The Perfect Town?

We were finally on our way out of Bolivia, excited to be heading to a new place, with all the creature comforts of a more developed country, a little dread about how much more expensive such creature comforts are and a little dissapointment that we couldn´t have made more of our time in Bolivia due to the roadblocks and such. The border crossing at Villazón was pretty uneventful other than waiting for 2 hours in a queue while the immigration office was closed for lunch. However once we got through to the Argentinian side of the border we discovered that there were absolutely no money changers in this side of the town. We were stuck in a country with no money and no access to an ATM, another amateur mistake, always change money when you can! Luckily I was able to simply stroll back through to Bolivia to change money and stroll back again past all the suckers still waiting for entry stamps. Whew!

Our first stop in Argentina was the wee town of Tilcara, and what a wee town it is! We both pretty much fell in love with the place within our first day there thanks mostly to all the friendly people we met. The town is a hub for artists in the northwestern region so it´s packed with interesting people, cool shops and spring blossoms coming into bloom. There seemed to be a really different attitude towards visitors compared to Bolivia, where the people were generally quite shy to talk. We found ourselves staying, by accident, in a hostel which was really just a house full of hippies making crafts and fresh bread. The people were really friendly and made us feel at home.

We very quickly realised that all the rumours we had heard about Argentinian food were true. After our bolivian diet of bland everything, I indulged in two steaks on my first day and they were both really good. We had a meal at a local peña, which is basically a venue for dinner with live folk music. The show had a really warm, small town atmosphere and the musician Carlos held the audience with heaps of jokes, most of which we didn´t get at all. It was a great night with great food, wine and music.

There are ruins of a pre colombian town on the crest of a hill above Tilcara called the Pucará. We hiked up to enjoy the views of the valley and run around in the maze of semi restored buildings.

Tilcara was one of those rare places you find when travelling that you find you don´t really want to leave. After spending a few days soaking up the relaxed vibe and not doing too much else we ventured onward to the big smoke.