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Published: April 8th 2009
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I started the first edition of this blog an hour ago and as pressing save there happened to be a power cut! Anyway, I have another four hours to kill until my bus so I´ve surrendered to starting over.
Anyway onto Salta..... nice place, nice people, hot. You should go!
No really... driving into Salta was incredible. It made the 20hr journey with my three varities of cheese and ham sandwiches seem a long way away. It was very early morning and the bus took a route where the whole city could be seen. I knew straight away I would like the city and it didn´t fail to meet my expectations.
It was the first place I hadn´t booked a hostel but arriving early I knew I had plenty of time to walk around and find somewhere nice. Luckily, I found a perfect hostel near the square, run by Spanish speakers only meaning I had no alternative but to speak Spanish. Ivana, the girl at reception was great and we were soon organising Spanish schools, tours and other activities. She must have gone through the whole Spanish dictionary to find alternative to words that I didn´t understand.
I compare a lot of cities to Krakow but with Salta I found lots of similarities. It has a certain cosmopolitan feel but retains a lot of culture and South American-ness (word? it is now!) despite being a huge tourist spot. It´s used as a gateway by a lot of travellers for Bolivia, Chile and the North of Argentina and I can see why. The main attraction is the square in the city centre, surrounded by cafes. Another great road is Balarce, filled with bars and restaurants. These places don´t even get half filled until 1-2am! My body clock certainly needs adjusting when I get back to the UK.
The week in Salta was spent with Spanish lessons in the afternoons with Gabriela. This time with a private teacher and far more intense than group lessons. However, she did sometimes forget whether she was speaking English or Spanish, a good thing for me.
Three Irish guys and James and Rachel from Manchester also shared my room in the hostel during the week and we got on amazingly. We spent pretty much the whole week together, walking around town, going out in the evenings, cooking a variety of dishes,
chatting and playing stupid games. One evening we made stacks of empanadas (remember the cornish pasty things?). My pierogi making skills came in great use and I think we´re almost ready to open a business!
Apart from cooking I also participated in one of the tours around the area, a 12 hour trip to the Sallindes Grandes. The van took a circuit to Humuhucua, the Sallindes Grandes (Salt Flats), an old Inca village and a few other desolate villages in the valleys. We followed the same route as the ´Train to the Clouds´ (unfortunately not running at the moment) but the van jouney was just as exciting. Our tour guide was also great and thought it was hilarous to pretend to drive the van off without us leaving us in the desert.
The trip included an ascent to over 4000m and despite being provided cocoa leaves to beat altitude sickness, I decided I would be ok. (To put this in perspective, you have to chew about 25 leaves and keep them in the side of your mouth, not my cup of tea!). Anyway, serves me right, an hour into the trip I soon found my head over a
Let sleeping dogs lie
and then take photos of them plastic bag and feeling like my head was about to explode. Nice! At least it´s a talking point.
I met Anna from London on the trip and also an ex-Argentine well known goverment economist...if only i could remember his name. Anyway, he treated us to Cocoa Tea on top of the moutain which was lovely. He also provided his advice on the UK economy. I probably won´t be repeating it....
The finale of the trip was the Salt Flats! An ambition of mine has always been to take photos here and I got very over excited in taking the optical illusion photos (pictures to come). It resulted in yet another fun episode of altitude sickness.
Overall, Salta was an amazing week. A testament to how great Salta is, are the people. They are amongst the nicest and friendliest people in Argentina (probably to do with the constant sun and 4 hours of sleep in the afternoon) but still.... We met a lot of locals through the hostel and they´re always helpful, interested in why you´re there and what you do and they like to party a lot.
On another note but while I think about it...one
particular night Victor, who worked at a nearby hostel, bought his dog to a very popular restaurant just out of town. We jumped into a cab afterwards back to the town and Victor assured us that the dog would be fine. 2km down the road, the dog was still running beside the cab and met us just 10 mins later in the main square. I´m still amazed!
My last day in Salta I went up in the Telefirico to get a full overview of the city and walked back down to the square for my last cup of coffee. Again, it was really sad to say goodbye but time is ticking and I have waterfalls and weddings to get to. Next stop, Puerto Igascu... the most Northern point of Argentina.
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