Journal: Day 1

Leaving Argentina

-06:00 brings us into La Quiaca where the elevation really starts to get to your head. Breath slowly, breath deeply, and hold the air inside your lungs. Day 1 has officially begun, and waiting here in the Bolivian border town bus terminal/refugee camp feels to me like our big step into the world we've been looking for. 

Last night as I got on our big rickety bus and sat down, I just arbitrarily got this swelling feeling of extreme contentment to be doing what I was doing - just to be where I was. Sitting next to George on a bus to the gateway of our adventure just conjured feelings that top easily those of anything one could ever smoke or drink in search of the sensation. Life is good. George feels sicks. 

- Upon getting up on our first Bolivian bus, a supposed 12 hour ride which cost US$3.12, I was a bit disappointed to find that it wasn't actually as horrible as Bolivian buses seemed to be in the stories I'd heard. It had seats, windows (albeit covered in tape), and most other expected qualities of your standard low-quality bus. Then, it left the terminal of Villazon, traveled a bit more than a block, and broke. Hooray Bolivia and its buses. I guess I'm happy with that. We've now been waiting an hour by the side of the road for a new bus to come. Bolivia rocks.

-On the evening of day one, George and I find ourselves at 3000 meters looking over Tupiza, Bolivia, chewing ojas de coca y bicarbonato to maintain healthy breathing patterns. The altitude is cruel. If hiking 2 km to 3000 meters hits me this hard, its hard to think of taking on 4700 meters above Quito, Ecuador. But thats in 2 weeks. We have time to develope ourselves into full-fledged Incan highlanders. We never actually planned to be here in Tupiza, but after our bus broke down we really had no other choice, so a 21:30 departure tonight will bring us into Potosi at 05:00 tomorrow. It's kind of nice to be here, though; its quite a ways off the beaten path, and obvious reasons to be here don't quickly present themselves. In fact, when we asked a local man what kind of things are cool to do here, he showed us a map and said, "Well a lot of people like to go walk over here, and also a lot go to walk over here, but also its popular to go walk over by the river."

Tupiza - and excellent place for walking.

The view from above Tupiza

Our bus seriously didn't take a single paved road to get here, and that rocks. The entire path here was punctuated by large, half dug holes in the road, almost as if the Bolivian government has some sort of initiative to at all times sport the world's greatest quantity of unfinished road work.



This town its self sits in a small valley (about 2 km wide) in between some jagged red rock mountains brushed with yellow and orange. The people and the buildings and the landscape and the mountains all converge here to make exactly what I'd hoped to find in Bolivia: a 3-course meal with desert for US$1.40

Journal: Day 0

Day zero comes to an end. The idea thusforth will be to write at least something down every day, but we'll see how that goes.

We've made a 13-hour sprint from Cordoba to JuJuy on those nice fancy Argentino busses, and that bings us now to a food stand at midnight in the bus terminal of JuJuy, awaiting the 01:00 departure to La Quiaca and the Bolivian border.

The day carries aptly the name 'Day 0' because it really isn't so much a part of the adventure, and more of a big leap out of Argentine. We said goodbye to Oliver and Antoine today, catching yet another last glimpse of friends out the window of a bus...  and now I cant sit still. It was the same all last night and all day today. The energy is just jerking at me. I couldn't get the idea of heading out on the road out of my head. I mean, seriously, one month solo on buses and trains in the metaphorical buttcrack of the west...  that stands right out from the start as something you know you'll remember your whole life, so all of a sudden every moment matters a whole lot more, Some day when George and I are old, pathetic, and incapable, this reminiscence will be a big chunk of fuel that keeps us going through those distant days. We're working on a painting that will hang in the near background of our lives and memories prominently and forever, so we've got to do it well, yes? Check back in tomorrow.

What I'm Wearing: sweat pants, jeans, cotton socks, wool socks, t-shirt, long sleeved shirt, wool sweater, big jacket.

Iguazu

Taking shelter from the rain

After one whole free day to recuperate for a good 10 previous days on the road, we made the 18 hour jump to Misiones province, which our first stop at the Ruins of San Ignacio, and old Jesuit estancia that seemed an awful lot like King Luey’s palace from the Jungle Book. We didn’t get to stay that long, or really have that good of a look around, as we got our first taste of tropical rainstorms (which would persists several times daily for the next 5 days) within 10 minutes of getting off the bus. The ruins where the remnants of what could almost classify as a forgotten empire, from a time when several Jesuit priests directly controlled and cared for over 8,000 guaraní and quecheua Indians, and indirectly influenced many many more. They had their own cities, and a well developed network in between, and were actually expelled from the new world by the Spanish in fear that they could get too powerful with the native population.

Speaking of which, alter traveling for several days in a region largely inhabited by direct descendents of Quecheua Indians, a group distantly related to the Incas, but a group which did form a part of the later empire, if was quite interesting and very notable seeing the ethnic change to the descendants of the Guaraní Indians who come more from the rainforests of Brazil. In both regions, the native language is still maintained and certain aspects of the native religion as well. In Misiones, guaraní choirs are not uncommon to see, as it became traditional after the Jesuits practice of teaching Guaraní children to sing to prove to Spanish dons that they were real people.

Riverboat on the Rio Iguazu

We stopped in Puerto Iguazú, where some friends and I immediately dashed down to the Iguazú River where we had been told not go, just to explore. We found a man with a boat and struck a deal to get an hour boat ride for 60 pesos. The Rio Iguazú is huge, about 800 meters across. That’s a little less than half a mile, and the reddish brown water, all runoff from the Paraná province in Brazil, runs right between cliffs covered in thick tropical rainforest, complete with wild banana, papaya, cayman alligators, and piranhas. Our boat took us to the point where the Iguazú and Paraná (the 4th largest river in the World) come together to form one river, at which point Argentina meets Paraguay and Brazil, and each country has constructed an obelisk of their color son their respective cliff above the river.

In our next day we crossed the half kilometer long bridge over the Rio Iguazú to Brazil, to see the Brazilian side of the waterfalls. Turns out that in the week we happen to visit, 10 times the normal quantity of water is falling per second over the falls; what is normally 1,400 cubic meters per second was 14,000. So, though, several parts were closed and inaccessible due to the amount of water, it was more than impressive to see. One path that would normally take you close to one of the falls and get you wet, because of the falls being significantly larger than normal, took you nearly under the water, or at least close enough to the point that it became difficult to stand, difficult to breath, and impossible to open your eyes.

 

The spectacular thing about Iguazú falls is that its not just a river that falls over a cliff – the river forms a sort of delta; its own little floodplain, just a huge body of water, and its that water that falls continuously over a huge Plot of more or less terraced Earth – cliff alter cliff, and with 14,000 cubic meters falling every second, it rounds like an airplane getting ready to take off. Likely there would be a lot more that I would say about this place in particular had it been at the beginning of this note, or had I arrived at that subject before writing 3 full pages…  

Cataratas de Iguazu

La Quebrada de Humahuaca

Cafayate vinyards from the mountains

After Talampaya we spent the night on the bus as we made our way north to the province of Salta, Turing which trip the bus stopped twice to let 55 exchange students get off and take pictures of llamas. We stayed at a little provincial border town called Calafate, which boasts a vineyard that can manage to sell a liter of wine for 6 pesos (about US$1.50), and a farm that makes goat cheese. My friends and I spent our free day walking aimlessly into the mountains, trying to get as high as we could, then sitting for a good 2 hours before heading back down.

We moved on after one night to the city of Salta, which happens to be the capital of the province of Salta. Salta, which I have now visited 3 times, is without a doubt my favorite city in Argentina. It seems to be more of what people would expect from a South American city – White plastered buildings with terra cotta shingled roofs touring down the side of hills covered in sub-tropical rainforest. It’s pretty impressive. We spent a day of city tours and shopping, but got up and out by 6:30 the next morning to make the 500 km round trip through the Quebrada de Humahuaca and back. A quebrada is sort of like a valley. I have to admit, I don’t really understand the difference, but the Quebrada de Humahuaca is a long flat pass with mountains on either side that over about 600 kilometers slowly and steadily ascends into la Puna, the Andean Plateau at about 4300 meters where most of Bolivia sits. 

Adobe houses in Purmamarca

The Quebrada de Humahuaca is known for its colors, thus boasts features known as the ‘seven color mountain’ and the ‘painters pallet,’ where the muddy adobe mountains seam smeared with earthy White, red, blue, and almost green. All that is set as the backdrop for adobe Andean villages and colorful hilltop cemeteries (that demonstrate a pretty lively and potent mix between imported European Catholicism and traditional belief in the Pachamama, or mother Earth). In fact, throughout most of the Northern provinces, every hour or so you’ll pass a stone monument to the Pachamama, where travelers spit mouthfulls of a home made corn bear into a big stone basin and leave coca leaves as an offering for protection on their journey. It’s obvious that these beliefs are still very legitimate in this part of the World. 

The 'Painters Pallet' and cemetery to the right