salta.
buenos aires, salta.
first impression during the bus transfer to the national airport: buenos aires is grey. let’s be positive and assume this is not the most exciting part of the city. i meet some nice french people on the plane to salta: michel, arnaud, justine and atika. actually it’s a rendezvous: they were with me on the plane from paris. during the small-talk i find out that they have a similar schedule in salta so i suggest that we share the rental car. i would not claim that my rusty french is good enough to follow their internal discussion but i understand ‘o.k.’. apart from cost-sharing, it’s convenient: somebody reads the maps while i drive. so my driving is only disturbed by sight-seeing not by an additional investigation of maps. applied risk-reduction strategy. and if we get lost i can blame somebody else – it’s always the ‘map master’s’ fault. let’s not forget that the french have a good combination of genes when it comes to appreciating food, so i don’t have to discuss why and when the next restaurant needs to be visited. a social factor that must not be underestimated. the hostel in salta is ok. i have a dorm for myself. the costs for lodging seem endurable since the peso is weak. 5 euro per night. the first steak creates high hopes. if this is standard then i won’t die from hunger.
first impression during the bus transfer to the national airport: buenos aires is grey. let’s be positive and assume this is not the most exciting part of the city. i meet some nice french people on the plane to salta: michel, arnaud, justine and atika. actually it’s a rendezvous: they were with me on the plane from paris. during the small-talk i find out that they have a similar schedule in salta so i suggest that we share the rental car. i would not claim that my rusty french is good enough to follow their internal discussion but i understand ‘o.k.’. apart from cost-sharing, it’s convenient: somebody reads the maps while i drive. so my driving is only disturbed by sight-seeing not by an additional investigation of maps. applied risk-reduction strategy. and if we get lost i can blame somebody else – it’s always the ‘map master’s’ fault. let’s not forget that the french have a good combination of genes when it comes to appreciating food, so i don’t have to discuss why and when the next restaurant needs to be visited. a social factor that must not be underestimated. the hostel in salta is ok. i have a dorm for myself. the costs for lodging seem endurable since the peso is weak. 5 euro per night. the first steak creates high hopes. if this is standard then i won’t die from hunger.
we pick the rental car up and drive off. traffic is moderate and luckily lacks the excitement of the traditional asian suicide attempts. first short trip: horseback riding at a village close to salta.
not that it was on my schedule but in gaucho's country you actually have to do like the gauchos do, so i follow my companions’ suggestion. it’s this typical irrational tourist behaviour: just because you leave your home you start to do things you wouldn’t do normally. riding elephants in elephant country, riding camels in camel country or riding horses in horse country. this is horse country. so here we are: me and friend horse. i choose the one with the blanket that fits my jacket (that behaviour is caused by this weird chromosome even tough guys like me carry around. and if you have 2 of them you not only choose a fitting horse. that’s when you have a car with an interior design that matches the colour of your socks which suit the pattern of your blouse which goes well with the texture of …let’s not go into details. you know what i mean anyway). so friend horse fits me. i look dashing on this wild beast. speaking of dashing: that’s exactly what’s on friend horse’s mind. most of the time i’m busy trying to keep it from what horses are made for: running. for somebody who has no clue how a horse functions it’s interesting to see how it operates in different modes. even more exciting is to try and control the operating modes. the problem is the interface: no dial on this gadget. and i’m not really a horse whisperer. not to mention that the german verbal interface is disabled: commands like ‘huea’ (start), “schneller treue rosinante” (accelerate), “brrr” (stop) or “oh gott oh gott” (emergency stop) don’t work. the argentine horses only run with the spanish command edition. which means that i spend the next hours uttering a permanent ‘ssh ssh ssh’ to keep it on the lowest mode following ‘parking’: ‘slow trot’. this mode is defined by a permanent collision of my butt (more precisely its bones) and the saddle. i bounce up and down and up and down and … the only positive aspect is that it’s less life-threatening than the ‘gallop’ mode. for professionals and hazardous heroes gallop is where fun starts but for wimps like me that’s more where control ends. so i enjoy the landscape (adventure country starts right behind salta), talk to friend horse (‘ssh, ssh, ssh’) and try to understand how one can spend a life on a horse. certainly i deny to join the proposed galloping intermezzo – not only because i have the fragile camera with me but also based on a bit of common sense: rule 1 says ‘don't race if you can't walk’. rule 2 says ‘if you break your bones make sure it happens at the end of your vacation’.
most of the people actually go for the race so i have the honour to watch a highly interesting show: a herd of happily running horses with attached packages on their backs that look a lot like tourists who are supposed to be in control but whose faces show expressions varying from ‘ups, that’s fast!’ to ‘i think i’m not really in control’ to ‘oh shit!’. the closer they get the louder the ‘ssh’ commands become. it’s hard to scream a sound that’s usually whispered but i can confirm that it’s possible. i don’t hear any ‘yeeha!’ though… how come? in the cases where the horses are completely out of control luckily the guides are able to bring them to a halt. sometimes it’s just a matter of seconds to avoid accidents. it’s still a miracle to me that nobody fell. now i know there was a good reason why we had to sign that liability statement before we started...
a question for experienced riders: is there a comfortable saddle for people whose butt consists of bones and muscles not of huge amounts of cushioning fat? let’s put it is this way: the entertainment takes 3 hours, the experience lasts for more than a day. for dinner we visit at a fancier restaurant and continue with the daily food routine: steak. tonight it’s an endurable variation with massala sauce. i have a feeling that in this country the meat will meet my high expectations but that i won’t find real culinary sophistication. but that’s better than chewy meat and sauces with complex nuances. and where can you get a good fillet mignon for 3 euro anyway?
not that it was on my schedule but in gaucho's country you actually have to do like the gauchos do, so i follow my companions’ suggestion. it’s this typical irrational tourist behaviour: just because you leave your home you start to do things you wouldn’t do normally. riding elephants in elephant country, riding camels in camel country or riding horses in horse country. this is horse country. so here we are: me and friend horse. i choose the one with the blanket that fits my jacket (that behaviour is caused by this weird chromosome even tough guys like me carry around. and if you have 2 of them you not only choose a fitting horse. that’s when you have a car with an interior design that matches the colour of your socks which suit the pattern of your blouse which goes well with the texture of …let’s not go into details. you know what i mean anyway). so friend horse fits me. i look dashing on this wild beast. speaking of dashing: that’s exactly what’s on friend horse’s mind. most of the time i’m busy trying to keep it from what horses are made for: running. for somebody who has no clue how a horse functions it’s interesting to see how it operates in different modes. even more exciting is to try and control the operating modes. the problem is the interface: no dial on this gadget. and i’m not really a horse whisperer. not to mention that the german verbal interface is disabled: commands like ‘huea’ (start), “schneller treue rosinante” (accelerate), “brrr” (stop) or “oh gott oh gott” (emergency stop) don’t work. the argentine horses only run with the spanish command edition. which means that i spend the next hours uttering a permanent ‘ssh ssh ssh’ to keep it on the lowest mode following ‘parking’: ‘slow trot’. this mode is defined by a permanent collision of my butt (more precisely its bones) and the saddle. i bounce up and down and up and down and … the only positive aspect is that it’s less life-threatening than the ‘gallop’ mode. for professionals and hazardous heroes gallop is where fun starts but for wimps like me that’s more where control ends. so i enjoy the landscape (adventure country starts right behind salta), talk to friend horse (‘ssh, ssh, ssh’) and try to understand how one can spend a life on a horse. certainly i deny to join the proposed galloping intermezzo – not only because i have the fragile camera with me but also based on a bit of common sense: rule 1 says ‘don't race if you can't walk’. rule 2 says ‘if you break your bones make sure it happens at the end of your vacation’.
most of the people actually go for the race so i have the honour to watch a highly interesting show: a herd of happily running horses with attached packages on their backs that look a lot like tourists who are supposed to be in control but whose faces show expressions varying from ‘ups, that’s fast!’ to ‘i think i’m not really in control’ to ‘oh shit!’. the closer they get the louder the ‘ssh’ commands become. it’s hard to scream a sound that’s usually whispered but i can confirm that it’s possible. i don’t hear any ‘yeeha!’ though… how come? in the cases where the horses are completely out of control luckily the guides are able to bring them to a halt. sometimes it’s just a matter of seconds to avoid accidents. it’s still a miracle to me that nobody fell. now i know there was a good reason why we had to sign that liability statement before we started...
a question for experienced riders: is there a comfortable saddle for people whose butt consists of bones and muscles not of huge amounts of cushioning fat? let’s put it is this way: the entertainment takes 3 hours, the experience lasts for more than a day. for dinner we visit at a fancier restaurant and continue with the daily food routine: steak. tonight it’s an endurable variation with massala sauce. i have a feeling that in this country the meat will meet my high expectations but that i won’t find real culinary sophistication. but that’s better than chewy meat and sauces with complex nuances. and where can you get a good fillet mignon for 3 euro anyway?
purmamarca, tilcara and humahuaca.
we need an hour to find a way out of salta due to unexpected road work and a lack of orientation (yup, the map master’s fault ;-) ) but after the initial problems it’s a convenient drive on the deserted toll roads. purmamarca.
an unassuming little village surrounded by some colourful rocky hills which are unsurprisingly named ‘7 colour hills’. we do a short but interesting hike through the hills. tilcara.
at lunch we experience an unusual ‘locals served first’ service in the restaurant. we’re ready to order but we’re professionally ignored by the waiters who are concentrated on everybody except us. ‘hola’, ‘perdon’, ‘senior’ is not creating a wished reaction except a ‘si, si’. that’s not too dramatic unless ‘everybody except us’ means a complete bus of school-kids who aren’t really quick when it comes to deciding on the dish. let’s hope this is not the standard service.
we continue to the pre-columbian fortification ‘el pucara’. not much to see except some fundaments but the landscape with the canyon, the surrounding hills and countless cactuses is interesting enough. humahuaca.
we continue through the broad canyon (which is called ‘quebrada’ in argentina) to the village of humahuaca. by the time we arrive the village is sort of closed down: no tourists (the trek has obviously left already), no stalls, not even locals are on the street. the only thing that’s missing to complete the picture is an official information about the village’s business hours. we stroll through the cobble stone streets and try to find out why this village is promoted as a picturesque touristic highlight as it lacks the ambiance of the indio villages you may find in peru. we can’t really figure it out but at least we find a little café with good hot chocolate (which is called ‘submarino’ in argentina): a chunk of dark chocolate that’s dissolved in the milk. a good chocolate always saves the day, doesn’t it?
we need an hour to find a way out of salta due to unexpected road work and a lack of orientation (yup, the map master’s fault ;-) ) but after the initial problems it’s a convenient drive on the deserted toll roads. purmamarca.
an unassuming little village surrounded by some colourful rocky hills which are unsurprisingly named ‘7 colour hills’. we do a short but interesting hike through the hills. tilcara.
at lunch we experience an unusual ‘locals served first’ service in the restaurant. we’re ready to order but we’re professionally ignored by the waiters who are concentrated on everybody except us. ‘hola’, ‘perdon’, ‘senior’ is not creating a wished reaction except a ‘si, si’. that’s not too dramatic unless ‘everybody except us’ means a complete bus of school-kids who aren’t really quick when it comes to deciding on the dish. let’s hope this is not the standard service.
we continue to the pre-columbian fortification ‘el pucara’. not much to see except some fundaments but the landscape with the canyon, the surrounding hills and countless cactuses is interesting enough. humahuaca.
we continue through the broad canyon (which is called ‘quebrada’ in argentina) to the village of humahuaca. by the time we arrive the village is sort of closed down: no tourists (the trek has obviously left already), no stalls, not even locals are on the street. the only thing that’s missing to complete the picture is an official information about the village’s business hours. we stroll through the cobble stone streets and try to find out why this village is promoted as a picturesque touristic highlight as it lacks the ambiance of the indio villages you may find in peru. we can’t really figure it out but at least we find a little café with good hot chocolate (which is called ‘submarino’ in argentina): a chunk of dark chocolate that’s dissolved in the milk. a good chocolate always saves the day, doesn’t it?
cafayate.
from salta we drive south towards cafayate through another canyon along the rio de las conchas. it’s one of these rides where a ‘not bad, not bad’ hardly describes the impressions. an endless winding road that goes on for hours, behind every curve another fantastic viewpoint. a landscape that makes death valley look boring. we’re literally forced to stop every kilometre to take pictures: wide and deep canyons, bizarre formations of rocks, open deserted areas, perfect sky. no reason to complain today. i start to like the country more and more.
in the afternoon we join a fiesta at the central plaza with real gauchos and real horses. certainly more lively and interesting than humahuaca.
at dinner we try the local specialty: desert wine. not bad, not outstanding either. today’s break from the routine: lamb. what can i say? not bad, not outstanding either.
from salta we drive south towards cafayate through another canyon along the rio de las conchas. it’s one of these rides where a ‘not bad, not bad’ hardly describes the impressions. an endless winding road that goes on for hours, behind every curve another fantastic viewpoint. a landscape that makes death valley look boring. we’re literally forced to stop every kilometre to take pictures: wide and deep canyons, bizarre formations of rocks, open deserted areas, perfect sky. no reason to complain today. i start to like the country more and more.
in the afternoon we join a fiesta at the central plaza with real gauchos and real horses. certainly more lively and interesting than humahuaca.
at dinner we try the local specialty: desert wine. not bad, not outstanding either. today’s break from the routine: lamb. what can i say? not bad, not outstanding either.
catchi.
we spend the day on a really rough gravel road that doesn’t accelerate the healing process … but the stunning landscape compensates the pain. again desert and rocks, but today it’s even more deserts and more rocks. same, same but different.
once a while (actually a long while) we see people who walk on the dusty street. i really wonder why you would live literally in the middle of nowhere (very funny when you live in metropolitan leimen, i know), 3 or more hours walking distance from the next tiny settlement. i mean there’s nothing out here, the next espresso place is probably 50 km away. sometimes it's good just to be a visitor – and relatively exciting to live in leimen. we arrive in catchi. again the 'why are we in this village’ question. again no answer. the only remarkable thing is the service in a restaurant which makes the german ‘service desert’ look like a wonderful oasis. the place is packed and we're nor really acknowledged a guests. there’s no menu available for us (why does everybody else gets one?) so the waitress quickly says what we can have – not that we really understand it – and she doesn’t really look to happy that we have to ask again to understand. she disappears. she stays away. maybe she’s on the dusty road back to cafayate? finally a lifelong suspicion is confirmed. ‘waitress’ comes from ‘wait’. i have to admit that we have our fun though: we entertain ourselves and come up with strange things that will happen next – something like the appearance of menus, food and drinks – and the waitress. at that time we’re still hopeful. but self-fulfilling prophecy doesn’t work here. nothing happens. we wait. we try to get the waitress’ attention. and we wait more. we’re foreigners, we’re patient, we’re polite, and we’re hungry. the latter must be obvious by now. as an act of pity, to make sure we don’t forget why we initially entered this place (food?) and to keep the theoretical chance of a tip suddenly forks and knifes are suddenly throw on the table by our service representative. we show our appreciation and solidarity to keep her in a positive mood and to avoid any further delays. only a happy waitress is a good waitress. by now we have reduced our expectations dramatically. and to make sure we don’t forget why we have the cutlery on the table and as a gesture of endless mercy she makes the miracle happens. food arrives. later. much, much later. some of us are really lucky: they actually get their french fries with the meat, not after the traditional ‘waitress torture delay’.
i think these things are part of a sociological experiment or they happen just to make sure that people have something they can write in their travel dairies or perform as a little play in front of the family when they’re back home. it’s a very hidden humour they have here. you have to search intensively but once you find it it’s funny.
we continue through the cactus landscape of the los cardonnes national park. after a short hike on the pass we descend towards salta on an endlessly winding road for an hour. ‘no papeles’. that’s a phrase that indicates the beginning of troubles. the papers for the rental car are missing and an endless discussion starts. when we took the car the lady from the rental car company put it in the car and told us to leave it there and now they are gone. certainly we’re kindly informed now that we’re responsible for it (as paragraph 17 b in the contract shows) and that we’re mercifully allowed to pay for it. i’m furious. they could have told us before. i think we’re set up, even more as we left the car at the company’s car park for a night before we went to cafayate. and my mood is not getting better when they tell me that paying with the credit card would be an extra 17%! sometimes i regret that i can’t execute a simplistic medieval procedure of justice: you just cut your opponent into pieces and things are settled once and for all. instead poor michel has to translate the whole quarrel between me and the mafioso from the company. finally i give in to pay the fine as there is no way to prove our innocence. ..them - sorry, the politically correct expression is 'appriacte them minimally positively'.
salta, mendoza .
after the traditional morning coffee with a pile of croissants at the main plaza i take the bus to mendoza: luckily i get the last business class seat that really allows me to stretch my legs. if the video is turned off even sleep is possible (i brought heaps of earplugs with me ;-) ), which is a rather important aspect on a night-bus. the extra money for the first class is well invested. it’s worthless to discuss the food though, simply because it’s worthless food. the simple advice: byo.