salta and jujuy

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soo last wedensday becca and I got on an 18 hour bus to salta from retiro at like 6:15 in the evening. they played bomb movies - premonition, made of honor, 27 dresses, and fed us delish alfajors and an edible dinner. we got to salta the next morning around noonish. we dropped off our stuff at backpackers hostel - city and made out for the city to do some exploring. we saw some linda churches, ate amazing food at doña salta - an amazing empanada with dried salted meat. we took a tram thing up to the top of the mountain and chiled by the waterfalls and then walked down the mountain, our legs were shaking! sooo then we are walking back downtown and a guy stops us asking for directions, turns out he's from NYC, born in Manhattan, talkabout a small fucking world. we checked out a museum that had 2 perfectly preserved mummies from the Incan people who dominated that region way back when - really creepy, they kept them in these rooms where the temperature was really cold. that night we went to la gargola, a parilla, and were served virtually every part of the cow on this mini barbecue for 29 pesos between the 2 of us...loved the salta prices. i mean, the lights did go out in the middle of dinner and everyone continued along like business as usual, but it was well worth it. we then trekked around looking for a fun bar to go to and wound up at goblin (gooblin according to our bootleg mapa) and had some salta cerveza.

friday we woke up bright and early around 7 am and to our surprise, desayuno fue riquis!! after that fernando, a young chico in a pink polo, grey jeans, and brown sunglasses comes in to pick us up. we get in a chi chi van and head for the montañas. the most amazing group ever was in our van!! it went like this, miguel our chauffeur who didn't speak at all except to laugh when fernando made fun of becca, then there was becca and I sitting with fernando, behind us was this really nice argentine woman who shared her mate with us and charlared with a guy from spain who spoke like 50 miles per minute, a brazilian woman who had been kidnapped before, two belgian girls who were like models, esther - this woman from canada who sold her bistro and has been travelling nonstop as a "full time job" aka my idol, some french girl who was really quiet, a crazy dude from buenos aires who thought he was all that, and some fat mexican guy who tried to be like a no it all and totally was putting the moves on esther. we checked out a bunch of spots in the desert, had lunch in a really small town, got wine helado after lunch and looked around a bit. when we got back to salta, molly was there so we tomared a cafe and went back to make plans for the next day. that night we had dinner at solar de convent, a bomb restaurant that gave us free glasses of great champagne, all our meals were pretty decent. afterwards we charlared at goblin which happened to be right down the street before heading back to our hostel. once again, a great but ridiculous hostel experience. the beds were awful and uncomfortable, the room always had a funky smell to it. some random dude also spent one night in our room and probably hated us for getting up so early the next day...

so the next day is saturday, and this was the excursion to the clouds...salta is famous for a train to the clouds which is really expensive and you need to make reservations way in advance. it's basically a sweet train that goes to the highest altitudes in the mountain. our hostel takes the chi chi van along the same route making several detours, for 270 pesos for a 15 hour day, to spend with fernando and miguel again? please, it was a no brainer. we went all through the mountains, stopping at the train tracks for the train to the clouds which ran over a dried out rio...que triste. we stopped over for cafe in a really small town in the mountains, later we went to a bigger pueblo for lunch that was really good. 2 hours later we were at the salt flats...i feel like everytime i take a trip i come back and write a blog entry about how amazing the place was and how ill never see anyhting quite as amazing...well yeah shoot me cause i'm saying it again - salt flats were unbelievable. like no hay palabras. just a hugeeee stretch of natural salt (i probared, it was great) with random pools of salt water, not quite sure what they were for. we got bumrushed out by fernando, had to keep a schedule. saw a lot of goats and lambs and llamas - great. we finally made it to the seven colored mountain - this mountain is naturally seven different colors because of mineral deposits or something. yeah, great EXCEPT for colorblind people those bitchesss. this mountain legit looked like any other rocky mountain. whatever, i took pictures and put them up so for all of you non colorblind people i'm sure they're just fuckingg amazingg (not even a little bit bitter)

that night, of course we didn't shower. rather we stumbled out to the city to the eat the worst pizza ive ever had in my entire life and then have the most amazing ice cream for dessert. a so so night, we didn't spend a lot of pesos which was the objective.

sunday, get ready because this is a ridiculous day. we wake up at 7:30 to be proactive, eat breakfast, head to the bus terminal and get on a bus to humahuaca bc the hostel had a bus schedule that said a bus was set to leave at 8:30, wellll that bus was completely full thank you rude bitch who just shook her head no at us. we bought our bus tickets home, another quilombo moment that we had, we were all just huge hot messes that day. we finally get on a bus from salta to jujuy that takes 2 hours. they blasted a bootleg straight to dvd sequel to the scorpion king the whole way, it was great. from jujuy we just made it to the most illegit bus in the continent and headed for humahuaca which was like over 3 hours. we finally make it to this cute little town. we're standing in this square figuring out which way to go to eat something before our 12 mile hike, when we get approached by these two guys, one of which is from tennessee...SERIOUSLY small world once again. he directs us to the area with places to eat. so after we stuff our face with some empanadas and coca light we head out for our hike. well biggest quilombo moment of the day, we had no snacks and limited water supply among the 3 of us. sooo we were corpses by the time we reached these ruins...its basically these clay houses that no one knows what they were used for or who they were used by. molly was like ill just leave the water here as we emerge from this trench and we were all like duh that is the best idea in the entire world.. yeahh took us awhile to get that bottle back. sooo by the time we got back to town we were officially dead, like no life left in us at all right. we get on a bus to go back to jujuy and this bus LITERALLY stops ever inch in every pueblo in argentina and is just loving it its becoming like a party bus...sooo ridiculous that we don't get back to jujuy til way after 10...the next bus is at 11:30 so we go to the shiestiest parilla in the bus stop and get sandwiches and beer and get back on the bus to salta...we arrive at like 2 am and obviously don't shower, just crawl into our cramped wooden beds and descansar.

monday, our last day we checked out of the hotel and did the tram thing again to the top of the mountain, then went out to lunch at doña salta again and got back on our bus to buenos aires. this time they played meet dave - the one where eddie murphy is like a tiny alien, worst movie ever made, then king of california which i really really liked and wanted...dinner was amazingly good like rivals meals that angeles prepares for us here.

really glad that i went with molly and becca they were great to travel with. also glad to be back in buenos aires for awhile, next trip will be to bariloche in 2 weeks. can't wait for the 21st festivities to begin this weekend!!

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