After escaping from the border marketplaces of Bolivia and then enjoying comfortable buses driving on roads that exist both on paper and in asphalt, instead of just river beds, we arrived in Salta. Salta might be more expensive than Bolivia, but the food more than made up for this. We could still pretend to be upmarket and eat at the best restaurants while trying to use the right cutlery. An excellent bottle of wine could be obtained for less than 2 quid, which would make anywhere rank highly on our list. Here are some humitas in the market - steamed parcels of vegtables/cereal.
Che Guevara´s Motorbike (or rather a much more reliable replica) at his house in Alta Gracia.Argentina is enormous, and bus journeys take whole days and nights. To limit the number of them we prioritised Mendoza and its vinyards. We arrived for Wednesday with Lou thirsty for shopping but the town seemed strangely quiet. After cursing the laziness of the locals for opening up late we discovered that 2nd April is national holiday (perhaps only since last year) for the ´Malvinas´, which means everyone gets a day off to remember the Falklands war. This seems to be done by drinking wine or playing football in the park, so we followed suit and lazed around.
After a spot of haggling for a local bike and we started to tour around. Most Vinyards are quite small; the grape harvest was underway and here is a lorry load of them being forked into a giant press. Traditionally though, this event only starts after someone finds an extension lead long enough to reach the press. After a good tasting we cycled back, which was hard after a 3 course lunch with a bottle of Malbec, further degustation at vinyards, and the 35 degree heat.
Now we are in Buenos Aires and the shoe shops beckon. I am wondering if we will now get through the 'weigh in' for the flight back.
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