This trip was totally unexpected and I only went along to accompany a mate, Claudio, who is thinking of moving from Buenos Aires to La Cumbre. I mean, I couldn’t really let him ride alone, could I? It was also a great way to test out some new kit.

Hotel Titi, Ballesteros

I didn’t fancy riding nearly 800kms in one day, so I picked Ballesteros as a good stopping point with only 250kms to ride the following day to La Cumbre.

We set off from Buenos Aires at around 08.30 in damp, overcast conditions – the remnants of the previous night’s thunderstorm – with the weather clearing to powder blue skies just before lunch. After a couple of fuel and coffee stops along the pancake-flat R9 to Rosario, we finally joined the seemingly endless 400km motorway to Cordoba, heading for Ballesteros and the economical, Hotel Titi.

I should explain here that titi is Spanish slang for tia – auntie in English – but this always makes me chuckle, for obvious reasons. The other side of the coin is that there are two types of hotel in Argentina – the standard, normal lodgings and the love hotels which you hire by the hour with the lover of your choice. These are sometimes referred to as telos by locals, so we all know what they are referring to. It’s also worth pointing out that Google Maps can’t seem to differentiate between the two, so I had to make sure that Hotel Titi wasn’t the latter!

Anyway, it’s the only hotel in town and reviews on Google Maps at the least were not too off-putting, so I phoned the owner and booked a couple of rooms at AR$18.000 (around US$15) each per night. For that price, I wasn’t expecting much and I wasn’t disappointed.

It was a punishing ride along the Rosario/Cordoba motorway because we had a very strong SW crosswind and when we arrived in the one horse town of Ballesteros at around 5pm, it was deserted, as one might expect in a tiny country town in Argentina. Our first view of the hotel at the rear was not exactly awe inspiring, to say the least.

Once we’d parked our bikes in the spacious, covered open shed and were unloading our bags, the landlady appeared from nowhere and ordered us to move our bikes closer together because ‘it could get busy later‘, which I very much doubted.

My companion obliged, so we then followed her through ‘reception’ and down a dark corridor reminiscent of The Shining and thence into the 1950s bar area, where we were informed by the owner that we were lucky to have caught her because she usually has a siesta until 6pm.

I then apologised for having disturbed her slumber, at which she asked for our ID card numbers and ages, but nothing else, which I found a little puzzling, so I gave her an estimate of my age, which finally broke a smile. She scribbled the scant information that we had provided into a well worn scrapbook, which she tossed aside on the pile of other crap and broken odds and ends on the bar area, at which point I asked when we could have a beer, for I was as parched as a parrot.

I even asked if she had my favourite beer, Imperial Golden, knowing that she probably didn’t and I was correct because she’d never heard of it. She offered Quilmes Classic 1L or Corona from the stylish wood panelled fridge, but she considered Corona far too expensive ‘for these parts’, which I agreed with. Once we had finished checking in, she informed me that all I had to do was let her know when we wanted a beer, hustled us out of the bar, locked the door and vanished, so we inspected our accommodations, such as they were.

 

The accommodation

 

 

I had to force the bathroom door open, but I was lucky because Claudio didn’t even have a bathroom door, so when I did peer inside, I didn’t stay long and slammed the door shut as it wasn’t particularly inviting.

Back to the 50s

After trying to force the locked door to the bar and having unloaded everything from the bike (when you live in BA, old habits die hard), Quilmes was calling me, so I sent the lady a text, at which she magically reappeared in the bar ten minutes later.

Naturally, I chose the Quilmes Classic and just as the lady opened it, foamy beer spurted out all over her face and top, resulting in one or two familiar expletives. Unperturbed, she put the bottle in a polystyrene shroud to keep it cool and disappeared again, but this time to change her wet clothes. I then settled at a table with my beloved Quilmes and everything became right in the world. I guessed that Claudio had fallen asleep dreaming about bathroom doors and I was right because my text, summoning him to the bar had the desired effect.

After a few glasses, the accommodation seemed luxurious and when the landlady reappeared, she handed me the TV remote control, turned the volume up to maximum and informed us that dinner would be available at eight thirty pm in the spacious dining room behind the curtains.

Part two