Tarija

I wake at midday and try to recover my energy from the previous nights' seemingly endless train and bus rides. My room is one of many cells lining the courtyard at the hosteria. I couldn't get the window closed the night before so my raincover for my backpack is draped precariously over it. I head to town in search of breakfast.

I stumble across the permanent market near the plaza in town. Enormous bags filled with bread, women selling racks of meat and fruit pilled to the ceiling. I come to the almuerzo stalls and allow a woman to seat me at her table, some kind of soup but I didn't know what exactly. I order one.

I wander on to the plaza and sit for a while. I see people meet their friends, taking pictures by the fountain or eating ice-cream on the bench and people watching just like me. I'm reading Paul Theroux's 'The Old Patagonian Express', a companion for the road, he goes where I go, only his writing seems sometimes judgemental and condescending. This frustrates me; I am an open book to the world and his is closed.

I leave the plaza and buy myself a bag filled with various pastries and empanadas. "Uno de eso y uno de eso y tres de esos". (They look good!) I walk to the top of the street where a beautiful old blue and white church is perched on the hill. It was full and I wondered what brought so many people to church on a monday afternoon. I left, seeking something I could understand.

I return to the plaza, studying my map for a place to eat. A girl sits directly opposite me. She looks about my age and seems more contented than restless. Moments later, a call from across the plaza and she is met by her friends. I smile because I know that feeling of being rescued from aloneness. At home I am constantly being saved from some unjustified fear of being alone. But here I relish it. My mind is free to absorb new streets, new tastes and new experiences without the tinted lense of a compatriate whose world-view inevitably becomes synonymous and intertwined with my own.

The next day I check out of the hotel that ended up costing me about $6 AUS per night and head to 'Sur Bike' where I had organised to hire a bicicleta for the day and ride to a nearby waterfall. Turns out it wasn't so nearby-a fourteen kilometre ride uphill, half of which was spent on a busy road. I went with a Dutch woman who arrived at the office just as I was leaving. Once off the main road we passed farms and schools and striking mountainsides. The river was small but grande and the surrounding cliffs beautiful colours of red and green. I sat by the river and ate a mandarin and a standard ham and cheese sandwhich, commonplace everywhere I've been so far.

I sped back to town knowing I had to cross the border before five o'clock. I hopped in a shared taxi with a couple with their baby and some Bolivian men. I got the front seat but soon regretted it when loud Bolivian pop music blasted out the tranquility. The drive was breathtaking passing a river and canyon, high peaks and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid wild-west rock formations. A walk across the border and two buses later, I'd made it to Salta, Argentina, where another adventure was about to begin.