Today we will visit Durban which is a city situated on the east coast of South Africa. It has a sub tropical climate opposed to that of Cape Town, which is Mediterranean.

What has Durban to offer the tourist or visitor? Along the beach front are many hotels and blocks of holiday flats. This area is called the Golden Mile.

Hotels on the beachfront have magnificent views over Durban Bay and the Bluff to south. Along Durban's beaches jetties have been built out into the sea. They have the effect of turning the long golden beaches into small bays, which can be protected by lifeguards during the holiday seasons.

Durban is well known for its sharks. All the beaches are protected by shark nets that have been installed about 300 metres off shore on the outside of the breaker line. It is very interesting to watch the Natal Sharks Board out in the bay each morning tending the nets and removing any fish that have become entangled during the night. If they are still alive they are released otherwise they are taken to the shark boards offices to the north of Durban where they are dissected for research purposes.

The “ Golden mile” is always a hive of activity with the many restaurants, pubs and bars to be visited. At night many people come down to the beaches to relax and enjoy the atmosphere or just to party.

Durban is also famous for it Rikshas. A Riksha for those who don't know is and African man who wears a very fancy head dress made of beads and cows horns and bits and pieces of cheap jewellery and feathers and other odds and ends. The Riksha also has a cart with two large wheels and a seat where two adults or three kids can fit into. For a small fee you will be taken for a ride along the beachfront with this man wearing his head dress pulling the cart. The ride can get quite exciting when the riksha picks up a bit of speed and leaps into the air balancing his weight and yours like a seesaw. When he does this without warning the passengers are thrown backwards and think they are going to fall out the back of his cart. Not to worry! There is a small jockey wheel at the back that stops the cart falling over and you falling out.

There are many other things to do in Durban other than just swimming and tanning. Although most of the action takes place along the beachfront there are other areas where there is much to do. The two main roads in Durban are Smith Street and West Street. Both of them are one way only with West Street going towards the beach and Smith away from the beach.

The main shopping areas of Durban are found along these streets.

There are also many sports facilities with the main arenas being Kingsmead for cricket and the Shark Tank for rugby.

Most people will have heard of the Comrades marathon. This marathon is run between Durban and Pietermaritzburg each year, one year up and the other year down. It is a gruelling race that is normally run in hot weather and it attracts 1000's of people. The race is 89 kilometres long and follows the old road between Pietermaritzburg and Durban. The next Comrades Marathon will be held on the 16th of June 2003 and will be the down run i.e. Pietermaritzburg to Durban.

The scenery between Pietermaritzburg and Durban is beautiful. The old road wends its way through the valley of a thousand hills. As far as one can see there are just hills. Vegetation is lush and if the province has received rain very green. In Pinetown a small town between PM Burg and Durbs there is a beautiful waterfall. Its called the Howick falls and although not very big is quite spectacular.

Durban also grows various varieties of tropical fruit. Fruit such as Paw Paws, mangoes, avocado pears and of course bananas. Their avos are to die for. On the occasions that I have visited Durban I have always made an effort to get a grass wash basket full of green avos to take home.

If you drive out into the country areas surrounding Durban you will come across many farms growing sugar cane. This is one of the main products grown in the area. Durban is known as the sugar capital of South Africa and you can see many large silos where sugar is stored. A tour of the refineries is very interesting as they show you the entire process from where the cane is pulped to where the white sugar is finally packaged to be shipped.

Durban is one of South Africa’s premier holiday destinations. Visit in July and watch the Durban July horse race.

Geoff Fairman writes an ezine called Turtle Essays that concentrates on Cape Town and its surrounds. To subscribe send a blank email to TurtleEssays-subscribe@turtlesa.com

or read the ezines online at http://www.turtlesa.com

Globetrotters should be extra careful when booking flights with travel agents in the UK. High street budget travel agents, Trailfinders are, like most other companies, happy to sell you a ticket for any destination in the world and try to get you to cough up for their in-house insurance at the same time. They of course earn commission on this.

This Globetrotter booked a ticket through Trailfinders to Bali. I booked it well before the Bali incident and am due to fly to Bali at Easter. I was offered insurance, which I declined as I have my own. At a recent London travel show I enquired about the two different Trailfinder policies on offer, one annual and one single trip.

When I rang to ask to book the Trailfinder insurance a couple of weeks later, I was told that Trailfinders would not insure trips to Bali or any part of Indonesia. Whilst I totally understand the reasoning behind this, Trailfinders should not be offering insurance over the phone and at Travel shows and then reneging when people try to book it.

After the Bali bomb many companies in the travel trade took the step of contacting clients with existing reservations to Bali offering them money back or a change of destination. Trailfinders did not do this and now as time for final payment looms, the horrible truth of the situation is becoming apparent to UK travellers.

U. S. Soldiers Home Mac: during a century of travel (well 78 years!) both in and out of service I have travelled to over 150 countries (I count both North and South Dakota as countries) and for some reason have jotted signs and happenings that I thought funny at the time (and now wonder why). So here is the perfect opportunity to share some of my anecdotes.

Beijing, China. The Imperial Palace in the Forbidden City in Beijing has 9,000 rooms. We agree that if we got lost and separated from each other we would meet in the Hall of Heavenly Purity (if they would let us in) At the time I was there the military did no wear rank on their uniforms (don’t know if this still applies or not) You could kind of get an idea of who outranked who by the number of pockets they had on their blouse of uniform. Someone with four pockets would have their baggage carried by someone with one pocket or no pockets.

In the hotels the orchestras (In the Peace Hotel in Shanghai I think they had some of the members or orchestra from the 30s) would play songs they thought we would like. Oh Susannah from a couple of decades ago seems to be making a comeback as well as Turkey in the Straw and Auld Lang Sang. At the end of each number the players would put down their instruments and applaud us in the audience. We could hardly wait for the Tuba player to unwind from his Tuba to applaud us. Everyone in our tour group caught colds (from the dust) except those that had taken Vitamin C for a couple of weeks before arriving in China. Mr Wu our guide referred to the Royal Bank of Canada (George from Canada wanted to get some money) as the Loyal Bank of Canada. One of the military said that when he was in China years before he took a piece of the wall and had a name plate put on it and sent it to movie actress Carole Lombard as he had read that she collected rocks. She threw it back. No she wrote and thanked him.

Our Chinese guide in Wuxi kind of had a high opinion of himself (unusual for Chinese) and though he was hip in Western ways. He liked to show off and showed us how he was proficient in Tai Chi (shadow boxing). Blonde vivacious Liza asked him to dance with her. He said No that he could not dance with a client but that he would arm-wrestle her Ha. He told long involved stories about the Kingdom of Wu and Dragons and such. George whispered: I wonder what he would say if we told him we didn’t want to hear any more dragon stories? If I were going to China today I would probably take my own plastic chopsticks. In Japan they have disposable chopsticks but in China they have plastic ones that you hope they wash after several others have used them. If going to China start a walking program at home. Walk around the block then next day further as in China even on escorted tours you are going to be doing more walking than you possibly do at home. Build up you let muscles before leaving home. I put as many Chinese stamps on letters sent home as possible for stamp collectors back home as their stamps are so colourful and unusual. While there their coffee was not very good so taking instant coffee along helped. The hotels had thermos bottle of hot water for tea in your room, which they replenished every morning and this was handy to make coffee with.

Kneehow (phonetic) in Chinese means hello. In China Carol who was from England and had a beautiful voice would sing slightly risqué Cockney songs and George would sing “My old lady and the lady next door went down the river on a barnyard door singing Ki Yi Yippie Yi ” and nonsensical songs. Miss Cha who was trying to learn English (she had taught herself) wanted to learn some of these songs so she could sing them to her next tour group. As some were risqué Carol said. “My dear I don’t think you really need to learn these songs” Les would give his excellent imitation of Peter Sellers imitating an Indian and his accent was hilariously correct. We should have been a USO troop. We laughed all the way across China. If you are in high altitude eating onions will help combat altitude sickness.

Next month, Mac discusses his travels through India. If you would like to contact Mac, he can be e-mailed on: macsan400@yahoo.com

Part One:

We had listened with excitement to our friend’s description of his travels in the tribal regions of Kinnaur and Spiti, in the North Indian State of Himachal Pradesh. Bordering Tibet, these areas had only recently been opened to foreigners.

The following May we set off from Goa, where we spend our winters, and headed for Shimla, the former summer capital of the British Raj. It was our second visit to this bit of old England located on top of and spilling over both sides of a steep ridge in the foothills of the Himalayas. Even a scaled down copy of London’s Gaiety Theatre sits on the Mall, the town’s high street from where on a clear day you can see high peaks while strolling past and poking into quaint old shops, including Maria Brother’s Antiquarian Bookshop, where you never know what treasures you’ll find.

We inquired about Kinnaur and Spiti at the tourist office, housed in a Tudor-style building on the Mall. They tried to be helpful but there wasn’t much official information to be had about the region. That was ten years ago. The bureaucratic hassles involved in obtaining permission to enter this region at that time were so formidable that few travellers managed it, and of those who did, most received permission to stay for only a week and others were even required to take a police escort with them. Surprisingly, the officer in charge of a small district headquarters granted us a two-month unrestricted permit from simply because we had struck a friendly note with him. Such is the way things happen in India. In the past few years entry restrictions have been relaxed and we have been back many times.

The district of Kinnaur is largely Hindu, but being far from the centres of mainstream Hinduism, it has retained an archaic character: oracles go into trances and the gods of the villages speak through them. There are no Brahmins here to act as priests; Buddhist lamas conduct the major household rituals for the Hindus, those concerned with birth, marriage and death, a practice unheard of elsewhere in Hindu India. Spiti though, is Lamaistic Buddhist as is Tibet, but the religion is more archaic here, retaining ancient ways, magical practices and archaic rituals that long ago disappeared from Tibet.

Over the years, we’ve spent many months exploring Kinnaur and Spiti, living in small villages, walking the trails between remote villages and into the high, uninhabited mountains and attending festivals at gompas (monasteries)—colourful events when the lamas don gorgeous silken brocade robes, masks and headdresses and perform graceful dances to the sounds of kettle drums and unbelievably long, curved brass horns. Once we pitched our tent on top of a flat-roofed mud house and watched the lamas practice their graceful steps and leaps for a week before the festival began. The dances are dramatizations of stories from Tibetan Buddhist myths, all very well known to the lively and appreciative audience of villagers, decked out in their finest and most exotic apparel; they come from near and far to watch these shows. We sat among them and enjoyed being among these gentle and colourful, full-of-life people.

At a festival at Ki Gompa, which is built around the small, rubbly cone of an extinct volcano, when the dances were over, the audience got up and moved to the hillside behind the monastery. There they formed long, snaking lines and prostrated themselves to make a living carpet for the lamas to walk on. Talk about devotion! The people consider their lamas to be literally living gods.

Ki village is high above the Spiti Valley, north of Kaza, Spiti’s main town. The bazaar has the timeless feel of an ancient entrepôt. It is a meeting place of people from all over the Himalayas and the Indian plains who come here to trade donkeys, yaks, rugs, turquoise and coral, seed pearls and peas… (and Spiti is renowned for its fine riding horses able to navigate the narrowest of mountain trails, and also for its wily horse traders).

The town is dotted with small squares built around gleaming white, highly embellished chortens or stupas, the reliquary mounds found everywhere in the Buddhist Himalayas, and shaded by ancient gnarled poplars. And surrounding the town are stark, boldly hued mountains. In this high-altitude, desert-like region all cultivation must be carried on by extensive and ingenious irrigation schemes, complex networks of channels that bring water to the fields from glaciers in the mountains high above. The emerald fields of barley and peas are like jewels set into this rugged, rocky landscape. Massive mud-brick houses and monasteries washed gleaming white with distinctive black and ochre trim stand out against the green of the fields and the deep blue of the sky.

More in our next letter about Spiti’s distinctive style of architecture—it’s amazing what you can do with mud! And, what happened when it rained in this place where it never rains!

Martin and Carol Noval have been living in India for more than twenty years and organize and lead several special cultural tours and treks a year for small groups. They’ll be leading road trips and treks in Spiti next summer (2003). If you would like to get in touch, email them at tripsintoindia@usa.net and check their website www.tripsintoindia.com

Meeting news from our branches around the world.

Nick from London says that he thinks that it does not really count if you have only been to the inside of an airport in a particular country, though others may argue this point. There are other brief visits I have made to countries. For instance, a couple of years ago I was holidaying in Thailand and took one of those long tail boat trips on the Mekong river in the Golden Triangle. During the short journey the boat driver called in at a jetty on the Lao side of the river for petrol.

Aha! I thought to myself, This is an opportunity to visit Laos! I leapt off the boat and walked up the jetty and spent a couple of minutes on the riverbank on the Lao side of the river. So I have had a very short “visit” to Laos, at least I have stood on Laotian soil, but of course I can't really say that I have been to the country in any usual sense. Perhaps others have similar rapid drop ins on countries? Write in and let the Beetle know what you think!

Globetrotters meeting on 1^st February by Padmassana

David Abram was up first and gave us a very interesting talk on Trekking in Corsica. David has spent long periods in Corsica in order to research his Trailblazer guidebook. He told us that the cheapest way to get there is to take a No-Frills cheap flight to either Marseilles or Nice and then take a ferry across to the island. David first showed us the easier coastal walks; we saw the azure seas and waves crashing on to rocky headlands. The main route for Trekking/walking on Corsica is the GR20, which winds its way 170 Km across the islands roof. The route has an altitude change of 19,000 Metres. David explained that although his photos of the route looked daunting to all but experienced mountaineers, including parts where it was necessary to use cables and ladders, most reasonably fit people can manage the route. The GR20 route is for the most part well marked with waypoints. It is divided into 16 stages, which most of the 17,000 people who do the walk each year complete in around 12 days. David finished up with some Corsican music and some of his favourite photos of Corsica. In next month’s e-news we are lucky enough to have one of David’s stories about his time in Corsica – look out for it!

After the interval our second speaker was Peter Nasmyth whose talk was entitled Caucasus adventure. Peter kicked off with photos of snow-capped peaks like Mt Elbrus and hilltop churches, lit by the intermittent electricity supply. This region has many surprises for the visitor; it’s a place where the locals drink toasts to Stalin (he was a Georgian) and to Adolf Hitler (he fought the communists). Other surprises were a bubbling carbonated lake, surrounded by red mineral covered rocks. Tblisi is the Georgian capital, we saw old areas where balconies over hang the streets and a tower block that was once the best hotel in town, but is now a home to many refugees from the wars in neighbouring countries like Ossetia and Chechnya. Peter’s photos of the local people included traditional dress that has built in bullet holders and knives in the waistband of trousers. The Caucasus is an area where it is possible to go heli-skiing, by renting a helicopter and heading up into the mountains, very popular with German skiers. Peter finished by telling us about his charity, which helps the local children, who are bright and well educated, but have little to channel their energies into. Peter also helped establish Prosperos bookshop. The first English language cafe bookshop, which according to Peter sells the best coffee in the Caucasus.

Coming up: Saturday 1st March

Leslie Downer – “Sadayakko and her amazing journey around the World.” Sadayakko was a geisha and Japan's first actress. In 1900 she enchanted audiences around the World from san Francisco, New York, London, fin-de-siecle Paris, Vienna and St. Petersburg. Part II of Leslie's geisha adventures. Geoff Roy – “Great Wall of China” is the longest man-made structure on Earth- stretching from the Yellow Sea to Tibet (6,700kms.) Geoff's talk covers walking on restored, as well as un-restored sections of “wild wall”

London meetings are held at The Church of Scotland, Crown Court, behind the Fortune Theatre in Covent Garden at 2.30pm the first Saturday of each month. There is no London meeting in August, but we will be back in September. For more information, you can contact the Globetrotters Info line on +44 (0) 20 8674 6229, , or register for email updates at at our website (click here)

My partner and I (aged 55 and 65) went RTW for 12 months to April 2002. She has written a book on it but is looking for a publisher. I went to internet cafes to maintain a long journal. So rather than travellers' tales here are some notes on how we did it. The RTW deal was from Star Alliance, giving us 12 months, 15 stops and 39000 miles. A couple of times when in dispute with an airline the Alliance link was useful. Their miles include overland legs which seems unfair but it is still good value. They allow backtracking, which we needed for India to China.

We flew to Brazil for two lazy weeks to get over the strain of preparations, then to Lima. We took buses – we avoided 'luxury' or 'tourist' buses -round Peru and despite being told it was impossible found a cheap way to Macchu Picchu. Three-day trips to Colca Canyon and to the Peruvian Amazon jungle. Bus and boat (aided by the Bolivian Navy!) to cold La Paz then bus on 'the most dangerous road in the world' to lovely Coroico. Flew to Costa Rica, which seemed very wealthy and grotesquely American!

But we had a wonderful time there – eco-tourism on the Caribbean coast and in the cloud forest. I wrote a report on working conditions on the banana plantations. Then buses through sad Nicaragua, tough Honduras (staying with the Garifuna) and Guatemala with its staggering range of wealth. We were in luxury after three months of back packers' hotels and crowded but fascinating bus journeys. Then we bought a car in Florida and eventually sold it in British Columbia. (One could write a book this, as on each leg of the journey.) This was not as easy as it sounds – big problems with driver's licence and insurance. But surmountable. Boat and bus to Houston BC. Strange coming back to sophistication a few days after 9/11, a different world. Hawaii then fabulous Tonga. Real bliss as the only visitors on an idyllic island, and time to think. Here my partner discovered the magic of snorkelling.

NZ was surprisingly far nicer than expected, Sydney also amazes. We were kept busy there and in Canberra and Melbourne giving talks. Thailand where we made lasting friends, one a young man not half way through 25 years imprisonment for drug smuggling. Don’t even think about it! Interesting to contrast the type of tourists here with those in S America. Almost a different breed. So to the jewel. Three months in India lived up to all my hopes and dreams. A stopover in steamy sophisticated Singapore (the night time zoo worth a visit) thence to Beijing, and onto the trans-Asia train with stops including three weeks in Mongolia (hiring a jeep to traverse the Gobi), Siberia (Lake Baikal), Moscow and glorious St Petersburg.

Stockholm was refreshing and spring time in England utterly delightful. Total cost was less than £4,000 on fares, plus £400 a week rent we got on our London homes. We ate local workers' food. We often stayed in people's homes – fellow Quakers, a hosting organisation, far flung family and friends. Otherwise in the better rooms in cheap hotels. Motels (except some on Route 66) have no character but are great value. Or ashrams. The only problematic visa was that for Russia, though others such as India and China needed some care. I was surprised to find one of the most irksome problems was telephoning – one needs to see if mobiles can be adapted cheaply in each region. Only disappointments: despite three weeks in most places we usually seemed to be in a hurry, and sadly I lost several sets of slides.

Essentials include up-to-date Guides. We used Footprint guides for Latin America because it avoids having lots of volumes; and for India as well as Lonely Planet there and everywhere else. “Road Trip USA” for the side roads. Take both Visa and MasterCard (and Maestro if possible) as many areas take only one or the other. We had all the jabs recommended except expensive encephalitis. We never resolved all the arguments for and against anti-malaria tablets, and if so which ones. But insect repellent from day 1, and a hat if you are bald like me. I had to have scalp pre-cancer treatment on return. I was supplied with and shown how to use self-catheterisation by the NHS. Never had to do it but without it I would not have dared go to Tonga, or deep into the Gobi.

Medically we had very few problems, tummy bug twice, and chest complaints in the Andes. I got shingles when in Thailand but was easily able to get powerful drugs (for £50 – a fortune), which knocked it out. But we had quite a few strains from lugging our packs (and from 3 days meditating cross legged in a Buddhist temple!) We both had Karrimor wheeled rucksacks and seldom had to hump them. My advice – just DO IT! Don't worry about food and accommodation and robbery.

Ignore travel mags and ads. They make it scary so you'll use their expensive services. Just GO! Details on the web site (at http://home.clara.net/spetter/sp/, but sadly I don't have time and space to mention our lovely hosts and the travellers and locals we met. To contact Stephen for any hints or tips, please e-mail him on: spetter@clara.net

Coming up: Saturday 1st March

Seeds of Peace is concerned with sowing the seeds of peace among children who have grown up with the horror of war. They will be back for an encore presentation, following their first visit to the New York branch of the Globetrotters Club on January 4, 2003.

Speaking will be: Jeremy Goldberg and Rebecca Hankin of Seeds of Peace, an organization that provides an opportunity for the children of war to plant the seeds for a more secure future. The program focuses on Arab and Israeli teenagers from ten nations in the Middle East but has also brought youngsters from Cyprus, the war-torn Balkans, India, Pakistan, Afghanistan and other regions of conflict to its unique coexistence program. Seeds of Peace has been featured in The New York Times, USA Today, The Washington Post, Time Magazine, The Christian Science Monitor, The Wall Street Journal, People Magazine and on ABC, CBS & NBC network programs, including “Nightline” (twice) with Ted Koppel, “60 Minutes” with Morley Safer, “Sunday Morning,” “The Today Show,” “Good Morning America” and on CNN, PBS and NPR. Jeremy Goldberg is the Director of Corporate Relations at Seeds of Peace, Mr. Goldberg's experience includes time spent on Capitol Hill, as well as at the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), a Washington, DC-based think tank. He is also the founder and former editor-in-chief of the Georgetown Journal of International Affairs, a nationally distributed foreign affairs publication. Jeremy is an honors graduate of the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. Rebecca Hankin is currently Director of Media Relations at Seeds of Peace, a position she has held since April 2002. Since its founding, Seeds of Peace has graduated over 2,000 teenagers representing 22 nations from its internationally recognized conflict-resolution program.

For details of forthcoming meetings email newyork@globetrotters.co.uk or register for email updates at click here at our website.

New York meetings are held at The Wings Theater, 154 Christopher Street (btw Greenwich St and Washington St), to the right of Crunch Fitness, in the Archive on the first Saturday of each month at 4 pm.

February is a slow month in the Costa Del Sol. This is why you can get some of the best deals during that month. The temperature goes from 16-10 degrees Celsius. So you can still be in shorts.

I recently just got back from Costa Del Sol. I took advantage of the airline price war that is going on right now. Arriving at the airport I noticed that the traffic was not as heavy as it was during the summer but still a fair number of the people getting off those planes were from the UK, Ireland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark and Germany. First things I noticed was that I needed sunglasses and needed to take off my heavy winter jacket. I just arrived from a Northern European country where that morning it was -6 Celsius. It was also icy and snowing conditions.

I was smiling as I thought of my colleagues back home at work. I was thinking that some of them do deserve their day in the sun. Some of my colleagues had become as cranky as the northern weather in the northern part of Europe and the sun would bring back their smiles. Productivity would greatly improve.

The second thing I noticed is the smile on the Spanish people's face. They seem that they were enjoying themselves. I thought what enjoyment have I had before coming to Spain? In my Northern country I was stuck everyday in traffic, I was driving 20 kilometres an hour on the highway due to snow and icy conditions, I had 3 layers of clothes on because of freezing temperatures. Coming to Spain I was no longer stuck in traffic, there were no icy conditions to peril my well being, and I was taking off my 3 layers of clothes in February!!! Therefore, I too had a smile on my face.

Once in Costa Del Sol, you will be tempted to stop on the highway to view the ocean. My suggestion is to drive west towards Marbella. Take the coastal highway N-340 so that you can get the ocean view throughout your journey. Stop somewhere where you can view the great ocean- like the top of the Sitio de Calahonda. Calahonda is 36 Kilometres west of Malaga and on the N-340. Once at the top there are bars and restaurants where you can sit outside and see the breathtaking views. You will soon forget your problems at work, your icy conditions, and your 3 layers of clothes that you left back home.

About the Author: Fred Desrosiers lives in the coldness of the Swiss Alps. He has been to the Costa Del Sol several times. He loves it so much that he returns time and time again. He can help you if you’d like to visit the Costa del Sol. View his website at Fred's Homepage

For information on Ontario meetings, please contact: Svatka Hermanek:

shermanek@schulich.yorku.ca or Bruce Weber: tel. 416-203-0911 or Paul Webb: tel. 416-694-8259.

Meetings are held on the third Friday of January, March, May, September and November. Usually at the Woodsworth Co-op, Penthouse, 133, Wilton Street in downtown Toronto at 8.00 p.m.

Iris is a British lady of considerable character and pluck, on a 23 week overland expedition from Quito in Ecuador to Caracas in Venezuela. After this, she plans to do a 3-month voluntary placement in Ecuador, and then visit Central America for another overland trip between Panama City and Mexico City, ending up with perhaps another 2-month voluntary placement somewhere in South America again. This amazing journey will take Iris one year. Here is an extract from Iris’ journey notebook.

30^th November: The Journey to Cuenca

I sent my last emails from Baños, was there 3 days and it was a lovely little town but, as I say, that volcano was brooding over it, which made things a little scary! One of our number said he had read there are evacuation arrows in the streets showing the population the way to run should there be an eruption but he couldn't find them which rather concerned him! But we evacuated from Baños without any trouble, but my, what a journey we had to Cuenca – right through the Andes at a minimum of 2,000 metres, sometimes going up to well over 3,000 metres. Everywhere – mountains that seemed to be almost piled one on top of the other, with the occasional narrow valley plummeting down to the depths with hamlets nestled in them. Scary at times as the road was just cut out of the mountainsides and there were some really incredible hair pin bends – looking over the side I was thankful we were going so slowly with no danger of going over the edge because we would have all been killed if we had crashed over the side – probably drops of at least 300 – 1,000m in places with nothing but rock to fall on!

We saw lots of local people – mostly shepherds in the traditional Andean garb of trilby hat, colourful (often red) shawls and brightly coloured skirts, minding their sheep, goats, donkeys, pigs, cattle or llamas. Unfortunately, the cloud was low and obscured what must have been some very fine views but every so often the scene (rather than the sky) would clear and we would see some awesome sights – steaming volcanoes, two or three of them in a line; sheer precipices and steep mountains with their tops obscured in cloud.

We left Baños at 0745 (yours truly being the last on the bus, not because I got up late, I was up at 0500 exercising and showering but the restaurant which was supposed to open at 0600 was later opening and then the girl who waited on table had to run off to the baker's to get bread. But by the time we were all breakfasted (and some rolled in in the early hours of the morning so had no breakfast as they were suffering from hangovers) and I had collected my belongings and finished my ablutions (the obligatory cleaning of teeth), I turned out to be the last on the bus!

We then made our way slowly out of Baños to Cuenca some 366 kms to the south but the terrain, coupled with the weight in our bus – full water tanks as well as petrol tanks, and with two drivers and 22 people aboard with all their luggage – we made slow progress up hills and all sorts of vehicles were continuously overtaking us. We were ok on the straights and downhills but on the downhill had to go slowly again because of the weight being hurled down steep inclines and having to negotiate some hair-raising bends.

We stopped for lunch on the roadside – our leaders/drivers (Heather and Martin) had bought local produce at the market in Baños and so we helped prepare a lunch of salad (lettuce, tomatoes, cucumber, radishes, avocado pear, onions) and rolls, butter, ham and cheese for us all. We go through an elaborate process of disinfecting our hands, using a spray disinfectant after using the toilet and then washing our hands again in disinfectant water and rinsing them again in disinfectant water and shaking them rather than wiping them dry. All table surfaces and pots and pans are sterilised and then work begins at cutting up and buttering and putting things on plates and in bowls on long trestle tables and canvas stools are put out for us all to sit on. Meanwhile, the local dogs congregate, sniffing out the food and looking longingly at us, as are the local shepherd population.

In the site where we were there were a couple of shepherds (women) with their children, and their donkeys and pigs. The children were wide-eyed but rather suspicious urchins (suspicious of us) and refused all requests to have their photos taken, but hanging around watching these strange tourists in their shorts and long trousers preparing food they could only dream about. We didn't encourage the dogs with any scraps and we certainly did not stroke any of them (dirty little mutts), but they all seemed innocent enough and quiet if not friendly, but after we had all finished eating, the food over was handed out to the shepherds and their children in the form of ham and cheese and salad rolls, and bags of lettuce and tomatoes, and for the pigs, all the swill resulting from the lettuce and other vegetables used in the salad. So everyone benefited, even the local hospice (just a dirty brick building with a small shop and rather disgusting loos but at least we were able to use them and rinse our hands under the tap, hence the strict regime of disinfecting our hands every time we used the loos when we stopped.

At one stage, we experienced the necessity of relieving ourselves without the aid of modern conveniences. The men went one way in a small wooded area and the women went the other. It is at times like these one wishes one was a man and could just open our flies without having to strip ourselves half naked and crouch in the undergrowth. Of course, yours truly had to choose a place with some rather long stems of grass, which tickled my posterior regions as I crouched so I made a rather ungainly spectacle of myself jumping around every time something touched me in a rather intimate place! Then the ceremony of the trowel – burying the tissue we used in the ground so that we didn't pollute the local area of scenic beauty! I am sure this is going to be the first of many occasions when we will need to wander off, trowel in hand, to seek out similar places for similar purposes.

If you’d like to contact Iris, whether to wish her luck with her trip or to ask questions about her itinerary and places visited, I am sure she would like to hear from you. She can be contacted on: irisej2002@yahoo.co.uk

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