THE ARGENTINE NORTH

17th century church in
Purmamarca.

The Argentine North is where you find “beautiful places with funny names”, as proclaimed my friend Vandria. From Cordoba we headed to Tafi del Valle, taking a quick detour in Tucuman, where Emi had to go see the city hall where the Argentine independence was proclaimed in 1916. The town of Tafi del Valle is a charming settlement in the middle of a green sleepy mountain valley. The climate and the scenery was very different from what we saw in Cordoba. It was colder, more humid and there was a lot more vegetation there. We did not do much in that town besides walking its streets and going up to the typical mountain with a cross. There is really nothing too special about the town, but it left such a pleasant feeling, that I would go back there in a heartbeat to get some of that calming, positive energy.

Tortilla, churros, tortilla....Anyone?

Out next stop was in Cafayate. Another valley town known for its white wines, mostly consumed in the province of Salta. We have no extra money to spend, but not when it comes to wine or cheese. Of course, I am talking about the level of “2 Buck Chuck” or “Vino Toro” level. Nonetheless, in Cafayate we got lucky and were able to raise the bar for only 5 pesos per person. We found an organic winery which gave a free tour and offered a rather generous wine tasting. The wines were absolutely delicious and it was hard to walk away without buying a bottle or two.

If you give us more food, we might give you more milk.

Feeling quite fulfilled and much happier we left the winery and set off to find a nearby cheese farm recommended to us at the hostel. It turned out that the farm was a side business to another winery, which decided to raise goats and cows for the manure necessary for the vineyards. I learned a bunch of peculiar facts about that whole operation. For example, I had no idea that grape seeds were very good for the animals because of their oils and vitamins, that goats gave 2 liters of milk per day and cows about 25, that the milking process had to be done when the animals were calm and happy and it only took about 3 minutes, and that most milk cows are now inseminated artificially and have to be given a bunch of hormones to conceive. It was really interesting to learn about animal maintenance and the actual cheese production, but it was even more exciting to find out that our tour ticket included cheese tasting and a whole wheel of goat cheese per person. We really lucked out with the treats that day! It was awesome!

Salt flats by Purmamarca.

From El Cafayate we went to Salta to visit more of Emi´s relatives. These relative were quite special, so I will skip this story here and tell you about them and the whole visit in a separate post.

The next destination after Salta was Purmamarca, or the famous “Hill of 7 Colors”.  That village is really small, and appears to only have rudimentary adobe huts for the locals and amazingly beautiful 5 star hotels for the tourists. We lucked out with the only camping in the village for only 10 pesos per person. We arrived to the village in the afternoon, and since there was time and we had nothing better to do we decided to join a group of 3 other argentines and go on a tour of the nearby (1,5 hour by car) salt flats. Since it was my first experience with salt deserts, they made quite an impression on me. Besides the endless see of white saltiness, there were also lines of bright blue saltiness. They were artificial pools made for cultivation of salt (I think), which are great fun to play with. We took a bunch of photos there and even dipped our toes in the water besides the freezing temperature.

Around Tilcara.

It was much colder at the salt dessert that at Purmamarca because of the altitude. It was there when, for the first time, I began feeling that it was very hard to breath. On the way to these salt flats we passed a peek above 4,000 meters! They say that altitude makes you feel bad for a day or two and then you get used to. In my case it was not true and I only got worse the longer I staid high up. It took me a week or so to get over my sickness and get acclimated. I got better only once we finally crossed into Bolivia.

Purmamarca.

After a night in Purmamarca and a day of climbing all around the surrounding hills, which had more that 7 colors, we got on another bus and went to the town of Tilcara. There we found an awesome hostel with a huge very homey kitchen where I made my coffee cake featured in “Cosina Valeriano Vo. 5”. In Tilcara we went up to the “Devel’s Throat” canyon, walked around the surrounding villages, and then got on an afternoon bus to Humahuaca.

The colors of Purmamarca hills.

This northern town is known for its “folk music halls” peña called. Emi has been to one of those and was really excited to check it out again. To his great disappointment, the place, as well as half of the town, was shut down for the off season, so I couldn’t even take a peek to see what it looked like on the inside. Besides this little frustrating moment, we found the people to be very reserved and not even close to being friendly. The good thing was that we were in town for just one night. The reason why we went to Humahuaca, besides going to a  peña, was to get a bus to the picturesque mountain settlement of Iruya.

Iruya (creacionymanifestacion.blogspot.com).

In reality, it is not the only village hidden away in those high mountain valleys, but it is only in Iruya that you get a welcome by an ancient, blue-domed church standing at the very entrance of the village. The landscape of the place is really unbelievable, with its steep mountain walls rising straight out of the river basin, which splits the village right in the middle. It is beautiful, but poor people who have to walk those vertical streets up and down every day! Our hostel, with no exception, was at the top of one of those streets. I thought I was going to die on the way to there when I had to carry my big backpack up that hill at the altitude of 2,780 meters and under burning mid day sun! On top of that, I was already sick with fever and headache and that up-hill stroll was not helping at all. I am not sure if it was the 3 hours of a dirt road, the altitude, or some weird bug but I was not feeling well and wanted nothing more than to lie down and close my eyes.

Cafayate streets.

I never fully recovered from my strange sickness in Iruya, but I did get a little better to be able to walk around and get inspired by the beauty of the place. We shared most our evenings at the hostel with 3 girls from Spain who were in Argentina on an exchange program. They were very fun and very Spanish, which made me miss my Spanish girls so much!!! It turned out that their next destination was the border town of La Quiaca, where I had to go get my Bolivian visa. We travelled there all together, and made more friends on the way. By the time we were looking for a hostel in Quiaca we were already 9! The more the merrier and that is exactly how it was that night. Between various Fernets we talked about everything from travel life to international politics, learned how to make macramé bracelets, and even shared some food, which we all made right in the room on our portable camping burners.

Purmamarca houses with funny corner doors.

In the morning, I was off to take care of my visa and Emi to meet up with Ramon and Celia, our first travel friends from Spain, with whom we shared some fun nights in Patagonia. They were on their way down to Buenos Aires and we made sure to coincide our border crossing with theirs, so that we could see them once again before they left for Spain.  My visa did not take long, and after about an hour I could join Emi and the Spaniards for a quick catching up session outside our hostel. Unfortunately, none of us had much time so we had to say good bye and press on to the border. Bolivia was waiting for us…