Salta & Enriques horse riding

---

After a long long bus ride we arrived in Salta at 10pm. Having suprised both myself and Seamus so far by not losing anything, I managed to live up to my reputation and half way into the journey I realised I had left my glasses in the hostel in San Pedro. As we were alreay half way to Argentina there was little I could do until we arrived in Salta. Seamus was more annoyed than I was especially after I confessed I had kicked something under the bed but because I had my big rucksack on could not be bothered to bend down and see what it was....won´t be making that mistake again!

Luckily our interpreter as she has since become known was with us and so was able to ring the hostel once we arrived in Salta to explain my issue. Thankfully the lady had found them and agreed to put them on the next bus out of San Pedro and assured Ilhame they would be with me by Sunday. I have never been so relieved in all my life! Images of me in an Argentinian opticians trying to explain which circles looked darker or lighter in broken Spanish was not appealing! Ilhame thank you sooo much!

Our hostel on the first night was a little shady....not only did it look liek it was still being built, there appeared to be noone else there and we were handed sheets to make our own beds! Not that I adverse to making a bed but when you pay for a service.....

Luckily however the shower was hot and it was too late to move so we decided to move on the next morning.

We ended up spending 5 days in Salta in the end, it is a nice city to spend a few days and has a very continental feel about it. There was a festival on whilst we were there so the city had a really nice buzz about it. We ended up bumping into our guide form the most dangerous road in Bolivia and spend Sunday sitting in a cafe and then headint to the cinema...felt like a sunday at home! Myself and Seamus then headed to the bus station where thankfully my glasses had arrived!

Our new hostel was much nicer and busier and here we met Anna and Daniel (two fellow brits) and Adeline from France. The 6 of us decided to have a go at horse riding and on the Monday headed out to a ranch owned by a sex obsessed Argentinian called Enrique.. The ranch was really lovely and we had two Argentinian cowboys (gouchos as they are known) and a South African girl as our guides. We arrived in the morning where breakfast was laid out and then given our horses and headed out on a 3 hour treck into the country side. When we returned to ranch we had the biggest lunch I think of us have ever had! Enrique ensured the wine was continually topped up and he cooked the biggest BBQ we have EVER seen. Seamus had 5 steaks and has we not run out of time no doubt would have been given far more...apparently he is too skinny by Argentinian standards! Enrique was a real character and took it in turn to victimise pretty much everyone at the table. Seamus or ´red man´as he was affectionately called definately came out with the worst ribbing!

After lunch we headed back out on the horses (strangely everyone felt a lot more confident) and we had a lasso lesson in which we took it in turns to be the target! Brilliant!

Back to the ranch for tea and biscuits (and more wine!) before heading back to Salta.

The next day we could barely move so decided to take it easy with a days very slow sight seeing. Anna and Daniel left for Bolivia and the rest of us got the cable car up to the top of the mountain over looking Salta. Was really pretty and best of all required very little walking! Rest of the day we did nothing..it was great!

We had a great few days in Salta and on the last night said farewell to Ilhame our travelling buddy of almost two weeks.

Tomorrow we are off to Iguazu falls on the longest bus ride yet...23 hours here we come!

---