Backdated from september

At this stage we're getting pretty sorted for our trip to south america.Plan is to fly over to buenos aires on the 7th of October. We're going to go to a language school and generally hang out, see the city and eat as much steak as we can to fatten up before the inevitable lean times we'll have cycling up the mountain passes in the Andes.

After two weeks we fly on to ushuia, the southernmost city in the world, to begin the journey proper. A lot of what we are interested in is in Patagonia, we'll be doing a lot of hiking in the national parks there, just google torres del paine or mount fitzroy to see what I'm on about. By hikes I mean 5-7 day circuits of the national parks, crossing glacier fields, nothing crazy, we'll have a guide for the glacier fields as a guy from mayo was lost on them a while back, but it will be one hell of an adventure. We'll be cycling and camping a lot. We'll camp to cut down on costs, as we all weill be doing this on less than a shoestring. Plus there are some amazing spots for free camping.
I guess what I'm driving at is that we'll be carrying all our gear on the bikes, clothes, wet gear, tent cooking stuff, a few days food and water. So at the moment I'm building my bike for the trip, it's coming together, had an old school leather saddle with springs, has no wheels or gears yet but I have my panniers, some 85 litres of storage space so far, with about 30 more to go. Being pretty careful about what I use to build it up with. Most people who go touring end up naming their bike they spend that much time on them and end up relying on them so much. Shoot me if I do!

As far a planning the total Trip we've only got as far as Xmas, which will bring us to Santiago, Chile. My Girlfriend Rosie is travelling over to meet me there, turns out my sister and her boyfriend will be in south America at the same time (copycats) so they're aiming to meet us there too, should be a blast.

Beyond that there the Inca trails, Ecuador and the small problem of not being able to cross Colombia without being kidnapped. About the only thing I've done for that so far is get my vaccinations. My doc wants to know for how long and in what country ill be so she can sort out the malaria meds for me, but I'm not getting any closer to that by a long shot. Will have to do some serious reading up in the next few days.