Don´t Cry for Us, Argentina

Week four of the journey to Salta proved to be the most eventful: my bike frame snapped; we discovered the best humitas and empanadas in all of Argentina; we tangoed with a headwind; and we knocked out the last clicks of the ride like seasoned battlers, finding our second wind, and then our third, as we rolled into the lovely city of Salta, a couple of days ahead of schedule.

Recap:
We were only 15 km out of Tafi del Valle, when the unthinkable happened: the corner joint on the bike frame that holds the bike racks in place snapped like a twig. The first of the two (prions, I think they´re called) had broken off a couple of weeks before, pinged clean as though it had been sawed off. I heard it pop and I turned in the direction of the sound and saw my bike rack and my panniers akimbo, hanging like sad and dirty bags of laundry off a donkey. Dios mio! We brainstormed, Deputy Dawg and I, wondering how in the world we'd attach the rack to the bike. Luckily, the Dep carries with him a magic bag of just-in-case emergency items and he happened to have a cable ring and wire cable. We secured the ring and cable around the frame and the corner of the rack, the weight of the jerry-rigged system settling entirely on the bolt, pulled the wire cable as tightly as we could, and prayed that the sucker would hold through another week of riding. (Photo coming soon.)

The best humitas and empanadas in all of Argentina: at the Terramama restaurant in Amaicha de Valle, some 50 km or so from Tafi. We met the lovely Maria Sanchez, student at the university in Tucuman, who helps out at the family restaurant whenever she can. The humitas were creamy and sweet, like smooth polenta, and surprising -- there were bits of raisins and small chunks of delicate cheese. So much goodness wrapped in a corn husk! The flavors of corn and cheese mingled pleasantly in the air and whetted our appetites. And the empanadas... it pains me as a writer not to be able to accurately describe the empanadas without resorting to overused adjectives like awesome and fantastic and miraculous, so let me leave the taste to your imaginations, gentle readers, and say only this: GOOD LORD!

Cafayate: We did not get to spend enough time in Cafayate, our one regret. It was Easter and we were lucky to find accommodations for one evening, let alone for two. We found Cafayate sweet and charming with its cafes and boutiques and vineyards, and we wanted to linger, but there were no rooms for the rollin' dawgies (except for the ones with smelly terlets and sheets sticky with old man juice, and the dawgies have standards, by god) and so we loaded up and left town the next morning.

The road to Alemania took us through canyons and red cliffs, one marvel after another, with evocative names like Gargantua del Diablo and Obelisko and Ventanas del Cielo. We fought against a headwind all day long, but we were not bowed nor weakened by it. We pushed on, remaining cheerful, buoyed by the fact that there was only one day of riding left and we would make it Salta, no matter what blew our way. I think I heard Deputy Dawg yelling into red-rimmed chasm when the going was especially tough: HAW! Is that all you've got?

After Alemania, we had 90 km left in the journey. The shoulder of the road was wide and smooth and curving, and so we rode it fast, hanging ten like Duke Kahanamoku on a perfect wave, and by 4 pm, we were in Salta, feeling euphoric and giddy, the effort of the journey falling away from us like a distant memory. We felt jubilant, as though we'd done something big, when all we'd done was chart a course and see it from beginning to end, which, in its own way, is thrilling and deeply satisfying.

Memorable: the pousada in Alemania, which we came to by accident. It was luxe and spacious and warm, its hosts thoughtful and generous; the Bicicleteria Sarmiento, best bicycle shop in Salta. The repair guy soldered the two prions back onto the frame like a vulcan god, the repair work is seamless and smooth, a thing of beauty. And all this for $7 pesos! We love Argentina.

-- Mad Dawg copyright 2007

The mountain: in our way. Located between Alguirres and Tafi del Valle (destination for the day); a 100 km ride, a 6,000 ft. climb.

The word: hell.

The attack: spirited (at first), but mainly slow, steady and laughable.

The hope: After 3,000 ft., that the locals had miscalculated the meter to foot conversion, that the climb would level off and we'd be sitting like pretty bandidos on our saddles as we cruised down to Tafi.

The results: 5 hours on the mountain, climbing; another 3 to Tafi. Which was not a cruise.

The law: the mountain will always kick your ass.

What more can we say about the day on the mountain except that we were humbled, that the sign that said Fin del Mundo (to indicate a panoramic vista for picture taking) might have been hilarious had we been in a mood for hilarity, but we were not -- we were cranky, which is the mood that comes after a sound humbling -- and while we were always full of hope that around every switchback was the end of the climb, a good thing to be on a tough ride, the mountain would not be moved by prayers and useless bargainings and, to be honest, grew even stonier and deaf, its road narrowing in places where only goats and tour buses are lords, and that for the last 3 hours on the evil mountain, we resorted to using our granny gears, the lowest gears available to humbled dawgies and wimps, but that at sunset, we came into Tafi, laid out in the valley like a green bed, and that we rested and then went into the center of town and found a parilla and were revived by sweet wine and humitas en chala and bread and grilled meats, glistening and charred on the plate, and by the company of boisterous families and lively tour groups there to celebrate Easter weekend, and that we were happy, the day and the climb falling into something that felt like peace, and that we rested and rested, for 3 days we rested, before we climbed back on our caballos and charted the rest of the ride to Salta, knowing that there would be more mountains -- there are always mountains in the way -- and that this is the way of the road, but that at the end of the day, the mountain would be behind us and that there would be food and wine and rest, and though we had no right to ever expect it, peace, the peace that comes after a hard and honest struggle up a mountain.

Palquita to La Rioja: 70 km; La Rioja to Catamarca: 155 km

There are times when we feel like ghosts as we shuttle through towns, staying only long enough to replenish our waterbags and fruit bowl, and then riding on to the next pueblo, the next kiosko outpost, until night takes over and we must stop.

It is always such a pleasure, then, to stay a couple of nights at a place. There are friends to meet, wine to drink, fruit to share. And there are stories. Always there are stories that we carry, the ones that we find during the day and pass on, from one traveller to another. This is the one of the great joys of being on the road.

From Palquita (which is after San Augustin del Valle de Fertil), we biked hard and long (70 km) and were looking forward to exploring La Rioja, a relatively bigger city (Palquita is a one-horse, one-motel kind of town).

But La Rioja did not like us. And after the mocking of the border police, we did not like it. (I'm pretty sure the policia were sniggering at my passport photo, which I know hurts the eyes, but sniggering? Really, senores, I wanted to say, must you be so amused?)

We should have continued on, but we needed to do laundry, to take a vigorous scrubbing to our tired, calloused dogs. We needed a rest, and so we stayed. The city seemed to seethe, with hostility, with suspicion, with hustlers and crooks. It was the only place in Argentina to which we'd come that our hola was treated not as a greeting, but as an insult. Why are you here, what do really want? they seemed to ask us, giving us sidelong glances and second looks. All we'd known in this country was kindness and friendliness and hospitality so genuine, it swelled our hearts, so the change in demeanor and personality was deeply unsettling. It was the first time on our travels that we felt unsafe. People looked at us as though they would just as soon shank us as shake our hand.

Deputy Dawg observed that the people were so hostile in La Rioja, they refused to say their ''esses'', their words sounding bitten off in speech: no me guto; bata; no hopedaje aqui.

Even our hotel (King's Hotel) had a guarded look with its barred windows, its dark, heavy drapes in the lobby. It was falling into disrepair and slovenliness, even though it claimed 4 stars. It slumped in the corner, right across the city´s sanitarium. Niiiiice. The orderlies brought out the insane and the lost to fume and howl on the cement stoop outside for a couple of hours at night.

We left La Rioja just as soon as our laundry was done.

We set our sights on Catamarca and rode fast until we came to Chumbicha. We needed more water, some carbs; I asked the woman at the mercado if she could recommend a good restaurant in town. I told her we had great hunger. Her eyes lit up and she let loose a stream of adjectives that had something to do with heaven and god and pasta.

Her praises led us inside the barrio to a fort roofed in tin and wood and into the cocina of one Nonna, an angel masquerading as a grandmother. We were shepherded from the dining area of a few tables and a dirt floor, which looked as though it had just been swept, and into the nook of her kitchen; we felt like we'd won some kind of lottery. There were wonderful aromas rising out of the blackened pots on the stove, the scents complex and layered and surprising, like any good story.

She listed the kinds of pastas she could make for Deputy Dawg and when she came to gnocchi, he pounced on it and nodded. She ignored my request for just a salad, but a big one, por favor, looking at me as though I were a dope or an ingrate. Pechuga de pollo suprema, she announced.

The chicken was supreme, in every way. Grilled perfectly with the skin left on for flavor, tender and juicy to the teeth. The lime she had squeezed on it while it grilled over the flames was the perfect complement, leaving a citrusy tang with every bite.

Deputy Dawg took a bite of his gnocchi in a rich marinara sauce and wept. This is better than the gnocchi I had in Venice, he whispered. How can this be? Food this amazing in this nowhere place.

Nonna, we sang, Nonna. Where have you been our lives? She basked in our adulation and when we left, proffered her cheek, as an angel does when it casts its eye on those it loves.

We left the cocina, lighter than we'd felt when the day began and it was all because we'd found our way to Nonna, our angelina de gnocchi.

We rode like crazed and happy devils all the way to Catamarca.

-- Mad Dawg copyright 2007