Suitcase on wheels: 46. Road Runner Territory (Salta, Argentina)

From Cordoba we headed north first to Tucuman, and then on to Salta.

From Salta a famous attraction is the Tren a las Nubes (Train to the Clouds) which is an expensive tourist trap. However, it hasn't been running since July since the train is out of order, so we couldn't do it anyway.

What about the cellphone on that guy

I was looking forward to Salta but I found it to be a bit of a disappointment, as all the touristy activities were overpriced. This is the reverse of what I expected, since generally things get cheaper the further north you head - to me it seems the tour agencies have a price fixing agreement. Although the train isn't running, you can do the same trip by bus as the road follows the train tracks. The agencies charge $140 - $200 pesos to do this tour. For $200 pesos I could hire a car myself for a day ($130 pesos) and enough petrol for the 500km round trip ($80 pesos). Divided by four people and that's only $50 pesos each which is closer to what the tour agencies should charge.

Old guy who'd dropped dead in the street

Salta itself was pretty nice, narrow streets and footpaths like Buenos Aires, and a lot cleaner. Lots of shopping and clothes and shoes shops, with some of the lowest prices I've seen in Argentina. Everything shuts down from 2pm until 5pm for the midday lunch and siesta, the first time I've seen that in Argentina.

Salta house

I'd been inspired to head to Salta ever since I saw my friend Danielle's photos here. Course I'd gotten the names confused and it was the red rock of Cafayate I was dying to see, not the surrounding of Salta. Fortunately Cafayate wasn't too far from Salta so we did a tour from their. The best thing about the tour was the guides pointed out the names of various rock formations which otherwise we would have missed. I filled my camera and drained the battery taking photos, here's some of my favourites.

An iguana atop a mountain