20 hour bus journey. Done.
We had a relaxed morning, packing our bags, then drinking coffees and eating Alfajores until it was time to leave for our bus.
We navigated the bus terminal pretty well between us and found the office for our bus operator, only to be told that our bus had been cancelled and we had to wait for the next one, five hours later.
Looking around at the bleak and dirty surroundings of the bus terminal, we decided to head back towards the hostel. We parked ourselves up in a sandwich bar and troughed through an awesome Milanesa sandwich (I felt I deserved it after carrying over a third of my body weight on my back in my oversized backpack for the last hour and a half!)
We set off a second time and this time managed to get the bus. I had promised Nav a luxury bus with reclining seats where food and Malbec would be served to us… I may have been a little lavish with the truth and to make matters worse Nav interpreted luxury as what I can only imagine to be similar to the likes of a pimped out tour bus. This, it was certainly not, but the seats did recline!
So here we were, facing a 20 hour bus journey with nothing but a bottle of water and some dried fruit to get us through. Thank goodness for that epic sandwich lunch!
Tired and fed up, and Nav threatening to replace all future scheduled bus journeys with flights, we finally succumbed to the tunes of Bryan Adams randomly playing in the background. After serenading Nav with a few lines of ‘Everything I Do’ (badly, I might add!), all was well again.
We whiled away the first couple of hours with a few tv episodes we downloaded on the iPad and then proceeded to sleep the majority of the journey.
I woke up this morning to us driving through an expanse of flat greenery, a world away from Buenos Aires. I’ve researched our destination (Puerto Madryn) in my guidebook and am set for the next stop on our adventure.
Top tips: book overnight buses – you sleep most of the way and save on accommodation costs. Take entertainment (books, music etc) and food and drinks to get you through.
