Bribery, corruption and the biggest steak ever

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Hola!

Yup its another hot day outside and here I am writing to you all inside the cool internet cafe.... I seriously can´t believe the amazing weather that we´ve been having - its only rained once and that was the first day in Rio. Every other day has been in the mid-20s with blue sky to go with it. The evenings are cool but so far so good, apart from getting mugged by the mozzies...

Anyway, after leaving the land of salsa (Brasil), we headed over to Paraguay for 4 nights. On our way to the capital, Asuncion, we got caught up in a road block because the truckies were protesting againist the rising fuel prices. There were police there too but because Paraguay is one of the most corrupt countries in the world, they really didn´t give a rat´s arse as to what was happening.

There is only one road from the border to Asuncion, and when we arrived mid-afternoon, we found the truckies letting off fireworks and eating oranges. We got told that there was a meeting happening in Asuncion and if it wasn´t resolved within the hour, then half the truckies were going to block the border entrance and the other half were going to block the entrance to Asuncion. Even if we´d wanted to take Jack (our bright yellow truck) off-roading, we had 4 more blockades to get through...

Anyway after some wait, they managed to resolve the issue and we were free to go ahead. That was fine, until we hit another road block. Only this time, the truckies that we spoke to had been waiting for over 5 and a half days, with no sign of when that one would be sorted. After an even longer wait there, we found that there was an alternative route that we could take and off we went.

Spent 2 nights in Asuncion which was cool but not much there. From there, we headed south to Trinidad and camped for 2 nights.... only we´ve realised that life is too short and pretty much everyone is taking the option of upgrading if we can (yup we´re just too lazy to put up a tent). In Trinidad, all of us slept in the hall that they had on sight and it seriously felt like a school camp!!

From Trinidad, we crossed the border into Argentina and spent 2 days travelling up to Salta, which is were we are now. On the way, we got pulled over by the cops who came up with all sorts of excuses to fine us from going through a light (he kept changing the story about whether it was a red or orange light) and saying that we needed seatbelts which is not a requirement here. Anyway basically he tried to bribe Pedro and Dave into giving him 100 pesos ($34 US) but we got away with giving him 30 pesos.

We all spent the free camping night sleeping in Jack, and Adam (one of the guys on the tour) had bought a hammock in Asuncion, so he had the luck of having a decent night´s sleep on Jack, while the rest of us didn´t.

Last night after checking into our cabins at the campsite (they seriously look like they´ve come from Goldielocks and the 3 bears...), we all headed out to a local Argentian steakhouse and had the biggest steaks that we´ve all ever had.

I ended up having churrasco de filet, which for 33 pesos ($10 US) was amazing value. It weighed about 600 grams and I was a piggy and ate the WHOLE thing (along with fries and salad). No one else was able to eat all their steak but it was sooooooooo good! I still can´t believe that I ate it all... oh well 😉

Anyway am going to go ziplining tomorrow which should be awesome and then we head to Boliva on Tuesday.

Hasta la vista!
Brooke x

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Photos

Whats a girl to do?
Caught in the first road block... not sure how long we were going to be stranded for. At least the sun was out...

Too much steak
I ate all of this steak along with crisps and a salad. Lets just say I couldn't go out partying with the others that night...

Comments

[gordon]

wow!
Awesome trip Brooke. Thanks for sharing them with us. Enjoying reading about your adventures (as always). A book in the making perhaps?

[danielmain]

Good combo
Ziplining on a full stomach of steak. Let the fun times roll!