A2A Expedition - From Africa to Argentina to Alaska

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I had my first run in with the South American Policia today! It had to happen eventually, you can't stumble through life being as silly as I am without attracting any attention. The family and I had gone for a long walk along the Montevideon waterfront until we eventually stopped parallel to the American embassy. The red, white and blue was looking grand billowing in the breeze so I decided to take out my little Canon and take a photo. I had timed the shot perfectly and captured the flag unfurled with a block of apartments, the blue sky and a corner of the embassy in the background. I had an intuition that photographing the embassy might not be permissable, but dismissed the thought as unlikely. The building is massive and could be photographed from across the Rio Negro. A minute later a Uruguayan police officer came marching over to me. She looked serious. She spoke Spanish and I replied in English that I had only photographed the flag. She wanted to see the photo. I showed her the photo then scrolled through to prove that there was only one of the flag and the rest were my holiday snapshots. She told me to delete the photo. I was tempted to argue but being silly does not make me dumb. I erased the photo then asked if I could take one of her, maybe being silly does make me dumb.

We are meeting with the shipping agent tomorrow to discuss the paperwork needed for the release of the Landy from her container home. I am really hoping that we will be able to drive her out of the port on Wednesday, hanging out in hostels is expensive and not as much fun as when I was 23 and single. :) More pics to follow soon.
 

DiploStrat

Expedition Leader
Sorry, but we do get just a bit twitchy about folks photographing chanceries. Enjoy Uruguay and the rest of your trip.
 

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Observer
Sorry, but we do get just a bit twitchy about folks photographing chanceries. Enjoy Uruguay and the rest of your trip.

I understand, it is an unfortunate reality. I guess that is why I only took a photo of the flag. We are enjoying Montevideo but have just heard that the Landy will probably be delayed until Monday so we wont be having the camping weekend we were hoping for. But, everything happens for a reason so we will just have to have a rum weekend :)
 

jessejman

Adventurer
Felicidades! You have your truck and you're on the move. Happy travels and we'll be watching eagerly. -jesse

By the way, my Landy is much more uncooperative than my cruiser (though it is thirty years older!).
 

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Sorry for the lack of updates, my wife semi killed my laptop by dropping it out of the Landy and finding camps with wifi has been an issue. Tech troubles aside all is well with the Bell family and we are having a great time in southern Brazil. We have met quite a few wonderful people and the camps have been safe and affordable. Right now we are in the city of Florianopolis which is absolutely amazing. I cant believe that this place is such a well kept secret.

Uruguay was also fantastic but we were caught in a cyclone on our first weekend of overlanding. We moved into a little bungalow when the trees started falling over but our Howling Moon roof top tent was doing a great job keeping us dry even after 18 hours of steady rain.

Here is a blog I wrote while in Uruguay.

http://blog.getaway.co.za/travel-blog/uruguay-and-yerba-mate/

Will post some pics and reports as soon as I repair my Sony.

Cheers.
 

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Right, so the laptop has been un-murdered and we can resume posting. We are currently in Porto Seguro getting our act together before we head north for Salvador city, Natal and Forteleza. After a few hundred miles of beach driving we will then head down south through the Amazon, Pantanal and a desert ot 2 before re-entering Argentina. Then we will be going south to Ushuaia and then up the west coast to Alaska.
Mermaid Beach (1024x768).jpgIMG_0304 (1024x575).jpgSurfer statue (862x1024).jpgIMG_0426 (1024x575).jpg
 

h2os2

Adventurer
Sweet looking Defender! Are you possibly going up I-5 of the US West Coast through the Washington State area? We have a good size Land Rover club here.
Safe travels. Subscribed to thread.
 

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Observer
Sweet looking Defender! Are you possibly going up I-5 of the US West Coast through the Washington State area? We have a good size Land Rover club here.
Safe travels. Subscribed to thread.

Hi. We will be heading up the West Coast but at the moment have no clue how long it will take to care there. Keep an eye on us (I will make an effort to be more productive) and hopefully we can meet your club.

Cheers
 

Wainiha

Explorer
Subscribed:coffee:

And very funny rules in the first post. I would love to see Machu Picchu.

I did a "bookreport" about it in 5th grade.
 

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Observer
Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year from us overlanding Africans in Brazil!!!

Here is our latest video, I hope you enjoy it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41b1UGuZop8

From 22/12/12 until 23/12/12 we drove the beach route to Pipa Beach and from there to Natal for Christmas. The BR 101 freeway would have been quicker but driving that road is like Purgatory!

From Natal we will be heading 700 km North to Fortaleza, which apparently, we will be able to drive to almost entirely on the beach. In preparation for a week or so of off road driving we have been downloading tide charts, moon phases and recipes for meals consisting of fish, coconut and rice. There are some rather major rivers and swamps to traverse which we will either drive around or ferry across if ferries are available.

I hope you like the video! The song is by David Bowie.
 

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Sorry for the lack of updates. Need to get my butt into gear and do some regular posting. We have since travelled 32000 km's from Montevideo, Uruguay almost to the Equator then all the way down to Ushuaia and are now in Northern Chile in a city called Iquique taking a break and working on the Landy. Here is our latest blog:

http://www.a2aexpedition.com/10-tips-for-overlanding-southern-south-america/

We are active on Facebook, it is just the easiest way to upload photos and chat to people in real time.
 

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