Salta (May 11-12, 2006)

We survived the gruelling 27-hour long bus ride, eager for a shower, clean teeth, and a comfortable bed. The bus line (Andesmar) was not as nice as the one we had from Buenos Aires to Iguazu (Rio Uruguay), and the service was definitely not as good. Not nearly as much food & drinks were offered, the bathroom was dirty and there was no toilet paper (of course I had some with me though). Twice during the night we were stopped at police checkpoints where they got on the bus and demanded to see everybody’s passports (once around midnight, the other at 3am). The first time it took Lincoln a while to find his passport, and he was worried it was in his big backpack which was down below in the checked luggage compartment. He had me worried too, but he eventually found it in his day pack. The second time, the police picked on an Israeli girl a few seats from us, and even took her bag off the bus to search it. She didn’t seem phased by it though; I would have gotten off with them and watched them search it to make sure they didn’t steal anything, or plant anything.

During our stopover in Tucuman, we found an internet café and looked for a place to stay in Salta. Since we were arriving at midnight, we wanted to have a place in mind already to tell the taxi driver. We found a nice-looking place called Las Rejas Hostel and tried to call them to see if they had space available. There was no answer, so we decided to take our chances and just show up. The taxi driver said he didn’t know the Hostel, nor the street name (we had written down the address and showed it to him even), and took us to a street that was much farther from the central square than it should have been. Of course, it wasn’t right, so he tried the “other General Guemes” street, which turned out to be the right one. We thought he was taking us for a ride to get more money from us, but in the end he didn’t charge us the fare on the meter and wouldn’t take the money, so I guess he really didn’t know where he was going and felt bad he drove us around.

We were very lucky that there was one last room available, and it was a room with a “cama matrimonial”, meaning a double bed. Their website had quoted prices both including breakfast and not including breakfast, but when we asked for the price the guy said there was only the price including breakfast. It was a bit more than we had planned to spend (72 pesos per night), but the hostel turned out to be so nice, and in such a great location, that we didn’t mind. It is in what appears to be an old house and has lots of character. The staff is very nice and helpful, and the breakfast was pretty good, although it is only a continental one. There is also a kitchen that we can use, free internet, and some nice sitting areas.

After finally getting to sleep around 2am, we then slept in until around 10am. Lincoln and I are both still trying to fight off our colds so today wasn’t going to be particularly strenuous for us. After breakfast we lounged in our room for a while, then headed out to see the city. First stop was to drop our clothes off at a Laundromat, next we headed to the Plaza de 9 de Julio, the main square. The park in the square is beautiful, with big leafy trees and great Spanish colonial building surrounding it. Salta is known for its wonderful climate, and today was certainly a great testament to it. It was a gorgeous sunny day, the temperature around 25 during the day, and cool at night. We enjoyed wandering around the quaint streets with many adobe-style buildings and terra cotta tiled roofs. We made our way to San Martin Park, which has a lovely little man-made lake in it with ducks, swans and a nice water fountain. We sat there for a while enjoying the park, then headed up to the top of Cerro San Bernardo via the cable car. The ride up was fun and on the top of the hill were great views of Salta and the surrounding mountain ranges. Salta is set in a valley in the foothills of the Andes, and it is so nice to finally see the mountains beginning to rise. Up until now, all the landscape we have seen in Argentina has been very flat (with the exception of Iguazu Falls). I love the mountains, and just being in their presence brings me feelings of peace and calm.

There is a small park at the top of San Bernardo which has a very elaborate man-made waterfall system flowing through it. All the water is pumped all the way from the bottom of the hill to the top, where it is circulated through several layers of falls. It was beautiful and very peaceful. We wandered around the park for a while, I bought an ice cream from a vendor, and then we sat at the café on the balcony overlooking the city drinking a beer for quite a while. Lincoln went out on a limb and ordered some humitas, which is a local dish that we’re not sure what was going to contain, but they turned out to be very yummy. It was a kind of mashed corn, flour, onions, and seasoning mix cooked inside corn stalks that were wrapped up nicely. Pretty tasty!

We made our way back down the mountain in the cable car and back through the town, checking out a convent and a couple of churches on the way, and then back to our room for a little siesta. We were thinking about buying some groceries to make some dinner for ourselves, but then Lincoln wanted to go to the outdoor store that we had seen to look for a jacket. He found one he liked, so we bought it. By this point it was too late, I was starving, so we just went to a restaurant to eat. We are contemplating changing our itinerary a little bit, and keep heading north up through Argentina to get to Bolivia, instead of across into Chile. A few people have told us that this is a beautiful area with some great little Quechua villages to see along the way. This would give us a couple more days in Argentina, and a couple of days in Tupiza, Bolivia, where Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid met their maker. We’ll discuss it more tonight and make up our minds.

May 12: We decided we would do the northern Agentina route instead of going to Chile, so we bought our tickets today for Tilcara, a town four hours north of Salta. We leave tomorrow, after deciding to spend one more day in Salta due to the terrible cold that we still have not been able to shake. Lincoln does feel a little bit better today, so there is hope for me that I will feel better tomorrow (I'm a day behind him on the cold). The nice lady at the hostel said we could stay in the same room we are in, and the people that had reserved it for tonight will be put in a different room. We relaxed/slept in the room a lot today, but we did have to make a few excursions - walked to the bus station to buy our tickets to Tilcara, went to pick up our laundry, went to two internet cafes before we found one with computers good enough to read our USB stick & send email, went to the grocery store to get food for dinner tonight, and to the bank machine to get some more money. We didn´t do those all at once though, we had to go back to the hostel in between for a nap!

To see some pictures of Salta, click here