My amazing, jovial, excitable and most wonderful father John Goldsmith passed away several years ago.

He died from cancer, a terrible disease that affects many thousands of families, The Garvan Institute of Medical Research is a world leader in biomedical research, pioneering study in the areas of cancer, diabetes and obesity, Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s disease, osteoporosis, arthritis, asthma, rheumatoid arthritis and other immune disorders.

This August, Nico and I are taking part in the Sydney City2Surf a 15 kilometer run from the centre of Sydney to glorious Bondi Beach. We have a fundraising page and hope to raise (more than!!) $1200 to donate to the Garvan Institute so they can continue working towards their goal of prevention and cure of these major diseases.

WE NEED YOUR HELP! Please click here to donate online to our fundraising for the Garvan Institute.

We miss you John ♡

Eighteen short hours later, we had arrived in Mendoza, Argentinas largest wine producing region well known for its excellent Malbecs. At the first opportunity we were on the bus to Maipu to go and see Mr Hugo about a bicycle to ride around the vines. With our pop-up cycling group made up of us and two Spanish guys who rode on the bus with us, we made our way to Familia Di Tommaso, the oldest vineyard in the area. After a few glasses of red we made our slighly wobly way to the next stop on the tour, Tempus Alba where we shared a bottle of most excellent Rose. We finished the day with a glass or two of Absinthe which was akin to drinking windowcleaner and seemed to sear off our nasal hairs.

With our fill of wine, the following day we rented a car to visit Aconcagua National Park and look at the highest mountain outside of the Himalaya (sadly it was outside of the climbing season, so we were unable to do any hiking). The landscapes on the way were surreal, with striking, sheer multicoloured mountains and cliff faces which photos do little justice. Although the mountain itself was veiled in chilly-looking clouds it was still a mangnificent sight, I am looking forward to another opportunity to return and conquer!

The next stop on our itinerary was Cordoba where we ran into a familiar face! Quite an achievement, we thought, for people so far away from home — Santiago Porter, Nics cousin was in Cordoba doing a series of lectures to accompany his show. It was great to hear a little about his photography work and catch up with him over a beer and a most excellent (the best in Argentina??) empanada.

Cordoba is a pretty cool city, with an excellent craft market and a reminiscent-of-Melbourne bar scene. We definitely enjoyed our two days of wandering around and I am officialy glad to confirm that we will never ever sleep in a dorm room again. Ever.

North, north further north we must go! Another long bus ride took us to Salta which is a reasonably uninspiring and dusty town with two redeeming features

1. The Terazza of Empanadas, which is a small group of empanada restaurants surrounding a small courtyard, the empanadas are excellent, so too are the humitas and tamales, we certainly ate our fill.
2. The excellent Museum of High Altitude Archaeology which has information about the discovery of the ‘Llullaillaco Children’ offered to the gods more than 500 years ago and due to the conditions on the 6000 meter mountain, they were recently discovered amazingly well preserved along with a number of artifacts.

Keen to leave this place, we boarded a bus and journeyed several hours north to Jujuy which in reality is a much more pleasant place to spend time…we arrived at a time of major indecision but after several hours we did eventually agree to rent a car and continue further north towards the border with Bolivia. We set off along the ‘Routa Nueve’ at dusk and arrived several hours later in Tilcara, where we slept in some pretty fancy diggs — both of us too tired to face mould, dirt, animals or any kind of infestation.

The following morning we were pleasantly surprised by a sweet little town with a craft market in the central square. After a wander around we packed the car and took a road that turned into the bed of a creek then back into a road which ended at a fort and a high country ‘botanical gardens’ which looked to my untrained eye more like ‘a whole lot of cacti’, after some photos we were off again blaring our recently purchased pan pipe CDs all the way up Routa Nueve.

By lunchtime we were in Humahuaca where we were lucky enough to sample our first llama steak…wow it certainly tastes llama-ish! Nic enjoyed it but I was definitely glad that I had ordered a salad. After a short wander around we forged north and veered off the highway just shy of the border, onto a rocky dirt road headed for Iruya — a tiny isolated town precariously balanced on the edge of a steep valley at the very end of routa 113.

We arrived in Iruya in the chilly drizzle, negotiating the steep slippery cobblestones looking for a place to stay, the forlorn look of the town enhanced by a pile of bleeding, salted goat skins. We found a nice room in a hotel full of excited and sweaty men who had just cycled up and over the impressive mountain range, most of whom were being picked up in a 4×4 the following morning (pussies!). After an uninspiringly watery stew for dinner we shuffled off to our toasty room and searched in vain for a cable channel in english and slept like the dead, having our lungs gradually crushed under many layers of blankets.

Thankfully the morning brought sunshine and Iruya showed us that it wasn’t quite so ghastly as it seemed the day before, we strolled through the streets and up to a lookout above the town affording an excellent view of the full sized soccer pitch.

After cautiously checking the depth of the river which had risen during the night, Nic deemed it safe for our little rental car to cross, so back up through the valley we drove, once again blaring our excellent pan pipe music. On our way back to Jujuy (after an obligatory stop at the ‘llama grande’ souvenir store) we stopped off in Purmamarca for one last humita.

Purmamarca is well known for its ‘Cerro de Siete Colores’, or hill of seven colours that sits behind the town. We took a short walking track to admire the amazing colours of the earth, pausing of course to take some photos with a very photogenic cactus.

We had a reservation at a sweet place in Jujuy and were happy to find it clean and comfortable when we arrived in the pouring rain. It really was a terrible shame about the bed bugs. Ugh.

It was obvious to us that there was one glaring omission from our northern escapade, the ‘Salinas Grandes’ are the largest salt flats in Argentina and we had to get there! We boarded an early bus back to Purmamarca and from there went west. In a tiny red taxi.

Yep, those Salina sure are Grande!

Satisfied that we had ticked all of the boxes of the north of Argentina, we braced ourselves for another very long bus ride and shelled out the big bucks for the ‘Cama Suite’ — where the seat reclines 180 degrees into a bed that travels at 100 kilometers per hour. We had the best seats in the house and arrived in Buenos Aires the following morning. After a good session of de-lousing and some delicious cooking lessons with Barbie, for us, it was back to Montevideo.

Of course don’t forget to see all of the loads of other photos from Argentina here (link opens in a new window).

There are LOADS AND LOADS more photos, click here!

First stop, Barbie’s apartment in Buenos Aires, we commandeered the house and stormed around the city in order to purchase all items necessary to become smelly backpackers; and so it was with thermal long johns in hand that we ran to the airport — destination Bariloche in the northern region of Patagonia.

Bariloche is a popular tourist destination, all wooden chalet-style accommodation and chocolate shops, located by the massive and sparkling sapphire-blue “Lago Nahuel Huapi” and embraced by forested mountains. After eating a revolting salad (consisting of equal quantities of salad and mayonnaise) we went back to our cosy room in Perikos Hostel to plan further adventures.

Our first trip took us by ferry northward through the lake, then on a short bus trip to another ferry ride where we arrived at the starting point for “Paso de las Nubes” trek which we planned to do in three days. After the first days hike we were rewarded with a completely deserted camping area that had a spectacular view of an enormous glacier which is incrementally being shoved off the edge of a cliff. All through the night, safe and cosy in our sleeping bags, we could hear the creaking and groaning of tortured ice threatening to come crashing down around us.

Our next trek took us through much more spectacular and mountainous landscapes, we trekked to Refugio Frey close to the ski-fields to the west of the town. We had a pretty terrible first night perched on a windy and dusty pile of rocks. Luckily our dinner was hot, cheesy and had ham in it, otherwise there may have been more of a breakdown on my part because the dust that was filling up our tent made me very sad.

Click here for a full-size version of this panorama.

The following day took us up and up past a lake that was every possible shade of blue and ultramarine, it was almost enticing enough to swim in — almost, but not quite.

After so much up, the afternoon took us down through a long, slippery and steep scree field, we ended up very tired and with shoes brimming with dust, rocks and dusty rocks. By the evening we were very glad to arrive at Refugio Jakob which offered us a campsite in a much more sheltered position among the trees.

During this trek we met a Swiss couple who mentioned an amazing place that they had been before Bariloche — apparently the best hostel in Argentina — how could we possibly not go to see for ourselves? This is why we found ourselves on a bus bound for El Bolson.

El Bolson is about an hour and a half by bus south of Bariloche, a hippy enclave since the eighties with a thrice-weekly market selling everything hand-made, from mittens to chopping boards and matés to hand puppets. The first two nights we spent in a family-owned-and-populated hostel in town and prepared for another three-day trek into the valley behind the town.

Thankfully we had our beloved Hubba Hubba tent, as it is a well known fact with backpackers throughout Argentina that Refugio “Hielo Azul”, the first stop on the trail has a bed bug infestation. Eeeeek!

The first day of hiking was initially quite steep but smoothed out to be a lovely day of walking and we arrived at the Refugio (which, despite its infamy is very cute) in the late afternoon. We set up our tent with the first snow of the season picturesquely falling upon us.

The following chilly morning we set out with the snow still falling, we made it up over and down into the next valley by late afternoon. And what a lovely warm reception from a clamorous family of cats, bleating sheep and a hot cup of tea compliments of Refugio “Cajon del Azul”. This place has to be one of our favorite places in Argentina thus far. The owner moved into this spectacular landscape during the late 70´s in order to create a self-sufficient lifestyle for himself, planting fruit trees and “una huerta” or vegetable garden. Possibly getting a bit lonely in such a remote place he gradually began to allow trekkers to stay on his property, thirty years later it is a comfortable and warm place to stay with wood-fired hot showers(!), home brewed beer and “pan casero”.

We were excited to return to El Bolson as we had reservations at the famed Casona del Odile, which is located on a beautiful piece of land outside the town, with lovely young owners and a very chilled vibe, perfect for relaxing and meeting other travellers. We loved it!

(Many) more photos to come!!!

But back to India…

On the overnight bus from Bangalore to Hampi, we finally got a ‘convenience stop’ (in the bushes by the side of the road) at around 3:30am, being long over my fear of peeing in nature and not to mention busting, I ran headlong into a patch of very vicious thorns. When I eventually found a place with no thorns and suitable cover, Nic, concerned for my welfare (rather than calling into the dark) shined his very bright torch on me, so everyone on the bus who cared to see my shiny white bottom could do so without having to strain their eyes. So when we decided to more on from Hampi rather than go through such a long bus ride (with no toilet) again, we instead made some pretty bad logistical decisions.

We decided to take an overnight train to Goa.

Sadly ‘the overnight train to Goa’ is not one train, rather two, and both travelling in a direction alarmingly away from Goa. In the end our journey was as such; boat, autorickshaw, train, wait at the station, other train, autorickshaw, bus, autorickshaw. The distance ‘as the crow flies’ is around 170km. It took us 16 hours.

We did arrive in the end and were super excited and glad to be in Panaji, as Panaji was at one time a  huge Portuguese colony. The town although distinctly Indian, certainly has a bit of a European feel to it,  some people still speak portuguese, many of the street names reflect the colonial past, there are also more Catholic Churches here than anywhere else we saw in India. Our hotel was abslolutely beyond great, after so long travelling in such questionable conditions the tightly tucked clean white sheets, immaculate bathroom and hot water on tap were most welcome – thank you Afonso Guesthouse!

From Panaji we boarded a public bus to Mapsa and then on to Anjuna. (I have created a soundcloud account for nicoandemma.com, it includes a short clip of the bus trip to Anjuna along with other parts of the journey that we thought were worth capturing – have a listen!) We were pretty happy to have arrived at the beach and Anjuna is reasonably nice as far as beaches go – shame about the thousands of tacky, cigarette smoking tourists. Anjuna used to be one of the beaches in Goa that was a mecca for hippies in the 60’s and 70’s but sadly since then tourism has really gone a little bit wild so it is very polluted and crowded. The five days we spent in Anjuna was too much, but sometimes when you wake up in a hut on the beach, getting motivated to move on to the next destination is a little bit too taxing.

Excited as we were by our supreme mobility on the public buses, we decided to go to a beach in the south of Goa by bus, well five buses to be exact. It took most of the day but we arrived safely and had spent a sum total of about 150 rupees per person — woo hoo, bargain travel! Arriving at this beach in the south of Goa was like a sigh, this place, in comparison to Anjuna was delightfully empty except for a few contented cows contemplating the ocean. The beach was clean with a modest amount of development,  the beach huts that we found were just perfect. We stayed there for three glorious nights, found an excellent place to practice yoga and in the end, were very sad to leave our little hideaway.

Logic did thankfully dictate the final travel leg of this journey – we flew from Goa back to Bangalore. Ahh what a simple way to go… we arrived fresh, clean and smelling sweet and were back in Mysore by 10pm.

Ohmighosh! Only three more days in India!!

Here are some more photos from this part of our time in India.

The ninth of February marks our first anniversary of travelling together. In twelve months we have had some great adventures, laughs and most certainly tears. We have slept in some questionable lodgings, met some amazing, funny and downright strange people and of course experienced things that will remain with us forever.

I have compiled a summary list in no particular order.`

We have:

• Had a massage by a transvestite in Thailand.
• Been given three haircuts (Bangkok Thailand, Granada Spain and Mysore India).
• Cycled over 15,000kms.
• Slept in more than 200 different beds (the majority with very uncomfortable pillows – this phenomenon particularly rampant in South-East Asia.)
• Taken 6 long distance trains.
• Seen thousands of dead, cats, toads, dogs, lizards, monkeys, snakes, frogs and a scorpion.
• Had 3 cooking classes – two in Thailand, one in Morocco (and one future one in India).
• Visited 10 countries on three continents.
• Eaten a camel burger.
• Ridden a camel (not the same camel).
• Were blessed by an elephant.
• Celebrated two birthdays and one wedding anniversary.
• Learned around 40 yoga asanas.
• Eaten in a three Michelin Star Restaurant.
• Learned how to facilitate healing through Himalayan Singing Bowls.
• Purified around 840 litres of water and used camelpacks or platypus bottles for another 547. That equals hundreds of plastic bottles that we did not use.
• Slept in the desert under the stars.
• Slept on the beach under the stars (with bugs).
• Slept in tree houses 30 meters off the ground – and also peed through the floor!
• Swam in a pool at the foot of a waterfall which was full of nibbling fish.
• Took our bikes on planes, longtail boats, tuk tuks, cars, busses, trains, ferries and vans.
• Designed, wrote and built one website.
• Talked to a blind cat.
• Walked 800km in 32 days.
• Read some pretty good books.
• Planned hundreds of incarnations of our future including our future menagerie.
• Took 12,428 photographs (and counting).
• Collected a raft of favourite dishes. (Grilled squid with Greek salad, Masala Dosa, Raj Katchori, Pulpo a la Gallega, Nasi Lemak, Roti Channai, Phad Thai, Som Tum, dumplings of any creed, BBQed pork – actually any kind of street meat in South-East Asia, (almost) any tapa in the whole of Spain, especially San Sebastian, Pamplona and Santiago de Compostela).

We are so lucky to have shared this wonderful time together and look forward to gazillions of equally as amazing things in the future (and obviously eating a huge amount of really great food).

More delectable food porn here.

Obviously we have been in India for ages. Sorry for that but we have been busy, super busy in fact. Nic and I are now officially yogis in training and have been bending ourselves in unnatural ways once a day (almost) every day for the past two months.

We arrived in Bangalore from Morocco (straight from the frying-pan into the fire), after bribing the customs official to avoid (possibly, probably not) paying larger import fees on the bikes we made our merry way to Mysore – the birthplace of Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga and our home for the next little while.

We spent a few days looking around to find suitable lodgings, after longing for a permanent roof over our heads for so long it was quite an important decision – we were very happy to find Tranquil Blues, a clean serviced apartment with modest kitchen and comfortable living area. It didn’t take us too long to make it our home, adding the carpet we picked up in Morocco along with removing some questionable plastic ferns covered in gold glitter.

The Mystic School was where we had decided to begin our foray into yoga, the school, run by the very enthusiastic Shashi is quite small in comparison to the hefty and extremely intimidating Pattabhi Jois Shala just down the road. The Mystic School offered small classes (at that time they were no more than 5 people) which could happily accommodate two über-novices like Nic and myself. Off we went to buy our new yoga mats (mine is green Nics is orange), classes began with Jaiprakash the following Monday at 6am.

(Thankfully) We LOVED IT! The painful arms, legs and backs were all worth it as we could see ourselves improving on a weekly basis. We also enjoyed the company of our teacher Jai, he certainly enjoyed our attempts at some of the asanas.

After yoga we would ride our bikes home, have oatmeal and a cup of tea, read the paper and then prepare ourselves for the variety of extra-curricular activities that we enrolled ourselves in, ranging from Yoga Philosophy, Meditation and Pranayama to Himalayan Singing Bowl Healing. That’s right people, our chakras are looking pretty good!

After a month or so at the Mystic School, Nic and I were fortunate enough to meet Mr Badri, he was introduced to us by our friend and human whirlwind Mr Neel Kulkarni, our Philosophy teacher. Badri began teaching us Pranayama, a breathing technique that helps to focus and calm the mind by the regulation and counting of the breath. We enjoyed this time with Badri so much that we decided to join him at his yoga school to continue our yoga practice. We would love you to have a look at his website www.badriyogaschool.com – we created it because we wanted to help other western yoga students find their way to his amazing school.

Now we find ourselves a world away from Mysore. We travelled by train to Bangalore and then from there took an overnight sleeper bus to Hampi, a small town on a river that is about 400 kilometres north of Mysore, parallel with Goa.

We have spent the last six days exploring the huge number of temples and royal palace ruins that were built around the 16th Century.

More photos from India so far are here.

So lets begin with that, shall we? They say that if you write something down you are much more likely to actually do it, so lets see about writing something down for all (of my family) to see.

New Years Resolutions for 2012 – Emma Goldsmith

1. During 2012 I will try to start calling myself Emma Porter.
2. I will eat healthier. Ah India, the land of ghee and sugar. So it’s time to break out the Spirulena and say NO to a second (or third) Gulab Jamun.
3. I will become a better blogger and by this I mean, I will write more often (at least twice per month) and hopefully, re-design the site.
4. I will continue to practice mindfulness. Yep! We have been doing mindfulness workshops and practicing living in the present, it is helping me to be a better me.
5. I will keep doing yoga (almost) every day. Although my Bhujapidasana is deplorable and my Kurmasana is more like a lizard being squashed by a car, I have most definitely improved in my postures and I look forward to being able to put my foot over my head in the not too distant future.
6. I will set up a studio space and do art (at least once per week). I will enrol in at least one class.
7. I will write about the Design of everyday life.
8. I will read more books. I will try to read at least two books per month. This means less TV (yay).
9. Learn Spanish! Hey, wasn’t this on last years list?
10. Sing and play guitar.
11. Start training for a MARATHON! Eeps, I have always avoided this claiming my knee as the reason — since it is much better thanks to all this yoga, I am sadly out of excuses! 42.195 kilometres here we come. Ouch.
12. Begin my career as a very amazing and wonderful AUNTY! Although I don’t REALLY have very much to do with this process, it is very exciting nonetheless. Congratulations Andy and Amelia!!!
13. Oh, yeah this is the most important one, I will love and accept myself. Even if I don’t manage to keep my resolutions – there will always be next year to re-reslove.

So that’t is. 2012 is already shaping up to be a pretty darn good year!

Feel free to share your resolutions too!

Our taxi dropped us off at Djema El Fna Square, and with the help of several shopkeepers and our trusty iPhone we made it to Riad Layla Rouge without too many problems, no mean feat in Marrakesh which, similar to Fes, is a myriad of criss-crossing alleyways and dead-end streets. And of course Layla Rouge doesn’t have a sign.

We were very lucky that the main part of the hotel was full, as the owner has another dar just meters away which was completely empty (and much more tastefully decorated), so we got to have the whole place to ourselves!

The Medina is a bustling maze where we enjoyed several days getting lost, having our chakras realigned by a reki healer (we are still not quite sure how that happened!), being hotly pursued by men selling brass door knockers, lamps, fabric, shoes, key rings, cats, silk and of course, the ubiquitous carpets — all the while avoiding high-speed motorcycles and precariously over-loaded horse carts.

Perhaps the most well-known spectacle in Marrakesh is the Djema El Fna Square after dark — every evening 100′s of men come out of various nooks and crannies in the medina and set up rows and rows of food stalls, by 6pm it is a cacophony of sights sounds and smells. You can’t walk through the square without being accosted by eager Moroccans wanting to sell you a plate of merguez sausages a steamed sheeps head or a glass of orange juice each assuring you that theirs is the best. This is also the spot where snake charmers, henna tattooists, musicians and shoe polishers choose to pedal their wares.

We spent three days exploring Marrakesh, on the fourth we rented a car to journey south-east through Ouarzarzate and Zagora to Mhamid which is quite literally a town at the end of the road. Departure was (as usual) slightly delayed, this time by a sudden and pressing sushi craving which surprisingly ended up being pretty good. Cravings satisfied, we negotiated our way out of the city and onto the N9 which would carry us up winding passes through the High Atlas then down to Ouazarzate made famous by it’s role in Cassablanca and Raiders of the Lost Ark.

About 50kms before Ouarzarzate we were stopped by a man who’s car had overheated and needed a lift the rest of the way to town — it turned out he came from a family who spend six months of the year traveling in a caravan of camels trading with the Berber nomads of the desert — at least that’s what he told us. And whaddaya know it also turned out that his cousin/uncle/brother takes tours into the desert. Over the next few days we saw several people with a similar trick — they would rush into the middle of the road holding up an empty water bottle, gesturing for us to “stop, we need water, this is the desert you know!” and no doubt eager to tell us about THEIR uncle/brother/cousin who also takes people into the desert. We never did figure out if our guy was legit (I mean he did have a broken down car..?).

From Ouarzarzate we slightly backtracked to go and see a small oasis several kilometres out of town, we followed directions and after driving on a rocky track for several minutes (and collecting a child who was on his way home from school) we found a bent sign pointing to our destination. After several moments we had a guide who was very eager to show us around his tiny village perfectly situated on the bend of a picturesque river surrounded by (delicious) date palms.

He first showed us the cave where Jesus of Nazareth was laid out after being crucified (we got to roll back the fibreglass stone!) and then took us to his home and introduced us to his wife. We were lead across the river (which can only be crossed by about 20 small and wobbly stepping stones — I am still puzzled why someone doesn’t just put in some larger, non wobbling stepping stones) and showed us the rest of the village of houses made from red-mud bricks. The tour complete, we parted with some Dirhams and said our goodbyes. Off again, speeding through the rocky landscape — we had a date, with a DROMEDARY.

We arrived in dusty Mhamid at about 11 the next morning, it is literally a few buildings at the end of the highway which trails off to 4WD tracks and camel paths. We met our guide and went with him to his uncles home for lunch before we set off into the desert – it was a really amazing meal, enjoyed by the entire family sitting on cushions gathered around a small table eating with chunks of flat bread as cutlery from the huge communal fish tangine. Delicious! The family were very eager to hear all about where we were from, happy to ignore the language barrier, we chatted on into the afternoon.

After lunch we parked the car and got into a dusty and squeaky 4WD that had clearly spent its formative years clattering across the rocky desert. We sped across the sandy landscape that was dotted with fresh patches of beautiful rocket that had popped up since the recent rain. We arrived at our camp in the early afternoon, our berber tent (more like a hut), had a camel hair roof and red mud brick walls which were very warm in the desert sun, perfectly designed, we discovered as the heat radiated back into the room during the very nippy night. After dumping our bags we were introduced to three dromedaries who were less than thrilled to take us for an expedition through the dunes. It was a beautiful experience, our guide once again very keen to hear about our lives in Australia.

After watching the sun go down to the tune of spaniards sand boarding on neighbouring dunes we went back to our camp and joined our hosts playing drums and singing some Berber tunes. Dinner was a grand affair — enough food to feed twice as many people — which we happily digested lying under the massive dark sky counting the innumerable shooting stars. I think it was about midnight when we crept back into our lovely warm house.

The next morning after watching the sun rise over the dunes, we ate our breakfast and bid farewell to our new favourite friend Nasima the cheese-eating cat, said a heartfelt goodbye to the lonely donkey and thanked our host for an amazing evening.

By mid-morning we were back in our own car and heading towards Marrakesh and the beginning of the end of our time in Morocco. There are lots more photos from this part of our trip here.