We left Cordoba at the far more civilised time of 10am for the drive to Rio Ceballos, where we were to camp at an estancia for three nights. Having now been given our cooking duties, we stopped off to do our shopping at a row of shops in a small village.
We had discovered that the truck causes quite a lot of interest in the locals, and so we were already rousing their curiousity when we pulled up outside. But I don’t think anything had prepared them for 21 travellers, with only limited Spanish between us, descending into their shops and buying food for the next three days. As you can imagine, that is quite a lot of food and we cleared their shelves of some items.
We had been told that the argentine people are always interested in tourists from other countries, and it certainly was true here. The shop owners were all very helpful and friendly, and they and their other customers showed remarkable patience while we tried to see what we could buy with our budgets and work out how many packets of spaghetti you need to feed 21 travellers for one meal - the answer is six 500g packets by the way. They guys in the greengrocers shared their mate with some of us, which is quite a privileged thing to be offered, and which we happily accepted.
And then of course there were the drinks. The food comes from the group kitty, but we buy our drinks individually, so they also had 21 people stocking up on beers, wines and a few soft drinks.
It took us just over an hour to do our shopping at stow it away in the truck, and as we drove off, everyone from the shops came out to wave us goodbye. We passed again after have stopped for petrol, and those who were still outside jumped up again to wave at us some more. I have no doubt that some of their pleasure came from the fact that we had probably just doubled their takings for the week (if not the month), but they also seemed to genuinely enjoy the experience. For us it was a great way to shop, and satisfying to know that our money was going directly to local people. And it was fun!
No comments:
Post a Comment
We like to hear from you too, so please leave us a message here. We are also happy to answer any questions if we can help. Comments are moderated so will not appear straight away and there could be some delay in replying if we are travelling.