Thinning Air

The trip from Tucuman to Tafi del Valle is less than two hours, but one travels from a humid, central plain not unlike California's to a glacial valley some 7,000 feet above sea level.  The climate changes from hot and stagnant through tropical rain forest to high altitude grassland.  The road that brings you on this whiplash journey is itself a destination:  at times two-lane highway where passing the creeping sugarcane tractors is an exercise in blind faith, and at others a one-lane paved donkey trail clinging to hillsides with only plastic "cuidado" tape where some unlucky soul decided to test the wire guardrail.

Some random horse Juan put Benji on in Tafi

Popping ears and a vague breathlessness signal that you have neared the summit...the first summit.  Our five day stop in Tafi del Valle was not the apex of our trip through these Andes foothills.  Various daytrips brought us to indifferent cow herds across gravel roads some 9,000 feet up, and our three day journey to Cafayate took us to over 10,000 feet in our Volkswagen Gol (the "f" cost more).

At a giddy 10,000 feet up. The llama could care less.

At our highest, El Infernillo, I tried to put aside my vague sense of panic and what felt like a drug flashback and just enjoyed the company of a friendly llama and a family selling mementos at the summit. Juan guided me back to the car as I tried to purchase hundreds of dollars worth of quince jam and cured goat sausage.  We coasted our way down the other side of the pass, thankful that there was little oncoming traffic and that our first destination, the lovely, undiscovered, and what I hope would be the last vision to ever have in my life, Amaicha del Valle would be only 30 minutes down the mountain.

A measly 7,000 feet up in a random pasture, with frankly
scary bulls and sheep who didnt seem too thrilled to have us there.
Unbeknownst to me, receiving stage four skin cancer. Benji didn't
 even get tan.. Damn his latino blood.

On our trip from Tafi through Amaicha to Cafayate, we left early to avoid the fog that can collect at the summit and to arrive in Cafayate in time for wine tasting: scheduled to be at an hour neither too early to feel like alcoholics nor too late to take in enough of the appellations before dinner. Amaicha greeted us at around 9:30 am.  We were amazed at all the camping tourists - all Argentinians drawn to this remote spot for some authentic Quilmes Indian culture.  And us, two gay men with a baby and a rented Gol.  Every single person we met understood instantly and made an effort to wish us Buen Viaje. We graciously accepted the newspaper from the old man leaving the restaurant and waved the flies off of our still-warm flat bread.  I was ready to buy a house.

Our stay in Amaicha was short as Juan grabbed me by the ear as soon as I started talking about buying the abandoned resort with the huge pool - girls, this town has 360 days of dry sunshine per year and everyone is  tan and skinny. And nothing costs anything.  I drove us reluctantly through the desert to the wine destinations in Salta. And what a trip that would be.