We’ve finally hit the point in our voyage where we’ve outrun all of our reservations, leaving us to shoot from the hip and follow our noses into the unexplored. So far, it’s been nothing short of magic, for not a week had passed since leaving our apartment in Buenos Aires and we found ourselves in the mountains above Salta, galloping horses and being chased around the yard with a lasso.

Our guide, Guillermo, won us over from the start. The chubby gaucho with bloodshot eyes, a cheek-full of coca leaves, and a bandage around his wrist, explained his injury thus: he’d finally won out in tournament over his perpetual nemesis, becoming the overall arm-wrestling champion. But his victory came with a crack in his wrist. As if this wasn’t enough, he turned on the CD player and thumbed the controls until “Barbie Girl” spilled out of the speakers. “I love this song” he said, singing along… And he meant it.

The first ride of the day started with a long country road. The horses were quite content to trot your ass quite sore, and open up into a gallop with the slightest input. Folks, I’ve never been on a galloping horse, nor should I have been, but a barely adequate helmet works miracles for your courage, and gallop I did… on “General”, the biggest horse they had! The ride continued with a climb along a mountain trail, with intermittent views of the city of Salta below, eventually reconnecting with the road for a sporty run back to the farm. “Black Sabbath”, the ever alert herding dog, followed along every step of the way — yapping and sprinting, bringing the horses along the road into order and back to the ranch.

After an asado lunch and some rare fresh vegetables, the “half day” tourists split, leaving Lucy and I on the patio with a few beers, stumbling our way in spanish through favorite films and pop culture with Guillermo (who spoke perfectly good English but encouraged our attempts all the same). And that’s really the magic of traveling: beautiful and strange people sharing their places, cultures and traditions. It was one of those moments where we both knew we were exactly where we wanted to be. After teaching us how to throw a lasso and chew coca like a salteaño, Guillermo saddles us up for a halcyon evening ride in the mountains surrounding the ranch — this time with the addition of “Chicki”, Black Sabbath’s young protege. We returned to the ranch as the setting sun turned the greens to greys, and settled in for a night in on the estancia.

The house itself was worn and dusty, but lovely. The rustic home was once a convent, and still had a chapel to prove it. We were joined unexpectedly by a late arriving couple from England, and with Guillermo, the 5 of us took a lovely dinner and stayed up late into the evening enjoying good company and drinking the ever present argentinian wine.

Doesn’t get much better than that, folks