The beautiful Salta

After a fantastic trip in the South Lipez and the Salar de Uyuni, we left Bolivia to go to Argentina. Our first stop is in the city of Salta, located in the north west part of Argentina, in the Lerma valley at 3,895 ft. above sea level.

Our bus left at 4:45 am from Tupiza to go to the city of Villazon, located right by the Bolivian-Argentinian border. The bus ride was only an hour and a half. We arrived in Villazon and it was FREEZING cold. Thankfully, we cross the boarder pretty easily and are now in Argentina in the city of La Quiaca. Argentina is yet again in a different time zone… 3 countries and 3 different time zones so far! Initially, we wanted to take the 9am bus to Salta but it was full so we had to take the 11am one. Traveling on a weekend in South America seems like it isn’t a great idea, since a lot of people travel on that day too and the buses are pretty packed.

Since we can only take the 11am bus, we have about 2h30 to wait. Thankfully, we found a nice little coffee shop with some very good pastries. We already like it in Argentina!

Around 11am, we left for our 7h30 bus ride to Salta. We are able to catch some sleep and admire the beautiful landscapes along the route.

We finally arrive in Salta in the evening, and a nice surprise awaits us… as we hop off the bus the weather is warm!! We had all our warmest clothes on, so we were completely sweating as we walked from the bus terminal to the city center to find a hostel for the night. We have been more used to having temperatures bellow 50°F these last few days.

First impressions : the city is a lot more modernized than anything we have seen in these past two months. And it feels weird. We walk past plenty of shops that you can see in the US or in France, big shopping malls, large cars etc…

After a great night of sleep, we hang around the hostel in the morning before going to grab lunch in the city. On the recommendation of Maider’s friend, Flora, we went to eat in a little restaurant, that makes excellent empanadas! Apparently the best empanadas of Argentina can be found in Salta.

After that, we wandered around the streets, but since we are Sunday a lot of shops are closed. On top of that, it is 3pm, so we are in the middle of nap time… So the only shops that are opened today are closed between 1pm and 5pm… for a nice little siesta.

But we can still admire the colonial architecture of the city.

The vibe is very relaxed and in the afternoon the temperature reaches 80°F. A winter a lot less harsh than in Bolivia ;). The people seem really chill, and we see a lot of musicians in the streets.

We can see from afar the San Bernardo mountain, that dominates the city. We can go up there either by taking a cable car, or by walking up the 1,800 steps.

In a great need for some physical exercise, we decide to take the steps.

And the short hike is really nice, especially since we can finally wear shorts and a tee-shirt! It’s been a while…

At the top, a nice view on the city and the surrounding mountains.

We can even see the Andes in the background.

There are a few water cascades and a quiet little park.

We even see a few beautiful birds!

In the evening we have to withdraw some cash for our upcoming road trip. But we soon realized (after trying at least 10 different ATMs) that the fees are super high in Argentina. We can’t withdraw more than 2,000 pesos at a time, which is about $60, and with each withdrawal there is about 300 pesos in fees, so about $10 in fees! Which means the commissions are over 15%!

On top of that, we can’t do much with 2,000 pesos in Argentina (for example one night in a hostel in Salta cost us 500 pesos). To make things worse, we don’t see a lot of places where we can pay with our credit card… At that point we start to panic a little (granted we did no research on this before getting here, we didn’t think it would be an issue), as we get to the hostel we go on the internet to check and see what can be done and apparently withdrawing cash in Argentina is a nightmare.

So we decided to go to a supermarket an buy food for the next few days. There we knew we could pay by card and save the little cash we had.

The next morning we wake up early to go to a couple of different banks and try to talk to somebody and try to withdraw more than $60… Impossible. Last solution was to exchange all the dollars we had on us in case of emergency. The exchange rate wasn’t too bad and we were able to exchange our dollars to have enough pesos for the week to come. Good thing we are heading straight to Chili after this, where we verified that there are no fees and no maximum we can withdraw. There we should be able to withdraw a great sum of money and exchange it when we come back to spend another month in Argentina. After having absolutely no issues in Peru and Bolivia, it was a little weird and stressful to have to think about all that. Good thing we had some dollars in case of emergency!

After spending almost an entire day figuring out this money stuff we can finally go to find a car rental company. The next day we are starting a 7 day road trip in the North and the South of Salta. Indeed the region around Salta is absolutely beautiful, and there is a nice loop we can drive around. We find a rental agency and are all set for the next day, we can finally go and discover the city of Salta!

Once again it’s siesta time, so a lot of the shops are closed, so we found a nice patio on the central Plaza to drink a cold beer! Life hardly gets any better than this.

A nice quiet evening at our hostel before picking up our rental car at 9am the next day and starting to visit the North of the region.