Northern Argentina: Salta, $30 luxury, cockroach hotel

After 12+ hours on a bus from San Pedro, we finally arrived in Salta, Argentina at around 1am. We stayed in Salta for two nights - Salta is a colonial city surrounded by mountainous peaks, and it has a nice, relaxing atmosphere. We took a gondola for views of the city from above and wandered around the pedestrian mall for a little shopping.

From Salta, we took a bus to a remote lake and splurged on a nice, lakeside hotel. An equally nice hotel in the U.S. would probably cost a couple hundred dollars but this cost us a mere $30. We then took a bus to a small town called Cafayate, which is a apparently a popular Argentine destination, so accommodations were tough to find. After about an hour, we did find a hostel but as with most hostels in Argentina, there were no screens on the windows. Northern Argentina is very hot this time of year, so closing the windows isn't really an option so I woke up covered with mosquito bites. From Cafayate, we took a 6am bus to Tucuman, where we were lucky enough to get the last four tickets that evening to Catamarca. We arrived at around 11pm, hot and tired but couldn't find a decent place to stay. We did find a hostel with availability, but when we went to see the rooms, we were greeted by a bunch of cockroaches crawling around the bathroom. Despite the fact that we were exhausted and sick of traveling, that was enough to prompt us to get a taxi to our next destination, La Rioja. We finally arrived at around 2am. We spent Sunday in La Rioja and were amazed by how much of this little town shut down on Sundays. Nothing was open, not even most restaurants. Although the community pool was, so we spent the day relaxing in the sun.

I had no problem with spontaneous travel in Peru and Bolivia, but January and February is vacation time in South American, and Argentina and Chile are proving to be difficult to get around without advanced reservations. As a result, I decided to continue South instead of going with Uly and Dave to the beach in Chile as I had originally planned. So on to Mendoza to check out wine country......

San Pedro and horseback riding in the Atacama Desert

Sorry for the delay in updates; I have been working on my Spanish in Mendoza, Argentina.

I went to San Pedro after New Year Eve in the salt flats. San Pedro, while very touristy and somewhat expensive is surrounded by some of the most dramatic, spectacular landscapes I have ever seen. It is a adobe mountain town near the border of Bolivia, in the dry, barren Atacama Desert. The Atacama Desert stretches over 765 miles, and rain has never been recorded in some localities. The food in San Pedro was fantastic too, which was particularly nice after my gastric misadventures in the salt flats. I met a few people on the bus ride from the salt flats, and we went horseback riding in the Valle de la Luna, or Valley of the Moon. My equestrian experience prior to this trip was pretty limited. Fortunately two of my new friends were very experienced, as our guide didn't exactly give us any instruction, and the horses - particularly mine - were quite temperamental. Not long after we started out into the lunar-esque, mountainous desert, we tried to take a picture. One of the other horses kicked my horse, who subsequently freaked out and almost threw me off. Needless to say, I was a bit nervous about heading up the mountain for a 5- hour ride after that experience, but the scenery ended up being well worth it. There was hardly any vegetation covering the stark, sandy desert, and harsh winds whipped sand through the air. We watched a breathtaking sunset over the mountains before heading back to San Pedro. My horse was in rough shape by the end of the day after getting kicked, losing a horse shoe, and barely escaping injury after freaking out while going through a tunnel.

The following day we headed to Salta, Argentina, which proved to be a rather arduous process. The border crossing was tedious, and the Chilean border patrols exercised tortiselike speed. The process was painful enough that I opted to skip going back to Santiago, Chile after Mendoza. More stories soon on Salta, lakeside luxury for $30, cockroach hotel, Mendoza, and chocolate heaven.

I hope everyone is staying warm back home.

4WD expedition in the Salar de Uyuni

The Salar de Uyuni is the world's largest salt flat and is in Southern Bolivia. The first day of the salt flat tour we visited the train graveyard, which features Bolivia's first locomotive. From there, we continued on towards Colchani, a village at the entrance to the flats where laborers cut the salt into blocks. There were eight of us crammed into an antiquated Toyota Land Cruiser, which has seen better days. On they way to the salt flats it broke down. It initially appeared like the tour might not happen and we would have to return to Uyuni, but they sent someone out with a new hose and we were off again. But we continued to have trouble the for the entire three days.

The first day of the tour was by far the most spectacular and unlike anything I have ever seen. It is the rainy season, and the miles of white salt were covered in water, with a perfect mirror reflection of the deep, blue sky making it difficult to discern where the land ended the the sky began. We drove for miles across the salt flats with the water reaching the door of the Land Cruiser, feeling isolated from the rest of the world in the enormity of the salt desert. We stayed in a hostel in the middle of nowhere, and the night sky was incredible. We could see the Milky Way, and in a time frame of about 10 minutes we saw 4 shooting stars. On day two we saw numerous flamingos, Bolivian rabbits, and spectacular rock formations. Our hostel was across from a lake and some white mounds that looked like snow but weren't. I couldn't understand the guide, so I don't know what they were but I am guessing some type of mineral or something. It was New Years Eve that night, and they gave us wine and champagne, but we had to leave at 4am the next morning, so things were pretty mellow. AndI ended up getting sick AGAIN from the food they gave us, so needless to say, the rough 4WD driving through the mountains was a bit rough the next day. But despite being sick, I still enjoyed seeing the geysers as the sun rose. After breakfast, the geysers, and stopping at Laguna Verde (the green lake), I took a bus to San Pedro, Chile, which is a touristy little town in Northern Chile.

La Paz, Bolivia

I spent a night in Puno, which is the town on the Peruvian side of Lake Titicaca and then completed my journey to La Paz, Bolivia, one of the highest cities in the world and the capital of Bolivia. It really is amazing that they choose to build a city here as it is incredibly impractical. It sits in a bowl surrounded by the antiplano with elevations from 3000 to 4100 meters. I spent a just a day and a half here, and while it was fun to see, La Paz wasn't my favorite spot in South America. It is a very busy, chaotic city, with traffic that makes NYC seem mellow.

I went to the Coca Museum and then tried to find the Museum of Musical Instruments. While looking for the museum, which was a bit away from the touristy area, I had a somewhat disturbing experience. Two guys were working together- one posing as a tourist from Ecuador and the as a police officer - the first one distracted me by asking for help in a very persistent way, and the second one acted like he was trying to help me find the museum. The guy posing as a police officer showed us his badge and asked for copies of both of our passports. I had all my valuables with me because I had already checked out my my hostel but lied and said that I didn't have it with me. The "police officer" demanded we go with him to the police station since I didn't have my passport. He wasn't in uniform but was dressed up and kept showing me his badge. In retrospect, the scam is obvious, but at the time I was caught off guard enough to contemplate going with him in order to avoid the potential ramifications of refusing to cooperate with a police officer. Fortunately I trusted my instincts and told him I was going back to my hostel to get my passport. He just walked away with the other guy. I have since heard that this is a major problem in Bolivia.

That night I took a bus to Uyuni to see the Salt Flats.

Bus rides from hell

I have experienced numerous bus adventures, scary drivers, and related travel discomforts, but there are a few in particular that I think deserve mention. The first of which was the near accident on the way to the Colca Canyon, which really couldn't have been any closer. As we were going around a mountain pass, a bus was going around the corner on the wrong side of the road. Driving on the wrong side of the road is nothing unusual in Peru, but usually they honk or slow down a little when going around blind corners. Not so in this case. We had to serve and nearly went into the ditch, and the other bus swerved so much that it rocked back and forth for quite a while, almost tipping over.

The second bus story is one in which we actually did go into the ditch. On the way back from the Colca Canyon to Arequipa, while going over the highest pass, it started snowing and freezing rain. I kind of thought that the driver was going too fast for the slippery, windy roads, but I figured that he drives these roads all the time and must know what he's doing. I dozed off for a bit, and when I looked up again the road was turning, and we were not. There wasn't any damage, but it took a few tries for him to get out of the ditch. The scariest part of all of it was not going into the ditch but the fact that had we slid going around a corner the other direction, we would have probably gone off the side of the mountain. The driver didn't seem the least bit phased and continued driving much too fast making for a white-knuckled trip back to Arequipa.

The third bus story from the trip from Arequipa to Puno. I took what looked to be a decent bus from the outside for the 5 1/2 hour journey, but it ended up being quite a nightmare. The bus looked like it hadn't been cleaned in over a year, and they packed people in the aisles. There were two kids sitting next to me, one in the aisle, and one in the chair across the aisle. Not long after the trip began, they started throwing up and continued to throw up for the entire ride. They were obviously both sick before the start of the ride as their father was well prepared with numerous pastic bags that he threw out the windows when they were full. The boy in the aisle next to me didn't always make it in the bag though and threw-up all over the floor.

White Christmas in the Colca Canyon

I spent Christmas in the Colca Canyon, which is one of the world's deepest canyons in the world and home to the condors, the world's largest flying bird. The guide pointed out the Misti Canyon, vicuñas (South American deer), and other wildlife. During one of the stops we fed the llamas coca leaves. We also stopped at one of the highest passes, which was snow-covered, making it feel a little more like Christmas. We hiked for a few hours the first day and then headed for the hot springs. Christmas Eve dinner was in a restaurant with traditional Andean folk music and dancing. While not quite the same as Christmas in MN with family and friends, it was definitely a good celebration. The next day we did more hiking and visited the Cruz del Condor viewpoint, which provided spectacular views of the giant birds as well as the depth of the canyon. I returned to Arequipa on Christmas evening and met up in the Plaza with a few of the people I met on the tour.

Everyone in the group was very nice, but I was particularly impressed by a guy from Hungary. He was in a climbing accident when he was young and was in a wheel chair as a result. He has been traveling all through Central and South America alone. There isn't a city I have seen that is even remotely handicap friendly, so I give him a lot of credit.

The day after Christmas, I headed back to Bolivia to see the Salt Flats.