Our Triptastic Trip: Northwest Argentina

Again it’s been forever since our last post. It’s a product of several things. One, when we were in Costa Rica and Nicaragua, it got dark at 5:30pm and no one stayed out late. Dinner was at 6pm. Here its light until 9pm and dinner is at 11pm with people out even on weekdays until 5am. Therefore, we never have the downtime we did in Central America to write a post because we’re, ummm, busy. :O) Two, the places we’ve been have had horrible internet. Three, we have been spending every spare minute trying to plan the rest of our trip because everything is so booked up here in Argentina this time of year. Yeah, so that’s our excuse!

Final days in Mendoza

The time we didn’t spend trying to plan the rest of our trip was spent just walking around town or tasting wine at this place called Vines of Mendoza. Not having a car here basically sucks. Everything is so spread out an inaccessible by bus that wine tasting is all but impossible unless you want to pay for a ridiculously expensive tour that only visits like 2 wineries. It was all kind of disappointing. The wineries, especially in Mendoza, are not nearly as organized as they are in the US, Canada, Australia, etc. They don’t have winery maps and most of them require reservations just to taste. It makes it so you can visit maybe 3 wineries in a whole day if you plan well. So that is the reason we spent our time in the tasting room in Mendoza.

The Vines of Mendoza is owned by an American so he understands what people want to do when it comes to tasting. Unfortunately, he also understands that he is the only place in town that does it and can charge whatever he pleases. It was overpriced by American standards, but for here it seemed expensive. However, the quality of wines we tasted was top notch and we were getting the cheap flights ($18). There were some reserve tastings (5 tastes per flight) that cost $175. Yikes, no thanks. This “cheap” stuff was really good. We did the Malbecs flight and the general regional wines flight. They were both excellent. The Malbec we both loved of course was the most expensive ($12/glass). We bought a glass of it afterward anyway and had a great cheese plate to go with it with several types of cow and goat cheeses. It was like heaven compared to the swill they offered for tasting on the bike tour. The other flight had Torrontes (a regional white that smells and tastes sweet but is very dry), Rose Malbec, Cab, Petit Verdot, and another red that I can’t remember right now. The Cab was my favorite in this flight and we came back the next night for half price wine night and had a few glasses of that. It was a lot cheaper, especially at half price. Four glasses of wine that night came to only $9.

The tasting room was really cool inside as well. It had lights under the bar for checking the color of the wine, it was air conditioned, and the staff was really knowledgeable AND spoke English which is a rarity here it seems. The outside patio/courtyard area was covered by a huge vine so it made it seem more like it was indoors. It kept out the hot sun and the ambiance was great. Even $9 for several glasses of wine is still relatively expensive.

The grocery store has a huge selection of all Argentinean wines for mostly under $10 a bottle, even the good stuff.

Another honorable mention for Mendoza is the food. Since this is a wine town resembling a larger Sonoma there are many great restaurants. We had everything from caprese empanadas (Coraleigh is becoming an empanada monster) and skirt steak to lamb in a Malbec reduction and pork in raspberry sauce. Another great night was dinner at a small Italian restaurant near our hostel that had homemade fresh pasta in the best puttanesca sauce I’ve ever had (since they have tons of olive farms there everything was fresh). The picture below is from a lunch where I had a giant beer and pizza. All the beer is giant here because it’s typically shared from one bottle rather than several beers from a six pack. They don’t really sell six packs or larger cases of small bottles here, just giant individual ones. This does not make me sad. :O)

On a lower note our hostel here was a little sketchy. Since we only booked a few days in advance most of the good hostels in Mendoza were taken so we were left with this one. The room and bathroom we had were pretty good, though fairly dated, and the bed was super comfy. However, the kitchen was pretty nasty, they blared retarded Spanish butt rock all day, and the breakfast consisted of rock hard pastries and Tang. We are starting to find that bad breakfast is a trend here in Argentina; I guess they don’t really eat breakfast. The best part was the people we met there who we actually ran into again in Salta at our hostel by coincidence. More on that later…

We caught a relatively short 3-hour bus ride to San Juan to line us up for a visit to Parque Provincial Ischigualasto.

San Juan and Parque Provincial Ischigualasto

San Juan is a pretty small town resembling Yakima. Again, there are many wineries in the area though mostly unreachable unless you have a car. Another small disappointment, but our main reason for coming here was to visit Parque Provincial Ischigualasto duly entitled Valle de la Luna or Valley of the Moon. Our hostel here was pretty uneventful, though it was cheap, clean, and had AC which was a requirement in this scorcher of a town. It hit 95 every day. Bleh. The people here, and everywhere outside of Buenos Aires, love the siesta. At 1pm all shops close and the streets look like a ghost town. Nothing reopens until around 6pm when people start showing up again. They are packed at 10pm with families, shoppers, and diners. It can be frustrating because people basically don’t eat here. They have a piece of bread for breakfast, maybe a nasty ham and cheese sandwich for lunch, and wait until 10 or 11pm for dinner. They of course supplement with tons of cigarettes and espressos or mate (strong flavored green tea).

Our tour (we were the only two who signed up so it was just us and the driver) to Ischigualasto left at 6am. We woke up, got ready, and were on the road before sunrise. I know you’re thinking we’re lying, but we have photo evidence! It was a loooong drive out there too. Four hours through some desolate high desert country and across an almost comically undulating and twisting road. The road was like a roller coaster with constant periods of weightlessness. I wish I’d have gotten a video, but we were too tired and out of it to care. Hahaha

We finally arrived at the visitor center 330km later. It was as bright and dusty as you imagine a desert could be. It felt like the sun was weighing us down. You are only allowed to enter the park accompanied by a park ranger and we had just missed one by a few minutes so we sped off down the dusty road to catch them at the first stop. There were five main stops on the 50km loop around the park. The first was called “The caterpillar.” It was a highly eroded sandstone layer formation that contained fossils of plants and fish visible right on the outside of the rock. The next stop was a canyon of eroded mounds of colorful rock and sandstone. We spent most of that stop running from the giant desert wasps (avispas!). The third stop had two interesting things.

The first was a sphinx-shaped formation and the second they called the Concha de Bochas or Bocce Court. It had about 100 very out of place round rocks that were formed by a strange underground process and were exposed by wind and water.

The fourth stop was a formation called El Submarino which was probably our favorite. Finally was El Hongo or the Mushroom. It’s location next to huge red cliffs made it a good spot for surrealistic pictures.

Speaking of pictures… the sun kinda got to our heads so we took these super dorky ones. Valley of the moon… get it? :O/

Another four hour ride back led us through an area that was really a weird sight. It was a shrine for saint-like figure called Difunta Correa. This woman, in the 1840’s, followed her sickly conscript husband through the deserts around San Juan during the civil war.

She carried her newborn child, and some meager supplies. Once the supplies ran out she died of exhaustion and dehydration. When a passing military regiment found her, the baby was still alive and nursing. They considered this the first of many miracles ascribed to her and now this huge shrine, and thousands of small roadside shrines are dedicated to her. Especially devoted are truckers who believe she can bless their travels, cars, houses or whatever else. At the main shrine were thousands of license plates, thank you plaques, miniature houses, pictures of cars, wedding dresses, sports jerseys and trophies. Anything and everything you can think they would want blessed is here. This picture doesn’t come close to describing the enormity of the shrine or how devoted these people are to her. No matter where we go we always see bottles of water next to small roadside shrines meant to quench her thirst. The funny part is that the Catholic Church is completely against it, but it doesn’t seem to stop anyone. Quite the weird cultural phenomenon.

The next day we caught an overnight bus to Tucuman, north of San Juan.

Rental car, Quebrada de Cafayate, and Salta

Our bus arrived in Tucuman around 11am the next morning. Guess what? More ham and cheese EVERYTHING meals. We walked to the Hertz office and picked up our sweet car. A Chevy Corsa with a cracked windshield. We made our way out of Tucuman and decided to take the scenic route to Salta. The first leg wound through mountainous rainforest toward a town called Tafi del Valle. It’s a high mountain town in a misty valley. We stopped there for lunch and had empanadas, locro (a corn, bean, and meat stew), and steak. It was delicious. We gave our leftover fatty pieces to the local dogs who had gathered and were salivating nearby.

The drive from here climbed a steep traversing hill out of the valley into the high mountains and then dropped down the other side into a dry desert area. We stopped at a gas station and picked up some candy for energy. :O)

Next we drove through a large valley where there were lots of vineyards toward a town called Cafayate. It was another wine town, this time more similar to Sonoma except all the buildings and houses were adobe. We stopped at a market there and bought a few souvenirs. This area appeared to be better organized for the wine tours because there were signs everywhere pointing out vineyards and the “Salta Wine route.” We would have loved to have stopped and sampled, but it was already after 5pm so they were closed. The valley was beautiful; surrounded by mountains and filled with vineyards.

After leaving Cafayate we experienced one of the best drives we’ve ever done. We went through the Quebrada de Cafayate (Cafayate Canyon). I can’t really describe what we saw here with words. It was simply amazing. Every other second, “Oh wow look at that,” with our mouths hanging open. The pictures don’t capture how awesome this area was. It was all eroded, varying shades of red, with a green river valley running through the middle. We seemed to stop every 100 yards for pictures.

We finally made it out of the canyon and it was starting to get dark so we drove straight through to Salta. Driving in a city in Argentina is quite the adventure. There are basically no stop signs or traffic control. The intersections are honk, block the cross-traffic with an aggressive move, and then go. It’s insane. Luckily we didn’t get lost and drove straight to our hostel, Inti Huasi, without incident. We arrived just in time to drop our bags in our room and join the rooftop asado (BBQ). There we ran into our German friends we met back in Mendoza that we had done the bike wine tour with. After an amazing grilled feast and way too much wine we headed out for some Salta nightlife. (EDITED FOR CONTENT and MOM FACTOR). Hahaha… It was fun :O) Let’s see… we woke up the next “morning” around 1:30pm. Bars close at 5am here and no one leaves early. It was busier at 6am in the streets than at any other time of the day, especially siesta.

We spent the day roaming Salta (at night the churches looked the best, though) and checking out the sites. There is a lot of colonial architecture here surrounding one of the best plazas we’ve seen. It’s very European with several large ornate cathedrals.

We also meandered through a Sunday craft market which sold the typical northern Argentina goods like leather, llama wool items, silver jewelry, and mate accessories. The market was massive and spanned blocks of the city closed to vehicle traffic. It was pretty interesting; plus it was in the same area as the bars we had visited the night before. We spent part of the time trying to remember the places we’d visited. Haha. Salta is, so far, one of our favorite cities. The next day we boarded our trusty steed and headed for Tilcara. Once again we decided to take the scenic route…

Desolation, salt flats, and the Quebrada de Humahuaca

We headed west from Salta toward a small town called San Antonio de Los Cobres. This decision was another last-minute thing so we had no good maps, just our Lonely Planet book. It’s not exactly made for driving. We missed our turnoff out of Salta due to bad signage, but found our way back pretty quickly. Then the road, hanging on a cliff, turned to gravel and wound through a river valley. It often turned to one lane around blind corners. It was kinda freaky, but we only had to dodge a semi-truck once. Luckily it turned back to asphalt after about 25 miles. That’s when we started climbing and climbing. This road we took almost exactly followed the Tren a las Nubes track which is a tourist train “to the clouds.” We did the carro a las nubes. Haha. We finally reached the dusty half-deserted mining town of San Antonio de los Cobres and bought more candy! We tried to eat at a restaurant, but it was 1:30pm. Siesta. From here the drive got interesting.

We headed north via the gravel Ruta Nacional 40. It’s a famous road due to its isolation, scenery, and long stretches through expansive valley and mountain landscapes.

It was exactly that, complete desolation. In the four hours it took to meet the next paved highway we passed maybe 3 cars, a guy holding a baby goat trying to hitch a ride, and 47 llamas.

We also saw some guanacos which are the wild cousins of llamas. Oh and a few disproportionate donkeys with huge heads just standing there, eyes closed to the wind. When we stopped, all you could hear out here was the wind. It was pretty eerie. Sometimes a large whirlwind would kick up dust in the distance looking like a small tornado.

After a brief scare that we somehow missed the only turnoff and multiple scares with almost getting stuck in huge sandpits in the road, we made it to Route 52. Here we detoured west a few miles to visit the Salinas Grandes which are some huge salt flats sitting at about 10,000 feet in elevation. They are the result of an ancient lake, now dried up in the desert heat. It was WINDY out there, but a very cool sight to see. We took some more dorky pictures (this time we blame it on the elevation and low oxygen levels) and headed on our way toward the Quebrada de Humahuaca and Tilcara.

Another awesome drive through very high mountain passes, we went through a pass at 4170 meters (almost 14,000 feet!). The weird part was that it was still like a desert landscape with grasses and the occasional cactus.

We were looking DOWN at the clouds, and they were not low clouds.

The moon was also near full and for some reason magnified to something like a harvest moon. It looked awesome rising over the colorful mountains. The pictures can't really show how large it looked in person.

We descended down a very steep and winding road into another canyon, the Quebrada de Humahuaca.

This is an area populated by descendants of Incas that still live in adobe huts and hold on to a lot of tradition. It is pretty highly touristed so they mostly sell their handicrafts, but we still saw many of them in traditional clothes herding sheep and goats in the desolate landscapes.

We arrived at our hostel in Tilcara, one of the towns in the Quebrada de Humahuaca, at around 9pm.

Our room in our hostel was actually a small adobe cabin with a rock floor. It sounds bad, but was super clean and nice and is one of the best places we’ve stayed. The rock keeps it cool during the day when temperatures hit 90 degrees+ and keep it warm at night when they plunge to around 45 degrees.

We spent the remaining time here exploring the area, the small dusty high desert towns, and more markets. The towns are surrounded by beautiful red rock formations and mountains.

A common thing here for the locals is to chew “coca-bica.” They actually just chew cocaine leaves and it’s sold in the streets and in stores, sometimes in tea form. The lady in the picture was just shouting “Coca! Coca!” Literally, “Cocaine! Cocaine!” It was kinda weird, and it’s illegal in Argentina, but apparently tolerated up here in the far northwest.

We are only 60 miles or so from both Bolivia and Chile. We are also right near the Tropic of Capricorn so the sun is almost directly overhead at noon this time of year. We stopped at a sundial marking the line and took a few pictures.

Of course we ate well with more empanadas, llama steaks, and local wine. Some of the best restaurants in town, very nice with good service and excellent food, cost around $20 in total. I’ll never be able to eat out in the US again without complaining about how expensive everything is. Now we are going to make the long drive back to Tucuman to return the car. Next stop, the amazing Iguazu falls (picture in the background of this blog’s title). Unfortunately, this also comes with a 23 hour bus ride. Wish us luck that there will be no ham and cheese!