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TOURISTICALLY, NORTHWEST ARGENTINA IS A TERRITORY YET TO BE DISCOVERED. THE BEST WAY TO TRAVEL IN THIS REGION IS TO STOP WHENEVER ONE'S ATTENTION IS ATTRACTED BY SOMETHING THAT CALLS FOR ADMIRATION. BE ENRAPTURED BY A SUNSET ON A MULTICOLOURED HILL, BE BEWITCHED BY THE MUSICAL SENTIMENTALITY OF AN ERKE, FEEL ECSTASY WHEN CONTEMPLATING THE UNIQUENESS OF A SKY FULL OF STARS, BRIGHT AND STRIKING, ADMIRE THE CAPRICIOUS SHAPES AND VARIATIONS OF COLOURS OF THE ENORMOUS ROCK FORMATIONS, THE VALLEYS, DISCOVER THE GREAT SILENCE AND LIVING NATURE. ALL THIS CAN BE FOUND IN THIS REGION OF ETERNAL HARMONY. EVEN THE TOURISTIC ROUTES FOLLOW THE SAME NATURAL TRACKS USED BY THE
ANCESTORS OF MODERN-DAY MAN. THE ATTRACTIONS APPEAR SUDDENLY, BEHIND A HILL, AT THE BOTTOM OF A RAVINE, IN A FEAST CELEBRATED IN A SMALL TOWN AROUND THE BEND. |
 If there is something that calls the visitor's attention to Northwest Argentina, it is the variety of shapes and hues, the vivid colours of the earth, its deserts, valleys and mountains, the break of dawn, the sunsets, the pureness of the air, its enormous silences, the bonhomie of its people, and the peculiarity of its feasts.
During the day, the sky is diaphanous, with an intense blue sky to be found nowhere else, though it is at night when a multitude of sparkling stars, blue and twinkling, seem to light up the infinite and place the sight within reach.
On the surface, mineral wealth gives colour to the hills, forming rock rainbows of extraordinary beauty causing suggestive names like "El Cerro de los Siete Colores" or "La Quebrada Paleta del Pintor".
The inhabitants of the Northwest are silent and hardly exuberant people. However, during the region's typical carnivals they don their best clothes, take out their ancestral traditions and their autochthonous instruments during nine consecutive nights of music, dance, and singularly colourful processions which find their roots deep in the local folklore.
Northwest Argentina maintains the roots of the region's pre-Columbian cultures though influenced by the habits and customs of the Puna. This enormous plateau is located at an altitude of 3,500 metres and stretches beyond Argentina, to Chile and Bolivia. It was precisely these cultures from the north of the continent that converted this zone into pre-Hispanic Argentina's neuralgic centre which later was transferred to Buenos Aires, the place where the emancipation of the country had its origins.
The northwest has a rich legacy of this past, in the way of invaluable indigenous ruins, works of art, in which the influence of the pre and post-Hispanic eras, harmoniously amalgamated, can be observed, forming the special style of the region, and the colonial architecture, clearly evident in the buildings and particularly in some churches still in use.
The inhabitants of the Argentinean Puna, in the northwest, still maintain numerous traditions with pride. Known as "collas", they maintain the cult of the "Pachamama" - Mother Earth - giving thanks to the One who makes the "maize grow and livestock multiply" even though they are, simultaneously, profoundly Christian. They sing and dance to the rhythm of their folkloric instruments: the charangos, quenas, erkes, cajas and bombos; they weave the wool of the vicu¤as, sheep, and llamas, making blankets, ponchos, and other artisanal clothes, and sometimes talk in Quechua, the language of their forefathers.
But there is more in northwest Argentina; it includes the provinces of Salta, Jujuy, Tucumán, Catamarca, La Rioja, and Santiago del Estero, six different physiognomies in a region larger than Italy, though only a 5% of its population.
This land, poorly populated and yet to be discovered by international mass tourism, has scenarios that are outstanding by their beauty and magnificence, centuries-old customs, and the most authentic folklore of the country. Places like "El Cañón de Talampaya" in La Rioja, or "La Cuesta del Portezuelo" in Catamarca, speak of extraordinarily spectacular panoramas.
Tucumán, the smallest province in Argentina and known as "the Garden of the Republic", shows all its beauty in Taf¡ del Valle and projects its past in the ruins of the Quilmes indians, the last bulwark of resistance against the Spanish Conquistadores.
In Santiago del Estero, nature has endowed some enclaves, such as Río Hondo, a quiet and agreeable place, with a sensational micro-climate, spas, and ideal spots for fishing.
One cannot help experiencing the charm and magic of "los Valles Calchaquíes" in the province of Salta, with its colonial towns and its wild, quiet, and silent attraction charged with tradition. All this has to be discovered without haste, like one who is prepared to savour one of its fruit wines of extraordinary bouquet.
Leaving the city of Salta, "La Linda" (the beautiful), one can ascend and penetrate deep in the Andes mountain range and emerge in the Puna heights, with the Tren a las Nubes (Railway to the Clouds), an incredible touristic convoy that climbs to an altitude of 4,000 metres across a magnificent work of engineering, the viaduct of "La Polvorilla".
On the northern border is the province of Jujuy of which 60% is the altiplano. One of the best excursions around northwest Argentina can be done from here. La Quebrada de Humahuaca, the natural pass towards La Puna, doubtlessly an unforgettable site of this region.
Picturesque villages that maintain the architectural characteristics and customs of the pre-Hispanic cultures such as Purmamarca and Maimará; simple chapels of exquisite beauty like those in Uqu¡a, Yavi, or Casabindo, that maintain their colonial style; pre-Hispanic ruins like the ones in Pucará de Tilcara, and traditional and surprising festivals like the carnival in Humahuaca follow one another along a route traced next to the Río Grande.
To cover northwest Argentina the best would be to program a point of arrival and let oneself be carried away by the tracks, the very same routes the first settlers followed, and observe the astonishing and surprising scenery that appears. Stop and enjoy contemplating everything that has aroused your attention.
Discover the mysterious charm of the daybreak, the sunsets, the imposing hills that seem to be the work of an artist, the valleys "with a thousand shades of green", the night on the altiplano, studded with countless stars of incomparable glitter, the intangible beauty of a church made of mud and cardón (teasel), the melancholic rhythm of a zamba or a vidala, the personality, cadence, and the slow rhythm of the Collas, the clearness and purity of the atmosphere, the forms, life and all the movement of this wonderful region.
Luckily, in this age of striking technological progress with its unavoidable presence of globalization and instant audiovisual communications, there is still the possibility of living sensations pleasant to the senses and spirit, that exceed virtual reality, that can be felt and lived only in natural places like northwest Argentina, where they can still astonish and reach out whoever visits it.
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