Although we were sad to leave Buenos Aires, we were looking forward to having a rest. The partying and lack of sleep had us worn out. After another night bus we arrived into Cordoba and made our way to our hostel "4 beds". We were too early to check in so left our bags and headed off to take a wonder around the town. Cordoba is a small little town with loads of churches, a few museums and little else which to be honest suited our purpose for the few days. There wouldn't be any mischief for us to get up too. We hit the bank to get some cash out but as has become one of the themes of this trip - either the bank has frozen our card for a security check or the money we've transferred has decided to take days to hit the account! And of course as look would have it we had no money on us. :( not happy campers- the night on a bus, no bed to get some catch up sleep for another two hours and no cash to allow us sit in a cafe somewhere passing the time. By the time we made our way back to the hostel we were tired, grumpy and p*$!ed off with the bank. Thankfully Matius the owner of the hostel had our room ready to go and after a few well deserved hours sleep we felt human again. Our Cordoba days were chilled and relaxed with nearly every day involving the now critical siesta! Over our time in 4 beds we made friends with a lovely woman from JuJuy called MaryAngelic, she was an absolute pet and although she didn't have too much English or me Spanish we got on quite well indeed. Herself and Rob would be having great chats in Spanish. We thought we'd get away with no parties for the few days we were there and we're doing pretty well until our last night when Mattie announced an impromptu parilla. The beer was flowing and the night was great craic. It also gave us a taste sensation first - bbq'd intestine. It was definitely worth trying but i dont think we'll b back for more.Slightly hungover the next day we dragged ourselves out of bed for checkouts time and rewarded our efforts with a nice lunch from town- that evening we made our way back to the bus station for a the next leg of our trip an overnight bus to mendoza. Mendoza was to be our last stop in Argentina before heading back into Chile. In Mendoza we stayed at a lovely hostel called hostel Mora. We had overspent a bit by the time we got to Mendoza so we opted for a dorm room the first of our trip. To be fair it was a lovely clean dorm with really good lockers but we definitely missed our personal space-it's hard to have a nap in a shared room when shuffle munchers (definition of a shuffle muncher- he or she who cant help but make constant noise when im quite clearly trying to sleep)refuse to be quite.We had the full day our first day there so decided to see if we could walk to the other side of the city where we spotted a zoo on the map. BIG MISTAKE! The place was a hell hole, I've never actually seen somewhere that says they're for animal protection; keep animals in such terrible conditions. It was the first time on this trip that we really came to see how little respect some cultures have for their native animals. We could write so much on the conditions the animals were in but it's really probably best left unsaid. Having come from the jungle it was really hard and upsetting to see such amazing creatures devoid of any type of natural habitat. So we did the only thing we could in personal protest and left. The woman in the loo on the way out tried to charge me for the convenience for the upkeep of facilities!!!!! I needn't tell you my response. That evening while chilling at the hostel we met Sunil, from Manchester we were chatting away with him when another traveller walked over, on hearing a fellow manc accent Alex joined us followed by Anna his girlfriend. From there the party kicked off the five of us got on like a house on fire. We spent the night swoping stories and laughing our heads off! Rob and I had booked ourselves onto a bodega tour for the next day and because we were having great craic the lads decide to come with. The day at the wineries was awesome at the expense of getting a bit girly it was really nice to have girly chats again, myself and Anna got on really well and just enjoyed a day of stupid giggling while we all progressed to get pissed as farts over the course of the day. That wasn't all we did though we learnt loads of stuff about wine; it was a lot more interesting than I was expecting especially when you consider that I don't actually like red wine. Rob now has a red wine compadre in arms- its called Carmenere and it's stunning. Each of the bodegas pumped us with facts and samples so by the time we got to the lunch spread that was included we were all ready for a feed. We were brought to this amazing little spot pretty much in the middle of no where, lunch was tapas like you've never had before, there was a little of everything on the table and we all tucked in happily. Towards the end of the meal myself and Anna were throwing the towel in we were stuffed when one of the waitresses came over and asked if wed like "something in spanish" we thought it might have been dessert so obviously we said yes-it turned out to be a bowl of spaghetti pasta (its important for me to note at this point that I havent been able to eat pasta since we were in the jungle - not even a bite). We sat like two little kids playing with our food trying our best to eat what we had asked for but there really is a fine line between stuffed and projectile vomitting in Public . We came up with the ingenious idea of getting wine from each bodega to drink back at the hostel that night which was added to by Alex coming up with " why don't we see if we can get steaks to take out?" the man is a genius! We found a little restaurant that cooked us a "bife de chorizo" each with salad and chips for the grand total of about €12/13 each. Think of the biggest thickest steak you've ever had and then double it, add to that the wine we'd bought-total class night! Everyone was a little worse for wear the next day but that evening we all met up again to hit the pictures. It probably sounds odd but it was soooo good to chill out and watch a movie. Spiderman was the film of choice and it was cool. The following day we waved Sunil off on his travels and in talking about our future travel plans it turned out that both ourselves, Anna and Alex were heading to Santiago. So the 4 amigos set off to leave Argentina and hit the Chilean capital. Music of Cordoba/Mendoza: Well to be honest its much the same as home, abit of reggie, jazz and some good old cheddar cheese to unwind!!! Taste sensations: Bife de Chirizo (the size of your face), Intestines, a horrible cousin of the chirizo that we thought might have been a stuffing ball but turned out to be a lovely mix of fat and herbs (no joke had to use water to wash this down - we haven't done that since we were kids), cofler chocolate bars ummmmmmm!!! and the lovely silky taste of Carmenere. Next up Santiago..