Following our morning of bicycle wine touring in San Rafael, we jumped on a three hour bus to Mendoza, to connect with a 19 hour one to get us to Salta.  We had plans to meet up with Rita (who I travelled with for a couple of months through Central America in 2011) and her boyfriend Eddie, who I met when I visited them in England in 2012.

Arriving at the Salta bus terminal, it was pouring rain outside, so we decided to splurge and get a cab to the hostel.  Unfortunately, the cab driver decided he could drop us off at any random hotel, claiming it was ours.  Naturally, we ended up walking longer to our hostel than it would have been from the bus station, jumping over massive puddles in the flooded streets with our massive bags.  At least the rain had finally stopped.

We finally got to our hostel, got sorted, and two hours later there were Rita and Eddie, a bit exhausted after their arduous journey from England.  We spent the next day exploring the beautiful colonial city, escaping the midday heat with air conditioned gloriousness in the archaeological museum, or what what we referred to as “the museum of dead children”.  Eddie even felt the need to buy a postcard depicting the mummified Inca children in question, although I’m not sure if he’s decided who’ll be lucky enough to receive it yet.  Check your mail!

Post museum beer

We also managed to get Marieke’s new passport application sorted, despite a whole lot of paper and a very long line at the post office.

Filling out all the paperwork for a new passport

After turning down a ridiculous quote of $300 a day for what surely must have been a Corvette, we found a much more reasonable compact car for $750 pesos ($75CAD), reserving the car for four days starting the next morning.

In between scouting car rental prices, we ran into Karina, whom we had hung out with at our favourite place, the Mendoza bus station, a few days earlier.  We spent the night reminiscing over wine and planning our trip to Rio for Carnaval.

Reminiscing