Wild West (well it felt a bit like it)

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- FOOD: The remains of the eggs and horrible gringo restaurant food after Braulia had left us.

- AREA: Small, wild west feel town with red mountains and canyons and lots of cacti. Luxury hotel (it had hot water anyway) with ice cold pool. Another horse ride experience.

- PEOPLE: Good masseuse, friendly locals.

- WEATHER: Hot enough to sunbathe and get burnt - hooray (except for the burn)


Sun 29th: After having a UFO ('fried' object) breakfast (we could tell Braulia was running out of food and ideas) we had a day of pure driving ahead. We didn't see condors as hoped but more llama and ostrich.

After 3 days of travelling in the bumpy back, Joke and I swapped with the boys and realised what luxury they'd had the whole time. Lots of space and not so bumpy that your stomach jolts and you hit your head every 2 minutes.

We passed quite a few tiny villages where the kids are shy and stare and even the dogs are shy (until they are fed by us).
The jeep seemed to be in need of repair more often which was slightly alarming as generous Jubenal had given away all our spare tyres but we made it to Tupiza somehow.

We passed an area which was supposed to look like a horse saddle from the way the mountains are formed but you'd have to have a damn good imagination to see it. This is part of a tour from Tupiza so it was nice to do it on the way there. The roads were so windy and narrow that I wasn't surprised when we stopped at a cross with flowers where 2 members of Braulia's family had died.

Tupiza is small with a wild west feel about it. I couldn't have taken another day of touring as fun as it was and so we treated ourselves to a luxury hotel with ensuite bathroom and HOT WATER.
The joy of hot water was only temporarily stopped when I managed to overflow the bathroom so that our room was flooded and the office downstairs was getting dripped into! Whoops.

Made the mistake of putting all my clothes in the wash and forgetting that just because we were in non minus temperatures, that didn't mean it was the perfect weather for sarong and beach wear as we ventured out for what turned out to be a crap dinner (Braulia - come back!)


Mon 30th: I took a while to get into the swing of things after speaking to Tora on her 30th Birthday (friend sick all over again) but took my mind off it by going on a horse ride.
My lazy horse Baijo managed to gallop for all of 3 seconds but at least I've now had a go at galloping! Joke complained when we reached the half way point very early and hadn't seen anything too amazing except for rocks that are phallic shaped (they must be so photographed).
So after some persuading, the guide took us back a different way which was MUCH better - red mountains, canyons and cacti gave it a real wild west feel and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid are said to have died nearby.

I was really scared when the horses had to go down a steep hill, especially as my horse had already tripped a few times (lazy thing couldn't even be bothered to lift it's feet properly) but he made it ok without me falling off.

We decided to chill by the hotel pool all afternoon. It was hot enough to wear a bikini but not hot enough to jump into the ice cold pool I soon discovered after doing it.

We all treated ourselves to a massage after our tough Salar trip and aching thighs from the horse. Which was lovely but not too relaxing as she chatted away in top speed Spanish.
But I felt nice and relaxed and ready to enter Argentina again - my plan to go up to La Paz and see the rest of Bolivia failed as I don't fancy getting caught up in the blockades that are still going on up there.

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