Welcome to Cactus Country

I´ve spent most of the last week crammed in a 4WD with 4 other travellers exploring the Andean countryside in north west Argentina. The crew (clockwise): Bonnie (career traveller from Alaska), Reid (high school geography teacher from New Zealand), On (Israeli ex-army captain and kick-arse lawyer), me, and Andreas (international commerce graduate/ Richard Gere body double - from Germany.

The 5 Amigos

It was a pretty random group of people but we all got on pretty good - though 5 days crammed in a small space together did test our patience at times. The things we saw and experienced were absolutely stunning - Dramatic mountain landscapes, cactus riddled deserts, salt lakes stretching as far as you can see, carnival (Andean style - spray the Gringos with paint and foam is a popular practice) herds of Llamas, Vicuñas and Donkeys, traditional Andean villages, crazy desert tornadoes, the tastiest carrots you can imagine, altitude sickness, pre-colonial Indian towns - in a nutshell, one hell of an amazing time.


















The landscape.... a lot of the trip was similar to what you might expect to see in a western movie... dry, rocky country with lots of cactus. Though it seemed to change dramatically around every bend in the road.... I have plenty of photos of pretty rocks now!




















Llama territory. These things congregate in flocks and make great beanies.

These are called Vicuñas - They´re a skinnier version of the Llama, not as wooly (hence they´re not as good for beanies) But they are much more graceful looking....

No that´s not a carpet. The red stuff is 100% spicy hot chillies, and I´ve found heaven on earth...







A desert twister...

The salt lakes created lots of opportunities for trick photography.

In the hands of Reid...

Pick on someone your own size!

¨Yes, it tasts like salt too...¨

A reconstructed Pre-colonial Indian village/fortress at Tilcara.

Carnival in the Andes stretches over about two months. Every day during this time the local townsfolk get together and dance and drink in the streets. Festivities seem to start about lunchtime and generally keep you awake until the sun comes up the next day.

At this little mining town (San Antonio de los Cobres) things were no different. We arrived on the scene at about sunset, and were dragged in to join in the funky traditional dancing they had going on (who could resist?!?). Soon they were prying us with a suspect (but potent) sangaria-like broth, and before you know it smearing paint and foam all over our faces when we least suspected. Apparently this is normal... and Gringos make great targets. We all needed a shower anyway....

Iguazu fever

This post is a bit old now, but I thought I should put it up anyway...

Well I´ve had enough of Buenos Aires and studying the local lingo, and have hit the road again - this time heading north towards Bolivia, Peru and the Amazon basin. But for now I´m in Salta, a pretty happening town in Northwest Argentina, with lots of nice colonial buildings etc and an unbelievable amount of very sexy women. Like the rest of Argentina...

Actually, this is important. Argentinians are an extremely proud and patriotic bunch - there are flags everywhere, derogatory jokes about the English\Chileans\Uruguayans\etc abound, framed photos of Diego Maradona hang off way too many walls, and there are countless other examples of how proud the locals are of their own country - and deservedly so, I should say (just don´t mention the economy). However, there are two things that they seem most proud of - that's their top quality beef, and their fantastic looking ladies. Every taxi driver I´ve spoken to (and that's a lot of taxi drivers now!), without exception, has asked me with a sly grin on his face, ¿So, what do you think of the Chicas in Argentina, hey?, ¿Muy bien,no? and I´ve got to admit they are very nice...

And the Beef is very good too - check this 1 inch thick monster that cost only 18 pesos (about $7 Australian....)






Anyhoot, I stopped off at Puerto Iguazu a while ago. Iguazu is famous for these very impressive waterfalls they have here - some say they are the most visually spectacular waterfalls in the world. Though as I mentioned, the locals are a very proud bunch.... In any case, they are on par with Niagra Falls and Victoria Falls in Africa in terms of water volume and height, but spread out over a long distance. I thought they were pretty speccy, despite the hoards of other snap-happy tourists. I´ll leave the gushing to the falls and the photos though, I´m sure they´ll be more convincing than my words....

This section is known as Guadar Del Diablo (The Throat of the Devil)¨... not hard to see why.



























While the waterfalls were great, one thing I didn´t expect was to see so much interesting wildlife - this was the first time I´d been anywhere near a tropical rainforest, and the variety and colour of the birds, buttlerflys and little bugs etc was pretty cool. Also there were a few monkeys, and alligator things... plus wild Giunea Pigs! Ferocious beasts Guinea Pigs.....

How´s your Mate´?

One not so great thing about South America is that the coffee here is really bad... even compared to Geraldton!. While some of the best coffee in the world is produced here it seems no-one has bothered to inform the locals how to make a nice cuppa. Some funky versions of coffee I´ve had include a cup full of warm UHT milk served with a stick of Nescafe Blend 43 on the side (and the proud as punch Chilean waiter actually hung around waiting for a tip!) and a tall glass of watery but bitter broth with cinnamon sprinkled on top - labelled as a cappuccino, but lacking milk or even frothy water on top. Coming from a rather flash looking cafe in a fairly expensive region of Buenos Aires I must say I was quite disappointed.

But that´s quite ok, because here they´ve got this other funky drink here, called Mate`! (That's pronounced ¨ma-tay¨, not ¨mate¨). And given the trouble I´ve had trying to get a nice coffee, I´ve grown quite attached to it.

It´s similar to tea, only its drunk through a metal straw and they have these cool little traditional pots or gourds which the Mate' is poured into, and which is topped up with hot water from a thermos.

The Mate' is quite bitter, but gets really nice once you get into it, and it gives you a very effective wake up slap if you happen to be struggling to start the day - (which is a common problem in this part of the world, given the night life rages to 6am.) It´s similar to caffeine, only it doesn't give you the shakes and nervous energy like caffeine does (maybe its time i cut down on the coffee anyway.....)

Mate' paraphanalia - seems to make up about 50% of any Argentinian market stall.

Anyhoot, its really popular here, (Particularly Argentina and Uruguay) which I guess is part of the reason why the coffee´s so bad. Its pretty funny, in Uruguay almost every person rushes around town with a thermos flask under their arm sucking at a little pot of mate'. I´ve seen little kids running around playing soccer (like 10 years old) sucking on these little micky mouse themed mate' pots, police officers cruising around busting people with the mate' paraphernalia tucked under their arm, even the Bikini babes on the beach clutch the gear, some even have thermos-shaped arm-pit tan-lines.

And when it comes to drinking the stuff, there´s a very important ritual. One person (the owner of the mate' gear) prepares a little pot, passes it to a friend, who drinks the mate' until he's had his fill. You can only pass (and receive) the mate with your right hand, and when you´ve had enough, you say ¨Gracias¨and hand it back, then the pot is refilled and passed on to the next Amigo. And, most importantly, the mate' is not a microphone! You must drink the mate'!

Yes, there is surf in Uruguay......

After a few weeks caught up in the frantic Buenos Aires concrete jungle ratrace, I needed to get back into the ocean - a quick check on the local swell charts revealed a solid swell pushing up the coast - nothing coming near BsAs but it looked like the North East coast of Uruguay (only a few hours bus ride away) might cop it sweet. So I packed my bags and headed off. For those who dont surf, Uruguay is not a famous surfing destination. Or really even a popular destination for anything else - The country is more or less deviod of notable tourist attractions, it has easily the slimest section of any country in the South American lonely planet guidebook- which is a probably a pretty reliable measure of how much there is to do in a place.

But it does have some nice beaches, lots of pretty mate-sipping beachbabes (a thermos never seemed so sexy before.....) and yes, some surf.... I managed to find a few waves in a little town called La Paloma - about three hours bus ride east of Montevideo. The town sits on a peninsula offering a nice left hand point break and a long line of solid beachies too. While it wasnt as great as some of the waves we have in WA, and there was a bit of jellyfish feeding frenzy going on (feeding on me that is) it was a fun wave and I could see it would be awesome with a bit more swell... and the water was warm too.

Another thing that surprised me was the standard of the surfing - Uruguayan surfers rip! All 10 of them that were in the water were carving circles around me. But they were very friendly, and seemed pretty happy to let a few waves sneak by my way.... Actually I think they were a bit stunned that someone from Australia was surfing in Uruguay.