OUR RUN IN WITH THE LAW

Wow the bus station here in Tucuman is huge! Like a shopping center, well it actually is. 12 hours in the bus relieved to be off it, there were a group of guys who sat around me one is my seatmate, annoying as hell, played music loudly and the guy sat next to me keeps changing seats, one time bumping his head on the tv , he never came back to his seat and I slept pretty well through the night. Thre was a bad smell in the bus that pervade for awhile, either i got used to it or it disappeared, I took the semi cama to save 7 US dollars, the upgrade was grand! Next time.. 

Took a taxi to La Posta de Viajero hostal. Paint peeling from the rooms, but its nice overall, hardly anyone there, was alone in my dorm, kitchen to use and lots of toilets! Showered and went for a walk to town, Plaza San Martin is my 1st stop, a statue of San Martin again, in the middle, around the park are kids in uniform milling about the 
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park some still wearing a white lab coat, i see them here and is fairly 
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students to wear them outside of school, quite unusual for me as I only wear lab coats at work. Anyway walked towards the center of town to Plaza Independencia lots of nice buildings around the square, and museums too but did not go into any of them. Had a good lunch on one of the ped. walkway streets then went to look for the cinema, found it but it was shut! Damn that siesta! Hardly anyone in the center around 3pm so decided to go back to my hostel to chill, as i was crossing one of the streets I almost got run over by a freaking taxi, It made a sharp left turn and almost nicked me, hate these Argentine drivers! 
Had a siesta of my own, got up and walked the center again, this time very lively, full of people and then went to shop for steak! at Carrefour, went back and cooked my meal of what else, steak!Walter, the reception dude offered me mate´ and so we sipped the traditional drink while chatting in Spanish, quite difficult task as I have forgotten 
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they have a different accent, took me awhile to adjust once again, but 
MENHIRES MONOLITHShe was very helpful and gave me tips for our road 
trip coming up tomorrow. After breakfast left the hostel and walked to the bus station where I waited for Aurelie, Georgina and Joe coming off the bus from Mendoza, we left our luggages at the left luggage facilitiy and went to town and had a walk around, brunch at the Mercado Central so cheap but quite good. Then we eventually walked back to the bus station to meet Andy, the Aussie friend of Joe who is driving from Salta with the hi lux he rented and we will all do the road trip for a week up north. 

Joe decided to drive out of the bus parking lot on our way to Tafi del valle, not 2 minutes out and we got pulled over by traffic police! He missed a no left turn sign and the police dude wanted us to pay a fine of 2,500 pesos! or pay him 400 pesos and save all the paper work, this guys are so corrupt, Joe got annoyed and asked Georgina 
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to help with the translation, all in all it took us a good 2 hours arguing with the traffic 
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police, just to get the hell out of there we offered 300 pesos bribe but they insist on 400! Then a local couple came and asked what was going on, after explaining our situation hoping for some sympathy they started giving the cops a sermon on how they are fed up with corruption and that she threathened to write an article on a local paper about it, they said locals get away with a warning and just because we are tourists they are taking advantage of us, then the cops denied having asked us to pay 400 pesos! A tow truck came and like hell we will give up the truck, we drove and parked the car out of site a block away while georgina and Joe sort out things, Aurelie meanwhile called the French embassy in Ba for advice, and was told to get attention from locals to deter them as they are illegal bribes, just then that Joe and Georgina came back walking to where we are with all the paperwork returned to them, they were told to follow the cops but we just floored it and left right away, thus we are now fugitives! 


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JOE BEING REPRIMANDED BY THE CORRUPT TRAFFIC COP
Driving towards 
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JOE BEING REPRIMANDED BY THE CORRUPT TRAFFIC COPValle del Taffi we have to go up on a winding zigzaggy road through a humid forest, all green really 
gorgeous scenery then suddenly turn dry. Arriving in Valle del Tafi we found Los Cumbres hostel, nice small hostel with a tiny kitchen where we cooked our dinner of veggie pasta. Had a few more red wine to celebrate getting away from the corrupt cops of Tucuman without bribing. Apparently Andy and I had a snoring contest that night and had to be poked couple times to shut up! The bad news came next morning, Goergina was feasted on by bedbugs and we think we all will get them as well, she started the day itching. Visited the Reserva Arquelogica de los Menhires to visit some monoliths, then walked around the manmade lake. from there we moved on to Quilmes a small town that resisted the Spaniards during the conquest. up on the hill, hiking on a very hot day we managed to go up to the top of the site and walk around shading ourselves from the intense sun under the huge cacti around us, quite a nice landscape.Drove to Cafayate and found the hostel 
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JOE AND GEORGINA NEGOTIATING WITH THE TRAFFIC COPS
Rustyk which is very 
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JOE AND GEORGINA NEGOTIATING WITH THE TRAFFIC COPSnice with a nice courtyard. We decided to sign up for the asado 
cookout tonight for dinner for 25 pesos each. we walked around town, quiet and not rushed as other towns. We started drinking early, a few Saltas and a few Quilmes at a bar near the plaza, we found a hotel called Briones! Did not know we have a hotel here! The church is nice inside and when we got out there was a small procession going carrying a very small image of a saint. went back to the hostel and had our asado, delicious, and with salad greens and free wine! typical of hostels here in Argie. When we had our fill and booze I went to bed, by now it is very cold and tucked myself in my bed. Joe went out with the lads from the hostel till 3am, woke me up when he was getting ready to bed. Our roomie from Switzerland threw up on the sink, stinks! 

The next morning we all got ready for the hike, we will take a hike along the valleys around the town and do some wineries 
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Corrupt Tucuman traffic cops trying to extract 2,500 pesos($667!)from us for making an illegal left turn near the bus terminal.
as well. The view was fantastic, a small dog followed 
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Corrupt Tucuman traffic cops trying to extract 2,500 pesos($667!)from us for making an illegal left turn near the bus terminal.us up as we follow an aqueduct, cacti, tall grasses, colorful trees, 
amazing landscapes, what more can you ask for and we keep following the stream to hopefully find the waterfall but failed, we walked about couple hours and we lost the trail and we decided to go back to do the wineries. we made it down and met more hikers and we gave them advice where to go. A local dude on the trail told us the direction of the waterfall and if we pay him he can lead us there but we decided enough is enough so we headed to the wineries. Las Nubes is our first winery. We had lunch of humitos and washed it down with torrontes, a slightly sweet wine that is quite refreshing. Then we headed off to town and dropped off Andy at the hostel and we looked for the goat cheese factory, we had a tour of the facility, showing us the goats, and how they process cheese and at the end we bought some for later. we got dropped off by Joe in town and we 
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went to another winery called Ninna, we got a tour of the bodega and we 
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decided to buy another torrontes for dessert.