Welcome to Mary and Zoe's World Wide Wander - herein find stories about their world trip in Mary's email diary & Zoe's email diary, and also photos: India & China & SE Asia. All spellings are good.
The plan was to travel across Chile, Mexico, New Zealand, Australia, Cambodia, Vietnam, China and India - but they ended up going the other way round.
Click on the maps for photos...
News From Far Parts
21/08/05 - News From The Edinburgh Fringe
Into the Closet - Mary and 'GrazingLab' are presenting "Into the Closet" at the Edinburgh Fringe.
Day Three Hundred and Forty Six - from Zacatecas
6/08/04 - from Mary
Hi All
I walked downstairs and there was Zoe... By some 6th sense and knowing the way things go, I had guessed she would arrive at my Hostel, and had reserved her the last bed in the house.
We hadn't planned to meet here...
Zacatecas is an old colonial city, straight out of a story book. You could place it in Europe and it would be ranked amongst the Baths, and Yorks as a city. But with a lively mexican twist.
They've got an international folk dance festival here this week, and I was relived to note the lack of morris dancers. But everybody thinks i'm a dancer, which I quite like.
I ate Cactus yesterday, bit like watermelon with lots of pips. I wasn't sure if I should eat the pips, so I did, and am not feeling any ill effects. yet. I was thinking of studying Spannish for a week here, but decided a week is not enough, and I wouldn't have much chance to practice and I want to see the church where they worship Pepsi.
Home soon
Goodnight all
m.
Day Three Hundred and Forty Two - It rained bucket
2/08/04 - from Mary
Dear all
I went in search of a lost cathderal. The decent into the Canyon was breath taking and hair raising... if I made it down there I knew I needed to make it back up again. There was one other traveller making the mission down with me, daniel from Czeck Republic. As we got off the bus at 2 pm the first big drops were falling. We decided we could easily make the 8km hike to the Cathedral and back before dark. It was a spectacular walk, and as we aproached the Cathedral the rain fell harder and harder and we were disapointed to find the lost cathedral had been found and locked, and opened only every other sunday. We dived for cover, and found shelter on a porch, with 2 cowboys in rocking chairs. It was raining harder than I have ever seen it. It lasted exactly 1 hour and exactly filled the bucket stood outside the porch.
As the sky cleared, lighting cracked, and thunder echoed off the walls of the canyon, washed illumious red by the rain. We headed for home. The road we had travelled just an hour before had been washed away in may parts, and huge landslides blocked our path. We climbed along what was left of the road, a precarious and slow journey. We crossed 5 metre wide rivers, watched with amusement by the locals that lived in the hills arround. They must have thought we were nuts. It was clear that the rain was heavier than normal, and it was going to take a while to fix the roads for the long journey out of there. Stuck at the bottom of the canyon. There was nobody bulk buying at the prospect of no delivery of coca cola, and when we asked if the bus would go on Monday they said 'probably'.
It was beyond my imagionation how the bus we came down on could possibly get back up again... I didn't sleep last night, when I boarded the bus it learched to the side. I wanted to get off, but it was the only way out, it was like a rollercoaster, but the drops were not controlled and there were still unstable rocks below and above.
We stopped... I realized whose job it was to fix the road.
We threw smaller rocks to the side and fixed larger boulders to the bus with a chain to drag out of the way. A tiny local bus with no susspension never mind 4 wheel drive, packed to bursting with people needing to leave the canyon before more rain made it impassable. It wouldn't have been so bad to be stuck down there, they have bars.
Goodnight all, I must siesta, ready for more adventures, I'm off to Chihuahua tomorrow, I will look out ugly bug eyed dogs.
I am very tired.
m.
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