We were walking the trail past village rice paddies, gleaming with soon to be harvested grains in the valley below Marojejy National Park. From the outlying fields, two men carried large potato sacks back to…
Marojejy is one of the most impressive national parks in Madagascar, with 55,000 hectares of primary rainforest, green mountains, spectacular views and twisting trails mounting over roots and rocks. It is one of six parks…
On the highest of several thickly forested hills, the first ruler of the whole of Madagascar established his capital in 1793, after he unified the various island realms of the Malagasy people into a kingdom.…
The capital of Madagascar, Antananarivo (or Tana, as it is locally known), occupies 12 sacred hills, even more than Rome. The hills are linked to the surrounding plains about 200 meters below and to each…
We came to Cuenca mainly to study Spanish for a few weeks. After four and half months of non-stop touring and activity, during which we learned scattered bits of Spanish, we thought we should try…
To begin with the dead, the mummies and the mound-covered burial chambers we visited along the edge of the salt flats attest to residents from thousands of years ago. It is likely that then, as…
Think of the Uyuni salt flats (El salar de Uyuni) as a completely frozen lake, eye-piercingly white in the fierce sun and chill air here at around 3600 meters (12,000 feet) altitude. At nearly 11,000…
Religious orders like the Dominicans and Franciscans arrived soon after Spanish soldiers spread across western South America in the early 1500s. They came to convert the indigenous from their heathen religion to Christianity and serve…
https://youtu.be/IlNvtIfkSek On the bus's speakers boomed Highway to Hell. So we knew we were at the top of 65 kilometer long Death Road - carved into the sides of the steeply sloped Yungas mountains and…
Potosi is less enticing for what’s left of its colonial town (where only Spaniards were allowed to live) than for its historical importance. Out of Cerro Rico, the double-humped mountain that rises behind Potosi and…