Category: Ruzow

New York on my Birthday!

Author: Ruzow

It was 9 pm. We were very tired after sitting in the car the whole day on our way to New York. It was my birthday and we had embarked on our road trip from Charlotte in the early hours of the morning. After many long hours, we went through a long tunnel, and on the other side there was a sign that read: WELCOME TO NEW YORK!!! We had arrived in New York City! Everyone was now wide awake again. I could not believe we were in New York on my birthday!!!

A few minutes later, we stopped outside an old apartment building, in a small side street. Instantly Kali started getting nervous. We went inside and found our tiny little apartment for $62 a night. It may have been small, but the owner was very friendly and the place was clean.

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The next morning, we walked to the subway station one block away. There we bought tickets and got on. Ten minutes later, we got off and walked a few blocks to Wall Street. Here, after about twenty minutes of searching, we found our tour guide. Jon was a nice guy with a great sense of humour. During our six hour walking tour of Manhattan, I would have been able to fill a whole book with all the things I saw and learnt, but here are my highlights:

  • The Twin Tower Memorial was something I have always wanted to see and learn more about. I was very excited when we arrived. Our guide shared a lot of good information with us, that really helped me understand what happened.
  • Little Italy, is the suburb where Italian immigrants settled for the first time, and who generations later, still inhabit the area. It was full of small shops and restaurants and interesting buildings.
  • Lunch in Little Italy, a delicious pizza.
  • Another of my highlights was that in every street, there was something interesting to learn. For example, the first building with a lift in it, the highest building with a fire escape on the outside and many other small bits of interesting facts about the buildings, their former inhabitants or uses.

I can definitely conclude that,  if you are ever looking for a tour to do in New York, Free Tours By Foot is the best one there is.

Following the tour, we walked along a pathway, towards the ferry terminals and after about an hour, we went inside a café where I got a milkshake. (Not the best I have ever tasted.) However, twenty minutes later, we were on board a ferry and sailing steadily down the Hudson River. Now we got to see New York from the river. We saw many famous buildings, including the World Trade Centre, Chrysler Building and Empire State Building. A little while later, we were underneath the Brooklyn Bridge, something I always longed to do. From there we sailed on, gazing at the city and taking photos with all the famous landmarks in the background. We turned around and sailed back a different route. Then, in front of me was the one thing I dreamed of seeing – the Statue of Liberty. It was up close now and people were all trying to take photos of it. I just stood there looking at it. It was amazing! After seeing it, we sailed back to the terminal.

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We then walked to Times Square.  The place was crowded with people, huge screens with advertisements and flashing light! So much excitement. We just watched everything around us, it was a whole experience in itself. All too soon, we had to head back to our apartment for the night.

We got up early and went for a run in Central Park. There were lots of people exercising, playing sports, or just chilling with friends. Afterwards, we went to get our breakfast bagels on Madison Avenue. We then headed back on a bus.

Back at the apartment, we showered and packed our bags, before getting on the subway to the airport. We were on our way again, this time to Finland.

– Ruzow –

 

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Entering Ecuador

Author: Ruzow

We woke up early, to start our trip to Ecuador. We had been staying in Chachapoyas, Peru and had quite a few bus, mini van and motor taxi rides ahead of us before we would reach the border.
After having been on rough, windy mountain roads, with numerous land slides, places where the road had given way to the cliffs and many more hazards, for nine hours, we arrived at the border. We had a late lunch / early dinner, before getting ready to cross the border. After about twenty minutes in customs on the Peruvian side, we were allowed to cross the bridge into Ecuador. In Ecuador, the customs took only about ten minutes. At long last we had arrived.

We walked over to a truck, that had been turned into a people mover, by adding benches. We climbed aboard, securing our bags to our legs, as the truck was crowded and had no sides to keep anything inside, just the benches!!! We had one and a half hours on this thing. About an hour into our ride, Eulain went to sit next to Dad so another man could have a seat. She was still standing on the ground, when the driver started going! She just jumped onto the side and held on, till she could be seated again. That was the only exiting happening of the ride. A while later, we arrived at Zumba, the small village where we were going spend the night, before going to Cuenca the next morning.

   In Zumba, we walked down the small main street for about a minute, then we spotted a hotel. We went in and got two rooms. We were all really tired and straight away got ready for bed. We were ready for a good night’s sleep.

– Ruzow –

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My First Real Zipline Experience

Author: Ruzow

2 June 2017

I was very exited as we walked towards the men handing out equipment. The men fitted me into a harness. When we started walking up the metal stairs to the platform, I felt adrenaline surge through my body. I stepped out onto a tiny platform with railing around it. Kali, Mum and I got hooked to the metal line. The gate opened, my eyes closed, nothing happened, I opened my eyes just as … whoosh (video)……….. we had left the platform.

Kali closed her eyes and started screaming from that moment, until her feet touched the ground at the end. Meanwhile, Mum and I were gazing at the river and forest bordering it, drinking in the scenery. It was over within half a minute.

The highlight of my day!!!!!

– Ruzow –

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Arrival in Peru

Author: Ruzow

We got up at about 2am Chilean time. We all rushed to get ready. Our flight to Peru was at 6am. The flight was fine, other than not being able to recline our seats, but I fell asleep anyway. After a bit of school work, we landed safe and sound in Lima, Peru at 8am local time.

The owner of the apartment we were staying in, had organised a taxi to pick us up at the airport. Once we were on the road, we were astounded to see that there were no rules at all!!! All the cars, busses and other vehicles were crammed with people. They were all speeding and weaving from one side of the road to the other, trying to take every gap they could possibly get.

About half an hour later, we arrived at our apartment. We got out of the taxi and went in. It was Eulain and my turn to choose the room, so we took the one on the top floor.

A little later, we went to a park where we joined a tour group. With the tour, we saw all of downtown Lima, it was very interesting. We walked into an old cathedral, watched a bit of a parade in front of the president’s office, saw a museum and much, much more.

Afterwards, we went for lunch at a traditional Peruvian restaurant. The food was amazing. I enjoyed and savoured every last mouthful.

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Afterwards, we headed back home on the Metro Bus. When we arrived back home, we got ready to go for a run. We ran along the Malecon clifftop walkways. It was really nice. There were other people exercising, riding skateboards and having picnics. Later when we were back in our apartment, we ate some fruit, and got ready for bed and so we concluded our first day in Peru.

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– Ruzow –

 

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A selection of Chilean experiences (Ruzow)

Author: Ruzow

Our First Time In Santiago (23-26 March)

We spent our first three days of our world adventure in Santiago. I saw many interesting old buildings, ate interesting food and met interesting people. As you may have noticed, I had a very interesting time.

One of the interesting buildings that I saw, had the exterior of a small corner shop, but the interior of a beautiful restaurant. Full of old furniture, and chandeliers. There were many small stores and stalls in the streets, these were full of weird and wonderful things for sale.

I saw some amazing street art. Some told a story and others were just colour to the street. But they were all beautiful contributing to making the street lively.

The busses in Santiago, are old and rickety. They look and sound like they are going to break down at any given moment. The rest of the traffic is also very busy, for example, we were walking down the street, when suddenly, a motorbike came darting towards us at a huge speed. People were scrambling to get out of its way. Also we were in an Uber on our way to the airport, when a taxi came rushing past us a top speed, it looked like it was going to slide off the road any second. In Santiago, pedestrians do not have the right of way, cars just rush past. Other than that, the traffic is not too bad.

We walked through many smaller streets, that were full of old buildings and street art. There were also little stalls with fresh fruit, fresh fruit drinks and fresh food. These were all relatively cheap and very good to eat.

We stayed in the old part of Santiago, it is the more lower class, but still very beautiful. Just two short bus rides away, is a huge modern city with big shopping centres and skyscrapers. You see a massive contrast when going from the old part to the new part.

I learnt a bit more basic Spanish, so I could at least communicate the basics with the local people who mostly do not understand a word of English.

To me, Santiago is an amazing place to visit, but I would probably not decide to live there permanently.

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Shaken While Home Alone

Mum and Dad went out to the wine land for the day. We had just finished our school work and were about to put on a movie, when suddenly everything started shaking………………………….

It was about 12 PM, when the windows started rattling, furniture shaking and Kali panicking. She shoved the electronic devices between the pillows on the couch and ordered us to run to the beach. We all followed her.

We ran to the beach under Kali’s command. She had mum’s phone with her and started to try and contact Dad. Unfortunately, the phone did not work, which made her stress even more.

Strangely no one else came running out. After about ten minutes, we decided to go back inside. Everything was quiet and calm. We put on our movie, and waited for Mum and Dad to arrive.

Later when they were home, we found out that these earthquakes happen regularly in the area. “Only run if you see the locals running”.

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Back In Santiago

We left our beautiful beach-side apartment in Concon at about 12:15 PM. After a short bus ride to Vina del Mar, we got on the bus to Santiago. The bus ride was pleasant, although, it seemed that every time I was writing something important on the iPad, we would go around a sharp bend or over a bump in the road. Other than that, it was fine.

When we arrived in Santiago, for our third and final time, we went straight to the nearest local bus stop. We had planned to go to the shopping centre as soon as we arrived, because we could only check in at our lodgings at 6 PM. We needed to take two busses. Huddling into an overcrowded orange bus, we completed the first part of the way. We got off the bus and waited for the next bus to arrive. After about fifteen minutes of waiting, it finally came into view. I got aboard but the driver abruptly motioned to me to get off. There was something wrong with the bus. After another ten minutes of waiting, we were allowed to get on.

On arrival at the shopping centre, we noticed that none of the shops were open. Of course………… it was a public holiday. We were all disappointed as we walked towards our apartment. But to our surprise, as we walked through a large park, we saw hundreds of people all having picnics, playing sport and just chatting to each other.

According to the GPS on Dad’s phone, we still had 2.2 kilometres to go. We arrived twenty minutes later with our heavy backpacks. We went in and dropped them on the floor. It was a brand new apartment, we were the first people to stay in it!!!

Dad and I went outside to find something to eat for dinner. We walked down the road, nothing was open except, an extremely expensive café and a pizza restaurant. We went back to our apartment and told the others. We decided on pizza, and went right away. We were extremely hungry!!

The pizza restaurant was completely empty when we got there. We walked in, sat down at a table and started talking to the delighted chef. He spoke a little English, so between him and Dad’s translator, we managed to figure out the menu and order our pizza.

After about 20 minutes, we were served our freshly baked pizzas. As we were eating, we noticed, that the chef took the blackboard menu out onto the sidewalk. The restaurant was only supposed to open now. No wonder there was no one else in the restaurant!

After dinner, we went back to our apartment. I could not wait to get into my warm bed.

– Ruzow –

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