Presidente Salta

... 8211; a place with several hundred thousand people, all sorts of street lights and a McDonalds’ which, to our surprise, straightened out Laynni’s on and off stomach faster than a monkey on unicycle. It worked, I mean. The new food theme continued at La Monumental, a place we were told to go for really good, if rather expensive, steaks. But hey, when in Argentina…. We wandered in a little hesitantly, skeptical of this huge, brightly lit gymnasium with ...

... top of the mountain and went to MAAM museum where we say a mummified child from the Inca period - apparently there is a lot of controversy surrounding this place, as some people don&#8217;t think a body of a human should be on display - and it is pretty strange experience seeing a nearly perfectly preserved human body in a museum - especially being a child.<br><br>Our bus didn&#8217;t leave ...

... had missed out on over the past weeks was the use of a good mirror. I&#8217;d been dropping hints for a while about Suren&#8217;s biblical-style beard, and the need to buy him some shaving cream - but my protesting was nothing compared to a good long stare in the mirror, and without any further insistence, Suren was off to find a barber! You can see from the before and after photos Suren lost his beard and about 15 years from his age : )<br>

... a pretty stream. We witnessed quite a lot of poverty as we passed several shacks with kids playing outside who all waved and shouted hello as we passed. We had a stop and the gaucho went into a field and picked nuts from the trees which we snacked on. By the end of the afternoon we could barely move and were relieved to get back to the ranch and off of our horses. We were greeted with tea before being taken back to our hostel.

... the most elaborate manmade concrete water fall I think I have ever seen. The early colonial Spanish buildings were much more preserved than they had been in Peru and Bolivia. Actually crossing the border from Bolivia to Argentina is more like flying to the other side of the world, so stark is the contrast. The town centre in Salta was lively but still nothing like what we had experienced in Mexico.<br><br>For our last night the ...

... the corrupt border officials threatened to tear the visa out of the passport! At the La Quiaca/Villazon border, payment, a little Spanish and a smile were all I needed to enter the country. However, in the back of my mind I was cursing ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) for their direct role in all of these ridiculous reciprocal visa fees (BRIC countries + Bolivia). Steve and I walked the 200m to the Villazon bus stand and ...

... year, some of these cacti were over 1000 years old. While protected, the wood from dead ones are used to make furniture. Weird thinking of cacti producing usable wood but it looked really cool. If only we could have carried it back............................ The last day wound round more tiny dirt roads on the edge of the mountains, back into Salta. We were so rapt we did the trip, it was absolutely stunning! Back in Salta itself ...

this is where we now have to drive across the huge expanse of south america.... we arent giving argentina any justica...we have decided we will come back and travel slower and further south, along with chile.... we say goodbye to the mad alaskans, and ellie , lukey and i move on

Horse riding was great. for me. not for amber. my horse, indigo, very passive, knew the way, lovely (only got a bit spooked twice when ambers horse went nuts). amber´s horse was mental. fine most the time but on 4 occassions went a bit crazy and at one point, top of sand dunes in the valley of the dead, did great impression of a bucking bronco. funny for me. not for her. our guide did not speak english and instead of helping just kind of ...

... Cafe Tortoni. We were led downstairs to a cosy brick walled room filled with small round tables facing a stage. For an hour and a half we were entertained over dinner and wine by Tango dancing and music formed into a show. Although we didn´t really understand the storyline as it was all in Spanish, it was a great evening. We also took a day trip to Uruguay to bring our passport stamps to a total of 20 countries, but that´s another entry...