In Pursuit of Wine in Cafayate

Cafayate is a wine region in southern Salta province. It is located at 5,500 meters above sea level which makes the wines produced there some of the highest altitude wines in the world. The valley has mild weather with low humidity, receiving less than one inch of rain per year, and is most known for the Torrontes grape. We had heard that Cafayate was similar to the Mendoza wine region in Argentina but lesser known.

From Salta city to Cafayate, there is a four-hour bus that costs 350 pesos ($9.37) per person. We took a bus on Tuesday with Roderick at 1pm and arrived at the bus station in Cafayate just after 5pm. On the bus ride, Roderick booked the Backpackers Hostel on Booking.com, but when we showed up, we were told there were no rooms available. It was clear the hostel did not have a system for dealing with day-of bookings since the person doing check in did not have a computer and kept insisting no one had told her we were coming.

Continue reading “In Pursuit of Wine in Cafayate”

Hiking to the Waterfalls of Rio Colorado

On Wednesday, Eric and I set off from Cafayate for a hike to the waterfalls of Rio Colorado. We had read many blog posts and TripAdvisor reviews of this hike advising that it was a must-see and indicating there was a guide option available for ~$10, but that many people had elected to do it without a guide. There are seven waterfalls along the trek of increasing size, with the seventh, most impressive, waterfall having a fall of 20 meters. We caught a taxi from our new hostel, Casa Árbol, for 150 pesos ($3.94) to the trail head and were immediately accosted by people trying to sell us a guide. They handed us a sheet of paper that indicated the cost for waterfalls 1-3 was 250 pesos ($6.58) per person; waterfalls 1-5 was 350 pesos ($9.21) per person and waterfalls 1-7 was 500 pesos ($13.16 per person). Normally hiking doesn’t come with a fee, and if it does, it’s nominal, but we were looking at more than $25 for this hike, which seemed a bit crazy considering we saw Iguazú Falls for just over $35.

Continue reading “Hiking to the Waterfalls of Rio Colorado”