Salta, Tucuman, La Rioha, San Augustin, Valle Union, Mendoza - Troy

I finally managed to get back on the road after my long stop in Salta, and began to head south and then west towards Ruta 40. Unfortunately the weather was turning and looking like rain so as I headed into the hills, I decided to set up camp, just off the road.

Luckily the rain didn't come though it certainly wasn't warm. When I started riding the next day, the Dingo started doing some strange things, the rev meter would go haywire, especially when I was decelerating, and at odd intermittent moments I would feel the bike lose power for a split second. I cursed the mechanics in Salta, thinking they may have done something to her, but I didn't want to go back so I headed south to Tucuman.

In Tucuman I found a nice hostel and checked the bike over. Everything seemed fine, she started nice and ran beautiful, but I took her to another mechanic anyway. They looked her over and pronounced all good. So after exploring the rather nice city of Tucuman for a few days, and catching up on blogs, I once again took to the road and Ruta 40.

Unfortunately the problem began to rear it's ugly head again, so I decided to head for La Rioha, to do some research on the net and try and fix the problem myself. I found a cheap hotel which unfortunately had no net so I then went to a cafe and sunk a bunch of coffees while using their wifi. Eventually I decided that it must be electrics and was either the kill switch on the kick stand or the clutch. I felt satisfied at this conclusion so I went out for dinner, and there met a cool Argentinian girl called Sole and an American cat called Ben who was studying in Cordoba.We chatted over dinner then decided to find a bar for a couple of beers, thought that's easier said than done in a town like La rioha, where the streets become deserted after 11pm.

The next day I cut the kick stand kill switch and the bike seemed to start fine, just to be cautious I tightened and checked all the connections too. I then rode out of town towards Valle de Luna, where, while I was waiting for a tour, I met 2 American guys called Gordon and Davis, who were riding up from Buenas Aires. When they heard my accent they said, "hey we were riding with an Aussie guy called Zane, from the U.S. into Mexico a bunch of months back". I then explained that I knew Zane too and we wondered at how crazy it is that bikers always seem to somehow meet up in crazy places and have mutual connections.

So we then rode through the amazing landscape of Valle de Luna, and by the time we'd done that it was getting late. I was going to camp in the desert that night, but they were cool guys so i headed to San Augustin with them and we found a nice hotel and average restaurant, then proceeded to chew the fat all night. Gordon had a tragic story in that just outside of Cordoba, the BMW 650 which he had just bought 2nd hand in Buenas Aires (he crashed his own bike in Mexico, so had bought this to sort of finish the trip), anyways one of the panniers fell off his bike somewhere and despite searching for it they never found it, and the worst part was that it had all of his documents in it!!

So the next day they kept riding to La Rioha and I headed for the Tulcuman national park, which is an amazing huge gorge of red cliffs with petroglyphs, beautiful little oasis of green trees and bizarre outcropping of ancient sea worn rocks.

I then rode to the town of Valle de Union, where I intended to pick up supplies and continue down Ruta 40, but when I got to the main square I had no choice but to stay! I hadn't realised that it was May 24 which here in Argentina is like their national day. I climbed off my bike and was in the midst of an amazing celebration. There were kids in various regional costumes doing dances, there were bands, rousing speaches and an all round atmosphere of pure joy. I rode back down the road and managed to get a cheap camp spot, set up my tent, then went back to mingle. It was a great thing to see, the whole town was filled with people from all over the region dressed in their best and drinking wine and mixing it up.

The next day I rode out to Ruta 40 and into the desert regions. I was expecting something really barren but it was a crazy ride where every hour the whole perspective would change, the colours, the hills, the road, the foliage... it was brilliant. I eventually decided to pull over early when I saw some abandoned buildings, in a perfect location. I set up the tent and spent the afternoon doing my French lessons, (I've been studying up for when I get to France), watching the sun go down and cooking up a very tasty vegie and lentil soup (this probably sounds like a boring detail, but for me there is nothing more rewarding than cooking an edible and enjoyable camp meal).

The next morning I made my way to Mendoza which is a really stunning metropolitan city surrounded by vineyards. I managed to find the tourist office and they steered me to some camp spots, whence I proceeded to get insanely lost. I finally made it outside of the city to a campestre where I set up camp and did my french lessons while cooking a rather nice pesto pasta. I decided that the next day I had to get a new rear tyre (I had almost no tread left on the Metzler, that I had bought in Bogota then carried all over Colombia and Ecuador, before installing at border to Peru), then I would head towards the border with Chile, where the landscape was meant to be spectacular...