"I'm so desperately lonely!"

That quote's just never going to get old.

I bring it up, however, because I am in the Locutorio and the Johnnys are playing the radio - The Killers, Mr. Brightside.

Due to the mysterious stomach ailment Rebecca has fled South America early, leaving me all on my lonesome until Friday - well, me and Florencia, who I spent an exhausting half hour with this morning. The gang at Piacere really hate us now.

Fortunately I happen to consider myself good company and quite enjoying hanging out with just me, so I wasn't homesick for the Chicas until I heard the song. Lucky for me the homesickness is being tempered by the fact that Johnny II is actually singing along with it to Juanita, who has just walked in. As Juanita is chronically angry she doesn't seem to be overly thrilled. Johnny II, on the other hand, appears very proud of himself.

Being alone so suddenly after having two gabby girls glued by your side for six weeks (I mean that in the nicest possible way, mi amors) makes everything a little bit surreal. Last night's traditional marathon walk took on mythical proportions. Especially as if you closed your eyes and just listened to the wind scrabbling through the falling maple leaves, and felt the quality of the air - a perfect Torrontes, unusual for muggy and oppressive Buenos Aires - you could have been walking in Canada on a cool fall day. Prime for day dreaming.

We never made it to Chile. After enduring the trials and tribulations of the Mendoza hospital and coming to terms with the reality that the border crossing was closed and was staying that way indefinitely, we held a meeting and voted to beat it back to Buenos Aires as soon as possible. Mysterious stomach ailments in the outdoor activities capital of Argentina with nothing but a hostel bed to lie on (and Owen as your neighbour) are really not conducive to a good weekend.

The bad karma held up, unfortunately. We bought our tickets back to BA the next day and then, on a whim, asked if the border crossing had been re-opened yet. Oh yeah, they said. It's open.

But by then it was too late. I can't stand being so close and yet so far. Reading the newspaper the next day and seeing it had been open only for a few hours and then was closed again, now with some 2,000 vehicles on either side, was small consolation. But we had to be reasonable - who comes to Argentina in the winter and expects to be able to cross the Andes in a bus?

We had lost faith in TAC by that point and elected to pay a little more and try Andesmar, another bus service. We should've known better. You don't mess with karma.

The seats were perhaps half the size of the good ol' TAC seats, and there were twice as many people on board. I braced myself for discomfort but had no idea how Becca was going to be able to last the 15 hours. We perked up at first when Martin, the oddly enthusiastic attendant, made us all play Bingo - we nearly won a bottle of wine and both promptly developed crushes on Martin.

Unfortunately Martin then fell asleep in some mysterious cubbyhole in the bowels of the bus, forgetting he had left the heat on. Heat poured in. We'd stripped down as far as was decently possible. I kept dozing off, only to be awakened by nearly choking on the dry, hot air. All around us passengers tossed and turned.

It must've been around 4 a.m. when both myself and another woman went yet again in search of Martin. Unable to find him, she reached the end of her rope, and simply busted in to the driver's cab and begged him to turn the heat off. She also helped herself to a cooler full of Fanta, pouring cupfuls for all the passengers - who were all awake and all extremely thirsty.

The cold air was a relief. Then we put our sweaters back on. Then our winter jackets. Then suddenly it was hot again. We stripped again. Cold again. Hot again. I really don't know how Rebecca survived that trip. As we got off the bus in Buenos Aires neither of us could even look at Martin.

Luckily, it was only a few days before we were laughing about it. Always keep your sense of humour.

So, we didn't make Chile. And phase one of Operation Alfajor is now over. But phase two is coming up, which means Belen and Rosario - and, later, the 40-hour bus ride to Rio Gallegos. (I'm not thinking about it, I'm not thinking about it.) It might even mean Brasil to visit another old roomate in Rio de Janeiro, there as part of her med school studies. (Unfortunately it won't mean Ecuador as we'll be in Patagonia by then, but you better say a big hello to Rachel for me, Em!)

Who knows - it might even involve speaking some Spanish. I'm pretty sure that was the whole point of the operation in the first place - though alfajores certainly have become more of an objective than I thought they would be.

Speaking of which, I'm really very hungry ...