I think we could easily have spent our entire trip exploring North-West Argentina, as it's a beautiful region, the weather is perfect - well a little too hot, perhaps - and there is plenty to see and do, much more than we had initially expected. We had originally planned two weeks in the north west, but that quickly became three, and would easily have become four had we not taken the decision to move on. Tucumán: Where the siesta should be obligatory San Migual de Tucumán (or Tucumán as practically every one calls it) is the largest city in the northwest but we spent less time here than in any other place we visited, with only 12 hours between our arrival from Tafi del Valle on the bus and and our departure on an overnight bus ... read more

Twenty hours after leaving Asuncion we finally arrived at our next destination, Salta, in North-West Argentina. This was the longest bus journey of our trip so far and we were a little unfortunate in that neither of the buses we took had "cama" facilities: I'm not sure such a thing exists in Paraguay, whilst the only bus with spaces from Resistencia to Salta was semi-cama. It might not seem that big a deal but for me it's the fine line between a good night's sleep and staying awake most of the night! At 7am we made it to Salta and were immediately talked into a hostel nearby for 45 pesos. Well, that solved the accommodation problem anyway. Salta is at 1190m altitude so after such a long journey we should probably have taken it easy, but, ... read more

A few months before we began our trip I remember we went to Stanfords, the best travel shop in London, to ask for books or any information about Paraguay. And they had practically nothing. No guidebook, no maps, no travel literature; all they offered was Lonely Planet's South America Shoestring guide which gives 29 pages (out of 1000+) to Paraguay. So what was it that put everyone off from travelling here? As we crossed the border from Posadas in Argentina, I read the Lonely Planet to see what we could expect from Paraguay: Friendly people, who all carry guns, and in the countryside, horrible poisonous snakes. Excellent! Paraguay, however, made a good first impression on us. The lady in the tourist office at the border was possibly the most friendly and helpful tourismo person we´ve met ... read more

Back in Argentina Just as we were leaving Uruguay a big storm hit the Rio Uruguay area so we abandoned our original plan of going to Concordia and Colon; instead we travelled further inland to Parana, on Argentina´s longest river, Rio Parana. The bus from Concordia to Parana was great - we travelled in Cama class which, despite reclining seats, movies, food and drink, is apparently only the third best class of bus in Argentina. I can´t wait to try the others! Argentina seems to have gone rugby mad since we left. The soccer authorities even changed the start time of the football match between River-Plate and Boca Juniors, the biggest club game in the football calendar, as it clashed with one of the Argentina's games. I guess, seeing as we're here now and Ireland are ... read more

After two very busy weeks in Buenos Aires, it felt like we needed a holiday, so we went across the Rio de la Plata to Colonia del Sacremento, a relaxed town in south-west Uruguay. We had had a great time in BA but I think it was time for a change. Many people we had spoken to were planning to visit Colonia on day-trips or overnight trips from BA but we decided to really take it easy and stayed here for 3 nights. We took the slowest (also the cheapest) ferry from BA, which meant we had to wake at 6.30 am to arrive in time. I think the previous night´s party was just finishing up at the Downtown Mate hostel at this time but we did manage to get a little bit of sleep before ... read more