MagnusAndCheryl - Trip Oscars

Trip Oscars

From the biggest thrill to the worst journey, people often ask about the most memorable parts of our travels.

Check out the highlights in the lists below, from our wildest animal encounters to the most verdant vistas:

	Things we discovered during the trip
	Wildest animal encounters
	Breathtakingly beautiful vistas
	Extreme physical challenges
	Hair-raising scams, japes and mishaps
	Strangest moments
	Volunteer groups we worked with
	Major environmental and conservation issues
	Kung Fu Magnus

The most important things we figured out during our journey:

1.	Traveling is hard work	Cross-continental overland travel requires significant reserves of initiative, stamina and toilet roll.
2.	Learn a language	Fluency in Spanish allowed us to delve deeper into the lives of South American communities.
3.	Help people help themselves	Aid projects that provide microfinance and guidance to entrepreneurs in developing countries are more effective than top-down handouts.
4.	Avoid con artists	Don't ever make friends by bus or train stations - 95% chance they are con-men.
5.	We have a lot in common	The world is incredibly culturally diverse, but you can make friends anywhere with a smile.
6.	Sustainable development is crucial	Environmental damage caused by unsustainable human development is visible everywhere. We encountered a number of important environmental and conservation issues first hand.
7.	Feel the fear, and go there anyway	Most places with bad reputations (short of war zones), can be visited safely by using common sense.
8.	Share your skills	Volunteering adds diversity and depth of experience to a long trip.

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Covering the world from top to bottom, and across 5 continents we were lucky enough to come face to face with some of the world's most amazing wildlife.

Our favourite moments:

1.	Antarctic Penguins	Sitting on a beach in Antarctica, surrounded by 200,000 inquisitive chinstrap penguins.	click for larger image
2.	Lunching Leopard	Looking up into a tree to see a leopard eating an impala, in Kruger Park, South Africa.	click for larger image
3.	Hunting Lions	Watching lions, hyenas and vultures fight over a downed buffalo in Chobe, Botswana.	click for larger image
4.	Gorillas In The Mist	Hiking through a jungle-clad volcano to come face-to-face with some of the last remaining mountain gorillas, in Rwanda.	click for larger image
5.	Swimming With Sea Lions	Swimming in the Galapagos while sea lions spun playfully around us.	click for larger image
6.	Turtle Preservation	Lying, face in the sand, on a stormy night in Monterrico, Guatemala, as a mother turtle lays 120 eggs into our hands.	click for larger image
7.	In The Blue Hole	Floating 120ft down in the Blue Hole, Belize, gazing up through the azure waters at dozens of reef sharks circling lazily above...	click for larger image
8.	Carjacked By A Bear	Repairing our campervan after a black bear broke in and ripped off the sunroof in search of food in Yosemite, USA.	click for larger image
9.	The World's Fastest Pet	Having a nice cuppa in Kenya, sitting next to the piercing stare of the pet...Cheetah!	click for larger image
10.	Sea-bound Cousins	Swimming with a mother and baby dolphin in Zanzibar, and watching humpback whales breaching.	click for larger image

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Some of the most beautiful places we saw en route.

1.	Neko Bay, Antarctica	Glaciers on all sides, giant icebergs in the bay and penguins littering the shore.	click for larger image
2.	Torres Del Paine, Chile	Granite peaks stretching up to the sky, glaciers and perfect hiking.	click for larger image
3.	Machu Picchu, Peru	The famous lost city, framed by gorgeous mountains and mysterious mist.	click for larger image
4.	Bryce Canyon, U.S.A.	Weird sandstone hoodoos in a western desert scene.	click for larger image
5.	Seward Glacier, Alaska	Looming fjords lead up to a river of blue ice.	click for larger image
6.	Rio de Janiero, Brazil	From the air a purely magical view, from the beach it's all bikinis and caiparinhas.	click for larger image
7.	Serengeti, Tanzania	A perfect sunrise over the savannah in the company of a lioness and her cubs.	click for larger image
8.	Iguazu Falls, Argentina	A perfect arc of waterfalls pouring out of the jungle and down a mighty chasm.	click for larger image
9.	Big Sur Route 1, California	Pure rugged beauty.	click for larger image
10.	Tikal Ruins, Guatemala	Atmospheric ruins, with a jungle setting and a soundtrack of howler monkeys.	click for larger image

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There are all kinds of remote trips offering encounters with wonders of the world.

Generally, we sign up straight away, and later realise how much work they are going to be...

1.	Wilderness trekking in Denali, Alaska	Freezing waist-high rivers to ford and grizzly bears for company.	click for larger image
2.	Climbing Cotopaxi, Ecuador	Ascending the highest volcano in the world at 20,000ft without falling down a gaping crevice.	click for larger image
3.	Hiking in Torres Del Paine, Chile	After 6 strenuous days carrying all our camping gear, we were in agony. The gorgeous views almost made up for it.	click for larger image
4.	Trekking to Machu Picchu	4 days over mountain trails at serious altitude	click for larger image
5.	Parque Impossible Trek, El Salvador	It was impossible: steep, wet, rocky, slippery and no medical services for miles.	click for larger image
6.	Volcano Climbing in Guatemala	Tip-toeing across freshly dried lava to view the burning red flow	click for larger image
7.	The Polar Plunge	A foolhardy leap into the freezing waters of Antarctica. Even thinking about it now makes us shiver.	click for larger image
8.	Rafting Lava, Grand Canyon	We took on the biggest white water in the U.S. in a monumental 9 day rafting trip and came out alive!	click for larger image
9.	Spelunking in Belize	Clambering a mile down through an underground river to view a royal human sacrifice.	click for larger image
10.	Mid-summer in Death valley	Possibly not the best time to get stranded in the sand dunes - parched, with a broken flip-flop and burning hot sand. We hopped back to the air-conditioned safety of our car and got out of there.	click for larger image

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With conmen in every country and putting ourselves in the hands of local transport across the world, something was bound to go wrong...

And a trip like this never quite goes to plan (did we even have a plan?!)

1.	Closest scrape	A team of thieves made off with our treasured laptop after spraying us with mustard. Cheryl flew after the main culprit, cursing in suddenly perfect Spanish: the petrified thief dropped the laptop and ran for his life.	click for larger image
2.	Money magically missing	An army official at the Peruvian-Bolivian border made $160 of our cash disappear while "searching for drugs". We spotted the larceny quickly, surprised the captain by storming back in loudly demanding our money and, once we had got it, legged it for the border as fast as we could.	click for larger image
3.	You must be off your head!	When offered a trip to a cocaine factory in Columbian guerrilla territory, we wisely declined: the government army attacked those guerrilla positions in force days later.	click for larger image
4.	Exploding vanagons	Laughing off advice that there was "something bad in our engine", we drove into the middle of the Canadian wilderness, where - boom! - our engine exploded.	click for larger image
5.	Para-crashing	Also in Columbia, we para-sailed down a canyon. Cheryl was paired with a 12 year old guide who managed to crashland them into a stone slagheap.	click for larger image
6.	Smoldering Albatross	Helping to refuel Gary and Kirstin's boat at the southernmost tip of Argentina, suddenly, the whole cabin, was filled with smoke. Only a desperate rearguard action prevented diesel from flooding the whole cabin, and setting fire to their precious ship!	click for larger image

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Some pretty odd things happened on our travels.

1.	Jumping into in a bubbling mud volcano in Columbia.	click for larger image
2.	A spooky consultation with a Zambian witchdoctor, possessed by spirits.	click for larger image
3.	Being offered dried llama fetuses in a witchcraft market in La Paz, Bolivia.	click for larger image
4.	Finally meeting both Elvises in Las Vegas.	click for larger image
5.	Being welcomed into a pygmy village by a wild dance festival.	click for larger image
6.	Stumbling upon a hippy solstice festival in the middle of Mormon Utah.	click for larger image
7.	Wandering into a street riot in Oaxaca, Mexico.	click for larger image
8.	Being served a traditional Welsh High Tea, on the coast of Argentina!	click for larger image
9.	Confusion Hill, Oregon, where up is down (sort of).	click for larger image

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During our trip we participated in a range of voluntary activities, trying to understand local issues better and help out where we could.

1.	Environmental health project, Kampala, Uganda	Our main effort - working with UCODEA and the University of Berkeley to build customer relationship management and website systems. These helped to build a business producing cleaner stoves that burn less fuel, reduce greenhouse emissions, save money for poor families and reduce respiratory diseases in African homes.	click for larger image
2.	Turtle conservation in Guatemala	We patrolled the beaches at Monterrico with ARCAS, saving critically endangered turtle eggs from poachers and releasing tiny hatchlings to the sea. In more enlightened Costa Rica we observed a successful green turtle conservation effort in progress.	click for larger image
3.	Civil War food distribution, Uganda	Working with the Norwegian Refugee Council, we assisted in emergency food distribution to refugee camps in the war-torn north of the country.	click for larger image
4.	Meeting with dispossessed Pygmies in Uganda	Assisting the UOBDU group supporting minority Pygmy (Batwa) populations, displaced from their forest environment, we met with local villagers.	click for larger image
5.	Guatemalan education programme for poor rural children	While learning Spanish, we starred in a promotional video for the INEPAS organisation.	click for larger image
6.	Teaching teachers in Malawi	We ran a computer skills training programme for teachers to pass on core I.T. skills to their pupils in a small town by Lake Malawi .	click for larger image
7.	Alleviating the impact of AIDS in Soweto, South Africa	We visited and supported the SKY community project in South Africa. They do amazing work in helping with the day-to-day struggles of families dealing with the impact of HIV/AIDS.	click for larger image

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All over the world people want to be better off, often exploiting the resources of their local environment in the process.

Unfortunately, without a commitment to sustainable development, this leads to the depletion of critical resources, degradation of the environment and, ultimately, a threat to our own way of life.

Here are some of the issues we encountered first hand.

There is a scientific consensus that human-caused global warming is underway.

Some likely symptoms that we encountered:

1.	Melting Ice Shelves	Antarctica - major ice shelf disintegration in recent years hints at changes that could eventually raise sea levels, causing major flooding.	click for larger image
2.	Mass Extinctions	Costa Rican tree frogs are incredibly beautiful, yet vulnerable to environmental change. Mass extinction of species is happening now: once gone, these precious animals will never be seen again.	click for larger image
3.	Arctic Habitat	Polar bear habitat is vanishing rapidly. With ice shelves retreating they may not be able to reach feeding grounds and will starve.	click for larger image
4.	Canadian Forest	Rampant Canadian mountain pine beetles are turning the mighty Rocky mountain forests brown with dead trees. Winters are no longer cold enough to kill the bugs off and allow for regrowth.	click for larger image
5.	Glaciation	Glaciers are retreating in Alaska, at a rate visible from year to year.	click for larger image
6.	African Drought	Lesotho and Malawi: suffering from recurring drought and failed harvests. With global warming projected to dry out southern and eastern Africa yet further, competition for food and water resources will become more acute, possibly causing famine and wars.	click for larger image

1.	Mountain gorillas massacred	When civil wars kick-off (in Congo, for example), irreplaceable wildlife resources are plundered for food & trophies.	click for larger image
2.	Turtles threatened in Guatemala	Endangered by poachers who sell them as aphrodisiac snacks, turtle nesting sites are also threatened by seaside holiday lodge developments.	click for larger image
3.	Destroying biodiversity in the Grand Canyon	The introduction of thirsty tamarisk trees monopolises the limited water supply and threatens fragile indigenous species.	click for larger image
4.	Depletion of the Amazon, Brazil	There was a clearly visible reduction in rainforest cover since our last visit 5 years ago.	click for larger image
5.	Overfishing in Lake Malawi	Much of the lake is fished out. With populations rising and few other economic opportunities, how will everyone be fed?	click for larger image
6.	Ugandan forests vanishing	Primary forests are being stripped out at around 2% each year by loggers. Rare animal habitat, home for jungle dwelling tribes and precious biodiversity is threatened.	click for larger image
7.	Galapagos environment suffering	Settlement and tourism: the government of this poor country is motivated by immediate financial benefit, not long-term environmental and economic security.	click for larger image
8.	Destruction of tribal culture in Panama	The last few tribes in the Darien jungle are being aggressively "modernized" by a government wanting to control the unstable border with Colombia.	click for larger image
9.	Dubious archaeology in Mexico	Many Aztec ruins being "restored" - but are they really being redesigned and rebuilt for tourist consumption?!	click for larger image

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Bringing silly kung fu kicks to the world ...

1.	Mendenhall Glacier vs Magnus	click for larger image
2.	A Long Way Down	click for larger image
3.	Shaolin Scuba	click for larger image
4.	Elevated Across The Equator	click for larger image
5.	A Match For Machu Picchu	click for larger image
6.	A Chilean Karate Chop	click for larger image
7.	Flying Flamingos!	click for larger image
8.	Camel Kung Fu	click for larger image
9.	Angie joins in on the karate fun!	click for larger image

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