We said our goodbyes to the Irish guys we met at the hostel in Cafayate and set off on the road to Salta. We reached the road around midday, hoping for a ride. To tell the truth as usual I was rather optimistic that we get a ride within an hour or so… Yeah, right!!! We were on the road until 3 pm; what an annoying thing it is to wait!
Well, we eventually got lucky and you won’t believe it but a Swiss car pulled up. The car was nearly full, but they still offered us a ride! It was actually a family with a five year old boy who spoke 5 languages and was talking about politics in Argentina, would you believe it?
Well the guys were only driving for 28 km in the direction we needed to go, better than nothing though. We were driving through the stunning scenery of Quebrada de las Conchas and we even got a chance to have a little walk around while the Swiss family was having lunch.
By the time we got to hitch-hike again it was already 5 pm. Thinking for a minute we realised that there is no way we can get to Salta and out of Salta the same day and as every hostel was full in Salta for Easter, staying there over night was out of the question. The Swiss guys told us that the town of Alemania is within 60 km away and is surrounded by mountains, so we decided to aim for that. This time, oh lucky us, the wait was only half an hour and we got a ride in the pick-up truck, hahaha, in the truck on top of the seeds, bye-bye health and safety and hello beautiful views. After about 30 minutes it started to rain, but luckily just a drizzle. We safely arrived in Alemania at around 6:30pm.
Alemania is a pretty interesting and desolated place. It once used to be a vibrant tourist spot as the train used to connect it with Salta, but the train stopped running about 40 years ago and there are only a few families living there now. We were told that there is a hostel in the old train station, but it turned out there wasn’t ;) Camping was the only option. We pitched up a tent and the minute we put the bags in it started raining like crazy! We managed to get to the shelter of the train station and asked the locals about food. That evening the guys there were preparing humitas, to be sold next day to tourists in the nearby attraction Gorganta del diablo. Humita – is a dish of minced corn mixed with goat cheese, raped in corn husk and then boiled. Unfortunately or fortunately, not sure, humitas were only to be ready later that evening, so we settled for a quick pizza. It was actually one of the best pizzas I ever had, very simple, but sooo good! And later that evening we had some humitas as well, which were truly to die for! Not to mention, all this time it was raining like cats and dogs. That night we went to sleep full and happy.
Next day after a nice 9 hour sleep, we returned to the beloved train station to have a breakfast of empanadas and sweet humitas. After packing everything up we were settled for another day of travelling.
We were waiting by the road in the baking hot sun for about two hours and I nearly started to give up hope and went to inquire about busses. At the same time a car pulled up and oh yes we had a ride. Just as Alex was thinking at the time “well what’s the chance of someone stopping if there is just a bloke!?” We started talking to the guy called Ricardo and turned out he is travelling into Bolivia as well. We didn’t want to push our luck too much and kept our thoughts quite of getting a ride all the way to Bolivia. Ricardo`s first stop on the way was Iruya, medieval town frozen in time in the middle of nowhere about 200km from the Bolivian border. After a few hours had passed we gathered the courage to ask about the possibility of going with him to Iruya and he didn’t seem to mind at all! We were driving for about 4-5 hours and it was starting to get dark, when suddenly Ricardo told us that he doesn’t want us to miss the best part of the drive and offered to stay overnight in a place called Purmamarca, which so far we heard nothing about. We were knackered from hitch-hiking and the long ride and happily accepted his kind offer.
Purmamarca was very beautiful, actually I imagined Bolivia like this, not Argentina. But later when we got to Bolivia I realized that my image wasn’t quite right. The town looked medieval, with its cobbled stone roads, little squares and markets. We walked around town a bit asking for accommodations, but as it was Easter everything was fully booked accept for very expensive options. Therefore we had to find a camping ground. We remembered that on the way into town there was a sign for camping. We returned to that spot and turned out it was a fairly nice and cheap place to stay and oh happy happy they had space! We set up tents in no time as everyone was starving. For food we went back into town to the place we spotted on the way which served nice Argentinian stake :) The meal was absolutely delicious with even better wine to go with it. I think the wine was called Latitude 33. During the meal Ricardo showed us his plans for Bolivia and I must say his schedule was tight.
We returned back to the campsite at about midnight and went straight to sleep to wake up early in the morning to amazing views of mountains and a river running just past the camp.
I think the shower is worth mentioning ;) Well, first of all it was literally across the road which was fairly busy that morning. It was located in a wooden hut and the shower itself consisted of plastic bucket attached to the wall with a heating element inside it. To get hot water you had to turn on that heating element and then wait for about 15 minutes to get some lukewarm water. Not to mention the whole construction has a major flaw, if the water is used and the person who used it forgets to turn of the heating element the whole thing melts… That’s what happened to one of these showers the night before.
After we had a morning mate we decided to explore the village during the day and trek a bit in the nearby mountains. The day was perfect, sunny and warm. Here are a few pics from our morning walk.
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After a walk we set out to drive to Iruya. The drive was exactly like Ricardo said; it is something you should see during day light. The mountains had amazing colours, strange shapes and the views were just breath-taking.
To get to the town of Iruya we had to do 50 km of dirt road and even cross a few rivers. The road went up to 4000 meters above sea level, pretty crazy! It took us about 2 hours to get to the place, but it was worth it for sure. Arriving at this town was unreal as you can’t quite expect to see a town of reasonable size in the middle of nowhere. A lot of travellers ask themselves a silly question why was this place built so far away from everywhere, but it was built before the big towns like Salta and Jujuy even existed. It was simply built there because the fresh water was nearby and the soil was right to grow crops. I think it was around 5pm when we arrived and the first thing we did was ate, as we hadn’t had anything except cookies for the whole day.
After a short search for camping ground we found one across the river, the problem was the road was washed away recently and the only option was to trek 1 km across the river. The place was great and even better, we were the only visitors. We set up camp and went back into Iruya to have dinner and a look around. We found a restaurant which served good food and as we later found out, a folk music concert that was great! Another good day finished!
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Next day we got up reasonably early and went for a trek to the little town hidden in the mountains, without even a dirt road connecting it to civilisation. The walk was long and we first realised that we are higher up than usual and the oxygen is a bit scarce. I think it took us about three hours to reach the small town of San Isidro. I think we had to cross the river about ten times on the way. The place was really small, but very cute. It even had a little shop which was completely stocked up with all sort of things. All of the goods in the shop were brought up with donkeys. We got back to Iruya around 5pm and we still had a plan to drive to la Quiaca, next to the Bolivian border.
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We had a well-deserved shower, packed up the tent and got going. The drive was pretty hard, even for me and I wasn’t driving ;) The road had many corners so I managed to eat all the mints we had, if you know what I mean. As soon as we got to the paved road I fell asleep, later waking up very close to Quiaca. It was around 11pm and the road was dark, but reasonably good so we were driving at a good speed and then all of a suddenly we hit a huge hole, very glad the car was alright afterwards. A minute later there was another hole and we saw a car which was less fortunate parked next to the rout. We reached Quiaca at around 11:30pm, hungry and sleepy. We found a hostel which was recommended by lonely planet and it was good and cheap, just the beds were a bit lumpy. Next mission was finding food. You know the feeling of arriving in an unknown city at night? Generally the impression you get is not a good one, so Quiaca didn’t look very friendly. It is a border town with not much going for it, a lot of shops were closed and looking rather shady. We decided that the best option would be to take the car and drive to the restaurant recommended by the guide book. It was not difficult to find but I can’t say it was particularly great, the lights were of the cold blue energy saving type which always gives an amazing atmosphere to a place, very cosy ;) Anyway, food was good, that’s what matters. I think our waiter was stoned as he managed to forget our order three times. We got back to the hostel and went straight to bed after an eventful day and to get rest for another early start scheduled for tomorrow.
The next morning we grabbed some supplies in Argentina and went straight to the border…
