It’s almost seven in the morning. It’s still dark and very cold. We are standing in the central square of the village of Villa Unión, waiting for a minibus. The bus takes the employees of the Talampaya National Park to their workplace. And that’s the bus we want to take too. We already had a lot of luck on our trip. Unfortunately, this day begins without it. It’s Sunday and probably the driver had a wine too much the night before at the village fete. Or two. How the employees got to the national park we don’t know. Nobody is willing to take us by car. Here in the province people don’t like to pull over for hitchhikers that they don’t recognize, especially when it’s still dark.
The next option to get to the park by bus is only at 1 pm, so there would be very little time to hike. The Argentine tourists all arrived by car. This time, for once, we cannot be accused of lacking preparation. Unfortunately, the only serious car rental company in the whole region did not have a car available. The other option to see the National Park is with a tour, but at this point it becomes clear that Argentina is not really suitable for backpackers. These offers, unfortunately, do not fit our budget. We decide to hitchhike again when the sun comes up and it is warmer. Lo and behold, we wait only about 15 minutes, then someone actually stops. Ricardo and Maria, an older couple, recognized us. We had dinner at the same restaurant the night before, otherwise they wouldn’t have stopped, they say.
And there it is again, our luck. The nice couple from Santa Fe takes us not only to the national park, but also to the neighboring provincial park, in which a lot of dinosaur bones were found. We had already given up on that park, because, well, you can only get to there by your own car. But with luck and the help of the incredibly nice Argentines we have a wonderful day. So it didn’t bother us much that in the Talampaya National Park a full day hike wasn’t available, but only a short trip with a guide, because seven participants would have been required for a longer, guided hike.
Unfortunately, it is not common here to explore nature on your own. Argentineans often go on more comfortable holidays by bus and car. We ask again at another hiking spot, why you cannot do the three-kilometer hike without a guide. We get the answer that you can get lost and it has already happened that a woman has not found her husband and then cried very much. Nothing happended to the man. In Talampaya they said you need a guide because there are sometimes Pumas. However, the guides are not armed like in Africa. It’s not that we strictly don’t want to tours with a guide. But in Argentina they quite often are simply too expensive.
When we get back from our trip, there’s good news. The only car rental company has a car available. We say yes immediately, because we have another spectacular destination, which, if you haven’t won the lottery, you can only explore with your own car. The “Ruta de los Seísmiles”, the road of the six-thousand-meter peaks. The highest mountains of the Andes. It is a nice feeling to be free again and to explore nature yourself. In the last village on the Argentine side, before the road leads to Chile, there are surprisingly large sand dunes. And even better, you can rent sandboards. Our joy knows no bounds. We drive there ourselves, are all alone and glide down the 45-degree slope. Awesome! Also for us, who have already seen many fantastic landscapes on this trip, the road of the sixthousand-meter peaks is once again an absolute highlight. Rugged rocks in bright colors alternate with grassy plateaus where Vicunas graze. Pink flamingos can be seen on the ice-free spots in a lake and the snow-covered peaks of the Andes rise above it all. At 3900 meters above sea level it’s over: snow covers the road, we can’t get any further. But we have seen and experienced the best. We happily head back. We cannot quite understand why this region is not a national park. However, we are pleased about this. Nobody controlled us and no guide dictates our way. We were able to decide for ourselves that we wouldn’t drive on snow-covered roads with summer tires.
We return the rental car a little sad and switch back to the bus. And here our winning streak is over again. The night bus north stops at three in the morning and can’t go on. With six hours delay we reach our destination in expectation of our next challenge.
