Salta day 1

Well, I arrived in Salta yesterday. It was a nice easy flight from BA. The airport in Salta is very small, only four flights a day. I took a cab to my hostel (Hostel del Centro) and got settled in. Went for a walk around town, up to the Monumento a Guemes, etc. Upon first impression, it was a very small, quiet town, easily walk-able. I sat in the Plaza 9 de Julio for a bit as it was quite warm. It is very unique- it’s lined with lime trees, along with pine trees, palm trees, and flower trees- it smells good, though. I got back to the hostel around 7ish (it gets dark very late here) and sat around with a bunch of people drinking wine. We had a huge steak dinner/BBQ with bottomless wine. We ate around 10ish, and left to go out at around 1 am … home at 6 am.

Today (this afternoon, specifically), when I woke up, I went back to where we were, Balcarce, which was PACKED with people last night (all the clubs are bunched together there) and found the street lined with a craft fair … I can assure you it looked very different the night before. I realized it wasn’t a sleepy town afterall, it was just siesta time when I arrived yesterday so everything was closed … as it was on Sunday. The biggest thing that stuck me walking around Salta is that there are no stop signs (that I could see), and very few lights. In fact, people hardly slow down at cross streets, so it seems to me like it’s just a great deal of good luck that these cars aren’t crashing into each other.

Then Audra and Alvaro came to pick me up, (yay!) with little Greggy, and we came back to their BEAUTIFUL house outside the city. We went for a walk, then showered and went to church. My favorite part is that you have to drive through two rivers to get there … thank god for 4-wheel drive. Then at church, it was so fascinating because the inside was packed, so they have the sermon on a loud-speaker, and loads of people were standing on the porch listening, as well as many people quite literally standing in the street and across it to listen. What a day!