Geh mal wieder

And after a week fantastic flying in Iquique we move on in the direction of Bolivia. Back to altitude, back to the altiplano. In San Pedro we visit the geyser fields and then we go into Bolivia to visit the Salar de Uyuni, the biggest salt plain in the world. This trip, for many a traveller one of the highlights of a trip to South America takes us to passes of 4.500m high, green, yellow and red lakes, lamas, alpacas, vicunas and ultimately to the Salar. We sleep at 4300m in freezing cold conditions and on day 3 we arrive at the Salar, a massive salt plain/lake with smack bang in the middle an island with huge (up to 10m high) cacti which are more then a 1000 years old! We pass through some beautiful nature and travel with a nice group of people (We didn´t do this trip with our own car, we went with a group of 12 Dutchies, Argentinians, English, Spanish and Israeli divided over two Landcruisers, we would have got lost in half an hour if we´d tried to attempt this by our self). Four days later the tour ends in San Pedro in Chile and we´re keen to move on to Argentina.

The next day we cross the Andes via Paso Jama (4400 m) to reach Salta in Northern Argentina. It is a nice drive and we are accompanied by English-Spanish couple Neil Maria who we met on the Bolivia tour. The geo-topo-logy-graphy here is amazing, at one point we descend about 2000m in 20 km. Hard work for Fem who safely pilots us down the steep sharp hairpin turns. We pass the so called 7-colored mountains and eventually arrive in Salta at ten in the evening. Perfect timing it appears, because as I walk in the hostel with my paraglide rucksack, a lady in the lobby asks me if I am a paraglide pilot. Me, ¨yep sure¨, she ¨oh how nice, why don´t you come and see us at our office tomorrow and we show you the flying sites around Salta¨. And so we teamed up with Gonzalo and Marianne for a week of more paragliding. Because we are back in Argentina we had to eat steak on arrival so the four of us set off to get some of the biggest steaks at one of Salta´s diners, 11 o clock at night being the perfect time to go for dinner in Argentina. The next evening there is a barbie (BBQ) at the hostel, the next night an asado (Argentinean for barbie) at the paragliding club, meat, meat, meat.

On my birthday we fly a new (for us that is) site in the mountains near Salta and as a nice present the thermals take me to 800m above take off, thank you air. The last day in Salta we go kite buggying on a salt plain, Good fun, especially the buggy training behind the Toyota going 60k+ over the salt plains was good for a bit of adrenaline. But we also manage to get a bit of speed, considerably less though, with the kites as the wind picks up. And then we slowly head South, visiting some more paragliding sites on the way.

Funny anecdote, as we drive in to, and later out of, Tucuman we get stopped by the police. The 1st time it appears we have an illegal towbar (rubbish) and the 2nd time we crossed a red light (again rubbish). In both cases we get fined, but when we mention we will only pay the fine at the police station they explain to us that we will have to wait at least three hours because there is no one at the station (obviously they are all here of course). Luckily we have plenty of time is our happy response and then a game of 15 minutes ¨playing dumb¨ starts; how much?, no entiendo etc... After 15 minutes the police are fed up with us and in both cases let us go paying nada. It must be said that Tucuman was the exception to the rule, in the rest of Argentina the officers are very jovial and friendly. You get to meet a lot of them as the argentinian roads are full of police check points and generally they ask us whether we like Argentina, whether we are going to or coming from the beerfest, if we enjoyed a lot of beers and that we should continue enjoying their country. They even give you a ride in the back of their Ute!

In la Cumbre, the paraglide Mekka of Argentina, we have some really nice flights, with good height and in one case even a decent bit of distance. But then it´s time to pack the gliders and get going for the ¨last¨ phase of our trip, Patagonia. Before heading South-South, we visit Cordoba, Argentina´s second city, where life is good on the terraces with 32 degrees. And as we are finally ready to make some distance we are told we have to visit Belgrano, a village 100km south of Cordoba where the country´s biggest October beerfest is held. Reluctantly we decide to take the locals up on their suggestion and as we drive to Belgrano, even the landscape starts to look like Bayern. And the Bierfest was going, the town was flooded with people, cars and loads of touring cars. A hotel/hostel was out of the question without a reservation so we pitched our tent on the campsite which had an Appelhof-Terschelling kind of feel. We quickly set off to the festival terrain where Heidi und Anton were by far the most favourite tunes and hey even the Zillertaler Orchestre was there. And so we finished our travels in North West Argentina in good spirit. Next stop, Patagonia.