Just back from a five day tour with three Aussie chicas - great fun with the food and wine adventurers but this trip was amazing for highlighting almost every situation possible with the roads in Salta and Jujuy, NW Argentina.
This is Ruta 68 from Salta to Cafayate through the Quebrada de las Conchas - Shell Gorge. Goat herds think nothing of wandering along the highway and you have to be careful on curves so as not to run smack into a horse, cow, goat, chicken, pig etc.

Same with ruta 40 although this being ripio and loaded with washboard ruts, it's harder to get up much speed. There are however plenty of animals along the way and other forms of traffic.


We'd stopped for a photo of this unusual modern church with a bacofoil-like roof when the 4 Horsemen of the Apocalypse appeared from nowhere on the 'highway' - Ruta 40 is Argentina's iconic road running 5200km from the Bolivian Border down to Tierra del Fuego along the Andes. Up on the Puna in the National Cactus Park, you will encounter donkeys and possibly Vicuna on the highway.

Beautiful snow on the Nevado de Cachi after witnessing two tourists smash their car into the jutting sidewalk in Cachi pueblo, totally destroying their axle. Next morning we encountered a landslide on the Cuesta del Obispo and had to wait for the ever-present digger to remove it while four English tourists changed their flat tyre.

Back to civilisation and we stopped in Cerrillos outside Salta for some fantastic local empanadas. The owners got as many snaps of the Aussies, juice running down chins as traditionally required of a good empanada, as we did of them.

In the north llamas crossing is the adventure and currently, many road blockages thanks to an unstable political situation.


I think of London and the current violent protest riots unlikely to achieve anything but rancour whereas the 'cortes de rutas' in Argentina often find people showing solidarity despite being blocked from continuing their journey for an hour or two.

These people in Abra Pampa, a small and non-picturesque pueblo north of Humahuaca on the way and close to Bolivia, had had enough with the lies from central government. Many people in the NW claim to be forgotten, far as we are from Buenos Aires and with insignificant population for votes. Madame Kirchner made one of her grandstanding Evita promises last November that every child in Argentina would have a netbook computer. The people in Abra Pampa are not only still waiting for theirs, they have been asking for the last four years for the second stage of the construction of the school to be completed.

My clients know that we have a charitable foundation at NW Nomad to help out with school supplies and other things necessary but forgotten for schoolkids. When I first came to the NW, the schools were in a terrible state. Then Madame was criticised internationally for lack of attention to education so all the schools received a bright coat of paint and visitors see a school that appears cared for. Inside and out of touristed areas, everything continues the same.
In Abra Pampa they have to operate on four turns every day from early morning to night for each of the levels to get a few hours of schooling in - they need more classrooms.
One of the wonderful Aussie gals had brought a ton of supplies and her friends at home had given her money for aid here and in Peru - thank you Aussies in Brisbane. This was a great opportunity for her to hand out the pencils and books she had carried so far and everyone was fascinated and very grateful for the items she gave.

I dropped two gals in Bolivia and came back to Salta with the third. We had to wait an hour again at the roadblock and were diverted off the highway at San Salvador as fires had been lit, blocking it off - there have been serious riots in that capital recently over land grabs and evictions.
Thinking that not much else could possibly happen, we were pulled over in Guemes and told I'd run a red light (You can't say you did not) and that as it was night, the car would have to be impounded and a 1800 pesos fine paid in the morning. The Aussie had her flight home in the morning. It was obviously a shakedown but with foreigners, they won't take the usual 100 backhander. 900 was the absolute minimum to be allowed to pay on the spot. Much arguing later, I got it down to 400 pesos so long as I didn't need a receipt and said nothing.
Upshot is - give yourself time to get places, don't travel the highways at night, keep a near empty wallet for bribes.
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