Lads on tour(s) - part II

SAN SALVADOR DE JUJUY, ARGENTINA - 25th March 2010

(...continued from Part I...)

The tour up to Humahuaca left, as with the previous day's Cachi trip, at the ungodly hour of 6.15am; it was thus little surprise that both myself and, to a more impressive extent Tom, were both very much asleep for a more than insignificant period as our journey began.

However, the inane chat from our Argentine tour guide soon had us wide awake and in tip top form for some culture and nature (in no small part thanks to her being rather hot), and things came thick and fast as we followed the Río Grande north through the 96-mile Quebrada de Humahuaca valley.  A UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2003, Quebrada de Humahuaca is best known its spectacular landscape - erosion and tectonic activity have combined to expose an array of colourful mineral rocks, creating a canyon filled with incredible formations complete with evocative titles - "The Painter's Palette", "The Skirt of the Colla" and, first on our itinerary, the striking "Hill of Seven Colours".

Overlooking the tiny little village of Purmamarca, the Hill boasts the full set of mineral colours across its distinct sedimentary layers: light orange (a blend of clay, mud and sand); white (lime rock); yellow (sulphur); purple (manganese); red (iron); green (copper oxide); brown (lead/general rock) :

While the Hill and its sedimentary layers are undoubtedly the main attraction that pulls in the tourists, locals in this part of the world scarcely miss an opportunity to flog local produce to cash-happy tourists, and Purmamarca's central square features market stalls on every face (one seen above), offering array of local crafts and textiles, with llama wool (right) being the star attraction.  

Half an hour or so is more than enough time to decide you don't have the space or patience to buy anything, but still take plenty of overly arty photographs; soon enough we were back in the minibus and cruising ever closer to Bolivia up Route 9.  Hot tour guide took the opportunity to fill us in on some useful regional history - the valley-come-ravine-come-canyon that is Quebrada de Humahuaca has been inhabited for something to the tune of 10,000 years; acted as the main caravan route for the Incas through the region in the mid twentieth century; and was the scene of several significant battles as Argentina fought for its independence in 1812.  Most famous of these saw cavalier firebrand Manuel Belgrano ignore orders from Buenos Aires to retreat, and instead pulled off a deuced unlikely victory against the Royalist Spaniards despite being outnumbered two-to-one.  200 or so years later, and every town in Argentina has an Av. Belgrano, so it's fair to say his insolence has been largely overlooked.

It was slightly older history that was of greatest interest, however, and particularly given our next stop on the tour.  The Incas, when travelling up through the canyon, would eat the flower/fruit of the cactus that grew wild along the Río Grande valley (see right).  This particular flower, independence of nutritional value, contained a seed that was extremely fibrous and, thus, passed straight through the Incan digestive system and, so to speak, out the other side.

The Incas traversing northward up the river are likely to have halted in the farming village of Tilcara, where a large Incan pucará (ruined fortification) stood and, from existing remains, has been rebuilt.   Occupied by Incan farmers between 500 and as long as 1000 years ago, the Pucará de Tilcara provides a source of mild intrigue today as fully grown cacti grow from what would have been the middle of the settlement's houses.  The conclusion: the farmers who ate the cactus fruit ended up excreting it somewhere in their house, and at the painfully slow initial growth rate of 5mm/year, a young cactus began to develop.  A few hundred years later, the Incas have been ousted, the pucará is deserted, and the cacti have been free to crank up their growth rate as they mature, resulting in a scene such as that below:

With the pucará hilltop successfully conquered, we were back on the road to Humahuaca, although not before making a brief but significant stop to snap the phenomenal colours of the Skirt of the Colla. 

The Skirt, named for its shape and the lively colours worn by the native Colla tribe before they were ousted by the Incas, boasts an array of colours that are almost certainly unparalleled anywhere else in the world - colour upon mineral-induced colour pile up one on top of another on what could be seen as the geological equivalent of a good English trifle. 

So from here it was full steam ahead to the town of Humahuaca itself - briefly interrupted for lunch on the outskirts of the village.  Ever the cavalier when it comes to sampling new food, I naturally opted for the llama steak and llama empanadas, both of which were suitable excellent if a little on the sharp side of the taste spectrum.  From here, we got a tour of the town, with particular emphasis on the colossal Monument of Independence that dominates the central area and gives the village an import sense of history (see below).

Cultured up and having, in my case at least, acquired a cheeky new "Humahuaca" branded vest, we headed back onto Route 9, though now southbound.  To go with "the skirt" and all the rest, we made a brief stop at the village of Maimará to appreciate one final offering from this incredible quebrada: "The Painter's Palette" (see below).  Although maybe not quite as colourfully explosive as the skirt or the seven coloured hill, the palette image offered something visually special - the small ramshackle buildings rolling over the small hills in the foreground of the palette provided a sight that combined nature's beauty and its best with the beauty that is somewhat inherent in the more simple human existence. 

That pretty much concluded things, bar the less visually impressive but equally important stop-off at the notional line that marks the Tropic of Capricorn at 23.5°S.  Naturally we took the opportunity to grab some classic photos - a cheeky Back the Bid snap snuck in there too - before we continued on our way to Jujuy where Tom and I were going to hop out.  How we got there and what happened on the way is anyone's guess - with fatigue catching up on me like a Michael Schumacher on speed, the first thing I knew was the two of us being unceremoniously woken up and dumped out onto the streets of San Salvador de Jujuy, and some dazed and largely aimless walking around as we tried to find somewhere to stay.  Thanks to the trusty LPG, and with no thanks to our combined ability to read a map, we found our way to the excellent Casa de Barro where, after checking out the various demonstrations and parades that were thumping their way around the city and grabbing an excellent spicy pancho (hot dog) where they all culminated in Plaza General Belgrano, we crashed out in quite spectacular fashion.  18 hours later, we remain in a state of innate lethargy, but with Anna on board a 21-hour bus from Buenos Aires to here as I type, her arrival this evening is likely to kick any lethargy off the square.

Lads on tour(s) - part I

SAN SALVADOR DE JUJUY, ARGENTINA - 25th March 2010

After two long days of bus tours, both involving waking up at 6.15am, Tom and I can be forgiven for having a lazy day. Despite going to bed earlier than I have done at any other time in 2 months here in South America (11pm), we still struggled out of our damn comfortable Cassa del Barros beds for a 10am breakfast, and at this stage have achieved little else today.  Tales of travel must be told, however, and we begin this episode bright and early on Tuesday morning as Tom and I stumbled out of Las Rejas in Salta and into our Cachi tour minibus with nothing but a few medias lunas (croissants in everything but name) and a couple of coffees stopping us from collapsing into fatigue-induced slumber.

Cachi is a tiny little town that lies about 100km southwest of Salta as the condor flies, but the fun of the tour is the spectacular 4 hour, 155km drive there via Cuesta del Obispo; combining rising latitude with a route that begins in riverside, jungle-type forest, it progresses up a few thousand metres to offer some stunning mountain-side scenery and continues to flat, cactus-filled desert as far as the eye can see, ultimately leaving you in Valles Calchaquíes, where little Cachi sits on what used to be the main route across the Andes.  I could wax lyrical about each of one of these fantastic landscapes, but will let some photos do the talking instead.

Condors deserve more than a passing mention. These eagle-like birds of prey (right), ubiquitous with this part of the world, grace the skies in and around the huge, towering Andean valleys, where the valley floor disappears under hundreds of metres of depth and cloud cover, and the height of the bordering mountains is more often than not concealed behind the hazy mass of this same cloud. The condor, patrolling these vistas, will never be seen alone - they mate for life (fairly rare among birds) and are totally loyal to their partner, to extent that that when a female dies, the male will, apparently, commit suicide by flying high into the sky before nosediving, kamikaze-style, like an arrow back down to earth.  This "romantic suicide" is just for males, mind you - if it's the female left behind then she'll just float off and find herself a new lad condor and pick up where she left off.

The fact that there is scant scientific evidence for these "romantic suicides" doesn't stop tour guides (like ours) proclaiming them as gospel truth - the reality of knackered, 50+ year old birds just running out of steam and falling to a grim death clearly wasn't so appealing to the ancient Incas, who considered condors a sacred link between the sky and the underworld.  Either way, we had this explained to us at the top of a mountain where Tom, Keith (a Mancunian who was the only other English-speaker on our tour) and I were being entertained and frustrated in equal measure by the audacity, stupidity, or general antisociability of some woman who, it seemed, had set herself the goal of single-handedly ruining as many photos as humanly possible.  Atop of this hill stood a chapel and, adjacent, a solitary cross looking out over the cloud-filled valley.  Clearly, everyone is going to want to take photos of this - the most poignant landmark at a beautiful location.  So where does the stupid woman decide to walk over to and plonk her butt?  Right on the base of the cross - right when all 3 of us have our cameras pointing right at it.  In all seriousness, it could not have been more patently obvious what we were trying to do and, given she proceeded to sit for a good 10 minutes, she'd have been hard pushed to do a better job of pissing on a parade.

Nonetheless, the photos were eventually taken, and for your enjoyment can be found below.

Lunch in a traditional little place outside of Cachi saw some excellent meat consumption (asado - chicken, sausage, beef - proper man food*), and the hour we had to explore the little town itself proved to be more than enough to see some random archaeological bits and pieces in a museum, get ourselves some ½ peso ice cream (8p),watch a dog bite off far more than he could chew and spend half an hour unsuccessfully attempting to dislodge the meat from his big canine tooth, and finally tie Tom to "the death swing" (see right). 

With the hour expired, it was back on the minibus for the ride back to Salta - a ride I can tell you absolutely nothing about save the fact that minibus seats are surprisingly conducive to shut-eye.  But R&R wouldn't last long - once back in Salta I got turfed out of Las Rejas as it was fully booked on the third night, so was forced to wander a few blocks down the road to Hostel Quara which, to be surprise and slight chagrin, turned out to be cleaner, more comfortable, with better (or at least hotter) staff and all for about half the price!  Still, there was minimal time to enjoy the surroundings; 24 hours on from yesterday's failed attempt, tonight we were hitting La Casona del Molino come what may.  What we had learned from yesterday's debacle was that walking was a bad idea, so the three of us (Keith having joined our motley crew) hopped in a cab and enjoyed a couple of rounds of excellent Salta Negra beer accompanied by many an empanada, before some excellent main courses (I went for locro, a local speciality in northern Argentina and Bolivia that is essentially a massive beef stew).  The food was good, but the charm of the place and the source of its reputation is its clientèle.  Every night, loads of locals head over to the place to eat, drink, and be merry, but most importantly bring all their instruments and (once a critical level of alcoholic consumption has been reached) strike up a good old fashioned sing-song.  Great times.

Waking up 6.15am had been anything but fun, but the next day's tour to Humahuaca involved a repeat performance - rendering a savage night out very much off the cards...

(to be continued...)

* Ed Sherrington would certainly approve

The importance of being idle

SALTA, ARGENTINA - 22nd March 2010

Prior to this morning, the last time I had to wake myself up for something, without the backup of having someone else to wake me up anyway, was at 3am in Auckland Airport back on that epically long 1st February. Clearly, I'm out of practice with this whole waking up malarkey - a fact not helped by my mobile phone-cum-alarm getting smashed back in Queenstown.

Having met up the night before for a cheeky bite to eat, Tom and I had decided to get up e.doors and hike our way up to the 1500m summit of Cerro San Bernado - the hill overlooking the city. In order to avoid the savagery of the tropical heat beating down later in the day, we agreed to meet bright and early at 8.45am at the foot of the hill, by the statue of Martín Miguel de Güemes - a hero in this northwestern part of Argentina thanks to his role in defending the north-west against the Spanish in the Argentine War of Independence. However, an 8.45 meet-up was looking pretty grim when I awoke and looked at my watch to find hands pointing towards a quarter to 10!

Feeling like a prize dickhead, I headed pessimistically over to the Güemes monument anyway - I figured at some stage on my way up/his way down we'd have to cross paths and I could apologise for being useless. What a surprise it was then, as I paused to photograph Güemes in all his military glory (see right), that over from my right strolled young Thomas - turns out he, being an equally useless boy, had done very much the same thing and had only been waiting at Güemes' foot for a bit over 10 minutes!

So up we went - step by step ascending to the top of this striking hill in, thanks to our mutual ineptitude, far hotter and more uncomfortable conditions that we'd intended, but the time flew by. Whether from the refreshment of having someone new to talk to, or the liberation of being able to speak totally frankly again, or just the immature amusement that comes only from laddish chat, it barely seemed like we'd set off before we found ourselves sitting pretty, looking down on Salta and - obviously - backing the bid!


The stroll back down was, surprisingly enough, much faster, but having both largely skipped breakfast thanks to our waking up woes, we were both bloody starving by the time we were back at street level. Cue scouting out a speciality empanada restaurant and, being hungry, growing boys, ordering a solid round of 6 (or 8?) special local-style empanadas (potatoes, chillies, and beef), followed by a proper main course involving plenty of meat, followed by fruit salads - all washed down with the delicious Salta Negra malt beer. Then it was definitely time to chill out back at Las Rejas.

Some quality kotching included time for Tom to get an email from his Mum with details of a Salta restaurant that had featured in The Observer's travel supplement - one of only 3 South American restaurants to be featured. As the same place had been recommended by Taylor back in Mendoza, there was no questioning La Casona del Molino as our choice of dinner destination. Unfortunately, the place was a mission and a half from the city centre where we were and, after making the ill advised decision to walk, we discovered that we'd inadvertently and wholly unnecessarily walked a good 6 blocks further north than we needed to, so proceeded to cover the same ground again back south. All in all, we walked the best part of 35 blocks before finally arriving, and very quickly realised that it was very much closed. Monday. Closed Day. Not cool.

Now knowing not to make the same error of heading north/south, our walk back home in a straight eastward direction was hella shorter (probably still 25 blocks though), and with hunger and time nipping at our heels we found ourselves in Plaza 9 de Julio (Iglesia Catedral looking stunning in its lit-up state, below) and were sold by the classic, simple option of superpanchos (foot-long hot dogs) - which came complete with all ends of sauces and toppings. I got one topped with sweetcorn and one topped with something else; both were fantastic.


Well aware that last night's decision to book of 2 consecutive days of tours to cool places around the area obligated us to two consecutive morning departures of 6.30am, and conscious of our collective waking performance this morning, it is hardly a shock that tonight is an early night!

Going solo

SALTA, ARGENTINA - 21st March 2010

"It's weird isn't it - when you go to other countries you always see locals wearing English football shirts, but you'd never see English guys back home wearing Argentine shirts, would you?"

Proudly sporting my "Moscow 08" Manchester United shirt (following this morning's brush past a Liverpool side that really, really aren't very good), I've just finished a good value pizza here at "New Time Cafe" in the south-west corner of Salta's impressive Plaza 9 de Julio. The quite stunningly dense quote above came courtesy of one of two English girls sitting at the table opposite me, presumably after a cursory glance in my direction (and the relatively standard if woefully inaccurate assumption that my dark skin makes me Latin). I'm not sure if it's good that Anna isn't here right now or not - these two are prize specimens of almost everything she dislikes (in English people): unable to speak a word of Spanish (less than me, even); content to order vegetarian salads in a place specialising in meat dishes, and still not finishing them; not particularly attractive (admittedly not their fault); and patently lacking a couple of notches of basic common sense. Shame - she missed out.

I rocked up to Las Rejas Hostel here in Salta this morning after a long 20 hour bus from Mendoza and, first things first, settled down to watch the football. Actually, it wasn't first things first at all - an hour earlier I'd decided to help myself breakfast and some coffee, but had the unfortunate experience of picking up a jug of milk, pouring it in and tasting it, only to discover that the "milk jug" was in fact yoghurt. Not ideal.

Equally far from ideal was sitting on a computer in the hostel attempting in vain to find an online stream of the match. Finally, via Facebook and a useful post from a certain Robin Hill, I managed to get a stream... and discovered that in the 10 minutes I'd been looking for a stream I'd missed Liverpool scoring, a penalty, United equalising, and generally the best 10 minutes of the match. Again, not ideal.

At some stage after a post-match shower I sauntered out the hostel and over to here. The square is certainly one of Argentina's most impressive, and is dominated at its northern end by the beautiful 19th century Iglesia Catedral, resplendent in pink and white paintwork (right). Sadly, like so many churches on this continent during the day, it was closed - but then again with hunger calling me it was probably for the best.

* * * * *

The near-on 1000km journey up here covers the best part of 10° of latitude - Salta is just shy of the Tropic of Capricorn, and you damn well feel it walking around in the early afternoon sun. So do the locals, apparently; the place was as dead as Liverpool's Champions' League chances - nothing open, barely a soul on the streets - siestas are the big business here. Iglesia San Francisco doesn't need to be open to be appreciated, however - its blood red exterior tapered with cream edging is so visually overwhelming you almost feel bad staring at it.

Anyway, Tom - one of the crew from our Mendoza vineyard and thermal pool adventures - will be getting into town around about now, so the next few days of South America are likely to involve more beer, less Spanish, and a lot more football than the previous 2 months. Happy days!