Salta Part II - The Road to Cafayate
After the magical discoveries of our first route in the Salta Province, we were more than ready to discover more. As is typical of our drives, shortly down the road, we needed to make an emergency bathroom stop. We happened to pull over near an old man herding goats along the highway. After we were back on the road, around the next turn was what we imagined had to be his little shack. His wife was standing at the front door drying her hands on a towel and waiting for sight of him around the corner. It was interesting to imagine their lives on this remote stretch of highway.
Entering the Quebradas de Las Conchas (Shells Ravine) Preserve, we were treated with amazing vistas for the remaining 2 hours of our drive. The soft green mountains were far behind us and the vista became increasingly dry and red. The mountains were striated with red and cream colored layers, uplifted in multiple directions from horizontal to almost vertical. The amount of earth movement of this area was impressive, especially as we pulled into one of the first short hikes from the road; the Garganta del Diablo (Devil’s Throat).
As we walked into the steep canyon of the Devil’s Throat, our brains were trying to make sense of where horizontal became vertical. It felt as though we were in the movie Inception, as what was straight ahead now looked to be 45° up. We dared to go deeper into the canyon where things that appeared to be flat were actually a steep climb. We did our best to capture the experience, but the sense of perspective is so trippy in person and doesn’t seem to come through in the photos.
Other features along the way included a formation called the El Anfiteatro. It shaped a natural amphitheater with the acoustics as well. A busker played Spanish guitar and a pan pipe to take advantage of the acoustics while earning a tip and loud applause from the girls.
Natural obelisks and solitary rocks sitting on narrow pedestals bordered the drive to Cafayate. As we drove on, we challenged the kids to come up with the explanation for how the features came to be. Thankfully, some of the stops had placards to test our theories and learn more about this interesting place.
By recommendation of our AirBnB hosts, we managed to get the kids to hold out for a late 8pm dinner at a local Argentine asador called the “Black Tote”. Walking in, Jon admired the large parillas (grills) and knew this was his kind of place.
The menu was full of grilled meat options – steaks, chorizos, and more steaks and more chorizos. For sides you had potatoes, five different ways including papas a caballo: french fries topped with two fried eggs. There may have been a small corner of the menu to pick a small side salad, but we didn’t pay much attention to that. The meats came out on a small tabletop grill, loaded with hot coals in a small chamber under it. We indulged in the meal fit for carnivores, including one of the more obscure items, chinchulins, or beef small intestine.
Dinner was fantastic and our waiter was engaging. He pulled Larson aside and asked him if he liked fútbol, making sure that we knew the right team to cheer for, the Boca Juniors. We closed our tab and retreated home after kicking off a great first night in town.
Cafayate is one of the smaller wine growing regions of Argentina. They are proud of their high desert wines, which are supposed to produce more fragrant and flavorful wines. After some research and driving around, we stopped into the Burbujas de Altura bodega. We were told they were not open just yet, but to come back in an hour for a tour.
We agreed and when we showed back up we were surprised to realize it was a private tour and the gentleman running the tour was the proprieter of the winery. He specialized in making sparkling wines using the traditional method, a.k.a the champagne method, using Torrontés, a common Argentine white wine grape. Andrés personally gave us a private tour of their vineyards and winemaking facilities, all the while giving us the 101 on high-altitude oenology.
The tasting was a great experience, with a beautiful view of their vineyard and the backdrop of the Calchaquí Valley and Las Conchas mountain range. While we sampled torrontés, malbec, and their signature sparkling torrontés, Andrés briefed us on tasting notes and pairing recommendation, the kids played with toys they provided, and his wife sat at the next table hand-labeling bottles. Looking back on the experience, it’s hard to tell if it was the ambiance or the wine, but we remember it as the best wine we had the entire trip.
The next morning we set out to hike the nearby sand dunes. To get there we had to trek through a lowland area. The most direct path to get to the dunes was on a dirt road that turned muddy, puddled, then to a soaking marsh. We passed another family on their way back from the dunes and they said they had to wade through knee high water. We marched on with hopes of finding a high road to the dunes. We couldn’t risk soaked shoes and we didn’t have time to change clothes before our next event. After testing multiple avenues and marshland mosquite bites, we aborted the attempt. All were sad, but we had to remind the kids that (other than covid) this was really our first bust of the trip!
After not scaling sand dunes, The Finca Las Nubes, or Vineyard of the Clouds, was our next stop. Lunch was on the lawn, al fresco, with a view of their vineyards. Wine and Fanta were paired with a picada (meat and cheese plate) and our main courses followed.
The kids got antsy and were able to run off to explore the vineyard and nearby orchard. They found an old stone with worn holes and created some special recipe nature stew. With the kids occupied, we enjoyed some quiet time together and ended up staying much longer than expected.
We soon found ourselves out of time in Cafayate and back in the car on our way to the city of Salta. On another trek through Shells Ravines, we could not pass up the opportunity to make a few more side stops along the way.
Midway on our return to Salta City, we took a slight detour to visit the town of Alemania. Once a booming railroad town, Alemania is mostly desolate now. Just upstream from the confluence of the muddy Rio de Las Conchas, campers enjoy the clear tributary of Rio Alemania. The stop was a bit unexpected and turned out to be a perfect picnic spot with views of the mountains. We cooled our toes in the cool water and, if you have not sensed the theme yet, sipped our afternoon yerba mate.
The city of Salta is very much an urban city, with a busy city center full of retail shops and a well-manicured central plaza. We were shocked by how packed the streets and sidewalks were our first evening in town.
The next day we enjoyed a picnic lunch at the park before visiting the Museo de Arqueología de Alta Montaña (MAAM), or Museum of High Altitude Archaeology. The museum’s highlights are the artifacts from high on one of the nearby mountain summits, Cerro Llullaillaco. In the late 1990s, three children known as “Los Niños de Llullaillaco” were exhumed from a ceremonial site. Due to it’s elevation of over 22,000ft, the children were mummified in almost perfect condition. In the museum, “El Niñ0” was on display. It was hard to believe that the boy was over 500 years old as his body showed no signs of age or decomposition.
The finding helped archaeologists better understand the indigenous people of the area and their way of life. The story of why the children were sacrificed in such a way is spooky to hear from our modern perspective, but to the Inca people of the time, it was a necessity to ensure that their gods would bless them with a good harvest and it was viewed as an honor by the indigenous tribes to be selected for the sacrifice. We were not able to take any photos or record the experience, but YouTube videos from the MAAM do a great job of documenting the process it took to carefully preserve the mummies and artifacts from the site where they were found.
After the heavy material we soaked in at the museum, we lightened the mood with some ice cream before heading home to pack. Of course, museuming followed by sugar is the perfect recipe for some crazy kids. Luckily, water bottles and plastic bags are readily available and the perfect play-things these days.
Salta turned out to be one of our favorite visits of Argentina. It had been described as one of the regions that was underappreciated and we couldn’t agree more. We felt that we were visiting local neighborhoods more than the crafted touristy experience of other locations, and we enjoyed how the people of Salta welcomed us as outsiders to their province.
Next stop is Mendoza, our final destination in Argentina and where we got to celebrate our sweet Louise turning 8.