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Day 22 - 24: San Pedro de Atacama

After an early trek through the dark Salta streets at 6am we settled in for a 8hr bus ride through the Andes into Chile and across the worlds driest desert...San Pedro de Atacama. Having spent our last Arg Peso on a hot chocolate and a tip for the bag guy to put our bag in the bus I couldn't buy my mandatory bag of snacks for the trip...not a good start at all! To fight our hunger we both went straight to sleep. We quickly climbed to over 4000m with both Mel and I waking up to an awful headache and feeling ill which immediately subsided as we descended towards Chile. After the Chilean customs (which involved the classic one guy working and 3 guys watching we have come accustomed to in SA) we were served lunch just in time (I was this close to passing out 👌🏼) to watch the spectacular descent down into the desert through salt flats and volcanic peaks. San Pedro is a vibrant, touristy yet relaxed oasis, central to the many natural attractions which serves up surprisingly good (muy bien!) food. We later learnt this was due to the abundance of farming communities around the town...yes fresh produce in the middle of the driest desert (a result of the advanced irrigation systems developed by the Incas...a lesson for all engineers!) We spent our first day booking our salt flat tour (more to come on this), sand boarding (so much fun and was great to see how much fun Mel had picking it up very quickly - bring on the Swiss alps with beca and James over Xmas!), a star gazing tour (a must do - learnt so much and haven't stopped searching for all the stars each night ever since) and trying all the local comida 😋. I some how convinced Mel that the best way to experience Valle de lunar was on bikes skipping the aircon van tours. This involved a 30km round trip through the worlds driest desert in the middle of the day...let's say I wasn't the most popular fiancee that day but I tried to make up for it with a few pushes up the many hills. Looking back it was an experience and was definitely a good way to appreciate the harsh environment although this opinion might not be shared by both of us 😄. We both really enjoyed San Pedro but all too soon we had to pack up again and prepare for the next adventure...

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The last supper!! there was so much food that the restaurant brings out a little side table for it all!

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Views of the Cerro de los Siete Colores (The mountain of 7 colours) in Pumamarca

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Wine tasting in Cafayate for $20AR or $1.80NZD!

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The desert lanscapes, dirt roads and high altitude made some for some spectacular driving!

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Every village has a church.... loved this egg shell coloured one in Cafayate!

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Nick discovered an old abandoned railroad and couldnt help but check it out.

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Salta from above and our little chevrolet hire car

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Day 17 - 21: Salta, Cafayate, Cachi and Tilcara

After leaving Buenos Aires we flew to Salta in Northern Argentina. We hired a car and used Salta as a base to venture to the North Western areas of Cafayate, Cachi and Tilcara in the Jujuy province. It was low season in all of these areas which was a contrast to some of the previous places we had been. At times we felt like we may have been the only tourists in the town which was a pleasant change. Hiring a car meant we really got to experience the terrain and landscapes that North West Argentina was famous for. One minute we would be at the foot of the Andes but in amongst some of the worlds highest altitude vineyards (reminded us of Central Otago back home) and another we would be in barron desert with vast canyons and rock formations. Highlights for us were: - Wine tasting at the Cafayate Bodegas- famous for its “Torrantes” grape variety (similar to Reisling but less sweet and drier...not quite to our liking) - The spectacular but tough drive between Cafayate - Cachi & Cachi - Salta with its ever changing scenery and feeling of isolation. - Visiting the anciant Incan Fortress “Pukara de Tilcara” in Tilcara - Catching a glimpse of the “Lightning Girl” at the Museo de Arquelogica de Alta Montana in Salta - She was one of three children that were found perfectly preseved in the highlands and were believed to be child sacrifices to the Incan gods. Its believed from the burn marks on her shoulder she was struck by lightning at some point...Morbid but soooo fascinating! - Splashing out on our last night in Argentina on a traditional Parilla (BBQ) and randomly sitting next to two kiwis who happened to be the parents of a guy that Nick worked with on the City Rail Link back in Auckland (2 degrees of seperation at its best!) - Visting the 7 coloured Mountain in Purmamaca where the different minerals/ sediments make the mountain appear almost Rainbow coloured.

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Wine tasting in Northern Argentina (at Cayafate)

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El Caminito-The colourful birthplace of Tango 💃🏻💃🏻💃🏻 (at El Caminito, Buenos Aires, Argentina)

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BA

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Some of the many BA tasty treats

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Day 10 - 16: Buenos Aires

We opted to fly to BA and were immediately taken aback by this metropolitan city (think New York, but less hectic with strong European and Italian architectural influences?!).

We had decided we would take it a bit slower here staying in San Telmo, the original settlement of BA. It worked perfectly allowing us to experience the famous San Telmo markets that run on Saturday as well as making the most of the (free) city walking tours.

Unbeknown to us the World Tango Champs that are held once a year were on (BA is the birthplace of Tango!) and we managed to catch some of the heats… Apparently last year a Japanese couple won… Go figure?!

Other highlights from BA for us were:

- Visiting La Boca which is home to the infamous La Boca Juniors football team and the El Caminito (colourful houses)- Nick also jumped in to shoot some hoops with a local boy who surprisingly wasn’t playing soccer like every other kid we saw!

- Stumbling upon the famous Freddys ChoriPan (a tiny hole in the wall shop where they sell only meat sandwiches. We ordered the ridiculously good bbq beef in bread)

- Cycling through the fancier suburbs of Palermo and Recoleta (lowlight- Nicks pedal snapping on the way home = One legged biking!)

- Sharing copious amounts of cheap Argentinian red wine (you can’t beat Malbec for $3.5/bottle) and cooking a bbq with our new friends Alistair and Laura from Manchester!

- The amazing food available throughout the city!

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Iguassu falls were big yesterday💦💧💦🌈🚿🇧🇷 #7naturalwondersoftheworld (at Foz Do Iguacu-Brazil.)

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Spotting wildlife at the falls.

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Amazing views. Great travel buddies!