wondering I'm not on drugs....just on the other side of the globe 
)
Well first of all let me give some details on our cruise through the Patagonian channels: passangers on board 26, plus crew members, low season. We picked the cabin on the first deck, more expensive than the one on the lower one, but we had a private toilet and a window .
The general feeling of all the passangers was, at the end, pretty much disappointed as we all thought that we would have made stops during the 4 days of navigation and that we would have seen some fauna....Reality was that we felt like captives for 3 days and the most exciting part of the day were the meals....
The wind was very strong for all the route so it was kind of hard to stay outside on the decks, on top on the third nite, when we travelled in open sea, the boat was massaged by huge vawes with the result of a common massive puking session throughout the nite...
(in case u r wondering our heroes made it, keeping the food inside....)
On the bright side I must say the environment was pretty fun as we were all young people travelling through south america and we all took drinks on board....and the last nite was the birthday of 2 passangers and also the chilean national holiday, so we got a bit of partying going on....We also managed to view couple amazing full arch rainbows and great sunsets, so at the end it was a draw....
We got off the boat on midday monday in Puerto Mont, a much nicer town than the previous ones...At nite we took straight away the bus to Santiago: an easy 13 hours journey.....
We arrived here on tuesday morning and we went straight to bed in the hostel....
In the past 2 days we did the usual tourist sightseeing, including Valparaiso and Vina del Mar on the coast. Compared to the other big cities we visited here it seems that the traffic and the confusion are not a big issue, even though the pollution level is very high and it is impossible to see the mountains surrounding the city....
Keep u posted....
And here we go again on a bus.....departure at 6 am from Ushuaia and arrival 12 hours later in Punta Arenas, in Chile.
The landscape has been pretty boring: huge lands and fields heavily populated by lambs.
The most exciting part of the trip was the border crossing, with the usual unload of all the luggage to get it checked. After few words with one of the policeman we got away with Ken's bag not even opened, while another policeman was fining an old lady for too many cosmetics and a young fellow who had too many shoes for kids....
On Punta Arenas not much to say: a small town with close to nothing activity. You can live without seeing it...
After 2 forced nights there, this morning we moved to Puerto Natales, a even more depressing place (after 2 hours we were already talking about politics...
, a ghost town...), but I guess it's all due to the low season.
Tonite we'll board a very fancy cruise ship that will last until monday morning: check at http://www.navimag.com/navimag/html/ingles/canales_patagonicos/el_viaje.asp
Well, talk to u later...
FOR UR PLEASURE MASSIVE PHOTO UPLOAD!
"End of the world...beginning of everything...."
And tomorrow morning (with our usual luck we have to get up at 5 am....) we r on the road again, this time towards the last country we'll visit here in south america: Chile.
We survived the 4 days of snowboarding, we r all in one piece and thanks to some aches we discovered some new muscles in our body 
. On the same slopes we had the french and italian national teams training....obviously we gave them some tips.....
After over a week we now know all the "all u can eat restaurants" and all the shops in town (FYI there is only one main road), definately time to leave.....
As advice, if u ever go to Ushuaia skip the acquarium and the "end of the world" museum and invest the money in the restaurant down the road...
. As well make sure u bring ur winter clothes as after all it is the southermost city in the world and the polar wind can really make a difference despite the shining sun.... And don't forget to eat the famous lamb ( cordero fueguino)!
As soon as I find an internet shop with a decent speed I will try to download some pictures,that I know u all want 2 see.
Here we are in the southermost city of the world: Ushuaia.
First thing to notice: after all it's not that cold for being winter, we were prepared for below zero temperatures and instead we have around 10 degrees during the day and around 3/5 at night. The climate is really changing....
Second thing: most of the restaurants here offer a "all u can eat menu" for around 6 Euro,with a great grilled meat selection...This is not the right country for vegeterians!
The first two days we did the touristic excursion at the national park, with the southermost train of the world, the former prison and the navigation of the beagle channel to see the sealions and the cormorant birds...I must admit around here there are someamazing landscapes
To spice it up we then book a trip called "Aventura Blanca" (white adventure): a trekking through the snow with a final part with a sleigh pulled by dogs. Because of the high temperature the snow is melting so the usual path they were taking was full of puddles of water as the ground is mainly made by turf and it is very soft.
After about20 minutes of walking the guide fell in the water as the snow broke under his feet, so we had to find a different way.....Obviuosly I volunteered to test the nearby ground....and as u can guess I fell as well in the iced cold water....twice....Luckily only my right leg got soaked...I was then given a spare sock by a guy of the group as mine was completely wet, but it didn't help as my shoe was wet as well...So I walked for the next 2 hours with a semi frozen foot...
. Don't try this at home!
That was the training for today come back to the slopes! Let's say that the training wasn't enough as, just like last time in February in Italy, we are totally wrecked after the first day of snow board....We are definately getting older.....
Well I must say that staying in Buenos Aires it seems like being in Europe: same atmosphere, architecture, clothing, food....To be more precise is very similar to Italy, and indeed 30% of the population has italian origins
....and I guess we got used to it, we spent most of the time ( and money! ) shopping like crazy and eating......at the end we both had to buy an additional trolley bag to carry the stuff we bought 
.
As a piece of advice if u plan to travel to Argentina remember not to fill up ur suitcase as here everything is quite cheap and u'll definately end up buying something....
I also managed to meet by absolute chance in the hotel where we moved for the last 2 days in Buenos Aires a girl I knew from Dublin: I can confirm the saying "The world is little!"
Thank god (as my credit card said....) today we leave Buenos Aires and we head to Ushuaia, the southermost city of the world in Patagonia!
At the check in obviously we were well over the weight allowance for luggage, around 15kg....
,but with some diplomacy blended with huge smiles and some well spoken Spanish we managed not to pay anything...., the luck of the Irish is back!
today
May 2006
February 2006
January 2006
December 2005
November 2005
October 2005
September 2005
August 2005
July 2005
June 2005
20th of july
30th
a bugs life
almost
banana republic
bat-man
biking
buenos aires
bye america
bye central america
chiapas
china part 1
cruise
did u know
end of the world
end or beginning
escaping emily
escaping emily - part 2
first stop
general
getting to panama city
jungle life
mexico city
on the road again
quito
rio
san jose
soaked
spring time
surfing costa rica
the beaches
towards the end of the world
travelling life
trip goes on
watch me
we love the bus
we love the plane