South America - Continent of Contrasts

until my voice can be clearly understood in all in another an American travel adventure [Music] [Music] the voice of the continent echoes across its mysterious Mountain Sonic the green peaks of the Andes towering toward the rim of the sky into the clouds like some ancient Queen shall adventurers to come and discover her secret [Music] and they came English see dog and Spanish voyagers seeking gold and glory try to imagine that first tiny cowbell groping along the coast and below in the captain's cabin a bearded explorers scribbling away in his journal truly this land had a layer of pivens sunlight on the coast and the air sweet as April in Andalusia four hundred years before Columbus the Incas were already laying down astonishing highways ten thousand miles of road linking their great stone cities this dusty path was once the main street of a metropolis with public bands and palaces filled with statues of the purest gold to the Incas silver was the tears of the moon and gold the sweat of the Sun the Sun was their God and it was the rare metal of the Sun that brought the conquistadors Francisco Pizarro when these ruins were mansions he swaggered among them courageous cruel proud illiterate gathering together a handful of battle-scarred Spanish veterans starting out from here in Panama to conquer the Empire of the Incas Panama is the gateway canoeing travelers onward to the south and the air alive with promise younger is a way that the hell they are away the anchor is wait until they are set and I'm all for the Rio Grande [Music] I'm bound for the Rio Grande in this wall of life of this Panama City you find sailors from Bremen and merchants from Bombay descendants of Spanish soldiers Portuguese fishermen San Blas Indians living in hope of the unexpected tomorrow is a gamble the future is a secret number in the hand of God the parallax barrier or centuries after these are the adventurers are still coming travelers and tourists seeking another kind of treasure the riches that come when you fling open the doors of your life and fly out to find what lies beyond the sea South America a continent where spring spills forth in late August and summer bursts into bloom in December and fall comes with a golden light of April you a continent that still keeps alive the memory of its liberators each of the Republic's has a history all its own but one proverb they share the sweetest kiss is from the lips of Liberty journey south from Panama to the adventure of Quito the cool brilliant capital of Ecuador a city dyed with a color of Spain [Music] Keigo with its sweeping plazas and its baroque churches like an ornate mirror bearing the reflections of barcelona and madrid [Music] Spain gave to her children her strong and musical language her concept of the family is the soul of society and most of all she gave them her faith Ecuador's the simple plan of a mother and Peru is the pride of a Gaza long before the Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock the city of Lima was cheated captains of Castile slipped down the streets and climbed the balcony to whisper love to their elegant ladies the ghosts of the past linger in the shadows of Lima and a few miles away on the shore of the Pacific the present lies baking in the January son at Peru's Waikiki visitors from Vermont tourists from Texas pilots open Agra's planes come here to taste of sport they say goes back to the days of the Incas Waikiki [Music] did any more [Music] they more than me for [Music] PETA [Music] [Music] donkey dokyun [Music] sweeping to length of Lima runs the here on de la unión while you discover the glittering dream that drew the conquistadors silver lurking silver is a family skill handed down across the generations from father to son or hat with avenues prices the traveler can carry home this pale metal that is the sole and signature of Peru these polished bowls in pitchers and candlesticks are direct descendants of the treasure of the Incas and who owns them owns the living path the history of Lima is ancient yet there are certain streets as modern as morning this mixture of past and present shapes the character of the local citizens like this importer waiting in the lobby of the hotel boulevard he speaks four languages including impeccable English his ancestors go back across the centuries to a Spanish grandee who came to Peru following in the footsteps of Pizarro his family put down their roots in Lima in 1551 the years San Marcos University was founded any man from Lima can tell you that no Peruvian lady in her right mind ever arrives for a luncheon appointment on time even with her father [Music] bündchen in Lima is allegedly a pair take the dime for a swim or a set of tennis [Music] actually at the sort of half country-club half hotel welcoming guests from the four corners of the world into an atmosphere of casual great forever you are in Peru however sophisticated the scene just behind you always are the mountains in the village markets you can tell where a woman comes from by what she wears on her head and when a woman from pisac says I'll eat my head she may really mean it [Music] on a Sunday morning in a country market you can find just about anything including this queer object called a lock [Music] these gentle people probable pattern of life simple and natural at the turn of the season up here in the hills they still speak the language of Incas Quechua even their Christian church services are in Quechua and on Sunday morning almost everyone goes to church almost Mountain Indians of pisac Brusco one kya their origins are shrouded in this did they come down from the waist to the or east across the sea from the Polynesian islands no one seems to know for certain in their ancient tongue they come to pray to a carpenter from Galilee and then return to the hills carrying ceremonial stats banded with silver and a seashell jump which they call a poodle eye on a mountain peak beyond Cusco stand the mysterious fortress of Machu Picchu stones sprung from stone walls built without mortar and nowhere a crack wide enough to slip in a knife blade [Music] what is it doing here in the middle of nowhere there is a legend that says this was a lost city of women when the ingots they left their bling away one by one prayers for their men their fierce doom [Music] across the highlands from Machu Picchu lies Lake Titicaca the highest navigable body of water in the world the delicate boats are called Bowser's flash together out of tough tutorial reeds and the local steamer had to be hauled up the Andes piece by piece [Music] Panthera Kaka down to La Paz Bolivia ng's paid tribute to the grinning little household guard EK co offer him a choice or the saying goes and before the year is out you will find yourself owning the real thing a house for instance here in la paz at the edge of mount any money the highest capital in the world perched in the pure air 12,000 feet above sea level [Music] intima bars on saturday morning come the peasant women to sell their fresh eggs and perhaps buy a new Derby the city may be written on the maps in capital letters the city with its clean wide-open plazas and it's quiet back streets running past the ancient walls may be the first attraction but it's the devil that the diablada every Easter time here in the sun-drenched mining town of a ruler the Battle of Lucifer versus Michael 500 things out of Hell's led by the seven deadly sins across the mountain peaks stretching away 2600 miles along the coast to the Pacific lies the land of Chile the city of Santiago with its tree-lined paths crossing Sun and shadow and the canon in santa lucia park booming the hour the patron fader of City naturally is a woman naturally women of chilly arm well Lord Byron grandfather of the poet described them as remarkably handsome some with sparkling black eyes and some with a cool English beauty a love of laughter a taste for romance and a certain charming lived to the walk when they go for to meet a man the young man comes from Amazon via outside the city a place famous for its vineyards it's sparkling wine and it's fine [Music] [Music] the local horsemen are called apostles and the local horseplay is no game for a gent with a delicate Constitution in this part of the world a good car is not just a musical instrument but a challenge the men of Chile are curious mixture tough as ride romantic and musical at their native Day [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] the scent of grapes is heavy in the April air on the estancia's the circle Santiago they are harvesting the crop now but during the great presses to squeeze out another vintage of the pale dried Chilean wine the toast in salud salud are more deeper set up health love and money and time to spend them every city has a voice and the voice of Santiago is music gusts of music as though the city were weaving a song as a backdrop for its women hasta la pasta Hohner Contino you're an island working for a corner kinky little yo and I see for a fourth appeared on zombie the love [Music] are giving me Twilight and the patron thing looking down from san cristobol giving her stone benediction up in the mountains the lakes are like fallen fragments of sky and the temple of the day is peace [Music] back home icy winds are biting the rooftops but here among the lakes sunlight slants through the pine trees and you stop running and there's time for taste and touch and smell to come alive again back in the city there's a temple that somehow seems to make people lose touch with each other but up here on the quiet pine tree slopes intimacy comes back again the little lake boat takes you across the waters of todos los santos peace is like an echo coming down from the mountains everywhere you turn your eyes there's a new poem written in water and sky you gaze at the familiar features of the earth as though you were seeing them for the first time [Music] here to South America's Lake District come fishermen from every continent on the globe the wind whispers in the great pine trees the Sun climbs slowly towards afternoon the soft sky arches overhead the hours slipped past but for the fishermen it's as though all the clocks in the world had stopped ticking [Music] time is that single moment when you cast and cast again and suddenly see the gleam of a child living in to take the bait [Music] with the morning your journey on following the trail of the adventurers across the border into Argentina when Osiris the most cosmopolitan capital of the southern continent the Morning Sun gleams on the obelisk commemorating the founding of winners Irish by Pedro de Mendoza in the year 1537 the wizard traffic along the Avenue of the 9th of July the world's widest Boulevard here in the morning the voices of the continents ringing the cries of the peddlers Hawking their wares along the side streets of the Calle River Daria a city of the present and the past a tapestry of contrasts and contradictions a part of life in Buenos Aires moving at an indolent pace a sort of slow-motion existence that seems to be saying where are you running my friend take it easy Argentina a country with the cranes for sports a restless love of speed at Palermo Park you watch with your heart in your mouth knowing it's only a matter of minutes before one of them turns over [Music] when OHS early races along with a breakneck tempo or drips in the piece of the yacht basin at El Tigre this is South America primitive and sophisticated rugged and elegant strange and familiar yesterday and tomorrow South America continent and contract ah