Who do you know in South America? - Days 418-419

Two days of taking it easy, booking travel and accommodation for the next few weeks. Which got me thinking. We love connecting with people and know no-one here. Who do you know in South America?

My body needed rest, so that’s what I gave it. So for the next two days, I’ve caught up on emails, completed my tax return, caught up with some family, friends and clients, and was overwhelmed by all the good wishes from so many people. Thank you very much from the bottom of my heart for all the messages.

We did go out in the first evening, and I unsteadily tottered down the steep stairs in the dark; down, down down to the restaurant. After eating a third of the risotto, I was done. Luckily Tim was hungry so nearly finished it off.

We ventured out yesterday to a café where Tim, George and Laura had visited on Sunday. What a great place and area. Beautiful murals on the walls, fascinating, quirky shops, and the ancient bright yellow tram passing by bring visitors up the steep zigzag roads from the centre of Rio.

It’s funny, I feel fine in the flat when I am not exerting any physical energy, but as soon as I am out, in the heat, I feel exhausted. Little by little Lindsey. My poor ol’ Fitbit isn’t getting much use.

I’ve now booked 4 long bus rides (some over 24 hours long), 1 flight and 5 accommodations which takes us to 23rd January and to the border of Brazil and Argentina. One of the hosts from Brasilia, a lovely young man called Jamie sent me details of cafes, restaurants and places of interest there and we ended up having a lovely WhatsApp chat. He and his wife are now in Valencia studying Spanish. A big part of this amazing journey we are having is connecting with people. We love it.

I realised then that apart from our short time in Lisbon, and a morning in Kazakhstan, every country we have been too, we have met up with people we know living there or were introduced to. Here, in the whole of the continent of South America, we know no-one. Yes, we have just spent some glorious weeks with our sons and their lassies, and in a few weeks, we are excited to be meeting up with our friend Bahar for a couple of days who is coming here for a holiday. However, if you have any friends in South America who like meeting a quirky couple of mid-aged travellers, please do connect them with us. That will be fab.