Cafayate: Wines and Wilderness

Vines in Cafayate

Cafayate is a wine growing town in the Salta province in Northern Argentina. The town boasts several bodegas within easy walking distance, so wine tasting is a popular activity in the town.

Bodega Domingo Hermanos

Bodega Domingo Hermanos is within the town itself and runs tastings along with a short tour of the winery. As with most wineries in the area, they produce Malbec and Torrentes wines. The Malbec from this winery was particularly good.

Bodega Nani

Bodega Nanni has a wider variety of wines on tasting and an excellent Tannat.

Bodega El Tránsito

Across the road from Nani is the El Transito bodega which has a small range of wines on tasting - none of which stood out particularly.

Further afield (about 1 km from town) is the Estreco bodega which has an extensive variety of wine on tasting.

Bodega Estreco

This bodega, along with a very good malbec, produces an excellent Chardonnay under the "Circulo" label.

Even further afield (5km) is the Mounier bodega.

Bodega Mounier

This bodega is situated under the surrounding hills and the walk to the winery gives views across Cafayate.

The road to Mounier

The view from the road

Apart from the excellent wines, Cafayate is close to an interesting set of coloured mountains, The Quebrada.

The coloured hills of the Quebrada

There are several tour companies in Cafayate that can drive you to do several short hikes through the incredible landscape.

Many colours

There are many formations created by the erosion of wind and rain such as the Window:

And The Toad:

There are also several deep gorges such as The Devil's Throat

The Devil's Throat with people for scale

And The Amphitheatre, where concerts are held occasionally to take advantage of the acoustics of the gorge.

The Amphitheatre

Apart from the interesting formations the scenery of the Quebrada itself is quite spectacular.

View from Tres Cruces

The valley from Tres Cruces

The valleys of Tucuman Province: Tafí del Valle and El Mollar

Tafí del Valle

Tafí del Valle and El Mollar are two small towns in Tucuman province, North of the capital, San Miguel.

They are easily accessible by bus which winds up the many curves into the mountains before eventually heading down into the valleys which are still over 2000m above sea level.

A statue of an indigenous messenger on the road up the mountain

Tafí del Valle is the larger of the two towns set in amongst the hills surrounding the valley.

The town is quite rural with horses and other livestock often grazing on the side of the dirt roads in the town.

Llamas grazing

The town is surrounded by many hills from which you can get a panoramic view of Tafí and the surrounding valley.

The trail to the hills starts just out of town across the Rio Banda.

Rio Banda

Soon after the river the trail becomes very steep as you begin the ascent into the hills.

The trail up the hill

From the trail you can see all of Tafí de Valle all the way to El Mollar.

Looking down the valley to El Mollar

At the top of the hill is a cross (of course) and from here you can see all of the valley.

The cross and some four-legged companions I picked up along the way

Tafí del Valle

Looking towards El Mollar

The trail continues into the hills but sadly the weather was turning bad so I had to head back to Tafí to enjoy some local delicacies.

Clouds over the trail

Locro - a local stew of pumpkin, beans and meat

Delicious local wine

Cayote with nuts - the fruit is slow roasted with sugar and eaten with nuts.

After a night's feasting, the next day I was ready to explore the nearby town of El Mollar.

The main square in El Mollar 

El Mollar is a tiny town on the edge of a large dam around 15km from Tafí del Valle. It's accessible by local collectivo via very bumpy dirt roads from Tafí. 

La Angostura dam

The town boasts a collection of important archaeological artifacts - Los Menhires.

Los Menhires

These stones were originally stood in front of the houses of the local indigenous people and could be found all around the valleys. Unfortunately many of the stones were vandalised, stolen and even used to construct bridges and roads so they were all moved to a secure park in El Mollar. The curators of the park have tried their best to recreate the position and orientation of the stones.

Designs carved into the stones - often faces or representations of animals

Unfortunately the reconstruction is mainly guesswork as many of the structures had already been dusturbed.

A reconstructed stone circle

The other reason why many of the stones were moved was to make way for a dam in El Mollar. The dam now provides a recreational area for the locals and a habitat for local birdlife but sadly has destroyed some of the valley's indigenous heritage.

La Angostura dam

Mendoza - A week of Malbec

Mendoza is a town in the middle of one of Argentina's most famous wine regions - in particular it is known for its Malbec, however there are plenty of other varieties produced too.
The wineries are easily reached by public transport - although there are plenty of overpriced tours available too.

There are two main areas with accessible wineries: Maipú and Coquimbito.

A tram ride to the end of the line gets you to Maipú and the Bodega Lopez is around 300 metres from the station.

Mendoza's Trams

Bodega Lopez runs free tours and basic tastings (there are also premium tastings for $Ars100 - approximately $A9). The tour shows people around the winery and explains tge history of the winery.

Stainless steel fermentation tanks

Oak barrels for ageing the wine

The big oak casks are for the Malbec

The bodega also has a very good restaurant that offers a three course set degustation with matching wines for $ARS420 (around $38).

Another delicious Argentinean steak

Also within walking distance in Maipú there is Bodega Giol which offers a wine tasting for $Ars70 (about $A6). 

Wine tasting

There are also other wineries accessible by collectivo from Maipú but sadly I spent so much time in Bodega Lopez (the wines were pretty amazing) that I ran out of time to visit them.

The other region that is easily reachable from Mendoza is Coquimbito. The No.10 172 or 173 collectivo both go to Coquimbito from Mendoza.

The best way of getting around Coquimbito is by pushbike and the town has built a 2km bike track along the main road to enable tourists to travel easily (and reasonably safely) to the wineries that are on side roads off the main Street.

There are many excellent boutique wineries along the route offering tastings and several larger wineries including the famous Trapiche winery.

The restored winery building

The bodega is built on the site of an old "Italian" winery and they have restored the old buildings to their former glory (for functions, etc). As with Bodega Lopez, Trapiche offers a tour and tasting. However the "tasting" of four premium wines is not free - $Ars100 ($A9) - but as with all paid "tastings" in Mendoza what they really mean is full glasses of wine (yes, not great on the bike).

As with Bodega Lopez, the tour gives the history of the winery and explains the production.

The Trapiche barrel room - with two concrete fermentation casks in the foreground

After the tour the wine tasting is conducted on their terrace - which has rather a nice view.

View from the terrace

Of course after drinking so much excellent wine one needs to cleanse the palate, and helpfully there is a craft brewery around the corner.

Stopping for a quiet Pale Ale

Thankfully it's only a short ride back to the main Street and the relative safety of the bike track...

In addition to the wine, Mendoza offers some other pursuits around the city to give a break from all the wine. 

Parque General San Martín is a huge park and recreation area just on the outskirts of the city. 

The ornate park gates

In the middle of the park is an artificial lake in which the local rowing team practice.

The lake in Parque General San Martín

Further into the park (about 7km) is Cerro de la Gloria. The hill is a popular hike with a monument to The Army of the Andes which was mobilised here by General San Martín before his trek over the Andes to liberate Chile.

The monument to the Army of the Andes

The hike up the hill is steep but relatively short and there is a reasonably priced kiosko at the top which serves very cheap cold beers (perfect after a hike).
From the top there are also several lookouts over the city of Mendoza.

Mendoza from Cerro de la Gloria

Mendoza with the foothills of the Andes in the distance

The view towards the Andes