Hmmm I seem to be getting the locations mixed up. i´m writing this in Salta but it´s about Mendoza, hope that makes sense.

Anyway, after a 17 hour night bus from freezing Bariloche we arrived in hot hot hot Mendoza where it was roughly 34 degrees. Bit of a shock to the system after the snow capped mountains but a chance to give the ol summer clothing a bit of an airing.

First hostel we found was pretty cheap but when we arrived we got really bad vibes as all the people were walking around like zombies in some sort of trance. Itd also advertised a swimming pool which turned out to be a paddling pool full of green slime surrounded by building work - nice.

Anyway, we decided to make the most of our day so dragged ourselves out into the heat to visit a small aquarium recommended by lonely planet for it´s albino frogs. After a sweaty 30 minute walk we arrived and paid our 60p entrance fee to a grumpy lady behind the reception.To say the aquarium was small was an overstatement.It was tiny.

We managed to see some blind fish whose skin had grown over their eyes due to them living in caves but the rest of the tanks were so small for the amount of fish in them that we began to feel uneasy. Then while we were looking in the terrapin and kayman enclosure, the terrapins were literally lying on top of the crocodiles for space, I looked down and noticed one of the terrapins attacking another one.As we watched, the attacked terrapin didn´t move at all and as I watched in horror for a little longer, i turned to Tim and said, ´I think it´s dead´.

So horrified was I by this that I rummaged for my dictionary and marched up to the reception to try and communicate, in very very broken spanish, that one of the terrapins had met a grisly end and was now been eaten by one of it´s fellow inmates.The lady just laughed and said it was playing but i carried on insisting that it wasn´t so she sent a guy to come with me and show me I was wrong.I pointed out the unpleassant scene to the man and he watched for a few seconds before the terrapin lunged at the still one and ripped a huge chunk of flesh from it´s neck.After a small pause the man said, ´Ah.....bueno.´ and went off to get an old guy with a net.

10 minutes later,and a lot of kicking and poking of the kayman to get them to back away, they fished out the cadaver from the soup of terrapins and walked away without even an acknowledgenment. As we sat outside contemplating the situation we´d just witnessed, the guy from teh aquarium walked out with a plastic bag and plonked it in the open air bin outside the building. We went over to look and it confirmed the worst. Teh terrapins eye was just visible through the plastic.What a grisly way to go and not a great start to our time in Mendoza.