Road-trip Through Salta, Jujuy and Mendoza

During our two-week midterm break, four friends and I had the luck to travel through three of Argentina’s most beautiful provinces. We headed, firstly, to the stunning city of Salta, a mere 24 hours bus drive from Buenos Aires. With the change in altitude and climate (the province of Salta is known for its mountains and desert-like landscapes), ‘Salta, la Linda’ offered a complete change in architecture, dialects, demographics, and political opinion, which was very interesting to witness. Heading outside of the bubble of liberal Buenos Aires allowed us to understand how the peronist Alberto Fernandez, often looked down upon in the capital, and yet which we had heard much of in our politics class, could have been elected in October. We also happened to have the luck to visit the town during a religious festivity, in which thousands of pilgrims from around the province, some of which had walked or biked for weeks, congregated into the main square to pay homage to the Virgin Mary.

After our discovery of Salta (and their nation-wide famous empanadas!) our road-trip could start, heading up north to the province of Jujuy, which borders Bolivia. We headed into the desert and mountains, first crossing a surprisingly green pass, spending a night in the beautiful lively capital of San Salvador de Jujuy, before heading into a long valley embedded in incredible rock formations.  Every few kilometers, the mountains around us would completely change colors and shapes, making for a breathtaking spectacle.

After spending a few days driving through these beautiful landscapes, and visiting the small villages of Purmamarca, Tilcara and Humahuaca, and the famous seven and fourteen-coloured mountains (pictured above), we drove up an impressive mountain pass to arrive to the surprising expanse of the Argentinian salt flats. Less well-known than the Bolivian Uyuni flats, the Salinas Grandes are the third biggest salt flats in the world, and offered both a beautiful view, and interesting geological explanations.

Our road-trip then took us back South to Jujuy, and through Argentina’s most famous road: Ruta 40, and the Cactus National Park to the wine region of Cafayate. The single-lane, unpaved road gave both our car and drivers quite a challenge, but offered views upon incredible jagged white and red rock formations, and impressive seemingly-endless expanses of cacti deserts. After a long day of driving, we enjoy a nice restful time in Cafayate, visiting ruins from an ancient indigenous civilization, which was strikingly lacking in funding and regulation: visitors of the ruins were guided by voluntary guides of the nearby community, and free to touch and walk among houses and pieces of pottery more than 800 years old!

We finished off this incredible journey back where it started, in Salta, where we left our now-beloved car much dustier than we had received it, before hopping into a luxurious 20-hour bus ride to Mendoza, Argentina’s wine capital. Due to the enormous distances in Argentina (the urban legend goes that England, France, Spain, Italy, Germany and part of Scandinavia can all fit inside Argentina’s borders!), the bus companies have developed incredibly comfy buses for travels that are often longer than the plane-ride from Europe to South America. Dinner, breakfast, pillows, blankets and free entertainment is expected in any normal Argentinian night bus!

Our stay in Mendoza was more relaxed, after our hectic road-trip, and allowed us to try out some nice wines, relax in thermal springs, and even visit the Southern continent’s highest mountain (although I must admit we didn’t climb it… it would have taken two weeks just to reach the top!). 

By Céline Dogsé