As we were now going to be stuck in Salta for 2 more days than anticipated, we decided to take a day tour organised through our hostel to Cachi, a small village in the mountains a few hours away. We rose with the sun (note: sunrise seems suspiciously late here for summertime) and were struggling to stay awake and alive for our 7AM pick-up. A van rolled up containing mostly Argentinian tourists, and although our tour guide assured us that she would do the explanations in both English and Spanish, it ended up being more like 20% English with 80% Spanish. After driving around town collecting the last few passengers, we were off. We passed through tobacco and corn fields, heading towards the looming mountains, while the guide told us about different types of tobacco cultivars in English, told jokes in Spanish that the whole van minus us laughed at, and sang along to the Argentine folk on the stereo in between. Soon, we had passed through the lowland farms and into the lushly forested slopes of the lower mountains. It took me a full minute to realise that there were jaguars in these mountains, as our guide told us that hhhhaguars were a really important protected species.
The point at which jungle starts changing into whatever a drier, higher altitude environment is called.
With less than an hours’ drive under our belts, we were already passing through the last of the verdant valleys, as the trees became increasingly replaced by high rocky slopes lined with scrub and huge cacti. We stopped for a bathroom/llama break (my first up-close llama sighting in South America!), before spending at least another hour heading further uphill into the mountains, where at one stage, we ended up over 4000m above sea level (and didn’t die). I’m not sure exactly how to express just how much mountain there is here. As a New Zealander, I am no stranger to mountains, but holy crap the Andes seem to be never ending (although I know that they do end, after about 7000km to be precise).
The earth does some cool stuff sometimes
Hell yeah llama! ("Shhhhhama" in Argentine Spanish)
Jeremy always seems strangely at home in mountains for some reason
Goats - the other caprine at home in the mountains
There is some scientific explanation for the reason the mountains look this way, but I don't know what it is
We were pretty impressed by all the huge cacti dotted along the slopes, but that was nothing compared to what we encountered once we were well inside the Los Cardones national park. There, thousands of giant cacti stand sentry in a valley (plateau? Whatever this thing is - my geography skills are crap) surrounded by hills with strange colourful layers. These cardon cacti had been chopped down for hundreds of years for their woody insides, but this has recently been banned as their super slow growth has led to them becoming an endangered species. However, furniture and other structures made of cactus wood is still a pretty common sight in this area of Argentina (one hopes that this is all from historical cactus-chopping, not current poaching).
Spiky!
Cacti!
Like a cactus, I also get pricklier and more dried out as I age
So these things get pretty big... (not talking about Jeremy here)
We arrived in Cachi in time for a lunch of mystery schnitzel (it may have been llama? The menu just specified “meat”) for Jeremy and goat cheese sorrentinos for me. Cachi was a cute little mountain town, with an awesome looking old Spanish style church. We didn’t get too much time to look around, which wasn’t too much of a loss since the Pale Creature Jeremy was blistering in the high altitude sun. Clouds had settled in by the time we were driving back to Salta, making for some dramatic mountain/cloud collaborations that I failed to photograph well.
View down the main street of Cachi. Cars kind of ruin the old-school effect
Badass old church in Cachi
So this is what cactus wood looks like when it's offering you a newspaper
Peek-a-boo!
Clouds like to give mountains hugs, awww
Back at the hostel, we met a nice French guy sharing our dorm who had managed to rent what was possibly the last available car in town and was looking for people to split costs with him on a day trip to Purmamarca. Over an asado dinner put on by the hostel, we made plans to do the trip with him the next day. Due to a tragic turn of events, this trip was never to be. Find out more in the next instalment of Katharine’s shitty (oooohhhh foreshadowing) travel diary (which will be published at the exact same time as this entry anyway, as I foil my own attempts at creating suspense).
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