Bonjour Amigos,

It was the longest trip yet, 27 hours on a bus, it wasnt´t as bad as we had thought it was gonna be, some food and a few films later we finally arrived in Salta at 1.30am on the Monday morning!! We caught a taxi to Casa Hernandez, the most amazing hostel EVER that our Dutch friends had advised us to stay in. We had a cup of Tea with Alex the owner then headed to bed for a great nights sleep. The Hostel was amazing it was more like a B & B, a nice comfortable double room with a beautiful bathroom, great lounging area, Beautiful breakfast and 2 amazing Dutch owners who were well travelled themselves.

TUESDAY 23rd June, we had a very "Ying Yang" day, went for a little walk around San Lorenzo and ended up having a very nice lunch. We went back to Casa watched a movie had a few beers with Alex and Rijkjeand there Dutch friends who were over visiting.

WEDNESDAY 24th June we went into Salta centre for a wander. We ended up at a museum, which is owned by two Argentines who have travelled throughout South America all there lives and collected things on there travels and made it into a museum, it was really good and Diego who gave us the tour was pretty funny "come er boys" is how he kept referring to Jamie and Myself. After that we went for a walk round Salta, we had a friend for most of the time "Scooby" as Jamie referred to him, a poor stray who followed us for HOURS, even when we went into the shops he waited patiently, then we went for a coffee and he sat outside with us, poor bobo!! Anyway we lost poor Scooby eventually......We decided to have a walk in the afternoon and ended up walking miles to the local Art Mercado which was full of cool local stuff, Jamie was loving it!!! After the market we caught a bus back into town to the food market to get some dinner. We bought 2 massive fillet steaks, veg and Tatties for under 3 quid. We went back to Casa that night to cook dinner and chill out, the steaks were the best we have ever had, so good its unreal.

THURSDAY 25th June, We went into Salta to the telephonic which is the cable car that takes you up to the top of the hill, overlooking Salta. We had lunch up there then headed back down. We bumped into a few locals selling jewellery and Andean pipes, Jamie bought some jewellery and I bought a pipe, it sounds like a saxophone or at least it did when the guy who sold it to me was playing it. We ended up sitting with them for a few hours chatting and me trying to get pipe lessons. That night we went back to the market to get some more steak, when we got there it was just opening, the butcher had the 2 half's of the cow lying on the counter, we watched him take the fat off then cut it open for our 2 sirloin steaks that night. You don't get much fresher than that!!!!
After a wonderful dinner and some Red Vino Jamie and myself joined the Dutch contingent for a bit of a party, I had the guitar out and one of the Dutch guys had Alex´s guitar out. It was a great night and hopefully Alex can now play Am and E chords on his guitar.....???

FRIDAY 26th June was Tranquil after the night before, it was a late night. We went into Salta for lunch then booked our bus ticket to Villason which is at the Argentina Bolivia border. Salta is such a beautiful city, we really had second thoughts as to whether we wanted to leave or not...

SATURDAY 27th June We went for a walk in San Lorenzo to La Cabrada, which Alex had suggested to do. Jamie and myself thought it was going to be a nice stroll but it turned into a bit of a hike, we met 2 Americanos on the bus who came with us, am pretty sure we took a wrong turning somewhere as we ended up right at the top of this hill/mountain, it was scorching hot and we had no supplies but luckily the 2 Americans had water and fruit which they were willing to share, thanks guys! After the walk we enjoyed a much needed feed and drink, thankfully there was a nice restaurant at the bottom of the hill/mountain!! That night we had dinner with Alex Rijkje, cooked by there lovely Spanish friend...Yummy! We sadly had to say good-bye to Casa Hernandez, which had felt like home! Alex and Rijkje were amazing hosts and we really did not want to leave there wonderful B&B, thanks guys you made us feel so welcome.

So it was off to the bus station to catch the bus to Villason which was 6 hours away. We boarded the bus at midnight and we arrived at the border at 5am. Just before we got to Villason I woke up and went to look out the window but all I could see was ice, the inside of the window was frozen solid, Smert. We got off the bus and were pretty unsure of what to do, it was 5am in the morning and -15 degrees outside...we were FREEZING! We walked into the bus station which was like a shed and a drunk guy started shouting at us in Spanish we never understood anything apart from the word "Gringo" which means "foreigner", the whole bus station was laughing at us, it was quite scary, needless to say we made a sharp exit. We jumped in a taxi which took us to the border crossing, after singing a few documents our passports were stamped and we were officially in Bolivia...First impressions were big difference from Argentina, we loved the look of Bolivia and could not wait to explore....

Chow Chow Amigos....

Marc and Jamie xxxx