TRAVEL & ADVENTURE

Argentina’s Route 66 LEFT: FROM CLOCKWISE MEYER/LAIF/REDUX; HEIKO YADID LEVY/ANZENBERGER/REDUX; MEYER/LAIF/REDUX HEIKO Red rock canyons. Otherworldy salt flats. Empanadas and red wine. Road-tripping through Salta Province may the best way to see the real Argentina—and now there’s a way to do it headache free. by MICKEY RAPKIN

ARTIN MIGUEL de Güemes had a point. And so when he offered me a leaf, runs the length of Argentina and is a national International Airport, I obliged. And off we drove. point of pride, despite long stretches where it M located at the foothills of the Welcome to Salta, a remote region in the has somehow never been paved. It’s a gaucho’s Argentine Andes, is a very northwest corner of Argentina and maybe the paradise, a sort of real-life Westworld. long name for a very small last place in the country that hasn’t blown up Even better? I didn’t have to plan a thing, airport. The place is so mod- in some Insta-influencer’s social media feed. thanks to the folks at Black Tomato, the sleek est you might confuse it for a bus station, if not I’d come for a five-day road trip along Ruta U.K. travel firm specializing in custom itiner- for the duty-free shops selling vodka by the gal- 40, the country’s answer to Route 66, which aries—one of a wave of new operators offering lon. When I arrived, there was almost nobody adventures in remote corners of the world with there, unless you count a few stray dogs and HOW TO DO THIS TRIP ON YOUR OWN: Fly into just the right amount of hand-holding. my driver, Juan, a sturdy cowboy leaning Buenos Aires, then take a two-hour regional After sharing my interests with one of against his truck, chewing on the kind of coca flight to Salta. Rent a four-wheel-drive vehicle leaves that are ground up to make cocaine. (you’ll need it), and head north on Ruta 9 until “Is that safe?” I asked in broken Spanish you reach Purmamarca and Ruta 40, to the Argentina’s Ruta 40, above left near the as he threw my bags into the truck’s cab. He west. Drive south to Cafayate, then back north town of Quebrada de Cafayate. Top right: shrugged. “You wouldn’t say, ‘I’m not going to into Salta for a 500-mile, five-day loop. Salta’s La Casona del Molino bar. Bottom: eat grapes because it’ll make me drunk.’ ” He The main plaza in Salta.

014 MARCH 2018 MEN’S JOURNAL Purmamarca

San Antonio de los Cobres

Salta Province

Cafayate

Black Tomato’s reps—medium-intensity “Tomorrow,” he said, “we might see an The flats at Salinas Grandes, far left, physical strain and high-intensity alcohol— ovni.” What the fuck’s an ovni? “Objecto vola- have been used since Incan times for salt they plotted the route, arranged lodging at dor no identificado,” he said, a flying object harvesting. Center: fresh empanadas. local hotels, hired hip guides to feed my brain you can’t identify. Man, I thought, this coun- in locations we visited, and contracted Juan try has everything. On my fourth day we were scheduled to visit to do the sometimes-perilous driving. Cómo After a night at Salta’s Legado Mitico, a the Caves of Acsibi. In the morning we picked se dice, giddyup? boutique hotel installed in an 18th-century up our local guide, a handsome 20-something What’s remarkable about the landscape in townhouse, we pressed farther along Ruta 40, cowboy named Rene Aban. For the next hour, Salta was how quickly it changed—from flat, at times just a dirt road. Local politicians often Juan drove us over impossible, rocky terrain green fields to mountains made of angry red campaign on a promise to finally pave it. But before we finally came to the start of the hike. rocks. We had plenty of time in the car, and what’s the rush? Hours turned to days—with “It’s maybe two hours’ walk from here,” Rene as I sipped yerba maté from Juan’s gourd, I stops at local inns—and it was sometimes hard said, as condors circled overhead. Knowing caught up on some local politics with him. to keep up with the fauna. We passed through a better, Juan got back into the truck and waved Halfway through the first day, we stopped at Dr. Seuss–like forest composed of cactus plants goodbye, and off went Rene and I. the Hill of Seven Colors, a geological wonder that stretched 25 feet into the air. Farther down The rock formations were so red they that some say is like a watercolor painting of a the line, the forest gave way to a stretch of can- appeared elemental. While I was photo- woman’s skirt. After I ate some llama, a local yons known as Quebrada de las Conchas. graphing the caves, which looked like Gaudí delicacy that tastes like gamy beef, I napped Juan, a surprisingly good amateur photog- Gone Wild, Rene produced a picnic table from hard for an hour. When I finally came to and rapher, presented himself as the strong and behind a rock and cracked open two cans of glanced out the window, it looked like I’d silent type. But he’d offer wisdom if pressed. beer. The place didn’t just look like Westworld; landed on the moon. When I asked what American men should learn it started to feel like it, too. Luxury travel, I “Las Salinas Grandes,” Juan said, as if that from Argentine gauchos, first he said, “How realized, isn’t about finding the best craft somehow explained what I was staring at. I to work a grill.” Then he added, “How to date cocktail in a foreign bar. It’s about becoming stepped out of the truck and threw on my sun- women.” By day four, though, he was the one someone else for a few days. glasses, trying to take in 2,300 square miles cracking jokes. When we pulled off the road Perhaps what I’ll remember most from the of blindingly white salt flats at the foot of the so I could go to the bathroom, he apparently road trip was a casual lunch outside a rustic Sierras de Córdoba. The sky overhead was called in to a local radio station and asked them hotel called Sala de Payogasta, at the base of mythically blue and I dropped to my knees, to broadcast my name, warning listeners that the Cafayate wine trail. The co-owner and running my finger across the flats to taste the there was a wild American on the loose. When vintner, Alejandro Alonso, a Gerard Depar- salt. There was nobody—and I mean nobody— we heard the announcement on air a few min- dieu look-alike, appeared when we arrived, around for miles. Juan saw me and smiled as if utes later, he laughed so hard he nearly had to promptly announced the internet wasn’t work- to say: Just wait. pull off the road. ing, and quit for the day, pulling up a chair and opening a bottle of wine. He couldn’t know this, but his restaurant was impossibly on trend: The 10-table watering hole had glass CUSTOM TRAVEL IN GAUCHO LAND casement windows and cornflower-blue chairs, like something out of Kinfolk magazine. Three one-of-a-kind trips from the firms who know northern Argentina best. Plates of empanadas and perfectly seasoned roast chicken, flavored with sweet peppers 1/ BLACK TOMATO 2/ JACADA TRAVEL 3/ ABERCROMBIE & KENT grown on-site, appeared out of very thin air, as Black Tomato has mastered the Relative newcomer Jacada Founded in 1962, the British Alejandro explained that his grape fields rely high-end, turnkey experience: designs private journeys with travel firm specializes in safaris, on an irrigation system designed by the Incas, Before departure, a package the help of local guides. In but in Salta the focus is on wine who ruled Argentina 600 years ago. The water arrives with your detailed Argentina, it offers a seven- and craft spirits, with a five-day is delivered to the crops by gravity, he said, as itinerary, info on guides, plus night, off-road tour through the custom trip that includes a he opened a second bottle of wine. curated reading for the plane. Salta Province—promising how-to on making wine in a I still hadn’t seen a UFO, though Juan had A nine-night itinerary, including sightings of pre-Incan ruins and high-altitude region and a insisted this was the place. When I asked Ale- time in Buenos Aires for a wild vicuña, a cousin of the horseback tour of the vineyards. jandro to tell me when I might have luck spot-

FROM MICHAEL LEFT: MOHR/REDUX; YADID LEVY/ANZENBERGER/REDUX speakeasy tour, starts at $6,500. llama—starting at $5,000. From $3,750. ting one, he smiled and muttered: “After the third bottle.” n

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