There's not much to see in this town whose wealth and stinky smell come from the nearby sugar refinery, however it is the base for exploring Calilegua National Park.
From the bus station we headed straight to the park. It was muddy from the heavy rains in prior days, and the river was very swollen and fast, but we walked for 2-hours, the only hikers around, and it didn't rain. The area in Calilegua where we spent our time is a subtropical forest, so it is very green, and not too high in altitude.
On Tuesday it was Simon's b-day. He is used to happy birthdays with family in NZ. Well, this one was quite different. First of all, the day actually started very early. At 3am a bunch of guys decided to gather on the corner under our hotel room window and talk and laugh for more than an hour. So needed sleep was badly interrupted. Around 7am, he woke up and showered in our hotel room bathroom with a door that wouldn't shut properly. Breakfast was a highlight, great coffee and milk with wonderful tortillas (a local bread, very different from the Mexican version). Unfortunately, we had to catch a bus, so he had breakfast in a rush, hiding a few tortillas for the road in our bag. After hailing a shared taxi, the only transport in town, we got on the bus right before its departure at 8:30. The problem with cutting it so close was that the bus was full. Three persons every two seats, and bags and boxes everywhere. Latecomers had to ride standing. And so we climbed over a few boxes, avoiding being hit by the bags of bread hanging from the handrails and trying not to touch the stacks of eggs parked by the windshield, to find some room at the back of the aisle. Let's be clear: there were no animals roaming on the bus, just lots of people and their luggage and food. A few minutes after leaving the terminal, the bus was pulling out of town, heading to the bridge that links Libertador with the road to the national park. The bridge was blocked by a union on strike. A group of young men were burning tires, and only a handful of cars who gave them money were allowed to pass. And Simon stood in the bus for 2 hours on his birthday until the strikers decided to move and let traffic flow. 10 uphill kms later, the bus dropped us at the start of a trail that went down to a river that we had to cross several times getting our feet wet up to the knees. It had been raining a lot in the mountains, so rivers were running really fast with lots of muddy water. We had a birthday lunch by the river featuring the tortillas from the morning and water. All in all we walked for 4 hours, and hitchedhiked our way back to town. The bus to Salta was 2 hours late due to other road blockades by the same striking union further north.
In the end it was a birthday hiking on a sunny day. I think Simon may want to come here every birthday now. Humm... Maybe not.
Mercedes
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