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South America Backpacking Trip
  • Zach Henshall
  • Charlotte Fricker
Currently traveling
Nov 2019 – Sep 2025

South America Backpacking Trip

Our first backpacking trip. A few months touring the most spectacular locations of South and Central America! Read more
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  • South America Backpacking Trip

    Arrival to Tulum & beach day!

    March 4, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ ⛅ 29 °C

    We arrived to Tulum after another overnight, 11 hours bus ride from Palenque, which gave us plenty of time to sleep...😴 But as we have learnt by travelling via buses even though its a night bus you may not be sleeping as much as you hope! When we arrived in Tulum we headed for our hostel, we checked a taxi fare (which we knew would be higher being a very popular holiday destination) and they wanted quite alot, so the Yorkshire in both of us said No way man, forget about it, we're walking! So off we went in the blistering sun with all our bags 😂☀️🌞 Our hostel was amazing, it was on the outskirts of tulum centre, quiet and had its own little kitchenette 😍 just like being at home again... Sort of! The first day we had a nap before heading out for food... Yes I know what you're thinking, mexican food but no, pizza and a moijto 😂🍕 The second day we decided to rent bikes from our hostel and take a tour of tulum, in the direction of the beach, as that's where the beautiful views were. Riding through the town and down the busy highway to get to the beach wasn't as pleasent as you would imagine, but as soon as we got onto the tourist tracks it was like smelling roses 😂😂 the pathways were lined with flora and fauna, lots of expensive cocktail bars and resorts for the package holiday get aways. Tulum beach was where we finally stopped for the day, we managed to walk all the way down to the Mayan ruins, and see them from the end of the beach 🏖️😁 we couldn't believe how blue the water was here, so we spent alot of time in the sea, diving into the waves and relaxing on the white sands (which made our tans look even better than they are haha 😂).Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    Palenque Eco reserve pt2

    March 2, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ ☀️ 32 °C

    More wildlife pictures 😁 including howler monkeys, or as one guide once called them (which I love) 'the monkey of metal' because of its death metal roar! 🐒☠️🤘 We also got to see the mexican toucan which has markings on its beak much like the mexican style skulls (day of the dead) 😮Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    Palenque Eco reserve

    March 2, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ ☀️ 30 °C

    Today we had a free day, so we took a trip to the Eco reserve that's right next to the Palenque ruins. The reserve is here to protect animals that have been mistreated as pets or within the wild, they aim to help animals recover, hopefully being able to send them back out into the wild if possible or otherwise they remain in care of the Eco park.Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    Palenque mayan ruins

    March 1, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ ☀️ 25 °C

    We'd heard on the grapevine about some spectacular Mayan ruins between San Cristóbal and Tulum so we stopped off in the town of Palenque for a couple of days. It was definitely worth it and the ruins were indeed spectacular. The Mayan city of Palenque (founded around 200 B.C and active till around 800 A.D) was originally known as 'Lakamha' literally "big water" after the large River that flows through the city. This was redirected by the Mayans to stop flooding and direct fresh water for drinking and agriculture. Which in itself is an incredible feat or engineering for a city built over 2000 years ago. The rest of the site is even more impressive. The huge temples are really imposing, each one a gigantic shrine to one of their many gods. One of them was so high that we had to take a 5 minute breather at the top after climbing hundreds of massive steps 😅 at the top of each stairway was the actual temple structure with stone engravings of their most successful king K'inich Janaab' Pakal doing ruler-ish stuff like vanquishing enemies or having dinner with a god made of corn. In the temple of the red queen there was even a tomb with the body of a woman (Probably a wife of Pakal) adorned with jade offerings and jewellery. She's obviously not there now but we got to look inside the tomb and at the sarcophagus which was pretty cool! A lot of the ruins have been restored to how they may have originally looked which was interesting but not authentic, I thought the temples that hadn't been restored were the most impressive. However, at the end we did a short jungle trek and got to see some of the totally unrestored ruins which looked like they were straight out of an Indiana Jones movie! 🤠Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    Lagunas de Montebello National Park

    February 28, 2020 in Guatemala ⋅ ⛅ 14 °C

    The samef day as visiting El Chiflon waterfall we went to the Lagunas de Montebello National Park, which is very close by to the Waterfalls and is full of lakes and beautiful pine trees through the green landscape 😊 we visited a view point that overlooks one of the biggest in the park, accompanied by lunch across the road at a traditional mexican street food stall. It looked rugged, and tbh we both thought food poisoning as soon as we saw it, but like many other street food stalls we'd eaten at, the food it homecooked, good hearty food that is really cheap and very tasty 😋😋 after lunch we took a short drive to a popular holiday park for locals just at the boarder of Mexico and Guatemala! We even got to cross over the boarder for abit of a walk (obviously Street vendors at ever corner ogmf the boarder trying to sell souvenirs with 'Guatemala' stamped all over it 😂 of course we had to buy at least a fridge magnet to say we had been! 😅 At the boarder you can see it's maked with white pillars to show where it starts, includeding a string of boys (the water kind 😂) hung across one of the lakes that the boarder sits on. So half the lake is mexican and the other half is Guatemalan 😀Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    El Chiflon, San Cristóbal (Chipas)

    February 28, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ ☀️ 23 °C

    Today we took a day tour to the nature surrounding San Cristóbal, with a totally and completely all Spanish speaking group, with nothing making sense except for a few words 😅😂 luckily there was a woman in our group that spoke alittle English enough to explain the important stuff, like what time to meet back at the bus and what the food options were at the available as there was no menu, as it was a traditional street food stop.... Which was absolutely yummy, and we loved trying the local dishes and paying the Yorkshire man's prices 😂😂. The first stop was at the nature park and waterfall called El Chiflon, it was about a 30min mini hike up to the top, nothing hard.. As it was mostly steps and a civilised path 😊 At the top was the amazing waterfall, the highest we've ever seen with the clearest blue water too. We had the option to swim at the bottom of the waterfall but the water was deceivingly cold ❄ and now we are used to the hot climates it was definitely too cold to swim in 😂 so we just paddled!Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    San Cristóbal México... Pt 2

    February 27, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ ⛅ 12 °C

    Among the many creative works in San Cristóbal we made our way through a lovely art gallery (and the also the artists home too), to get to one of San Cristóbals nicest view points to see the town and surrounding mountains and landscape. Apparently its really nice at sunset but most of the time, as it was really cold here we were tucked up in bed with our bottle of red wine. 😂🍷 This bottle has a travelling story too... Its one we bought for way too much money in Puerto Escondido unknowingly, as we did the conversion wrong 🙄. We should have known as the check out lady and surrounding locals looked at us in disgust and shock, shock horror as we proceeded to buy 😲😂😱... Then didn't have time to drink it in Puerto Escondido! Classic! (it was for my birthday but too much beer was had instead) So we had to hope that the bottle survived the trip to San Cristóbal, as we saw the bus driver launched zachs bag into the undercarry 😂😂. But all was good clearly!! So glad, as it was a fantastic wine (obviously from Argentina lmao 😂).....got some real wine snobbery going on now I tell you!🍷😉😂Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip
    2

    San Cristóbal México

    February 27, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ ⛅ 10 °C

    We got a night bus from Puerto Escondido... From the lovely warmth to almost altitude sickness level but not quite, and into the cold of winter ❄️😳 We managed to handle our arrival after the 11hrs bus ride quite well and pretty much got straight out to explore (zombiefied 😂) ... But mainly to grab breakfast at one of the many coffee shops that served great coffee and sometimes French style pastries! 😊 The streets of San Cristóbal are beautiful, full of local graffic art and handcraft shops, not to mention the abundance of local artist galleries and the Frida Kahlo bar/art gallery that we got introduced to on our walking tour. The Frida Kahlo was very interesting as at night it becomes a place where no matter your sex, race or gender choice you are welcomed to have a drink or sing on stage! As the town itself appears really traditional the people are very modern thinking and open minded, as it's such a hot spot for creative people and I can see why, and also a place to try a naked spa in the dark if you do wish or try the herbal remedies to help the mind😅😏😂. We loved it here, it kind of reminded us of a Mexican Cusco (Perú) but alot more colourful. The traditions of indigenous Mayan culture runs deep here, and they sell important stones like Jade and Amber which they believe have health protection and as we walked around the markets our tour guide explained the importance of these stones for their culture and also what they do with them that dates back to Mayan practice 😉😳 it was really nice to learn about this as they are still in touch with their cultural roots! Among our walking tour we passed by one of the nicest looking Burger Kings we have ever seen... Although our hearts sank alittle seeing it was a Burger King and not a local burger joint instead 😒😔🤣Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    Puerto Escondido Bioluminescent Bday

    February 21, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ ☀️ 32 °C

    So it ended up being my birthday here in Mexico (its not all about me, but was for this one day only lol 😂) zach surprised me with some lovely jewellery that he bought way back when we were in Ecuador 🇪🇨 and the story goes I was chillin by the beach while he went off for a 'hair cut' in Montañita! I loved the jewellery and proceeded to wear it all day on my birthday of course! 2 women (Helen from the UK and Niaomi from Rotterdam) we met in our hostel (Paziflora) overheard us at breakfast talking about what to do for my birthday, so decided there and then we we're all to meet in the evening for beers in the lovely hostel garden... After our tour to the bioluminescent lagoon!! 😊👌 Perfect! It was a heavy night of many beers and chatting until the early hours of sunrise and birds tweeting around us (including the hostels parraket 'Nino' 🐦😍). Anyway the bioluminescent lagoon was amazing, even though we couldn't get photos of the luminescent algae, we were able to swim in the dark of the evening with them! We took a boat out down the lagoon rivers around 8pm, and the stars were soo vivid, we've never seen anything like it! As we got to the sides of the mangrove trees all around the river edge, we saw the water light up as the tour guide stopped the boat and stamped his feet! The algae started to glow brightly. This is a defence mechanism when they are scared, but as a result glowing under water only attacts the sardines to eat them, so there for the sardines start to glow too! ...ahh natures way! 🙄 It was something we had both never seen before, as we jumped into the water the algae glowed around us, the more you moved, the move they glowed in the water and on us! 😀 We spent about 30mins in the water splashing around making the algae glow, as we got back on the boat our swimwear still glowed like pieces of glitter when you touched it! A great experience not to be forgotten.. Or photographed lol👌😍. When we got back to the hostel thats when the party started for my birthday, even with a little cake and a birthday song sang in Spanish / English... We tried lol 😂. Zach also cooked us some amazing faijas that day in-between our chilling and lagoon tour...why not as they have the best ingredients for them in Mexico 🇲🇽 😊😉Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    Gerald & Denzel's Seabound Adventure

    February 20, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ ☀️ 30 °C

    We heard from the owner of our hostel that there's a beach just out of town where you can release baby turtles. It was quite a walk from where we're staying but it was definitely worth it! The beach itself was stunningly picturesque and after a 20 minute walk across the sands we arrived at the little hatchery where they release baby turtles every day, they must have thousands of eggs this time of year as about 30 people turned up and everyone got their own little turtle in a coconut shell 😍
    I named my turtle Denzel and Charlotte eventually named her turtle Gerald. It's impossible to tell the gender of the baby turtles until about 1 year so we'll never know if they were aptly named! Once (a little clumsily) released Gerald had no problem getting to the ocean. Denzel on the other hand seemed to want to do anything but go into the sea. After about half an hour and several helping hands later he (or she) eventually made it and we waved him (or her) off and hoped that they all didn't get eaten by seagulls. A few of them did get scooped up despite the best efforts of the volunteers to keep the birds away! 😰 Only about 5% of every 1000 turtles reach adulthood so we've got our fingers crossed for our little turtle babies 🤞
    After they'd gone we watched a beautiful sunset and made our way back to town. On a side note we also saw some whales off on the horizon while we were releasing the turtles which was a nice bonus. Such an amazing experience in an equally amazing place!    Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    Puerto Escondido... Beach time again!

    February 20, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ ☀️ 31 °C

    Yes we're at the beach again, 3 days of city and we're back to relaxing 😂 this morning we walked from our hostel to a local beach called Puerto Angelito, it was about a 10min walk down and it was absolutely beautiful, the tide was rough here but perfectly good for swimming in, the water was so clear and really warm... Good for snorkeling too👌🤗💦 We also had some amazing mexican seafood here, fish tacos and prawn enchiladas 😋😋 with lots of picante 🌶 of course!Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    Mexican food

    February 19, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ ☀️ 22 °C

    Here's a post just about the mexican food and drink, might look abit questionable but it's pretty tasty! 😋 And like we've said before not for the faint hearted when comes to the sauces, they look quite harmless but most of them pack a massive punch down to the Picante 🌶 chilli or habanero chillies that they use with all their mexican dishes, sometimes you get the tray of sauces even if you're having a plain old burger! 😂🍔Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    Frido Khalo musuem & home!

    February 19, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ ☀️ 25 °C

    We visited the much famed house of Frida Kahlo in the afternoon, she is such a big figure of influence here in Mexico, know for her amazing paintings, individually in her dress sense, personally and home. She also was a revolutionary woman not scared to explore the new and controversial decisions in her life. Despite her misfortunes in life she was always positive and strong minded throughout (she contracted polio when she was a young child, and this made one of her legs shorter, then while in high school she had a terrible accident involving a train crash where was paralised and bed ridden for 1 year, where she started to paint as a hobby before she could walk again! She later realised in her life because of the accident she could no longer have children and continued to give her pain throughout her whole life) She married the famous painter Diago Rivera who she lived with in the house we visited with its beautiful gardens, colourful and creative interior.Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    Coyoacan walking tour pt2

    February 19, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ ☀️ 21 °C

    More of coyoacan quiet neighbourhood, before we got to the main square. Unfortunately we had cut the walking tour short, as we had to book out tickets in advance for the Frida Kahlo House, as its a real tourist attraction all the time 😅. But after visiting Frida Kahlo's House we revisited the main square in Coyoacan and had a small but yummy Mexican meal and made our own self guided tour before heading off for our flight to Puerto Escondido (yet another beach town in the south of Mexico😂😂) 3 days in the city and its all too much it would seem! We loved México City, and wished we'd have booked longer, so we can do alot more.... I'm not sure even a week here would be enough to see everything!Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    Coyoacan walking tour

    February 19, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ ☀️ 20 °C

    This morning we took an uber (of course so we could pack and have more sleep lol 😂) to the beautiful Coyoacan neighbourhood, home to the rich and the famous Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera. Apparently alot of famous stars of Mexican TV live in this area, and so makes since why it would cost around 1.5million dollors to buy just a small place here 😳😱 alot of people that live here though have had the houses in the family for generations, so that's how alot of normal people can afford to here too. The area has a very bohemian atmosphere with lots of small coffee, and cake shops with a beautiful town centre with alot of history around. We also took a visit to some of the gardens, which some are unnone to the mexicans visting the neighbourhood, as most tourist stick to the main centre of the town.Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    Lucha Libre in Arena México

    February 18, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ 🌙 24 °C

    After a day of looking at fine and contemporary artwork in the highly refined museums of the historic centre, we decided to immediately forget everything we'd seen and go watch some wrestling!! 💪😎 Lucha Libre is the second most popular sport in Mexico (after football obv) so its a huge deal here. It's also kind of a big deal for me and my family, all because of a highly underrated B-movie starring Jack Black called 'Nacho Libre'. So needless to say we were both pretty excited! We started by meeting a group of other tourists and heading to a bar where the locals gather to drink and dance before watching the Luchadors. We were given literal bucketloads of a traditional drink derived from tequila (which was absolutely rank unless diluted with gallons of fruit juice) but no amount of alcohol would be enough to get me to go up and start dancing salsa 😂
    Afterwards we all got to pick our Luchador masks from a bag. We picked out some questionable ones but you pretty much get what you're given! Once inside there were already some warm up matches going on. Even though it was a Tuesday night there were still loads of people and a really good atmosphere. The arena itself is amazing and they created quite the spectacle. Not to mention the incredible Luchadors! In Mexico you have to go to Lucha Libre university for 4 years before you can compete professionally 😯 so the stunts were awesome. There's good guys and bad guys but we just ended up cheering for anyone pulling some sweet moves! We had a great time being part of something that not only is hilarious and fun to watch, but an integral part of Mexican culture... We also got to experience real life Nacho Libre which was pretty cool! 😆    Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    Modern art museum pt4

    February 18, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ ☀️ 27 °C

    Alot of these large, bright and very detailed creatures are used for festivals in México City as street parades with fireworks and traditionsl dancing. The sculptures are usually carried by people or put on floats. 😁Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    Modern art museum pt2

    February 18, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ ☀️ 27 °C

    More of the modern art museum in México City 😁 as you can see we were pretty obsessed with the 'day of the dead' part of the museum, most of these works of art are to celebrate the life and death of a family member, showing a unique take on the particular persons personality 😁 Day of the dead is Méxicos biggest holiday and festival, which takes places over 2 days in October on the 2nd and 3rd of the month! It would be anazing to see this in person, me and zach really wanted to make it to this but we're here at the wrong time of year!....maybe next time 😜Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    Modern art museum.. México City

    February 18, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ 🌙 13 °C

    In the afternoon after seeing the Palacio de Bellas artes We took a walk through one of the beautiful parks to get to the museum of popular art. The art took us on a journey from early México influences from different forms of art through history that has taken on styles and traditions that the art still has keeps up to the present day in modern art. The influences have been from anything from beliefs (religion) to the way of life in tribal backgrounds and the celebrations they famously have parties for every event in life and even death ☠️🖤 (day of the dead). Traditional mexican styles of wood carving, and using natural materials also plays a big part in modern art today in México 🇲🇽Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    México City Day 1 pt 3

    February 18, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ ☀️ 21 °C

    More of the beautiful mosaic/mexican style buildings right in the historic centre (near our hostel) and the images also show the famous paintings we mentioned in the post about the 'Palacio de Bellas Artes' building and the Tiffany curtain.Read more

  • South America Backpacking Trip

    México City Day 1 pt 2

    February 17, 2020 in Mexico ⋅ ☀️ 26 °C

    More of our walking tour took us round the impressive post office, political building and the heart of the city; the Palacio de Bellas Artes which is designed in an art deco style inside (very much like alot of buildings in New York or Great gatsby 😎) it houses an art gallery on the 2nd, 3rd and 4th floor. Including the famous work of Diago Rivera (married to Frida Kahlo also famous painter and revolutionary woman of her time! 😊) 'Man, Controller of the Universe' which was originally was started in the Rockefeller building in New York, but as it was deemed too radical and communist, the Rockefeller family had it destroyed in 1934, so Diago had to come back to Mexico City after losing his contract in America and re-paint this mural in the Palacio de Bella Artes. It also has art by other artists of that era like Siqueiros, Alfaro, Orozco, O'Gorman and Tamay. The palace is also home to many famous shows including ballets, opera and musicals. The curtain in the main threatre is very famous for being designed by Tiffany Co. in 1912 made with mosaic of a million 2 cm crystals composing the landscape of the Valley of Mexico. On our walk we also came across streets of just dresses which apparently are a big thing for when girls turn 15,its a sweet 15 not 16 here. But they have big parties that can cost up to $5000 or $6000 just for one party! The cakes are a big thing too, as you have to have an amazing cake for such a big party lol 😂Read more

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