The Long Road to Oz

Amazing steak at La Pulperia

The next day we headed off by ferry to Uruguay, a rite of passage for most travellers wanting to make a short trip over and to top up on dollars (although now longer, and I do wonder how this will be affected). Within our first hour in Uruguay I managed to order us our most expensive meal (based on cost per item) of the entire trip - a piece of boring soggy vege quiche for £16 ! I had rushed to a cafe in the bus station to grab us something for the 2hr journey from Colonia del Sacramento, little realising the exchange rate of things. What a con! But lesson learned to do my homework before parting with strange foreign cash. Montevideo is an interesting city, full of contradictions. It oozes a charm of a bygone era, although that charm is mixed with hideously ugly concrete structures which leave little to the imagination. Think London council house with broken windows and oodles of sky dishes pock-marking the exterior. Our hotel for the two nights was Hotel Palacio, a charming almost Parisian hotel, with antique furniture and bucks loads of charm. Not normally the style we go for but we loved it. We escaped to suburbia for dinner, where things seemed instantly more affluent - green leafy boulevards and huge mansions. We had an excellent steak dish at the unassuming local favourite La Pulperia, and wolfed down excellently cooked cuts of prime beef with dollops of Chimichurri, sausage and crisp fresh salads. Delicious! Next day we strolled down 18 de Julio Avenue for a spot of retail shopping, before reaching Torre de las Comunicaciones building to take in a birds eye view of the city. The covered market called Mercado Del Puerto made for a late lunch stopover and was full of character- we'd been recommend it in a LAN inflight article and the featured picture coincidentally was the restaurant where we ate. We showed the chef who was delighted at being 'semi famous' and showed all his mates at the nearby rival restaurants. Hilarious!

San Telmo market

On Sunday morning I made a beeline for the famous Feria de San Telmo market, around the corner from our airbnb. This place has been a cornerstone of BA for many centuries, and it was quite an experience wandering through the hoards purchasing everything from oranges to handmade jewellery. I'm not a huge market fan but this was impressive. Sort of the portobello rd of BA. I also managed to find excellent coffee at Coffee Town - highly recommended!

Polo in Palermo, BA

Saying goodbye to Mendoza we were then bound for Buenos Aires by flight with LAN - a nice change from lengthy buses ! Arriving in BA to torrential rail we made our way in by Manuel Tienda Leon bus transfer - a great and cheap way to get in from the domestic airport to city centre, with only 1 stop in between. Our airbnb in BA's San Telmo ticket was the perfect antidote to hostels and buses - it was a little piece of domestic paradise after 3 solid months living out of suitcases. The 1 bed flat was located in a charming old building with a central courtyard, almost Riad in style with an open atrium space. BA very much lives up to its hype - it is a wonderful city, with so much vibrancy and energy. We quickly found this within the first evening when we went to a local neighbourhood restaurant called El Refuerzo. It had a distinctly European feel, and was full to the brim with stylish patrons spilling out on to the street, sipping Malbec and smoking the night away. The menu was a simple array of daily specials, chalked onto blackboards dotted across the walls - all in Spanish, of course! There was even a dedicated board for Campari cocktails (those who know me will attest this is a highlight for me of any dining experience). It was a wonderful first taste (literally) of BA and we couldn't wait to come back for seconds. The next day we explored well-heeled Recoleta, where Evita is buried. We listened to the story of her life, and more importantly death. What we didn't know is she was really an opinion-divider: when it was proposed she be buried in Recoleta cemetery the wealthy aristocratic families threatened to remove their entire families long laid to rest, as she was detested so much. It is said that you can lead an extravagant life and still not afford to be buried in Recoleta cemetery. Still, it is a very beautiful place (for a cemetery) - almost a town itself, with paved roads and road signs in between the Mausoleums. One essential whilst in BA is a trip to the polo, and we happened to visit just at the right time when the 122 Campeonato Argentino - international polo championship semi finals were on. We made our way to leafy Palermo in the north and purchased tickets for a mere £15 each (thank you, blue dollar). It was a great atmosphere, filled with BA's stylish upper class and zeros tourists / backpackers. Brilliant! The people watching was almost the best bit. Unlike my experience of polo in Britain, where predominantly the crowds (especially females) are there to pose for the paps, nearly every face in the crowd was intent on watching and cheering for their team. It made a nice change.

Wine tasting in Maipu, Argentina

On the final day before departure, we set off on what would be another bike and wine (or wine and wobble as I called it) around the Maipu wine district of Mendoza. Picking up our bikes from Mr Hugo we cycled around to a few of the vineyard highlights, including Tempus Albs and Mevi, and had a fantastic lunch at Trapiche vineyard. Hugo's sensitive stomach couldn't handle much wine so I drank for us both, and definitely managed the wobble part by the end. !

Argentinian BBQ

Departing Salta, we took a circuitous route towards Mendoza - we had planned the trip route based on the roads, which of course wasn't at all logical for Argentina's bus system. The only way was from Cafayte to Tucuman (5hrs) and then onwards to Mendoza, where we arrived some 19 hours later. Almost a trip from UK to Australia, we thought..! Because we had booked the journey late, we had few options but to join very much a locals bus, which trundled along the road without the luxuries of the 'tourist class'. In South America, there are handful of distinguishing classes for buses - everything from local 'chicken' buses to Semi Cama (part reclining seat) and Cama (full reclining seat). A few even had a luxury bed option, although we would unfortunately never managed to give this a try. The buses - all privately owned and run - vary hugely between companies, and Argentina was no exception. It was almost certainly the most expensive of our bus journeys on the continent, too. In any case, we arrived bleary eyed in Mendoza, thankfully disembarking our bus (and with it, leaving behind the little kid with sticky fingers and troll doll hair who'd taken a liking to Hugo) making our way to our hostel, Chill Inn in Mendoza's famous Villanueva Aristides road. The hostel turned out to be one of the best we'd stay in on the trip, with great people and a friendly vibe. One night the resident Spaniards cooked up an Argentinean feast of steak, sausages and salads washed down with uber cheap and wonderful local wines. A benefit of being in wine country! Unfortunately, whatever was in that meal didn't agree with Hugo and he ended up bed ridden for nearly 2 solid days in the hostel. A few trips to the pharmacy and lots of rest, plus a chicken broth cooked by a lovely Austrian we met at the hostel, and he was right as rain again.

Wine tasting in Cafayate

Argentina We flew back up to San Pedro de Atacama for one more night before heading across the border to Argentina's northernmost area. The bus trip had to be taken by day due to the difficult a windy roads. Having enjoyed a week or so back at sea level, returning to the altitude of circa 5,000 metres was hard. Nevertheless, the bus journey was beautiful, passing through desert valleys and the lunar landscapes so charismatic of that part of the world. We arrived at Salta at dusk, and made our way to Hostel Al Norte on the other side of town. It was a friendly, colourful place with owners to match (and a gorgeous resident Kelpy dog). Salta has the benefit of being bordered by beautiful mountains and vineyards, at the beginning of Argentina's famed wine country. We decided to concentrate on the top half of the country rather than trying to cram in too much. We had an amazing gastronomic feast at Bartz Tapas Mundiales, where seemingly endless dishes of tapas were proudly produced, and washed down with some local Malbec.

Sunrise over Easter Island