My Forrest Gump moment

Hi friends and family,
Well the journey continues......this time through South America.
First stop Bogota in Columbia. I managed to catch up with one of my Anthony Robbins family members, Dennis, his beautiful wife Adriana and his adorable baby son...Bruce.... A huge thank you for your hospitality of showing me around your country.

We spent a great afternoon at the Salt Cathederal.The Zipaquira Salt Cathedral, is an impressive work of architecture created by the people of Bogota. The Cathedral is enormous and is constructed from the salt mine and has baptist font.
There are twelve stations found inside bearing different crosses which are made out of salt rock. One of the crosses is filled with a stunning blue light. It was built in the year 1995 by the people of Colombia.

Next stop into Lima Peru, and then to the Amazon Basin. Now I decided not to spend too long here since the week before I got here ,the town of Iquitos was in epidemic due to dengue fever.
Although it was rainy season, the humidity was uncomfortable.

I met some great people and we hung out at the local markets. Now walking through the butchers is not for the faint hearted... it almost made me throw up... the meat consisted of the usual local suspects ... monkey, turtle, lizard and iguanas. Thats it............. vegetarian for life...
I hope you all understand.. I decided not to attach photos.

A visit to a local animal orphanage was exciting...... we spent the morning playing with a 4 month old jaguar ...rescued after its mother was killed for its pelt.... It was just like Miss Amanda... only with sharper claws....Kez you would have loved him.
The turtles and the Amazon Anaconda (snake) were interesting but not as fun...although the Anaconda does eat people..cool.....yes I did hug him too.

I have always wanted visit Lake Titicaca....Why.... Why not.... I just love the name.
It is located between Peru and Bolivia and is one of the most fascinating lakes in the world. Its the largest lake in South America and is at an impressive 3800m(12,500ft) above sea level. Its the sacred place for the Inca civilisation. It hosts itself to the famous Uros islands, which are 42 small floating islands made from reeds.

The next day I decided to bail out of Peru... as the locals were having riots in the town .......it was getting a little dangerous so I jumped on a bus headed for Bolivia.
I thought that all my troubles were over... but they were just beginning....

By now the rainy season was setting in... and by the time I got to the border of Bolivia .....the locals were also having riots over petrol prices. The bus driver told us to get our backpacks and to walk to the nearest town after leaving us at the border. So picture this... walking 8km to the next town in the rain with my whole wardrobe on my back....which weighed about 20kg.... I found a buddy to walk with...someone to be pissed off with...

So as I am walking conteplating my life... (and trying to work out what I could dump out of my back pack)...mmmmmmmmmmmmm perhaps the stilettos...nope......I need them for tango dancing..What about my book on intimacy..... I may need that one too...

Then along comes a boy about 8 years old with a trolly....Bring on the Law of Attraction...... Now if you are thinking.. would she engage in child labour in a third world country?...the answer is YOU BET..... So my girlfriend and I paid him a few bucks we were off.. Poor kid.. I dont think he knew what he was getting into....We finally arrived in the dark and of course no beds left in the hostel....lucky my new found friend had booked a room..so I could crash on her floor...

The next day I travelled to La Paz.. the capital of Bolivia which was a typical third world city. Then the unthinkable happened..I woke up and had an amazing sense of completeness in my life..I had my Forrest Gump moment...(remember when he was running for several weeks across the USA... he just woke up one day and stopped running and went home.) Yep ... thats what it was like.. I felt like my eat, pray love journey was over.... except I hadnt done the eating part.......Oh no.. I still wanted to eat pasta in Italy.....
I felt like I had a sense of inner peace within me. Its so difficult to explain.. but what I was certain of was that I no longer needed to travel the world looking for who I was anymore....OH MY GOD what next....

I knew that I couldnt go back into the USA for a while ......as several months ago I managed to get detained at the Canadian/USA border and had my passport taken off me.
I was suspected of trying to stay in the USA and I spent an hour being interrogated. After being granted a visa they did flag my file.

Argintina here I come.... What an amazing country... I especially loved Buenos Aires. What a great city... I think God put the most sexiest men and women in the world there. Great food, great looking people, great dancing, great shopping and great weather.... And of course Yes I did do tango lessons and got a dinner invite by my dance teacher.

I now decided to head south to Patogonia. Patogonia is a region of Argintina and hosts one of the worlds most spectacular glaciers. I had the privledge of spending Valentines day with a packpacking buddy (in fact she was a Cameron Diaz look alike)at the glacier. ...... After jumping the barrier (which gave a stern warning of not pass... I think over the past several years 32 people have been killed by flying ice whilst watching the glacier break off )we enjoyed a spectacular showing of the Perito Moreno glacier shearing off and crashing into the ocean. The glacier is the worlds most stable glacier (in that its not melting), with 250km2 (97 sq mi) of ice formation.... Its 35 km (19mi) long and 60 meters high. The impressive show was never ending.

So thats it my friends.....for this posting..

warm hugs
Katrina