Pedro and Maria Motorcycle South America!: Frias to Cordoba, 220 miles

We got a late start today because we didn’t realize we crossed a time zone when we crossed into Argentina. Oh well. We got a few mesquito bites in the night, but we are finally done with Malaria territory, so we weren’t that concerned. We expected it to be scorching hot again, but as we pulled out of the hotel and went from 0-80mph in like 5 seconds we realized that it wasn’t so warm. In fact, it started raining and hailing and we scrambled to make ourselves waterproof on the side of the road. The wind picked up and we were flung all over the place for the next few hours.

More bolts that I neglected to tighten have been coming off and we had to periodically stop to see “what that noise” was. Don’t worry moms, I tightened the brakes, wheels, handlebars, etc--all the important stuff.

As we were checking our map of Cordoba for potential hotels from the cities edge, an elderly man with one normal leg, and another miniature leg about half the size as the normal one dangling from a scooter stopped to ask about our trip. He was impressed and mentioned he is a bit of a moto-adventurer as well. He asked if we had any stickers we could give him. I was confused, but he was just happy to have met us. He offered to lead us into Cordoba to wherever we wanted to go, so we followed him to the city center. From there, we spent the next few hours going from Hotel to hotel checking out rooms and haggling over prices.

One was too musky, others too expensive. One was nice, but smelled like dead people. The most interesting one had the receptionist tell us we could check in, but we couldn’t be in the hotel from 10pm to 2pm on Christmas eve/Christmas day because “In argentina we celebrate Christmas, and the hotel is closed.” Hmmm? Why would I pay to stay in the hotel then?

Finally, just before we were about to settle for the musky one, we found a lovely 3-star for $32 which is nice, smells good, and is, as Amie says, tastefully decorated. We checked in, enjoyed the amenities (including internet) and went out for lunch at a recommendation from the hotel. I had empenadas, a t-bone and mashed potatoes. Amie had ravioli. The food was fantastic and cost us less than $10.

Through a window we could see in the kitchen where the chefs were putting together some amazing looking party platters. Amie and I wished we could crash a holiday party by figuring out the address those platters were destined for. No such luck.

The city is sparsely decorated but bustling in the early afternoon. By early evening it was dead. Everyone was where they intended to be, except us. We were left in an empty city feeling melancholy. Boy its hard not being with family this time of year!

We took another recommendation for dinner at the nicest restaurant in town. There were no cabs so we had a long walk, about 20 blocks, ahead of us. From the looks of the place, I didn’t think they would let us in with jeans and flipflops, but we were welcomed in very graciously, but then quickly turned away as we didn’t have a reservation. DOH! Amie was pretty upset, as was I, because it was about 9:30pm and the place didn’t look that busy. Come to find out, people don’t start showing up until about 11pm. !!!

Luckily we found a second choice not far away at all that would seat us and had a nice special menu for the occasion: $25 a head got us appetizer, main, dessert, wine, champagne, etc. It ended up being very nice. We left at 12:30am, and it was just getting busy. We’ll make a reservation for the other place tomorrow night.

On the long walk back the streets were dead--except for so many families setting off fireworks you would think it was 4th of July. It sounded like a war zone, or a Bolivian mine! Explosions were everywhere. Kids were running around blowing stuff up right in front of our hotel at 1am. Amie and I laughed as we contrasted the Christmas culture between the US and Argentina.

The usual morning packup...all smiles after that comfy night