Hola
Well as you can see I found an internet cafe to upload some photos. Pretty impressive they are, but a shadow on the real thing.
Northern Argentina was a great way to practice the little Spanish. It is amazing at how many different combinations of sentences you can form from limited vocab.
From Corrientes we made our way to Salta. I was excited having heard some stories about this place in Buenos Aires. We did a trip to Jujuy, which included the seven coloured mountains, the grand salt plains and cloud valley. The workers on the salt plains wore balaclavas and a good indication to get my screen out of my bag. The trip also included going passed the largest cactus I have ever seen. It was 7 meters and is around 700 years old, so around the same time Christopher Columbus set foot on the continent.
We came across some friendly llamas in colourful neck ties. This somehow twigged that if you ask what a persons name is you ask tu llama, and also the name for fire is llama. llama llama llama
After Salta we slowly did day by day trips through various little towns and cities namely Tucuman and La Rioja and landed in San Juan for a couple of days. San Juan is where we set off for Valle de la Luna or Moon Valley. We had met some Argentians in Salta who recommended Moon Valley. It was closer to La Rioja but trying to arrange a trip without our own vehicle proved to be challenging.
Moon Valley was literally like walking on the moon. The colours and limited vegetation are pretty mind boggling and the formations of the rocks can sometimes be amusing. There was a spinx, a pyramid, plenty of male appendages, fish, lizards and one sleeping dragon.
We had a recommendation from a guide book about a hotel in San Juan, which turned out to be cockroach infested - shudder, so we left and wandered the streets and stumbled on a cute little place that had little apartments out the back of a large house. We shared the place with a person who had a strong resembelance to Phillip Larkin the poet and a Frenchman. Stories of travels were swapped and we took to a little night out.
After Moon Valley we made out way to Mendoza and met with some more friends namely Fanny and Margot and took our hired bikes around the vineyards on a blue sky day, all very idyllic. The futbol fans would be interested that Mendoza was where we stopped off to watch the La Boca and River game. The bars were full but we were lucky enough to get a hot tip to watch the match at a bar called Moes and something about knocking. We made out way down a deserted street with not a sound in sight. Surely this is not right.....We found the bar with Moes face from the simpsons on the front, gave our special knock and low and behold the door was opened by a burly guy who gave us the once over. We stammered out Futbol? And he let us in to a rowdy crowd of passionate supporters for both sides. There was no bar per se but a wall of fridges. You passed your beer and money across the span of people to the makeshift bar which was a store front and a few minutes later your beer and change were returned.
After two and a half weeks of semi cama buses overwhelming scenery, mixed bag accomodation we booked ourselves onto a posh bus which was the equivalent of business class flight on wheels. We left Fanny and Margot and Gloria and I headed back to BA. How I missed BA.
We pretty much headed straight to a favourite restaurant once we got in, for food and cocktails. This city is pretty cool. Im a little bit in love with it.
Well as you can see I found an internet cafe to upload some photos. Pretty impressive they are, but a shadow on the real thing.
Northern Argentina was a great way to practice the little Spanish. It is amazing at how many different combinations of sentences you can form from limited vocab.
From Corrientes we made our way to Salta. I was excited having heard some stories about this place in Buenos Aires. We did a trip to Jujuy, which included the seven coloured mountains, the grand salt plains and cloud valley. The workers on the salt plains wore balaclavas and a good indication to get my screen out of my bag. The trip also included going passed the largest cactus I have ever seen. It was 7 meters and is around 700 years old, so around the same time Christopher Columbus set foot on the continent.
We came across some friendly llamas in colourful neck ties. This somehow twigged that if you ask what a persons name is you ask tu llama, and also the name for fire is llama. llama llama llama
After Salta we slowly did day by day trips through various little towns and cities namely Tucuman and La Rioja and landed in San Juan for a couple of days. San Juan is where we set off for Valle de la Luna or Moon Valley. We had met some Argentians in Salta who recommended Moon Valley. It was closer to La Rioja but trying to arrange a trip without our own vehicle proved to be challenging.
Moon Valley was literally like walking on the moon. The colours and limited vegetation are pretty mind boggling and the formations of the rocks can sometimes be amusing. There was a spinx, a pyramid, plenty of male appendages, fish, lizards and one sleeping dragon.
We had a recommendation from a guide book about a hotel in San Juan, which turned out to be cockroach infested - shudder, so we left and wandered the streets and stumbled on a cute little place that had little apartments out the back of a large house. We shared the place with a person who had a strong resembelance to Phillip Larkin the poet and a Frenchman. Stories of travels were swapped and we took to a little night out.
After Moon Valley we made out way to Mendoza and met with some more friends namely Fanny and Margot and took our hired bikes around the vineyards on a blue sky day, all very idyllic. The futbol fans would be interested that Mendoza was where we stopped off to watch the La Boca and River game. The bars were full but we were lucky enough to get a hot tip to watch the match at a bar called Moes and something about knocking. We made out way down a deserted street with not a sound in sight. Surely this is not right.....We found the bar with Moes face from the simpsons on the front, gave our special knock and low and behold the door was opened by a burly guy who gave us the once over. We stammered out Futbol? And he let us in to a rowdy crowd of passionate supporters for both sides. There was no bar per se but a wall of fridges. You passed your beer and money across the span of people to the makeshift bar which was a store front and a few minutes later your beer and change were returned.
After two and a half weeks of semi cama buses overwhelming scenery, mixed bag accomodation we booked ourselves onto a posh bus which was the equivalent of business class flight on wheels. We left Fanny and Margot and Gloria and I headed back to BA. How I missed BA.
We pretty much headed straight to a favourite restaurant once we got in, for food and cocktails. This city is pretty cool. Im a little bit in love with it.
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