I had a quick visit to San Agustin as it was the base to get to one of the National Parks. This little town is in the middle of a desert area and was quiet though quaint, lots of old cars and a few friendly locals.
Parque Provincial Ischingualasto also known as Valle de la Luna (Moon Valley). Not difficult to see where the nickname came from. The deposits in this area date back over 230 million years and it has some of the oldest and most preserved dinosaur remains ever found. The funny thing is that the first dinosaur skeltons were only found in the 1940`s by some Guacho`s (cowboys) who initially thought they were just cow bones.. You are only allowed into the park with a park ranger as people were stealing the dinosaur bones!!
These boulders were formed on a river bed where the pressure of the water caused different minerals and rocks to rub together.
The strong winds that pass through the valley have eroded many of the rocks over the last few million years creating these unusual rock formations - over the last few years several of these rock formations have collapsed due to erosion and there are another few that the expect to fall down over the next few years. But they won`t do anything to stop it as it is all natural and they say that over time others will be formed.
Some fossils that were found in the park area.....the dinosaurs that lived here were pretty small relative to their bigger cousins found elsewhere but I think this is the first time I have ever saw real dinosaur bones and not just a replica.
Even though they were amongst the smaller of the dinosaurs Feliz decided he would have been pretty scared if he had come up against them....
A Mara - a little hare like rodent found out in the desert - we saw a couple of these as we were passing through though I have to admit I cheated a little with this photo (taken from the wildlife info board) as they were too quick for me in a moving van on a bumpy road!!
Sunset as we left San Agustin.
A quick stop in San Juan to break up my journey and get a nights sleep in a bed rather than on a bus!! As I waited the next day for the hostel to do my laundry I went for a walk around town. The local park seemed to be a bit of a war musuem.
There were also some interesting sculptures.
I fell across the Titanes de Ischigualasto (dinosaur) exhibitionso F
eliz and I went for a look and narrowly escaped without being eaten!!
The road network in Argentina is pretty good between the main cities there are big wide highways...though most roads have tolls on them.
My next stop was Mendoza with a population of just over a million people this city had quite a cosmopolitan feel about it. It is set around a main Plaza like lots of Argentina towns but there were also lots of smaller plaza`s around the city where in late afternoon and evenings the locals meet up to catch up, chat, eat, shop at the little market stalls or have some romance.
I found a lovely little hostel (Pirka Hostel) not far from the Independence Plaza which was run by Blanca and her sons. The night I arrived I was the only guest and they were having a meal with their friends and invited me to join in. Despite the language difficulties with the help of my phrase book I had a lovely time staying here and Blanca and one of her friends even took me out for the evening.
There were quite a few old classic cars driving about in Mendoza as well.
Some nice little houses just out of the city centre.
A walk to Parque General San Martin on Sunday morning found it busy with keep fit fans doing aerobics classes, cyling or running....me I was happy to sit and watch and read my book!!
Was up early enough one morning to catch the sunrise as I made my way to the bus station for my day trip.
As I headed to Alta Montana I had thought I would catch a sleep but the views from the bus were too nice to miss.
I jumped off the bus at the town of Upsallata in the Alta Montana mountain range. I had been told this was a good place to start a day hike from. The town itself looked like something you would find in the alps.
The Parque Provinical Aconagua (aka Alta Montan Route) is a stunning mountain range just a few hours drive outside of Mendoza. I decided to miss the guided tours and go on my own as I like just getting out into nature by myself when I can......having been told the local tourist office would provide a map I was handed a postcard with a few dots on it!! Needless to say it didn`t take me too long to realise that in fact I wasn`t on the right trail to get a view of Cerro Aconagua (the highest mountain in both the southern and western hemispheres). And after about a 7 hour hike and a few scrambles over the hills so I could keep my bearings from the snow topped mountains I made it back to the town in time to catch the last bus to back to Mendoza . But the views were absolutely stunning and worth the effort - trivia information - the Brad Pitt movie Seven Years in Tibet was filmed in this area.
This donkey was the only sign of life I saw in almost 7 hours, other than the trails I kept following that only turned out to be eating spots for the local goat herds!!
Not quite sure why there was a sign for live explosives though!!
There were some really colourful rocks when you got up into some of the hills.
Though only a few patches of snow on the hills we were on Feliz was excited as he had never touched snow before...
keep going more to come.......
keep going more to come.......
