WILDERNESS EXPLORER 2 – SOUTH AMERICA
BACKGROUND
SOUTH AMERICA, discovered by the modern world in the late 14th century by the Spanish and Portuguese, is truly a melting pot of cultures, colours, ethnic native groups, immigrants, sights and sounds all rolled into this very vast, beautiful and contrasting continent. This vast landmass houses the countries of Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Guyana,
Paraguay, Peru,
Uruguay, Surinam and Venezuela.
Situated mostly in the
southern hemisphere, bordered on the west by the
Pacific Ocean, north and east by the
Atlantic Ocean and
North America and northwest by the
Caribbean Sea, South America has an
area of 17,840,000 square kilometres and home to more than 380 million people.
In
1494, Portugal and Spain, the two great maritime powers of that time, signed the
Treaty of Tordesillas, by which they agreed that all the land outside Europe should be an exclusively ruled by the two countries. Thus, the Spanish language is spoken in all countries of South America, except Brazil who speaks Portuguese. Besides the two main languages, Quechua, Aymara and Guarani are the main Indigenous languages spoken mainly in Peru, Bolivia and Paraguay respectively.
THE EXPEDITION
On 13th October, 2006 a group of 40 adventurers made up of mostly Malaysians, Dutch, Norwegian, Argentinians and a Paraguayan in a convoy of 13 units heavily modified 4x4s and 4 units Dual Purpose motorcycles, was flagged off from Buenos Aires, by Her Excellency Dato’ Rohana Ramli, the Malaysian Ambassador to Argentina, to embark on a 2-month expedition of Peace, Goodwill and Friendship to 7 countries in South America. The route covered 22,700 kilometers through Argentina, Uruguay, Brazil Paraguay, Bolivia, Peru and Chile.
THE ATLANTIC COAST
The Expedition headed north-east from the capital of Argentina, crossing the River Plate delta to Uruguay along the Atlantic Ocean coast to Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay and on to Rio de Janeiro in Brazil.
BRAZIL TO PARAGUAYFrom Rio, the convoy went westwards inland towards the Parana River bordering Brazil and Paraguay, visiting the UN Heritage site of the might Iguazu Falls shared by Brazil and Argentina. On entering Paraguay, the adventurers visited the 2nd largest engineering project in the world at Itaipu Dam spanning across the Parana River, which generates 12.6 million kilowatts of electricity for Brazil and Paraguay.
From Asuncion, the capital of Paraguay, the friendship expedition crossed northwards to the Chaco Desert, which only receives a few inches of rain a year, to enter Bolivia, following the Che Guevara route passing through the Indigenious Regions of Sucre, Potosi and Oruro on the way to 4000 metres highland plateau of the Altiplano city of La Paz, the capital of Bolivia.
MACHU PICCHU
Taking a ferry across Lake Titicaca, the highest fresh water lake at 3,812 metres above sea level, the expedition arrived into Peru, heading towards the Sacrad Valley of Cusco, the gateway to the world famous UN World Heritage site of Machu Picchu complex of the Incas, which was lost for more than 500 years, only to be re-discovered in 1911 by the American Explorer, Mr Hiram Bingham.
The legendary 'Lost City of Machu Picchu', built more than 500 years ago is the most important tourist attraction in Peru and one of the world's most impressive archaeological sites drawing some 500,000 foreign visitors a year.
Built by the Incas on the summit of "Machu Picchu" (Old Peak), the whole archaeological complex covers approximately 5 square kms overlooking the deep canyon of the Urubamba river’s dense jungle, 120 kilometres from the city of Cusco at 7,000 feet above sea level.
Machu Picchu, which is the Inca's best kept secret, was probably the most amazing urban creation of the Inca Empire at its height, with its giant walls, terraces and ramps, which appear as though they have been cut naturally in the continuous rock escarpments. The building style is "late imperial Inca" thought to have been a sanctuary or temple inhabited by high priests and the "Virgins of the Sun" (chosen women). Excavations revealed that of the 135 skeletons found, 109 were women. No signs of post Conquest occupation were unearthed.
Traversing further west, the Wilderness Explorer 2 - South America Expedition, organized by Asia Offroad Centre led by Thomas Foo and Steven Ng, both veterans in numerous expeditions over the last 15 years around the world, headed towards the mega metropolitan city of Lima, the capital of Peru, situated along the Pacific Ocean coast.
THE NAZCA LINES
Going 400 kilmetres south to the Nazca Desert, the Nazca plains like a giant map or blueprint left by ancient astronauts, lie the famous Nazca Lines of Peru, associated with the
Inca Civilization who many link with alien visitors who still interact with local people to this day.
The high arid plateau covering an area of approximately 450 square kilometres, of sandy desert as well as the slopes of the contours of the Andes has about 300 figures made of straight lines, geometric shapes most clearly visible from the air.
No one has proof on who built them or why. Since their discovery, the Nazca Lines have inspired fantastic explanations from ancient gods, a landing strip for returning aliens, a celestial calendar created by the ancient Nazca civilization -- putting the creation of the lines between 200 BC and 600 AD, used for rituals probably related to astronomy, to confirm the ayllus or clans who made up the population and to determine through ritual their economic functions held up by reciprocity and redistribution, or a map of underground water supplies.
Some of the more clearly visible geometric shapes are a Killer Whale, Wing, Baby Condor, Bird, Spiral, Lizard, Tree, Hands, Spider, Flower, Dog, Astronaut, Triangle, Star, Pelican, Hummingbird, Monkey, Llama and Trapezoids.
THE ANDES
From The Nazca Desert, the expedition crossed the Andes Mountains the 3rd time at the Sajama Volcano mountain pass back into Bolivia.
The Andes run the entire length of South America, from the humid tropics of the Caribbean to the ice fields of Patagonia. The longest north-south mountain range in the world, the Andes encompass a tremendous range of ecosystems and are home to a rich variety of plant and animal species and human communities.
This rugged chain of volcanoes, grasslands, deserts, high altitude lakes and lush forests are home to some of the most diverse habitats on earth. More than 30 spectacular volcanoes occur in the Andes Mountain range with heights ranging from 15,000 to 20,000 feet.
THE UYUNI SALT FLATS OF BOLIVIA
After a grueling 20 hours ascending and descending the Central Andes, the expedition reached Uyuni, the gateway into Bolivia’s Salar de Uyuni Salt Flats.
The Salar de Uyuni, a sea of salt, a salt desert, in southwestern Bolivia, was once an inland sea, but the water vanished into the thin dry air of Andean altitude. All that remains is the salt, tens of meters thick, forming the biggest mirror in the world; where the earth blends with the sky.
The 4,085 square miles of salt flats, at 3650 meters high contains 10 billion tons of
salt of which less than 25,000 tons is extracted annually. Every November, Salar de Uyuni is also the breeding grounds for three species of South American
flamingos -
Chilean,
James's and
Andean.
ATACAMA DESERT
Further south, the salt flats gradually gave way to the Atacama Desert, where the convoy crossed into Chile, at the Andean border post of San Pedro de Atacama, the luanch pad town to the Atacama Desert.
This Desert extending from the
Andes mountains to the
Pacific Ocean is 15 million years old covering a total area of 180,000 square kilometers.
The Atacama Desert is the driest desert on
Earth and is virtually sterile because it is blocked from moisture on both sides by the Andes mountains and by coastal mountains. Some weather stations in the Atacama have never received rain. Evidence suggests that the Atacama may not have had any significant rainfall for the past 400 years.
Heading south for 1500 kilometers along the Pan Americana Highway along the Pacific Ocean Coast, we reached Santiago, the capital of Chile.
PATAGONIA
From Santiago, the expedition cut east to cross back to Argentina to begin its journey into the Patagonia, through the picturesque Region of Argentina’s Lake District.
Patagonia is the portion of
South America in
Argentina and part of
Chile made up of the
Andes mountains to the west and south and plateaus and low plains to the east.
Most of the region is a vast
steppe-like plains, rising in a succession of abrupt
terraces about 100 meters (330 feet) at a time, and covered with an enormous bed of
shingle almost bare of vegetation. In the hollows of the plains are
ponds or lakes of brackish and fresh water. The high rainfall against the western Andes and the low sea surface temperatures offshore give rise to cold and humid air masses, contributing to the ice-fields and
glaciers, the largest ice-fields in the
Southern hemisphere outside of Antarctica. The most famous and visited Glacier is found at Perito Moreno, about 80 kilometers from the beautiful mountain resort of El Calafate.
The main economic activities are sheep farming, oil extraction and tourism. This region is also home to the one of the world's spectacular adventure races. The southernmost state of Argentina, Tierra del Fuego has the touristic city of Ushuaia, the southern most city in the world. Here, tourists from around the world come by the thousands to enjoy the paradise like scenery of ice-capped mountains, lakes, estuaries and is also the gateway for visits to the Antartica Continent. Truly the entire region of Patagonia can be considered as Paradise on Earth.
THE LAST LEG
From the beautiful resort city of Ushuaia, which was founded as a prison outpost some 300 years ago, the expedition returned to Buenos Aires along the Atlantic Coast, passing through Rio Grande, the Valdes Peninsula, famous for its Whales and Sea Lions, the seaside resort city of Mar del Plata after traversing about 22,700 kilometers in 61 days to the very successful completion of the Widerness Explorer 2 – South America Expedition.
EXPEDITION OFFICIALSOrganizing Chairman : HJ MOHD ISA BIN MOHD SALLEH
Expedition Leader : THOMAS FOO
Expedition Manager : STEVEN NG
Expedition Logistics : MOHAMED ASSIR BIN A. MOHAMED ARIFF
Official Doctor : DR. SHARANJIT SINGH KULDEEP SINGH
Documentary Producer : HASSHIM ABU HANIFAH
Official Photographer : YUSUF BIN MOHAMED HASHIM
Mechanical Chief : NG KEEM CHUAN
