From my home in Piribebuy a trip to Asuncion is always a long one. To travel to and from Asuncion is guaranteed to fill a day. It is not a difficult trip to make but it is one that is best done for a reason and not on a whim.

Yesterday was one of those days. And as always a good day out it was.

The first thing I have to consider is that to spend a meaningful amount of time in Asuncion the day must begin early. So the preparations begin the night before with everything that will be needed sorted out and left ready for the morning. There will be no opportunity to return home and collect anything that had been forgotten.

As such I was up not long after 6 AM. Leaving enough time for a nice relaxing breakfast before heading out.

By 7 AM everything was organised and I could head out for the day.

This time of year, autumn, it is cool at night and so quite fresh when I left the house.

After much trial an error I have found the simplest and smoothest way to get to and from Asuncion on day trips.

This is not the most obvious. Catching a bus from the front gate and then changing to an Asuncion bound one in Piribebuy. Instead I ride my motorbike through Piribebuy and up to the junction with the main East West route across Paraguay.

There I can leave my bike parked for the day along with many others on a garage forecourt. As crime is really not an issue I leave my crash helmet hanging on the handlebars knowing it will still be there when I return. Free parking for the day under the watchful eye of the workers in the garage.

Once I had dropped my bike off the next thing to do was find a bus. Skipping across the road in front of the garage took me to a bus stop where I could wait for one to come along.

One of the reasons for travelling this far to catch a bus, I had travelled already nearly an hour from my house, is the increased frequency of buses. I Piribebuy there is a bus once every half hour. Here a bus from somewhere would come past every few minutes.

So as it was I did not have to wait long for a bus. Shortly after 8 AM I was seated on a bus heading towards Asuncion. My fare of less than a pound had been paid and I could sit back and make myself comfortable.

The bus was not even very crowded. Often they are. This one though, probably with it being past rush hour and mid week had seats for everyone.

As I travelled towards Asuncion Caacupe soon passed by and we dropped out of the hills and onto the lowland plain. Fewer passengers also meant less stops and in not much more than an hour I had reached the first of the suburb towns that surround Asuncion.

Even here traffic was for once flowing well. Here also itinerant sellers with seeming anything they could carry began hopping on and off the bus.

It is often possible to get a fair amount of shopping done long before a bus gets to its destination. In their arms and baskets sellers came and went with fruits and freshly baked snacks, toothbrushes and socks, herbs and medicines and all manner of accessories for mobile phones.

All that was missing was the guitarists singing traditional Paraguayan tunes.

This activity helped to pass the time way. By then the bus had slowed in the traffic and I was looked forward to getting off it.

However with the traffic being light I did not have too long to wait. The bus pulled into Asuncion Central Bus Terminal not long after 10 AM and I was on my way.

Just one more bus to catch. A local bus from the terminal down to the shopping center. Local buses are paid for with electronic cards so no need even to fish about in my pockets for the right change.

Local buses which are identified by route numbers rather than names feed their ways into all corners of Asuncion and its suburbs.

To catch one that is going the right way it is necessary to scan through the place names displayed in its front window. I spotted one that said Mariscal Lopez, the street I wanted to get to, and jumped aboard.

Unfortunately its route took it though an estate coming out on to Mariscal Lopez about 1 KM from where I wanted to be. But after all that time sitting down a good brisk walk was quite refreshing.

With the good trip into Asuncion I had time to spare and reached my destination Shopping del Sol a little bit after 10.30. Slightly over three and a half hours since I had left my house to pop to the shops.

The first thing I made sure I got done was the one thing that really needed to do. Everything else would be just whatever came along. That was to get a ticket to a music festival I want to go to later in the year.

Rather than through a ticket office I had read that tickets were being sold through the chain of currency exchanges that has branches in all the shopping centers.

Yes they had tickets and could sell me one they said. But could I take a seat while they did that.

There was then for ten minutes a lot of coming and going as they got themselves organised. Then a lot of fiddling about under the desk as they were obviously trying to get some electronic equipment connected. It was clearly a request they had not received too often.

Eventually though things seemed to be connected and working. I could finally buy my ticket. Thank them and walk happily out of the office knowing the days main objective had been achieved.

By then it was lunch time. All the shopping centers have large food halls with a wide variety of restaurants. I chose Chinese. That is something I could never get out in the countryside. A good plateful of a mixture of items from the self service counter and I could sit down for a tasty and relaxing lunch before a couple of hours wandering around the shops.

Shopping del Sol is not the biggest of shopping centers even after a recent extension. It is though a pleasant place to stroll around doing a little window shopping.

Many of the shops are of the boutique type so of little interest to me as I was looking for sensibly priced clothes. Even in the department stores I was unsuccessful picking up nothing more than a book I spotted in the malls book store.

Looking round the entire shopping center had taken little more than an hour so rather than heading straight back home I crossed the road to another nearby shopping center.

That was Paseo de la Galeria. The newest and smartest of the malls in Asuncion. It is almost entirely expensive boutique stores so I was not expecting to find suitable clothes. It is though a a very nice place to walk around and relax. Once again all I managed was a book.

By then it really was time to start heading home. A local bus back to the bus terminal and than another onwards towards Piribebuy and my motorbike. And from there home.

Just after 3 PM under a very sunny sky the bus pulled out of the bus station. I could see immediately this was going to be a slower journey. There was far more traffic slowly making its way down the road.

Once again sellers jumped on and off the bus with their wares. This time I spotted items for sale I not not seen on buses before. Jars of coffee and mayonnaise. Myself I saved my purchase until we were in San Lorenzo where I picked up a fresh fruit salad.

Then after almost an hour and a half we finally cleared the last of the suburbs. It was little more than a dozen miles from the starting point.

Now though suddenly the view outside turned green and the bus picked up speed as it headed now unhindered by traffic into the countryside.

By the time the hills had been climbed and Caacupe had been reached the sun had set and the sky was starting to darken.

It was only another 15 minutes to my stop but by then the sky was quite black.

I had had though I very good day out, and was now looking forward to getting home.

The road though Piribebuy was dark and unlit. There was hardly a vehicle around and all was silence.

Looking about at the dark empty landscape it seemed that it could easily have been 3 AM. It was not of course and when I arrived home and check the time I found that it was just 7 PM.

So that was 12 hours out just for 3 or 4 in the city. Most of the day as always was spent sitting on buses waiting for them to get somewhere.

I am now quite used to that. Once I take my seat I drift off into that relaxed state where time and distances just roll by.