After 22 hours on a bus - albeit in relative comfort and having had much more sleep than in the previous several days (heating will do that for you) - I was amped to get out and off to my CS friend's house in Santiago. But first to check the internet for news on my flight home.
The volcanic ash in Chile had been making things difficult for me and a whole lot of other people, and I did not want another barrier preventing me from getting home. The whole ordeal with the borders in Bolivia had made me very keen indeed to get back to my family and friends, and feel the security of a 1st world country once again. I never thought I'd say this, but I missed home.
I was already at my wit's end... everything was tipping me over the edge. The poor English fella that was with me on the bus from Calama - Santiago had to deal with this. First stop, the internet cafe. Where I found out my flight was cancelled. 100%. Not flying. That was the first setback. I spent half an hour on hold with the flight company while a nice man tried to find me space on an alternative flight. With no luck. I was to call back later.
Then I called my CS friend, who said she would come to the bus station to pick me up. Finally, a stroke of good fortune! So me and M waited at the ticket area where we had arranged to meet, and grabbed a pretty friggin good burger to fill our famished bellies (there is only so much several 'snack packs' can do during a 22 hour bus ride). So we waited. And kept waiting. After some unsuccessful calls to O's phone, I started getting worried. Then we found out there were 2 bus terminals. Hmm.
Once at the OTHER bus terminal, me thoroughly sick of life, I tried to call from a public phone my CS friend, and eventually she ordered me a cab to her house. This meant I still had no address for her and just had to blindly wait on the street corner for someone to tap me on the shoulder and lead me to their car. Highly safe behaviour. There were already enuf freaky men staring at me. Which is funny because I thought such a civilised part of South America would warrant slightly more subtle behaviour from pervy men.
After waiting an extended period of time, I finally received the tap, and British M bid me farewell - I wonder if he also thought it strange to walk off with a random man to a random car destined for an unknown address? Well, if he did he didn't show it!
The ride to O's house was not entirely smooth sailing. He got us completely lost and when he eventually found the correct house, I was again on the verge of losing it. That's what made the welcome even warmer at O's... her Belgian BF Y took my bag straight away and ushered me into the kitchen, where they were all just finishing off burridos and beer. Oh, the comforts of a family home! I devoured a burrido and downed a beer, and some wine, and managed to only cry once in front of them. I was doing pretty good.
I tried the airline again, but it was constantly busy, so I headed to the shower instead... oh, sweet mercy that shower was good. I must have smelt something savage when I walked in the door, and to be able to wash my body... oh, just those simple things in life can be so rewarding when you are deprived of them... And then I crawled into bed, set my alarm for 5am to call the airline again, and fell promptly to sleep.
Thursday, 30 June 2011
Tuesday, 28 June 2011
Kissing Chilean soil
Yet another early wake-up greeted us as we prepared to catch the 6:30ish bus to the border. The night before we had worried it wouldn´t have space so we had forced the agency to call ahead and warn the bus it had 11 tourists to pick up in this random village, and so they went off and returned promising it would have space.
Well, it didn´t.
All of us freezing to bits (again) out the front of the hostel, me pissed off from the fucking witch who owned the hostel trying to charge me an insane exchange rate because "it was difficult" for her to change US dollars. Like our fucking situation was any less difficult! Try to tell me to be more prepared next time, won´t you... What a cow.
So the bus is completely full. They start shaking their heads at us, telling us "no, we thought it was 6 people, 5 people, 3 people..." More lies. Most of us girls just stand there crying. At one point the bus staff suggest we could put the backpacks on the roof and us in the luggage compartment - what a joke - and then FINALLY they relent and let us stand in the aisle. The Brazilians stay behind, hoping to get a lift from a random old man from the village. I didn´t feel bad. I needed to get to Chile. Stat.
The people on the bus were pissed off we wasted so much of their time faffing around outside, but once they saw our tear-stained, exhausted, desperate faces, they softened a little. I was given the "seat" in the aisle from one lady, who then sat on her mother instead, and I heard R´s gf J discussing her plight with the ladies that worked on the bus. We were fast earning sympathy. And so we should, they charged us fucking double fare to be standing there.
At the border, it was a quick stamp n pay to get out of Bolivia, then onwards and upwards to Chile. Except that we waited what seemed like forever for the bus to arrive and then leave, it sorting out where to put baggage at the very last moment in true Bolivian style. Finally we were on the move, anxious to get out of no man´s land where we really had no identity, and into a more civilised country like Chile.
At the Chilean border, there were checks for fruits and animals parts, so I declared my favourite feather earring to no protest, and they took out the top 2 items of my backpack in their thorough search of all things illegal. Finding nothing, and probably tainting their own clothes with the stench of mine, they moved me on and I went back to the bus. Then I remembered about my moler tooth I still have in my handbag. I do wonder how that will go down once I reach Australian customs.
But before I boarded the bus, I kissed the ground. Just as I promised I would.
Then it was several more hours drive to Calama, where I hoped to get a bus straight to Santiago. The bus, as with the Jeep the day before, had not protection from the dust and so I was forced to breathe through my jumper most of the ride. I could feel a cough already from the English man in La Paz, I knew this dust would do nothing to stave it off.
We got to Calama around 5:30pm, with another gringo to the pack (an English guy also wanting to get to Santiago), and set off for the cash machines pronto. There, I found I had lost my UK debit card - fantastic - and it was too late to get money manually withdrawn from my account. More tears.
I hoped to be able to pay for my bus ticket with credit card, so I headed - with the Japanese lady, I, in our border-crossing group and English M in tow - to the other bus terminal. We got there and found tickets for a 10pm bus, going from another terminal still (how many terminals are needed in this friggin tiny town, I ask) and then relaxed. M paid me cash for using my card to pay for both tickets, so I now had money to eat with. But it was certainly not Bolivia anymore. This was civilisation. And civilisation meant more money. Dammit. The honeymoon period was over.
We ate and then headed to the other terminal to wait and find the internet. There, I checked my UK bank account, and it looked like the miniscule amount I had left had not been stolen so I now think I just forgot the card in the machine and it had been swallowed again. Nicely done, moron. But now I need to get another card to withdraw that last bit in Australia. What a mission.
And then we settled into our Salon Cama, first class, and boy-did-we-pay-for-it bus. We were in the special section at the bottom, away from the crying kids, bad smelling feet (although it was probably us that smelt) and a far cry from the -15 temps of the previous days. Comfort felt good. And it was to feel good for 22 hours. Even the Spanish dubbing of English films like The Gods Must Be Crazy 2 satisfied me. Nothing like a bit of education while I relaxed. Annnnnd lights out.
Well, it didn´t.
All of us freezing to bits (again) out the front of the hostel, me pissed off from the fucking witch who owned the hostel trying to charge me an insane exchange rate because "it was difficult" for her to change US dollars. Like our fucking situation was any less difficult! Try to tell me to be more prepared next time, won´t you... What a cow.
So the bus is completely full. They start shaking their heads at us, telling us "no, we thought it was 6 people, 5 people, 3 people..." More lies. Most of us girls just stand there crying. At one point the bus staff suggest we could put the backpacks on the roof and us in the luggage compartment - what a joke - and then FINALLY they relent and let us stand in the aisle. The Brazilians stay behind, hoping to get a lift from a random old man from the village. I didn´t feel bad. I needed to get to Chile. Stat.
The people on the bus were pissed off we wasted so much of their time faffing around outside, but once they saw our tear-stained, exhausted, desperate faces, they softened a little. I was given the "seat" in the aisle from one lady, who then sat on her mother instead, and I heard R´s gf J discussing her plight with the ladies that worked on the bus. We were fast earning sympathy. And so we should, they charged us fucking double fare to be standing there.
At the border, it was a quick stamp n pay to get out of Bolivia, then onwards and upwards to Chile. Except that we waited what seemed like forever for the bus to arrive and then leave, it sorting out where to put baggage at the very last moment in true Bolivian style. Finally we were on the move, anxious to get out of no man´s land where we really had no identity, and into a more civilised country like Chile.
At the Chilean border, there were checks for fruits and animals parts, so I declared my favourite feather earring to no protest, and they took out the top 2 items of my backpack in their thorough search of all things illegal. Finding nothing, and probably tainting their own clothes with the stench of mine, they moved me on and I went back to the bus. Then I remembered about my moler tooth I still have in my handbag. I do wonder how that will go down once I reach Australian customs.
But before I boarded the bus, I kissed the ground. Just as I promised I would.
Then it was several more hours drive to Calama, where I hoped to get a bus straight to Santiago. The bus, as with the Jeep the day before, had not protection from the dust and so I was forced to breathe through my jumper most of the ride. I could feel a cough already from the English man in La Paz, I knew this dust would do nothing to stave it off.
We got to Calama around 5:30pm, with another gringo to the pack (an English guy also wanting to get to Santiago), and set off for the cash machines pronto. There, I found I had lost my UK debit card - fantastic - and it was too late to get money manually withdrawn from my account. More tears.
I hoped to be able to pay for my bus ticket with credit card, so I headed - with the Japanese lady, I, in our border-crossing group and English M in tow - to the other bus terminal. We got there and found tickets for a 10pm bus, going from another terminal still (how many terminals are needed in this friggin tiny town, I ask) and then relaxed. M paid me cash for using my card to pay for both tickets, so I now had money to eat with. But it was certainly not Bolivia anymore. This was civilisation. And civilisation meant more money. Dammit. The honeymoon period was over.
We ate and then headed to the other terminal to wait and find the internet. There, I checked my UK bank account, and it looked like the miniscule amount I had left had not been stolen so I now think I just forgot the card in the machine and it had been swallowed again. Nicely done, moron. But now I need to get another card to withdraw that last bit in Australia. What a mission.
And then we settled into our Salon Cama, first class, and boy-did-we-pay-for-it bus. We were in the special section at the bottom, away from the crying kids, bad smelling feet (although it was probably us that smelt) and a far cry from the -15 temps of the previous days. Comfort felt good. And it was to feel good for 22 hours. Even the Spanish dubbing of English films like The Gods Must Be Crazy 2 satisfied me. Nothing like a bit of education while I relaxed. Annnnnd lights out.
Salt Flats extended...pt 1
Our driver had promised to meet us at 7:30am - the first of many lies - so we all got up and readied ourselves in the cold. Having still had no running water and having to flush the toilet with icicle-thick water despite paying the kind of money you´d expect more for, none of us were washed or in any way content with life, but we threw on more layers and breathed in for the onset of cold that was set to greet us as soon as we stepped out of our beds.
Then we waited. Grew anxious. And waited some more. The hostel owner told us not to expect much before the border opened for business, first 9am then 10am, then it was closed for the day. But wait, maybe not. Was that... oh, no...uhhh.... shit. Communication at an absolute minimum out here in the middle of NOWHERE, we were at the complete mercy of these drivers who seemed even more clueless than all of us put together. A great feeling.
We walked to the nearby refuge to talk with our driver, who still hadn´t materialised after promising the early morning departure (if not for one frontier, for the other next to Argentina). He was chilling nonchalantly in the warmth of the kitchen, having no reason to go into the cold to update us. While we were there we got a radio update, which was really pointless, basically saying that they hoped to open by the afternoon but that a car had crashed and that was now causing more blockage to the queue waiting to get through. More great feeling.
We trudged back to the others, 3 London lawyers now feeling well n truly put out, and tried to think of the next step in our fast-failing mission across borders. Some Jeeps passed through, unsuccessfully trying for the border, and I begged the driver of one with a spare seat to let me come back for the ride to Uyuni, feeling a little too close for comfort with my flight looming ahead. He basically didn´t want to take me, and made up some excuse about my bag being too big to take on. That was it. I lost it, threw up my hands in exasperation and ran inside as the tears started.
The English girls comforting me, I was lost in a hopeless world of no more options. Our drivers insisted on staying put to wait until the new information at 6pm, no other car would take us and in fact no other car was passing since the few left in the morning... I never thought I would see the other side of that border. The mountains, in all their natural splendour, started to mock me with their beauty. The icy lagoon swallowed every inch of hope I had left in my body. And the wind smacked the door closed on its way out.
That was it. R, the Swiss guy, went back to the refuge to have Spanish words with our driver. 5 minutes later we heard a commotion outside and were told VAMOS, we were going to the other border, about 6 hours driver away.
The plan was to drive until a little village about 2 hours from the border, sleep there and wake early to drive across and into the town closest to the Chilean side of the border.
But what did I say about false hope? It´s a bitch.
After a semi-satisfying dinner, our driver returned with some news. Apparently the 2 drivers were heading back early morning to the other border because it had actually opened at 6pm the day we left (of course). They had people to collect that had paid much more money than us to do a 3 day salt flats tour - so of course they got priority. Which displeased the English lawyers. Greatly.
After unsuccessfully demanding another car be sent from the agency, they were forced to make a choice - go back to the other border and risk being stuck again or go on a public bus to the border and another bus to San Pedro, their original destination. They chose the latter, basically due to lack of better options. I of course hadn´t paid anything yet so I was fine to go by public bus, if it got me out of Bolivia. I would´ve in fact ridden a donkey if it got me there too.
So that was what we were left to sleep on. More hope. Or lack thereof. I longed for a shower. I longed for Chile. I longed for anything but this.
Then we waited. Grew anxious. And waited some more. The hostel owner told us not to expect much before the border opened for business, first 9am then 10am, then it was closed for the day. But wait, maybe not. Was that... oh, no...uhhh.... shit. Communication at an absolute minimum out here in the middle of NOWHERE, we were at the complete mercy of these drivers who seemed even more clueless than all of us put together. A great feeling.
We walked to the nearby refuge to talk with our driver, who still hadn´t materialised after promising the early morning departure (if not for one frontier, for the other next to Argentina). He was chilling nonchalantly in the warmth of the kitchen, having no reason to go into the cold to update us. While we were there we got a radio update, which was really pointless, basically saying that they hoped to open by the afternoon but that a car had crashed and that was now causing more blockage to the queue waiting to get through. More great feeling.
We trudged back to the others, 3 London lawyers now feeling well n truly put out, and tried to think of the next step in our fast-failing mission across borders. Some Jeeps passed through, unsuccessfully trying for the border, and I begged the driver of one with a spare seat to let me come back for the ride to Uyuni, feeling a little too close for comfort with my flight looming ahead. He basically didn´t want to take me, and made up some excuse about my bag being too big to take on. That was it. I lost it, threw up my hands in exasperation and ran inside as the tears started.
The English girls comforting me, I was lost in a hopeless world of no more options. Our drivers insisted on staying put to wait until the new information at 6pm, no other car would take us and in fact no other car was passing since the few left in the morning... I never thought I would see the other side of that border. The mountains, in all their natural splendour, started to mock me with their beauty. The icy lagoon swallowed every inch of hope I had left in my body. And the wind smacked the door closed on its way out.
That was it. R, the Swiss guy, went back to the refuge to have Spanish words with our driver. 5 minutes later we heard a commotion outside and were told VAMOS, we were going to the other border, about 6 hours driver away.
The plan was to drive until a little village about 2 hours from the border, sleep there and wake early to drive across and into the town closest to the Chilean side of the border.
But what did I say about false hope? It´s a bitch.
After a semi-satisfying dinner, our driver returned with some news. Apparently the 2 drivers were heading back early morning to the other border because it had actually opened at 6pm the day we left (of course). They had people to collect that had paid much more money than us to do a 3 day salt flats tour - so of course they got priority. Which displeased the English lawyers. Greatly.
After unsuccessfully demanding another car be sent from the agency, they were forced to make a choice - go back to the other border and risk being stuck again or go on a public bus to the border and another bus to San Pedro, their original destination. They chose the latter, basically due to lack of better options. I of course hadn´t paid anything yet so I was fine to go by public bus, if it got me out of Bolivia. I would´ve in fact ridden a donkey if it got me there too.
So that was what we were left to sleep on. More hope. Or lack thereof. I longed for a shower. I longed for Chile. I longed for anything but this.
Salt Flats Day 3: Swap an Aussie for a tyre
The earliest rise yet. 5am. I felt like I had finally fallen asleep when I heard the knock on our dorm door from the driver and his wandering lazy eye.
We had lots to do, he´d told us the night before as we downed the wine, so a 5am wake-up call was necessary. I parked up particularly when I heard the border to Chile was open now, having been closed earlier due to dangerous snow on the road. So it was looking like I was finally getting to Chile, where my flight home (home... sweet home) was due to leave in a few days. "Vamos vamos" you could hear me cry, as the others begrudgingly packed their backpacks and stuffed breakfast pancakes in their mouths.
Freezing cold, we piled into the Jeep and tried to regain feeling in our extremities. Task almost done, we stopped at our first site to see how sulphur geysers spraying hot air (thank the heavens!), then to a lagoon with a small thermal pool in front. There was nothing stopping me from going in there. Not even massive wind gusts and what I am pretty sure was still below zero temps.
Stripping down to my bikini and running from the bathroom to the pool with my poncho on top, I had the Bolivians in military regala laughing at me and the rest of my tour group shaking their heads at my craziness. Except the kooky French couple, the man of which was in the water with the woman taking pics. Running back to the bathroom brought on the beginning stages of hypothermia, and I wondered for a moment as a shivered back into my many layers why I chose to expose myself so recklessly. Ahh well, only live once eh.
Then we went onto Laguna Verde, which sits in front of an inactive volcano also topped with snow... a picture perfect sight if ever there was one. But of course still with ice-cold wind, we continued to freeze.
Our driver didn´t take me to the border after all, because apparently it was now closed. So we headed back towards Uyuni, with me sulking in the back because we had been within 5 minutes of the Chilean border and were now driving 9 hours back into Bolivia. Getting to my flight was proving more difficult than first thought. And that was before we even encountered the Jeep heading to the border...
Said Jeep was broken down when we first saw it, trying to change its tyre that I soon found out had broken 3 times already that day. While the driver scratched his head, my driver struck a deal and had soon offloaded me to the broken vehicle. They were headed to the frontier, I wanted to go, they needed a new tyre and so instead they got a tyre and an Aussie girl. I was literally swapped for a Jeep tyre.
Elated I was finally going to the border, which was apparently now open, I chatted away to the Swiss guy in my new car while the somber group of English girls slightly dampened the mood. I was soon to find out why... they had started towards the frontier the night before, staying in a random village before starting out at 4am that morning to make it to the border by 11am. That was about the time I ran into them on the road, having had 4 tyre punctures and made considerably slower progress than hoped.
We got to the border without any more tyre problems, but found ourselves waiting at the dodgy-looking immigration office while our driver and the police officer from immigration drove the car up a hill for phone signal. We watched in confusion as they, with all our possessions still in the car, faffed around for a while and finally returned with somber faces.
We can´t cross the border today, they said, because of the snow. Hmm. So why didn´t we know this earlier? And what the hell are we meant to do now? We had 2 options, we were told. First, stay in the nearby refuge overnight and hope the situation improves tomorrow. Second, walk 7 hours with our backpacks to San Pedro. Well, I know which one is absolutely fucking ridiculous. Especially considering the time - 4pm - and then the time after 7 hours of walking. We would freeze to death.
So the refuge it was. Except the refuge had no food, snow in the toilet and insufficient blankets to shield us against the howling wind and unforgiving night cold. So we chose the other hostel near the national park guard, and had to pay inflated prices for a bed and dinner. The first of many Bolivians to take advantage of us in our predicament.
There were more people in the same situation as us, from Brazil, and we all sat around the window trying to absorb the last rays of light before it disappeared and we were forced to wear all our clothes to keep our limbs from going numb. Dinner warmed us for a brief moment, but there is only so much packet pasta and tomato paste sauce can do for a thawing one´s body.
We settled into our dorm giggling like school girls, I think a little delirious and incredulous from the day´s events but hopeful a solucion would come to pass tomorrow. Hoping. Hope. A word soon to scratch at my throat like a cat possessed.
We had lots to do, he´d told us the night before as we downed the wine, so a 5am wake-up call was necessary. I parked up particularly when I heard the border to Chile was open now, having been closed earlier due to dangerous snow on the road. So it was looking like I was finally getting to Chile, where my flight home (home... sweet home) was due to leave in a few days. "Vamos vamos" you could hear me cry, as the others begrudgingly packed their backpacks and stuffed breakfast pancakes in their mouths.
Freezing cold, we piled into the Jeep and tried to regain feeling in our extremities. Task almost done, we stopped at our first site to see how sulphur geysers spraying hot air (thank the heavens!), then to a lagoon with a small thermal pool in front. There was nothing stopping me from going in there. Not even massive wind gusts and what I am pretty sure was still below zero temps.
Stripping down to my bikini and running from the bathroom to the pool with my poncho on top, I had the Bolivians in military regala laughing at me and the rest of my tour group shaking their heads at my craziness. Except the kooky French couple, the man of which was in the water with the woman taking pics. Running back to the bathroom brought on the beginning stages of hypothermia, and I wondered for a moment as a shivered back into my many layers why I chose to expose myself so recklessly. Ahh well, only live once eh.
Then we went onto Laguna Verde, which sits in front of an inactive volcano also topped with snow... a picture perfect sight if ever there was one. But of course still with ice-cold wind, we continued to freeze.
Our driver didn´t take me to the border after all, because apparently it was now closed. So we headed back towards Uyuni, with me sulking in the back because we had been within 5 minutes of the Chilean border and were now driving 9 hours back into Bolivia. Getting to my flight was proving more difficult than first thought. And that was before we even encountered the Jeep heading to the border...
Said Jeep was broken down when we first saw it, trying to change its tyre that I soon found out had broken 3 times already that day. While the driver scratched his head, my driver struck a deal and had soon offloaded me to the broken vehicle. They were headed to the frontier, I wanted to go, they needed a new tyre and so instead they got a tyre and an Aussie girl. I was literally swapped for a Jeep tyre.
Elated I was finally going to the border, which was apparently now open, I chatted away to the Swiss guy in my new car while the somber group of English girls slightly dampened the mood. I was soon to find out why... they had started towards the frontier the night before, staying in a random village before starting out at 4am that morning to make it to the border by 11am. That was about the time I ran into them on the road, having had 4 tyre punctures and made considerably slower progress than hoped.
We got to the border without any more tyre problems, but found ourselves waiting at the dodgy-looking immigration office while our driver and the police officer from immigration drove the car up a hill for phone signal. We watched in confusion as they, with all our possessions still in the car, faffed around for a while and finally returned with somber faces.
We can´t cross the border today, they said, because of the snow. Hmm. So why didn´t we know this earlier? And what the hell are we meant to do now? We had 2 options, we were told. First, stay in the nearby refuge overnight and hope the situation improves tomorrow. Second, walk 7 hours with our backpacks to San Pedro. Well, I know which one is absolutely fucking ridiculous. Especially considering the time - 4pm - and then the time after 7 hours of walking. We would freeze to death.
So the refuge it was. Except the refuge had no food, snow in the toilet and insufficient blankets to shield us against the howling wind and unforgiving night cold. So we chose the other hostel near the national park guard, and had to pay inflated prices for a bed and dinner. The first of many Bolivians to take advantage of us in our predicament.
There were more people in the same situation as us, from Brazil, and we all sat around the window trying to absorb the last rays of light before it disappeared and we were forced to wear all our clothes to keep our limbs from going numb. Dinner warmed us for a brief moment, but there is only so much packet pasta and tomato paste sauce can do for a thawing one´s body.
We settled into our dorm giggling like school girls, I think a little delirious and incredulous from the day´s events but hopeful a solucion would come to pass tomorrow. Hoping. Hope. A word soon to scratch at my throat like a cat possessed.
Salt Flats Day 2: Spooning the random Argo
When a tour agency says "basic", they mean basic. And that´s precisely what led to having to spoon with the random Argentinian guy in my Jeep for the second night of my tour. It was that cold.
Having left the salt flatty area of the salt flats, we woke early to drive to the pretty lagoons famed for their pink flamingos (although most of these flamingos had flown to warmer waters in Chile), and enjoyed the changing scenery of the desert, its snow-capped mountains and natural rock formations. It really is breathtaking the desert out there, but it was getting increasingly colder as the day wore on.
We had grabbed a few bottles of wine in anticipation of the coldness to come at night, wanting anything to warm us (and basically we are drunks, at the end of it all) and not particularly looking forward to anything involving 6 blankets and/or a sleeping bag (the latter which I do not travel with).
With the wind whipping wildly around us, and the temperature dropping with every rising breath, we pulled into the "basic" hotel. Thin walls. Cracked window in the bedroom. Stinky bathroom. Definitely no hot water. In fact, hardly any water at all in the taps. But thankfully a small furnace in the main eating area (the corridor). Oh, how I crave the simple things in life now.
We polished off the 5 bottles of wine we had with dinner without blinking, and by this stage it was an open invitation to I, the Argo, to join blankets and beds for the evening. The rest of the group thought it was pretty funny, but for me it was a matter of survival. And hey, if I can borrow a cute Buenos Aires boy (how rare they are) for the evening, I most certainly will.
He was a good cucharita (spoon). However, as good as he was, I was still tossing n turning all night... various things getting in my way, such as another girl in my tour group vomiting from what I assume was altitude sickness (the food seemed fine) and me running around trying to help while also freezing to death. I wonder how much sleep the Argo got next to me. What a shit bed partner I am.
Having left the salt flatty area of the salt flats, we woke early to drive to the pretty lagoons famed for their pink flamingos (although most of these flamingos had flown to warmer waters in Chile), and enjoyed the changing scenery of the desert, its snow-capped mountains and natural rock formations. It really is breathtaking the desert out there, but it was getting increasingly colder as the day wore on.
We had grabbed a few bottles of wine in anticipation of the coldness to come at night, wanting anything to warm us (and basically we are drunks, at the end of it all) and not particularly looking forward to anything involving 6 blankets and/or a sleeping bag (the latter which I do not travel with).
With the wind whipping wildly around us, and the temperature dropping with every rising breath, we pulled into the "basic" hotel. Thin walls. Cracked window in the bedroom. Stinky bathroom. Definitely no hot water. In fact, hardly any water at all in the taps. But thankfully a small furnace in the main eating area (the corridor). Oh, how I crave the simple things in life now.
We polished off the 5 bottles of wine we had with dinner without blinking, and by this stage it was an open invitation to I, the Argo, to join blankets and beds for the evening. The rest of the group thought it was pretty funny, but for me it was a matter of survival. And hey, if I can borrow a cute Buenos Aires boy (how rare they are) for the evening, I most certainly will.
He was a good cucharita (spoon). However, as good as he was, I was still tossing n turning all night... various things getting in my way, such as another girl in my tour group vomiting from what I assume was altitude sickness (the food seemed fine) and me running around trying to help while also freezing to death. I wonder how much sleep the Argo got next to me. What a shit bed partner I am.
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