Adios South America and iPhone

As the sun sets, a billowing flag stands tall atop clay rippled roof tiles.
The grind of steel rises from the street below as a tram drives itself up a steep incline.
A rhythmic cry from a seagull harrows between houses to remind us how close we are to the sea.

We rest at our balcony, Portuguese tarts still warm in our bellies. A world away from our experience in Southern America.

But first.
Let's return to the Southern Hemisphere.

A four hour bus journey took us higher into the Andes from the great Uyuni salt flats to Potosi.
It was easy to tell this was an historical mining centre, a vast industrial site cut into the mountains and landscapes turned upside down in search for valuable minerals. The mines were still operational and the life of a miner particularly dangerous as conditions had not improved for decades.

Markets and squares were lovely as well as old Spanish buildings. Carnaval festivities were gradually building and moments of delight could be seen as children sprayed foam or threw confetti around corners.

The following day, this time a three hour journey took us down off the mountains into Sucre. The official capital city of Bolivia.

There, we had a house for five days which coincided with Ian's birthday on the 24th of Feb. We shared some space with the host, Tania, her son Gustavo and another guest travelling the land on a motorocycle from France, Sebastien.

Sucre was a beautiful city, well organised and maintained. A great pleasure just walking through the parks and squares. While there, the city also celebrated a charity event, encouraging groups to volunteer items that would be provided to the poor. Music and food was spread around and young soldiers helped rush all the goods onto the back of trucks with great gusto.

Tania delighted us with a local home cooked breakfast. To her surprise it was the day of Ian's birthday. Sausage in rolls with beer was perfect for 10am. After some getting to know each other, Sebastien demonstrated his dancing skills and some moves he had learnt while travelling.

That afternoon we 'dinked' on motorcycles up to the historical Dinosaur park. An opportunity to view the largest collection of dinosaur foot prints in the World. Who knew?

It was great fun, imagining the variety of dinosaurs trudging across this same area hundreds of millions of years ago. The park was well presented with life size replicas helping the imagination.

Our time in Sucre was coming to a close. The nearby fresh produce market was perfect for our home cooking. Even cleaning up the barbecue in the back yard and grilling some steak. Some grass cutting was required to access the barbecue and a huge shock to us both when Tania told us to avoid the Tortoises. Two giant, live tortoises resting at the back of the garden beneath a hedge and in the grass.

Always finding a surprise, we loved our time with Tania and Sebastien. A little too surprised when Tania informed us how much she admires Donald Trump. We won't explain why on here.

A flight out of Sucre took us finally free from the altititude, through the remaining Andes and down to 500metres to Santa Cruz de la Sierra. Our final Bolovian city.

Here we stayed with a beautiful French couple and their son. They were teachers at a French school and had a consignment for two years. Things were okay, however they did not like their French principal. Over some drinks we understood that some misunderstandings had taken place in agreeing to the jobs.

Their son, Athiem, was wonderful to play with. Though he spoke more French than English, we could tell he was thrilled to explain all of his Pokemon knowledge to us.

Santa Cruz was probably the largest city we had been in since La Paz. A few more markets and squares to visit.

Closer to the Amazon, the warmth and humidity made it a little less comfortable. A thrill first however, visiting the city botanical gardens, Jamie was able to spot our first wild sloth. After trudging through some mud and getting a little lost in the gardens that were somewhat free-range. Jamie's keen observation picked up a relaxing fellow dangling in a tree.

Despite us disturbing his peace, we couldn't help but think he was in a very content state due to the colouring shape of hair on his face that appears as a giant grin. A gorgeously slow creature we were very glad we were able to view one.

One more final internal flight, took us from Santa Cruz, back into Brazil to Sao Paulo.
Our final city in South America before departing for Europe.

We had four days in Sao Paulo, the largest city in South America, during Carnaval.
The day of our arrival, we dropped our gear at our Airbnb and took off exploring. Walking into the city centre, the beat of drums and heavy music could be felt running through pavement.

We found our way to one of the larger squares and were met with a thriving crowd of young party goers. All with a variety of drinks in their hands and scantily clad clothing, glitter in hair and bright colours marked across their flesh. It was mid afternoon and it seemed thousands of revellers had been partying all night and all day. Rubbish and discarded bottles were strewn along gutters. Yelling and shouting took place across groups as people pushed through each other.

We had somehow stumbled into a giant mardi gras styled indie festival that was a free for all.

The music being played was coming from separate groups of party people that had their own speakers. Who ever had the biggest speaker won the loud contest. Mixing between the crowd of drinkers were local vendors pushing drink carts that held eskies full of alcohol. The vendors were selling out of drinks quickly as party goers came to them and handed over cash, grabbing in place bottles of alcohol and heading back to their friends.

We found it interesting that so few security or actual city event organisers could be seen. It seems that during the weekend of carnaval and on the special days, the city is just left up to the party animals.

These revellers had the run of a good six city blocks and gradually rumbled around mixing and drinking and yelling.

After a brief observation and while not being at the intoxicated level these people were at, we decided to make our way to the edge and watch from afar.

A lot of fun was being had and there would be a whole week of this. So we chose to call it a day and make our way back to accommodation.

We made our way away from the music and around a few corners. Gradually heading back but checking which direction we were going. We paused on a street corner to view the google maps on our phone. Together we looked down to see where we were, then up to check a street, back down again at our phone to work out which direction we needed to go.

As Ian stood holding the phone, both of our heads down, a cyclist rushed past and snatched the phone from Ian's hand.

Ian dropped his bag beside Jamie and began chasing the cyclist who was now zooming down a hill away from them both. He kicked off his thongs to try and catch up but there was no chance. The cyclist turned a street corner and was never seen again.

Jamie collected Ian's bag and thongs and stood beside Ian, the rain started to fall.

We both agreed we had gradually become complacent. Our time in the Americas had been incredible and not once had we felt concerned for our safety or fearful of theft.
We had always tried to remain vigilant in our basic routine. We kept passports locked in our room, our belongings close by us. Cautious of the type of people we engage with.

We had a moment in America when a heavily drunk fellow became only slightly aggressive towards Ian, but that turned out okay.
We had a moment in Cuba when we were lost and required the assistance of someone that wanted a very high price for aiding us, other than paying him, we were still fine.

But other than that, after seven months, we have been very safe and well looked after.
Until now.

We were able to speak with Police, the best they could offer was, "Be more careful next time."
We tried to visit the city tourist police department, but it was closed.
We met with the Military Police again to triple check if there was anything we could or needed to do. They advised us to log our stolen phone on the Civil Police website.

We tried to do this, however we do not know the IMEI of our phone. Of course, we know that as a mistake of ours now, but not much we can do about it. Another method of recording a theft on the website just led us make to visiting the Civil Police in person.

After two days of this, we slowly got over our frustration.
We ventured out for sight seeing again.
We vowed not to let this incident ruin our perception of Sao Paulo.

Walking the streets again, with Carnaval still on. We felt a little unsafe. 
Part of it was due to the vast number of homeless people. Not their fault, but they occupied all of the parks.
A high concentration of garbage was littered in gutters, streets and parks.

Party goers were still enjoying themselves in certain areas. With literally no facilities, on the fringe, drunk people would be urinating against buildings, trees or just on the street.

Finally, on our last day we thought we would rest in a park before making our way out to the airport.
The park was more dirt than grass. A homeless man tried to speak to us, though we didn't understand, we hoped he didnt mind us resting for a moment near his  makeshift room against a tree.

We'd had enough.
Our departure from Brazil was seamless and we were on our overnight flight to Portugal.

With hindsight, yes we stayed in the 'city' part of Sao Paulo. We were advised, that further out of the city there are some very lovely areas. We didn't see those.
We would skip Sao Paulo next time.

But South America, incredible.
Three months in Chile, Argentina, Brazil, Peru and Bolivia. World's away from our life in Australia.
Sights and moments that have changed our view of the World.

A family on Lake Titicaca.

Planes banking between hills over the waters of Rio.

The Salut to new friends on Christmas Eve in Mendoza.

And the gratitude to Jose for stopping to let two Australian's into his truck.

Thank you South America.

Thank you.