Beer and BBQ in Salta

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Day 626 (15.12.08)

After an excellent breakfast we decided to head out together with Tess and Haydn to explore Salta. Immediately on our arrival we'd felt the difference between here and Bolivia with a far more developed and prosperous feel to the city yet the streets were still teeming with cars and the hustle and bustle of South America was still very apparent.

We planned to explore the area around the city so after trawling a few car rental companies and booking ourselves a vehicle for the next couple of days we made our way towards the central plaza passing some very bright and ornately decorated churches as we walked. The plaza, lined on all sides with beautiful buildings, was very pretty and, we felt, the perfect spot for a light refreshment. As we sat under a pavement umbrella sheltering from the heat of the day with a beer in our hands it almost felt like we could be in Paris or any other grand European city.

As the day rolled on it seemed that siesta was still a time-honoured tradition in Salta and everything around us was closing up until later in the day. We made the most of our hostel's pool and sat in the garden drinking some more beers and playing some more Skip-Bo (a game that we've quickly become addicted to!)

The hostel was arranging a barbecue for the evening so we decided to join in with that and learn about eating the Argentinian way. We quickly found to our delight that it would involve large amounts of steak but to our dismay that in Argentina you eat late...very late. Our tummies rumbling madly it was 11pm before we tucked into our delicious dinners that were definitely well worth the wait!

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