Week 31 - Argentina

Yummy!

Salud Green Bay!

Cafayate at a restaurant

Salud to Salta!


Que Tal! Buenos Tardes!

Well, I´m writing you for the last day of Argentina. Tomorrow the road takes me to Bolivia in search of gold.. no salt actually, but gold sounds much better.

Let me leave you with a few odd things about Argentina;

Siestas, well you may have seen the siesta culture before or possibly just in movies, but let me tell you - in Argentina they live by it. And let me say it is the most annoying thing. Just to explain, its 3pm and you want to buy something, but then realise that EVERY shop in the city (not small town) is closed. I´m talking about some of Argentina´s biggest cities. I can see the scenario now, a man complains to his friend about not making enough money and possibly having to close his shop; meanwhile its 4pm on Saturday and his shop is located in one of the main areas in the city. Then he goes back to his shop at 7pm after complaining about the lack of money to reopen it after he has slept all afternoon. Its crazy and I am sure this is happening all the time... I don´t think they need Warren Buffet to give them a class on business, my 12 year old niece Lauren can certainly teach them how to make more money!

Stop signs, or the lack there of. Argentina, just seems to work without them. In the busy intersections, they have stop lights, but any place we would have a stop sign in St. Louis they don´t have anything and it works. Strangely, once I read that St. Louis has the most or 2nd most stop signs in America.

Mobile Phones, well I´m not sure why this is, but Argentina is the 4th most expensive country in the world for mobile phones. In every country we have visited, I´ve bought a local sim card and learned pretty quickly which county has good or bad service. Argentina.. hmmm, I wouldn´t say bad, maybe a better way to describe it is possibly the WORST in the world! Mongolia makes Argentina look like Sudan! The coverage is very poor (I´m using their biggest provider, strangely called Movistar). In the rural areas there is no reception. If anyone tries to phone me from abroad, it hasn´t worked and nor can they text. When I came back from Chile all my credit was wiped off. Did I mention its the 4th most expensive country for mobile phones :O

So what have we been up to; Mendoza > Cafayate > Salta

Saturday - Argentinian Beef: I´ve probably already mentioned this, but it certainly needs to be highlighted again! Wow, they have excellent steaks in Argentina. We went to a restaurant and had an 800gram (nearly 2lbs) steak, wow! What a meal! (see the picture above).

Sunday - Superbowl party: Shockingly, we bumped into a bunch of Wisconsin born, Green Bay fans for the party that night in the Irish bar. The Superbowl may not be watched thoroughly by every country in the world, although we would like to believe it in America, but its certainly broadcasted everywhere, even in Mendoza, Argentina!

Monday - 25 hours of buses: yeah, travel in south america takes a while, this place isn´t like Europe and you can be in a new country in a few hours.

Tuesday - How to order a steak: We arrived in Cafayate on Tuesday evening after our LONG journey and were dying for some real food! The number one thing in Argentina is beef, I don´t mean the best thing for food - I mean the best thing period! The meat is incredible, however, they are not the best at cooking it. Argentine´s also say, that there are two types of service in Argentina, slow service, or no service at all! So if you want to get a good steak in Argentina, let me help you out. That is if you want a ¨real¨ steak :D Firstly about 60% of the time its over cooked, they don´t have the culture of even pink steaks, so you must ask for rare, yes I´m serious rare, then you will get a medium rare steak. Also, they season the steak with approximately 2 kilograms of salt, so a good phrase to learn is Sin Salt (no salt) - they will still put some anyway but its a small amount then. Let me tell you in the gorgeous town of Cafayate (their best wine area in my opinion) a good bottle of red and a perfectly cooked steak is like heaven after a 25 hour bus journey!

Wednesday - Rio Colorado and its crazy roosters: This day we went hike along the Rio Colorado (meaning Colorado river). The whole wine area of Cafayate is around 1700 meters (just over 5,000 feet) and it has gorgeous scenery. We packed a lunch and made our way around the river up in the mountains. Along they way, as we were followed by a very friendly stray dog, we saw dozens of mountain goats and some crazy roosters back towards the entrance. So what do I mean by crazy, well, this rooster who was just on someone´s farm was super friendly. It would chase after food we threw, just like a puppy dog. We even had it eating out of our hands, Marina loved it!

Thursday - Quebrada de Cafayate: Picture the Grand Canyon with its colored walls. This is kind of what you see at Quebrada de Cafayate. The minerals in the mountains have changed they gorgeous colours of sandstone red, emerald green and deep blue! Along with crazy formations that they call the Devil´s throat, the Amphitheatre, and the Mansions. We had the best tour of the South American trip so far. That night, for the 3rd night in a row, we ate steak! Pretty bad I know, but its oh so good!

Friday - Salta´s nightlife: Ok, I know on the last blog I said that Mendoza had a great night life, better than Buenos Aires. Well, Salta´s is even better! Not to mention that we are in a hostel that is just at the end of the bar street, kind of like my apartment in College. Again, there is a street of bars, clubs and restaurants that pack out on the weekends and even last night (Sunday). Its worth a trip to Salta just for the fun!

Saturday - A little culture: That night we went to a performance by a few members of the Salta symphony and listened to some excellent works by Braun consisting of violins, viola, and a chello. Once we were a wittle bit smarter we headed to Paseo Balcarce for a fun night. Partying with our friends Jen and Steve, we managed to lower the alcohol supplies of a few bars and I won´t say who...:D managed to drop a few glasses to the barman´s displeasure. And no Rob, it wasn´t me... :)

Sunday - Cerro San Bernardo: Feeling a bit rough having gone to bed at 6am the night before, we went to climb the local mountain and lookout point in Salta - Cerro San Bernardo. Needing a break from steak, which if we go out, is all I want to order, so we cooked in making a pretty decent Eggplant Parmesan, yum. Then we went out to Paseo Balcarce, but it wasn´t as crazy of a night and I was pleasantly surprised that the locals were out having a good time even though it was Sunday.

Monday - Zip Line in the San Lorenzo Nature Reserve: To start the day, we headed with Jen and Steve to San Lorenzo and did a short bit of hiking around and eventually made it to the zip line. One of the better ones and I would say this was a bit more crazy than in Hawaii last May. One because its South America and you just never know what is going to happen, but more so because it was very high and probably a good 600 meters with some decent speed. Tonight, Marina and I are off to have a nice romantic meal, well, you can guess what I´ll be ordering..Hmm, someone tips us that this place had the best steak of his life!

So whats next; Bolivia!!! Firstly the world famous Salt Flats.. Stay tuned for next week!

Adios amigos!

Dan and Marina