Day 23 - Sat 22nd Nov - Cordoba Estancia

I arrived at Cordoba bus station at 7am, and got picked up from there and taken to the estancia which was about an hours drive away. It really is in the middle of nowhere and we had to drive through lots of farm gates to get there.

I arrived just in time for breakfast, and they had just seen off several guests so other than me there was just one lady that had been there for two weeks and was leaving in a couple of days. There was also an American cowboy who had been over for the polo week the week before and was also leaving in a couple of days.

Immediately after breakfast I was on my first ride. They style of riding is completely didfferent in Argentina and I was quite unconfident at the beginning. The terrain didnt help help my nerves either - its very steep and very rocky! It was a bit nerve wracking at first, but the horses are incredible, and so sure-footed they are almost like mountain goats.

We had a nice ride out to a rockpool and stopped there to have a drink before heading back whick took about 3 hours in total. When we got back it was lunch time! I quickly realised I was going to settle into a routine of riding, eating & sleeping.

The days on the estancia work like this:

8.30 - 10.00 Breakfast (bacon, eggs, toast, cereals, yoghurts)

10.00 - 1pm Long Ride

1.30 - 2.00 Pre lunch drinks (alcoholic of course)

2.00 - 3.00 Lunch (main course, desert, wine)

3.00 - 5.00 Free time (siesta, swim, read, more sleep!)

5.00 - 5.30 Afternoon tea (with homemade cakes)

5.30 - 7.30 Ride

8.30 - 9.00 Pre dinner drinks

9.00 - 10.00 Dinner (main course, desert, wine)

10.00 - ? After dinner drinks until the last person goes to bed.

This timetable repeated every day. It was tough.

On the first day on the afternoon ride we went to herd in 20 1year old foals who need to be brought in at night into a pen near the owners house to minimise the risk of pumas getting to them. We stopped at their house after the horses were in and wife of the couple that runs it came outside with champagne for us on the lawn! (I think it was because the other two were such good clients of theirs and realised it was probably not going to happen every day.

Then it was back to the estancia for dinner and more champange > This isn't quite helping me get used to the backpacker way of life!

Day 24 - Sun 23rd Nov - The Estancia

In the morning we went on an long ride to a local crypt and small museum. The crypt was built by a famous physicist as a memorial to his wife and daughter and it was quite amazing inside (we weren't allowed to take photos). The museum next door was about his life and work.

As it was Sunday there was no ride in the afternoon so that the horses and staff can have an afternoon off, but three additional guests arrived in the afternoon.

Day 25 - Mon 24th Nov - The Estancia

The two initial guests that were there when I arrived both left on Monday morning, which suddenly made me the most experienced rider in the group, which was a bit strange! I had been feeling much more confident by the second ride once I had got the hang of the style a bit more - it just felt so completely unnatural at first as you have pretty much forget everything you have been taught as a rider and start from scratch.

Sat & Sun had been scorchers of days but there had been a thunder storm on Sunday night, which meant that it was a bit overcast and cooler on Monday. The morning ride went out to a place they refer to as 'the top of the world'. Well, its the top of their world anyway as its the highest point on the estancia. The estancia is 6000 acres and nestled in the Sierra Chicas mountains (hence the very steep terrain!). The views were amazing and you could see for miles (stupidly I didnt take any pictures).

The afternoon rides tend to involve 'jobs' such as bringing the foals in, and as we had been joined by another two guests in the afternoon, the afternoon ride consisted of 6 guests, 2 guides and 1 gaucho. The foals often know when its home time and are standing quite near the gate waiting to come in so you don't have to go too far to collect them - not this time.

They were standing at the top of a very steep hill on the far side of the field (the gaucho said they had never been that far before), and we had to cross three very steep ravines and ditches to get them. It was quite a hair raising ride, especially for the less experienced riders, but it certainly got the adrenaline going and was quite fun.

Day 26 - Tues 25th Nov - The Estancia

Today's morning ride was quite different - we played polo! We had three teams of 3 and played a very simplified version, but I absolutely loved it. I thought I would have found it slightly scary, and admittedly we weren't playing anywhere near as fast as the professionals, but it was great fun and I didn't want it to end - even though my team didn't score any goals and came last!

In the afternoon we split into two groups for the rides, the less experienced group went off for a fun ride, and myself and two of the other more experienced riders went to herd the foals in again (it definitely pays to be a less experienced rider here I think). They weren't as far away this time as the night before but we still had to do two of the three ravines from the day before. Didn't seem half as bad second time round.

Day 27 - Weds 26th Nov - The Estancia

Today we broke into the same two groups again as last night. We went out with the lady owner and the head gaucho and we had a job to do on our ride (again, pays to be more inexperienced!), which was to herd in all the horses in the 'holiday field'. The horses on the estancia work on rotation between being riding horses (for guests or horse gauchos), working with the cattle gauchos, or being on holiday. The holiday field (which is also where they retire horses) is 1000 acres - so a very big chunk of the 6000 acre estancia.

We had 30 horses to find somwhere in the 1000 acres, and luckily they were all quite close to each other; however they were at the bottom of a valley, across 3 very steep hills (again). The terrain was very tough and was definitely the hardest ride, especially as we were herding them which meant that we were all dispersed and not following each other or a path. I did have to shout for the gaucho to come and help me down one of the hills at one point as I was stuck, it was practically vertical, covered in rocks, and my horse was getting a bit agitated and had decided it was a good place to turn circles on the spot.

Lou (the owner) was also having problems with her horse who kept rearing up, eventually she had to swap horses with the gaucho as it was getting quite dangerous. When we finally got them back into the corral at the estancia, we got off whilst the gauchos checked the horses to make sure they were ok, and decided which ones they were going to keep to ride next. Then we had to herd the rest back again! We didn't have to take them as far, just to the inside of the gate for the field so it wasn't quite as treacherous.

We joined the other group for the afternoon ride as we had had such a difficult (and slow) ride, they made up for it with a very fun fast ride - lots and lots of canters (and a few gallops for the three of us too!).

Day 28 - Thurs 27th Nov - The Estancia

Four of the other guests left this morning, so there was jsut four of us left now - the three from my group and one extra. It was an absolute scorcher of a day again, unbearably hot, so we just went on a gentle ride (too hot for the horses) to a waterfall that is on the estancia.

We had to tie the horse up at the bottom of a stream (and leave them with the gaucho) and then climb up and down a steep path to get to the waterfall which was completely secluded.

We had a dip in the water which was very cold, especially as the weather was so hot. We had Norman the Golden Labrador with us, who couldnt keep himself out of the water. There are 5 labradors on the estancia (4 black, 1 golden), including one called Harvey! They were all absolutely gorgeous and very friendly.

In the afternoon, before we went out again to herd the foals in, we had a lassooing demonstration by 3 of the gauchos. First of all they showed us lassooing a post in the middle of the corral, then they got us to have a try! After totally messing that up, they then let the cattle in, gave us another demonstration of how it should be done, then let us lose on the real thing.

Apprantly its meant to be easier on a moving object (not sure exactly how that can be!). Needless to say, I didn't catch anything, but the rope did touch an animal on a few occasions so I was quite pleased with that.

Between the waterfall and the lassooing it was a really good day, probably one of the best we had. We agreed at dinner which horses we would ride the next day (which I was pleased with), then they said that they would give us a horse breaking demonstration with the head gaucho in the afternoon. And to top it all off they said they would schedule an extra polo game for us on Saturday morning just before I left. So it had been a great day and I was really looking forward to my final 36 hours.

Day 29 - Fri 28th Nov - The Estancia

Woken up in the middle of the night by torrential rain and thunder storm which continued all day! Very disappointing after such a good day and I'd been looking forward to riding today so much. They ride in any weather at the estancia except an electrical storm, and while it was still bucketing down there was no more thunder and lightening so it was entirely our choice whether we wanted to go out.

I decided not to as I was a bit worried about the slippy terrain and the lightening starting again. The other two more experienced riders decided they were going to ride and as I watched them ride out I also watched the clouds clear up. Knew I'd make the wrong decision! I instantly regretted not going and decided that I would definitely ride again in the afternoon if we were able to.

So I made the most of the spare time by catching up with my diary and blog and reading. They had a log fire in the living room so it was nice to just curl up on the sofa in front of it, doing nothing for a while.

We did get to go out in the afternoon for a slightly longer ride than usual, but we also got caught in a downpour of hailstones! All went without incident though and was quite a nice ride.

Unfortunately they had to cancel the horse breaking demonstration that they were going to do as the corrals were flooded, so sadly didn't get to see that.

Day 30 - Sat 29th Nov - The Estancia

Last day on the estancia . The polo also had to be cancelled because the ground was too soft which can make it quite dangerous. I did get one last ride in the morning though and was able to request which horse I wanted to ride (Sal = salt in Spanish as she has grey speckles, you can see her on the photo on this page).

We went up for a ride to the 'top of the world' again although we went a completely different way to before. It was a nice ride and quite a fast one too. When we got to teh very top there was a swarm of flying ants that started attacking us and the horses. My horse who was still quite young, went absolutely nuts at this, but managed to calm her down and run away from them. So we didn't actually get to the very top and weren't able to stop there, instead of taking in the views we just headed straight back down.

When we got back for lunch the heavens opened up again, and this time more torrential than before. It was so bad that I wasn't actually able to get accross from the dining room to my bedroom as there was now a river running between the buildings!

This also meant that the car wasn't able to get up to the estancia to collect me, so my departure was delayed by a couple of hours. In the end they had to get a 4x4 pick up truck to come and get me. I ended up leaving about 4pm.

Unfortunately just before I left I went to get my tip money to give to the owner (they then split it out between gauchos, guides, housekeeping etc) and discovered that the money had gone. Ironically it was only the tip money that they had taken but that was the biggest value that I had separated into a different place from the rest of my money. When I told them what had happened they were extremely apologetic and said that it had never happened before (they did have a member of staff leave during the week to go back to Peru so I wondered if it had been them). However I did also think that most of the other people that go there are quite well off so I would doubt they even would have noticed that amount of money going missing! They gave me the money back themselves and wouldn't accept anything for the tips. I felt quite bad about not being able to reward the rest of the staff who had all been so great.

Despite that I was still very sad to be leaving the estancia as I had a fantastic time and would definitely like to go back again. The drive to Cordoba was torrential rain the whole way and getting out of the estancia was quite difficult. I got into the city about 6pm and place looked dreary and horrible in the rain, and everything was shut.

I had booked a private room in this hostel. The good thing about private rooms is the privacy and not being disturbed so much, the bad thing when you are travelling on your own is that it is not so easy to meet people. They were meant to be having a bbq at the hostel that night but because of the rain it was cancelled as the terrace was flooded. So I just headed to the supermarket, bought some food, and cooked my first meal of the trip! It only took a month. Wasn't very adventurous and only went for a simple pasta dish but it was very nice to have something I had cooked myself and the kitchen in the hostel was great. I ended up just having an early night as by the time I arrived and had eaten it was quite late so I didn't really get talking to anyone. In hindsight that was a shame because it was Saturday night and Cordoba is meant to have great nightlife as its a major university city. But I think I knackered from a week of fresh air and exercise!