New York

Managed to find a job really quickly. A crap one. In fact the worst job I've ever had. And that's saying something, given I spent a summer working in a well known bookies in Niddrie, scared for my life. Got a job doing data entry, so I'm basically turning into a robot. Sit all day in front of a computer screen typing people's driver license details into a computer, so that they can be issued with a fine for not paying tolls. You could teach a monkey to do it, and it would probably be a lot more enthusiastic about it than I am. Jenny's landed herself a similarly boring job in a hospital. They both pay ok although it's difficult to make any money out here, as the Government robs 30% through tax, and it's compulsory to pay 9% of your wage into a pension!

The folk at my work are all dead friendly. Also the guy who seems to be running the show is quite funny (peculiar). He's a bit of a David Brent - quite a bit older than everyone else, but acts hip by wearing sunglasses indoors, and a leather jacket and shiny shirts. He also likes to add the word "...meister" to the end of everyone's name. Seems like a nice enough guy though. Even more impressive than finding the job so quickly was that I managed to find a work outfit for less than AUS$100 (40 quid). Shirt, tie, trousers, and shoes. Transpires that I may have to invest in another pair of shoes though. The ones I bought are called "Ned" shoes. Didn't see this printed on the side of the box otherwise I'd have left them well alone. After wearing them only once they have begun to smell like garlic bread. They smell even when I've got them on my feet. It's rank. Not even odour eaters or specifically designed spray seems to help.

We had to wait longer than expected for our little studio appartment to be finished, surprise surprise. But it's all kitted out now and we've both settled in, and are quite enjoying living there. The only issue is the cockroaches. Lots and lots of them scuttling about the place. Think they're attracted to the smell of garlic. Not seen any venomous insects yet which is a bonus, long may that continue. Doing plenty of shaking of clothes and checking of shoes before puting them on.

We went out on a bit of a heavy one at the weekend with James. He knows a guy who is head of promotions for Jagermeister, and we got ourselves VIP passes to a trendy club in Kings Cross. Was really good night although all the drinks were really really expensive, apart from Jagermeister.....which was free. Me and James got a bit over involved in the free shots and the Jagerbombs (a shot of it in a glass of red bull). I also managed to persuade the bar staff to give me full glasses of it, which resulted in Jenny having to help me home. We also had a wee argument in a shop on the way home which ended up with Jenny helping me into a display by shoving me. Ended up destroying it, and on the floor. All good fun, although we can never go back there because the owner didn't find it very funny. Spent the next day crawling about on the floor beside the toilet so lesson learnt, I'm never drinking Jagermeister again.

Anyway, better get back to work. Counting down the days already. Only 10 weeks to endure then back on the road. Roll on October. Not least because the weather is crap here at the moment. Pretty cold, although it is the middle of their winter, so 15 degrees isn't too bad. Supposed to warm up soon. Can't wait to get to the beach.

The flight to Australia was a little traumatic, seeing as I'm not so fond of flying. It was a very long time up in the air. A few drinks on the plane settled the nerves though. Relaxed to the point that I fell asleep half way through some crap film, and began singing along to the music at the end in my sleep. We stopped off in Auckland, New Zealand and had to get off then reboard the plane, so I can add New Zealand to the list of countries visited, even though we were only there for an hour. It was peeing with rain when we landed in Sydney, and we overheard that the plane that landed after us was hit by lightning on its way down.

We've come crashing back to reality so far as prices are concerned here. The hostels are ridiculously expensive and not even that nice. We are staying in the Kings Cross area of Sydney, which is an interesting mix of backpackers, strippers, hookers, beggars and mental cases. It'll have to do for the next few days though.

For the first few days we were here we did most of the touristy things (well the cheap or free ones anyway). We went to the botanical gardens which were very cool so far as botanical gardens go. Wasn't really interested in the plants, although enjoyed the Queensland Bottle tree.

The highlight of this place is the fruit bats, or flying foxes as they're called here. There were loads of them hanging about in the trees.

They're not the most friendly animals, screaming away at each other and biting their sleeping neighbours for no apparent reason. They're really big though and it was great watching them flying about in the daylight. Needless to say Jenny was running about in the trees, with the camera getting very excited about all of this, had to almost physically drag her away. There were also parrots and cockatoos all over the park as well.

The path through the botanics goes right out to a point that overlooks the Opera house and bridge. Get such a good view from here. The Opera House is pretty spectacular, although looked like it could do with a lick of paint.

It was a bit dirty looking, kind of beige coloured as opposed to white. It's an amazing building though, on the outside. We never went inside because they were going to charge some ridiculous price for that, but you can see bits of the inside. It's a bit dated looking as well, reminded me a bit of the Brunton Hall in Musselburgh (bad memories - a place I had to be dragged to, to do music competitions as a child) all the 1960's style wooden walls.

We also took a trip to the Sydney fish market which was interesting, especially the giant crabs that were the size of my head near enough.

It's a huge market selling all kinds of seafood. You can also try just about anything in the restaurants in the place too. Jenny had baby octopus, although she only liked eating the tentacles.

Luckily there was a few giant pelicans roaming about the car park waiting to be fed the other bits. They were quite funny, literally lurking about outside the market waiting patiently to be fed, and posing with all the tourists sidling nervously up to them for a photo.

Sydney's a really vibrant city that we both really like. And we know a couple of people who stay here already which is helpful. Went out for a few drinks with a guy James we met whilst travelling in Costa Rica, a couple of nights back. He's moving here, and so is Sarah his girlfriend hopefully, for the next wee while. Also Russell who's a pal of mine from Uni days, who helpfully took pitty on us both the other night and shouted us dinner. So, having hummed and hawed about whether we were going to head North to Brisbane to settle for a few months to work, the main draw there being the better weather, we decided to stay here. We're planning to stay here for the next 2-3 months to work which is a pretty depressing thing to have to consider, as I have particularly enjoyed being a waster for the past 6 months or so. Accordingly we've been forced into doing grown up stuff over the past few days looking for a more permanent place to stay here. We have now found somewhere, after going to see quite a few really dodgy places. Jenny's contribution to the flat hunting exercise was on occasion spectacularly poor and as a result I'm seriously considering buying her a hearing aid. One property she arranged for us to see we ended up on a road that sounded 'similar' to the road we were supposed to be viewing a property on, although a 'similar' road is clearly not very useful when it's on the other side of the city from the actual street - and on another occasion we ended up at the correct address but were confronted with 75 buttons on the intercom to choose from, with no idea which one to press and no phone number to contact the owner.

We did however manage to find a place to stay yesterday, although we had to use our imagination a little, as the room hasn't quite been completed yet?! We are assured that it will be finished on Wednesday when we can move in. We hope. It should be really good though, self contained with ensuite and own kitchenette. It's well located in Bondi 10 minutes from the city and the beach which is nice.

Going to start job hunting tomorrow, can't wait.......

Managed to survive the plane journey over the Andes and arrived safely in Santiago yesterday, however the pilot did have to take a diversion due to bad weather over the mountains, and there was plenty of turbulence to keep me guessing if we were going to fall out the sky.

On Monday morning we went to stay for a few days at a ranch 220km North of Buenos Aires. We were picked up from our weird little hotel by Javier who would be our guide for the next three days. He was a nice guy and seemed really interested in Scotland, so did quite a lot of reminiscing about home with him over the course of our stay. Santa Maura is a working estancia/cattle ranch. It is absolutely massive, something like 4000 acres with 4000 cattle.

The whole of the East coast of Argentina is absolutely flat. Really weird not to be able to see any hills for 360º. There are lots and lots of cows all over the place though. Big fat juicy succulent walking steaks as I have come to view them over the past month. Jenny was well up for some horse riding whilst we were in Argentina so Santa Maura was perfect as they owned about 70 horses, some tame, some wild, and the farm itself is worked by traditional Gauchos on horseback.

I wasn't so keen on the idea to start with as I'm a bit apprehensive of horses. I'm happier putting my money on them as opposed to my self. Anyway turns out we both had a really good time, and I even managed to get my horse up to a canter which was quite exciting. My horse was called el sincero - the sincere - and he was nice and sedate. Didn't really seem that keen on moving anywhere too fast, and took a good kick to get him going....on the way out. No problem encouraging him to go home though, back to bed - the kind of lazyboy attitude I admire. Did manage to get him up to a canter though which was good fun.

The first day that we were there we settled in to our accommodation which was an old farm house. Was really nice old place. Absolutely freezing, but had a huge open fire which kept me entertained.

The only electricity came through a generator that went off at about 11pm each night. Was all good though. Olga looked after us, preparing all our meals whilst we were there. She was such a good cook and really friendly. She kept taking the piss out of me because I looked like a dummie when getting on the horse, and like a cripple when I got off at the end of our riding. She and her husband let me and Jenny join them to watch the football (Argentina v Colombia) on our first night. Olga is probably in her fifties, and I have never come across a woman, let alone a woman of that age who was so excited about watching a football match, and so knowledgeable about the players. Was very impressive. Argetinians are absolutely mental about football. Most impressive was the asado (barbeque) that she prepared for our final lunch at the estancia.

Absolutley amazing. Stuffed ourselves full of meat. Argenina is all about meat, meat, meat, and cakes and buns smothered in Dulce de Leche. Dulce de leche is basically caramel made from boiled condensed milk I think? It's so so sweet, but they all love it. I'm sure some them even have it on their steaks behind closed doors.

Having settled into the house we went canoeing on the lake behind it with Javier.

Was nice and peaceful and saw loads of ducks and birds. After this we played bowls, me and Jenny against Javier. Javier was very competitve. Unfortunately we, as team Scotland, put on a typically Scottish display, starting off so promisingly then ending up getting inihalated. We had a wander round the farm houses, which had plenty of animals for Jenny to chase about the place, in particular two young puppies which she was very fond of.

I liked the chickens and the big black pig that they had locked up in a kind of dark wooden prison in the woods. It got very excited whenever anyone went near it. Along with horses and cattle they also kept quite a few sheep. They were weird looking things though, not like the ones at home. They had thick wool all over them, head and legs, and no tails. They looked a bit like miniature polar bears.

On our second day we got up early and went for a long horse ride to look for the Gauchos, to try and see them working. Unfortunately we didn't get going til a bit later than planned because Jenny was in control of the alarm. We did get to see them the next morning when we went out, as we left earlier. Was really interesting to see them herding the cattle into a pen and giving them vaccinations for the winter. Jenny even got a chance to give the shots, which she really enjoyed. The afternoon of our second day we went for some more canoeing. This was a big mistake. It was ok on the way out onto the river, but the wind picked up on our way back and both of us were knackered from the riding. Me especially, not being used to it. I felt like someone had taken a cricket bat across my lower back. Anyway it took us ages to get back, and at points we were going round in circles and backwards, wasn't much fun.

All in all Santa Maura was a really enjoyable experience, and the locals on the farm were so nice and made us feel really welcome. From here we returned to Buenos Aires spent a quite night in and got up early to fly to Chile.

Only spending another half day here in Chile then leaving South America for oz tonight. The weather hasn't been great since we've got here, pretty grey, wet and cold. However, Santiago seems decent enough.

There's not anything that really stands out about it as a city. It has a prettyish central plaza and lots and lots of religious sculptures and monuments littering the streets but nothing that really sets it apart. Today we took a trip up the cerro San Cristobal which is a big hill in the centre of the city. Took the funicular up to the top.

Unfortunatley was a bit cloudy, so couldn't really see much, which is a shame because I know the Andes are out there somewhere, as we saw them when we were landing here.

There is a big statue of the Virgin Mary at the top of the hill looking out over the city which is quite impressive. Also up there, there is an open air church with speakers all over the place playing hymns and latin chanting which is quite creepy.

The one downside to Chile so far is that it is a lot more expensive than anywhere else. We were staying in a pretty grotty little hotel for more than we have paid anywhere else so far. It did the job, although there was a nest of pigeons right outside our window flaping about and cooing at each other the whole night. Eating and drinking is pretty expensive here. A bottle of wine in a restaurant starts at about 4 pounds which is a shame, because the wine here is supposed to be pretty good, and we are being confined to drinking the stuff from the Chinese supermarket at 85p a bottle that tastes like vinegar. Food is really good here, I had conger eel soup the other day, which was a lot nicer than it sounds. Spent last night drinking in communal area of our hotel with a paralytic Chilean guy. He was a good laugh, although was a strange conversation, because he kept talking to me in broken English and I would respond in my crap Spanish. There was an Australian guy with us too, Glen. He seemed alright to begin with but as the night progressed it became apparent that everytime he opened his mouth a torrent of diarrhoea would come out. He was full of shit. He came out with some absolutely ludicrous claims, like his friend had been eaten by a crocodile, he'd been kidnapped in Columbia, he'd been stung by a boxjellyfish and he worked for the 20th richest guy in Australia etc etc. Didn't impress me very much, and I told him as much. Ended in a bit of shouting at each other. I just hope there aren't too many Glens in Oz.

Anyway, we are having to kick about here for the rest of today, before flying out to see the wizard later tonight......

In addition to the suicide showers that are standard issue in most of central and south america, the electricians over here also like to have a bit of fun with both the electrical sockets and light switches. It seems to be the norm to wire the socket up and then leaving it unscrewed from the wall. Most times anything is plugged in or removed it is accompanied by a burst of sparks from the holes, which makes using them very exciting indeed.

This is also a favourite for the lightswitches. Either that or to have broken/cracked switches embedded into the wall so that you feel like you're really getting involved with the electrical wiring behind.