Going to Guemes and Beyond

After 10 hours on a bus, I made it to Yacuiba, the Bolivian town on the border with Argentina. I arrived at 6 AM and tried desperately to sort out who was offering what as I waded through the venders touting their buses to Salta. I chose a bus and a company that fit into my meager cash budget (I only had $62 Argentine pesos, and there no ATMs in Yacuiba), and then waited nervously in an interminal line at immigration, hoping desperately that they wouldn´t mention anything about yellow fever. They didn´t and my passport was stamped without a problem.

From there I thought I was home free. The travel agent pointed me across field (right) to the bus terminal on the Argentine side and told me to give my ticket to the Flecha Bus ticket counter when I arrived. I got to the station, handed the teller my ticket and he handed me another (for a different bus company) in its place, and I noticed with annoyance that the price tag said $41 pesos, and I had paid $60. That was some commission Flech Bus was making.

And then I noticed something even more disturbing - the name of the destination had changed from Salta to Guemes. Is that the same thing?, I asked. They are very close, I was assured . . . only 20 minutes by car. No. No. Sorry, but I PAID for Salta, I said, and I don´t have any money left to pay for a taxi from Guemes (supposedly $7 pesos). After over 1/2 am hour of haggeling, I finally got them to give me back $10 pesos for my taxi. Whew . . . guess that Spanish does come in useful. I had 12 more starving hours on the bus after that, but I didn´t dare buy a thing to eat (I was out of food) for fear that $10 wouldn´t actually cover the taxi. Luckily, it did.

At 8 PM the next day (24 hours after leaving Santa Cruz) I finally rolled into Salta, went to an ATM, bought a snack and triumphantly crawled into bed.