Last days of Argentina, and the start of Bolivia

Hola!

20 hours by bus can be fun, if you have the right bus assistent named Mariano on it. He served us some lousy food, but some funny jokes, and made it all worth while. We finally arrived Salta, and after walking from one full hostel to another, we finally found a simple, cheap, but nice one. We desided to share rooms to get to know new people, and ended up in a dorm with Andres from Colombia, and Lio from France. Salta was a nice town, however, we didnt make to much out of it. We took a cable car up to a small mountain with a good view over the town, and went out for drinks with our new friends. And of course made them a real backpacker dinner at the hostel. After 2 days here, we hopped on a bus further north, to Jujuy.

In Jujuy we met Walter, a guy from Argentina, that could speak Norwegian! Not often that happens. He had worked as an artist in Kristiansand in Norway for almost 4 years, and his Norwegian was quite good. He invited us for after-work drinks with his friends where they all worked, a skater/biker/surfer/tattoo and piercing shop. So we went to the shop after hours, and had a couple of beers with them, before we all moved on to a nice bar, where we drank some more beers on the roof terrasse. Meeting the locals is always cool, since as a backpacker you often just meet and hang out with other backpackers. Marthe struggled a bit since her Spanish isnt exactly fluent, and our new friends didnt know English to well. But with hand gestures, drawings, and improvising, you can communicate with anyone! Tina is excited to get to use her Spanish skills again, but can notice that its been a while since she went to a Spanish speaking country.

In Jujuy we signed up for an excursion, but because of the low season, it turned out it was only the two of us, and a driver. He took us for a whole day to the sorrounding areas of the town. Its famous for many villages, like Humahuaca, and Purmamarca, in the mountains sorrounding the town, ancient Inca fortresses, and multicoloured (7 to be exact) mountains. Beautiful! Well spent 200 pesos each.

The next day we hopped on the bus (again), and drove to La Quiaca, and Villazon, the border of Argentina, and Bolivia. We expected it to be a hastle to go across, but everything went smoothly, and after half an hour, we were in Bolivia. Its easy to be Norwegian abroad. We drove 2 more hours, watching beautiful scenery, to the town of Tupiza. Today we have been horsebackriding for 5 hours, with a guide called Louis, he was 16, and had worked with the horses from the age of 13! It was a wonderful trip, and we both felt excellent about moving away from the streets, and into the wilderness again, if only for one day. We visited sights like Puerto el Diablo, said to be the gates to the devils house. The horseback riding took its toll, and after a couple of hours relaxing and looking at pictures in our hostel, we are now writing our blog, before going out for dinner at the Alamo.

Tomorrow we are going on a 4 day trip, ending in Uyuni, the largest salt pan in the world. We will be going with two english girls, and to be honest, we are quite excited to hang out with girls again! We will write again sometime after the trip.

Hasta Luego! :)