Four hours is never enough sleep. Going to bed at 5am and trying to rise at 9am is futile. Crawling from bed with burning eyes and an empty stomach, needing a taxi to the bus terminal for an 11am trip to Yapeyú, our designated half-way spot to Concordia, our designated half-way spot to Montevideo. So many stops all because there is nothing direct.
Getting dressed is painful. Getting organised is worse. Making sure that we haven't left anything behind is a bloody joke. We bid farewell to Tim and Lees at 8.30am somehow, the Bavarians are barely alive and heading back to their volunteering project in Puerto Rico, and we don't even remember to lift the delicious chimichurri sauce or cayenne pepper marinade from the fridge on the way out the door. It is not easy to get hot sauce in Argentina.
Our taxi arrives and we watch the minutes drip away as we jolt down side streets and main avenues, and my frigid memory of where the bus terminal is seems shakier than before. We pull up well after 11am and any hope we had of getting to Yapeyú by mid-afternoon is gone.
After an empanada or two, and some agua con gas, we book onto a bus leaving at 6pm. Nothing much to do but hang around, try and sleep in the waiting room upstairs, watch animals tearing each other to pieces on Nat Geo Wild on the plasma tv, and when we eventually feel human again head to the restaurant downstairs for a sandwich or two. When these fail to satisfy we have to leave the station and get a decent milanese across the road. Very tasty, and plenty left for the onward journey.
6pm rolls up and we, semi-flawlessly, roll out of Posadas and head south.
Getting dressed is painful. Getting organised is worse. Making sure that we haven't left anything behind is a bloody joke. We bid farewell to Tim and Lees at 8.30am somehow, the Bavarians are barely alive and heading back to their volunteering project in Puerto Rico, and we don't even remember to lift the delicious chimichurri sauce or cayenne pepper marinade from the fridge on the way out the door. It is not easy to get hot sauce in Argentina.
Our taxi arrives and we watch the minutes drip away as we jolt down side streets and main avenues, and my frigid memory of where the bus terminal is seems shakier than before. We pull up well after 11am and any hope we had of getting to Yapeyú by mid-afternoon is gone.
After an empanada or two, and some agua con gas, we book onto a bus leaving at 6pm. Nothing much to do but hang around, try and sleep in the waiting room upstairs, watch animals tearing each other to pieces on Nat Geo Wild on the plasma tv, and when we eventually feel human again head to the restaurant downstairs for a sandwich or two. When these fail to satisfy we have to leave the station and get a decent milanese across the road. Very tasty, and plenty left for the onward journey.
6pm rolls up and we, semi-flawlessly, roll out of Posadas and head south.
The sun falls from the sky quickly around here. Not much to see in between anyway.
Yapeyú appears off a roundabout, a tiny town of a single main street, an a two-space bus terminal. This is not a metropolitan hub. Selected from a few towns as it is the birthplace of quasi-deity Jose De San Martin, or El Libertador De La Republica de Argentina as he is known round here, Yapeyú is something you imagine rather than visit. But in the late night glow of streetlights, and the barking of tiny dogs that freaks Sarah out, we stalk back up the road to the edge of town, and by torchlight make our way down the long, lit, but cow-pat-ridden path to Pousada Altos De Yapeyú. Another barking dog blocks our way, but once again bounds out of the way as I show my determination to get to the front door, and Mario appears after a wait to let us in. The Pousada is fresh and clean and as good as anywhere we have stayed yet. I already wish we were here for longer. But then I have felt that way everywhere, why should this be any different? I have spent my life endeavouring to leave the party before it becomes stale, before the fighting begins and everyone goes to bed.
We need a hotel for the next night in Concordia. Life doesn't make it easy when the power cuts out twenty minutes later. We look dazed and close our eyes; no AC or mosquito-plugs working, and a dog barking in the distance. But it doesn't last long, and half an hour later the power kicks in, we book a hotel and collapse into an incredibly comfortable bed.
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