SAN JUAN

Departing Cordoba via a night bus we arrived to the dry and dusty city of San Juan which is the capital of the province of San Juan. Sheri had a bug to rent a car and drive around. We rented a car from the friendly owner of “Classic” rental agency. We picked up a two door Suzuki Fun. San Juan is a city of 400,000 and Argentine drivers are aggressive and most intersections are uncontrolled. So its whoever has the biggest balls gets the right of way. So cautiously we made our way to the edge of town and then we were free. The province of San Juan is a land of rocks, and vast desert-scapes and the occasional giant glacier topped mountain in the Andes. We took a windy road to a village called Barreal. We landed at a shady hostel with nice grass and a little above ground pool, and an obsessive cleaning staff that never stopped. All this was nice because we were surrounded by a sea of scrubby desert and burning hot sun. From Barreal we visited a dry lake bed (in Spanish Barreal means dry lake bed) and put our little Suzuki through its paces. From there we went to a national park that has two astronomical observatories. Then we trudged around in the desert to a little waterfall where Sheri stripped off for a dip but that was short lived as a group showed up and one old guy in particular got a big thrill from seeing her au natural. It was desiccatingly hot so we walked along a small creek and took a nap under a huge willow tree. From Barreal we drove north on a gravel road. We were along there for four hours and saw one car (of course it passed when Curtis pulled over for a crap). We stopped at a village of three houses and a police station (Tocato) and had lunch under a tree. A guy came out just to see if we were OK. We could stay at his place if we were broke down. But we were OK and carried on to the paved road and to a town called Rodeo that’s on aa reservoir. Sheri wanted a swim so we went to a beach, but the wind was ripping and swimming wasn’t allowed. Instead we stopped at a wind surfing complex called Puerto de Palos. It’s like a wooden plank fortress that has been smeared with mud. Inside is a bar restaurant and stacks of wind surfing boards and dudes sitting around playing cards and bunches of folks on the beach and on the water ripping back and forth. And of course there is a large picture of The Man: Ernesto ‘Che’ Guevara (did he wind surf?). We had a coke and a beer and a yummy piece of dulce de leche and coconut cake. Moving on were enjoyed the weird rocks and super narrow windy roads and landed in the dusty town of Jachal. They don’t get many tourist in Jachal. People love to ride bikes there and all over San Juan. We sat in the square at night watched as people went round and round and round. Jachal is a town of 21,000 and it doesn’t have one stop light or stop sign - an interesting system. Moving on we drove through the nothingness to Talampaya National Park and camped. Access is tightly controlled so we went on a tour. The land is something like the red rock canyons around Moab, Utah; with petro glyphs and guanacos and condors and parrots. They also have big rabbits that almost look like the have hoved feet (jackalope?). We picked up a French hitch hiker and boogied on over to Ischigualasto National Park. The park is another bizarre landscape like the Canyonlands in Utah. Another unique thing about the park is that because of the tipping of the Atlantic and Pacific plates there is a complete record of all the geologic layers from present going back hundreds of millions of years in one place. Access is tightly controlled so people are required to caravan into the park in their own cars, and a guide jumps into the first car, we made about five stops. We drove on down to San Augustine in Valle Fertil for the night. The “fertile valley” in reality is quite infertile. From there we drove through more emptiness and stopped at a shrine called Difunta Correa. It is based on a “miracle” that happened in 1841. A woman, Deolinda Correa, followed her husband who was in the army across San Juan. She succumbed to thirst and heat and died. Miraculously her baby survived and was found nursing at the dead woman’s breast. So based on this a shrine was set up were she died on top of a small rise in a place called Vallecitos. This story has caught on all over western Argentina especially with truckers and there are many road side sub-shrines. People give thanks to Difunta Correa for all the things they have received, especially cars and houses, and they leave water to quench the woman’s thirst and burn candles to honor her. So there are tens of thousands of bottles of water laying around, and a lot of car parts and license plates. Where they burn candles the wax is thick on the ground and is drained off into a pit at the base of the hill. Thousands of people were visiting, a few were climbing the stairs on their hands and knees, and some others were crying. At the base of the hill are dozens of gift shops and chapels and parrillas and camping and picnic areas. We drove on to San Juan were the friendly owner of Classic car rentals drove us to a gas station to fill up and to the bus terminal where we caught a bus to Mendoza.