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Published: September 8th 2008
Tren de Las Nubes
Amazing piece of rail engineering up an increasingly difficult valleyHaving met a Spanish couple remarkably briefly only 700kms ago, Roberto and Esther, our paths again crossed whilst hunting both cheap rental cars and Arlene's coffee fix. After some intense negotiation, both were solved, and we had a delightful 4 days together to celebrate, whilst sharing the scenery and the cost of a tiny car. And our Spanish improved out of sight along the way.
The stunning "Tren de las Nubes" ("Train to the Clouds") takes its enraptured passengers up countless swtichbacks on its glorious route to the Andean plateau. We were so keen to do this, but there was no train working, and it was SO dry there were no clouds. So off in our little VW rental car we went.
Wearing short sleeves and sunnies, our little car quietly climbed to 3700m to a small nitrate mining town called San Antonio de los Cobres. We should have suspected something had changed when some cyclists and locals went past rugged up like abominable snowmen. Severely underclad, Benj jumps out to take some photos of the most depressively under-presented town, to find out just why the locals live an existence akin to trench warfare against a bitter and unrelenting
San Antonio
... the picturesque. This was a rugged photographers dream. wind. The concrete visitor centre, which is still under construction, takes its inspiration from the cold war in more ways than one. But hiding behind an adjacent 2m high unfinished mudbrick wall, we stumbled into the local celebrations of the Pachamama festivities (Mother Earth worship). As part of the event, the local community and mining company had sponsored a lunch for all - touristas included. And so we were treated to a superb regional soup with big chunks of broiled Llama (?), bread and fizzy drink. It was delightful.
As the sun clambered towards its demise for the day, we arrived at the Grande Salinas (salt planes), a pre-historic remnant of long dead inland seas that lost their connections as the continent was thrust upwards through volcanic and tectonic activity. The white pan of salt is all that is left, and is a remarkable terrain to play in. The stunning light angle had us running around fiddling with the cameras, despite our frozen fingers not working properly.
Altitude is a funny thing. One valley has it, the neighbouring valley doesn't. Only 70kms separate them, and the difference is dry stoney moonscape vs lush forest. The cooling effect on
the airflow of the ascending terrain dumps the moisture before getting to where it seems most needed. As we inevitably dropped off the edge of this valley, we headed to an excellent forest park next to a decent sized river - what a change.
So we have entered a completely different Argentina, and are delighted to have been able to experience it. As we were reluctantly leaving Argentina, the best way to celebrate was to find an excellent parilla (meaty grill restaurant dish requiring at least 2 persons) to inflict some serious damage to the sizzling grillplate brought out to our table, laden with ribs, steak, kidney, and intestines.
Adios Salta, y adios Argentina, el pais con muchas differencias.
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