(Click on the pictures to enlarge them)
This was a totally unorganized trip. We
didn't know where we would go, we only knew we were to begin at San
Luis, a place we've been before. We just picked the car and drove the
800 kilometers (500 miles) to San Luis, the capital city of the
province of the same name. We've been there when we were teenagers,
practically as hitch-hikers. We knew good places there, and we wanted
to come back and do some "pending work". The first of them was a place
called "Sierra
de las Quijadas", an unbelievable landscape of rocks modelled by water, the
water of an ocean long time gone. 
The place is also a good resource to look
for dinousar traces, put in evidence after the geological changes. You
can't reach Sierra de las Quijadas if not by car; when we reached there
we found a guide who took us to the very heart of the place and
explained a lot of things to us. He was a young and passionate man;
later we discovered that such job was chosen by himself: he was not
working for the government or a touristic establishment. 
He told us he was one of a very fruitful
university year, and the rest of his colleagues were in different parts
of San Luis, doing the same job. He brought geologists, historians,
experts on dinosaurs and paleontology, everything was built up by
himself, because the government didn't believe on Sierra de las
Quijadas. Now that the place is working big time, the government wants
to take it out from him, with laws and the like. He is resisting,
stoically. We found that situation in other places in San Luis: all
those young people were doing an excellent job. For example, there's an
old gold mine town, Carolina. It's an abandoned place now, when nobody
is working in the mines. Some fourteen years ago, when we were there
for the first time, there was nothing interesting to see. Now ther are
guides, they take you inside the mines, they explain everything to you.
It's fantastic. There's an old indian cave at Inti Huasi where the same
is happening. In the city of San Luis, in change, there are no
attractions. We wanted to go to a famous place called Ischigualasto,
also known as "the
moon valley", but they told us we wouldn't find anything too
different to Sierra de las Quijadas, so we faced south, to the Mendoza
province.
Adventures
The first place we found was San Rafael,
famous because of its vineyards. We weren't interested on them, but
there were some interesting landscapes outside the city. We found a
cosy place of lovely cottages by the Atuel river. There was a lake near, and we did all
sorts of activities: we rode horses up to a mountain, we rafted in the
river (not too dangerous), we rowed with a boat through a lagoon to a
rather wild place, we walked there until we found an intern lake, where
we had to swim to cross it. We had also to climb a rock wall in our way, a
new chance to defeat my vertigo, up while going, down while coming
back. 
Well into the landscape, as I say. We ate a
wonderful goat in the place where we were staying. There was a dam
near, and everything was peace and nature. A place, perhaps, to rest
from the noise of the city, for years. But we had to follow on. We were
told that to the South there was a place called El Sosneado where you
could find a guy who would take you to a vulcano of the same name, in a
trip to the Andes, walking for three days. We headed there, but the guy
wasn't at home. He took other people to see the debris of the plane
that fell in the Andes so many years ago, that inspired the movie
"Alive!". Many people come here to
do that. He would come back in three days; we decided not to wait.
Near there was Malargüe, known also as "The Capital City of the
Adventure Sport", so we asked if there was something interesting there
to see. We were told "no", categorically. We had no chance to return to
a place where to sleep, so we drove to Malargüe for a hotel. As
the sun was still shining, we decided to go for something interesting
around, and we asked in the city for information. 
They pointed two places: the Llancanelo
lake, and the Witches Cavern. We had seen a lot of caves in Europe, so
we decided to go for the lake. The lake it was supposed to be the
target place for migratory birds coming from the Northern Hemisphere.
"It's full of rare birds", we were told. We drove miles and miles of
horrible gravel, and finally we got to see the lake. It was huge, much more than the
sight could embrace. But there were no birds, and no one to point out
anything, to explain anything. We were terribly dissapointed, after all
the ungrateful travelling.
The Witches
Cavern
We came back to the city, and went to a tourism shop. A guy there told
us that we got to go there with a guide, not alone. We came back to a
hotel, after arranging with the guy that before departing the next day
we would go with him to the cave. 
Just to do something. Next morning, we were
at the entrance of the cavern, five kilometers long. We were surprised:
it was nothing like in Europe, where a cavern it's lit by strategically
placed spotlights of several colours, and you walk in a wooden path.
Here you had to enter in the cave at your own risk. The first passage
was a narrow hole where you had to crawl and creep through a tunnel to
reach the other side. Not for the fat, old or claustrophobic. Half of
the people deserted. Even a German who went to Mendoza for climbing
mountains didn't want to continue. After that, to descend using a rope
into a dark place. I liked the idea of knowing the heart of a
cavern as a regular man, not as a tourist. No light, only the dim light
of your helmet. We got to know really wonderful
places, not to be captured by a photo camera.
The Payunia
We liked the guide, and we asked him if he
knew some other place around. He spoke about a place in the Andes where
there were natural hot spring baths. Also about a volcanic complex. We
went to both places. 
The volcanic place was incredible, I have
never seen a place like that. We crossed a river running between lava
walls. We reached a kind of desert, but instead of sand there were
grains of lava. You could look around and everything was black. Instead of
dunes there were small volcanos.
La Payunia is one of the three most populated places in the world, in
terms of volcanos. We felt like we were in Mars: no vegetation, but
some raw yellow grass, with an
impressing contrast with the black sand. No rocks, except the big lava
bombs, as if they were frozen drops of red iron in the ground. The
whole place was totally different to anything I had seen before.
And I thought that in San Rafael they told
us there was nothing to see here! Even more, I thought that noone ever
mentioned a place like this, and Malargüe is known by the cave,
rather than this place. Few people go there, the guide told me. And of
course, I thought, if noone ever talks about this... A month ago
(2003), I
read that a kind of thematic park about volcanos will be built in
Malargüe. Perhaps it was better when it was unknown. We came back
through a different road that took us to the Llancanelo lake, but this
time we climbed an old and big volcano to see the lake from above. It
was really huge, even from above it was difficult to embrace with the
eyes. Next two days we drove into the Andes to meet the hot baths.
The Andes
The road was lovely, full of green rivers and snowed mountains. The weather was
also with us. Instead of sand, in the banks of the river there was ash.
We reached the place. The baths were holes digged in the ground, in the
very heart of the Andes, surrounded by tall mountains and a big
volcano, with some activity: a constant smoke was coming out from it.
We naturally wanted to climb it, but it was too late. We climbed a
different mountain instead. The guide decided to stay, while we ran up
the first slopes. We ran out of air, so we took it easy. The rivers
around us were each coloured differently: some were blue, green,
magenta, lilac, yellow, even
white, like milk. The several minerals give the colour to the water. We
reached the top, out of breath,
where we met a full glacier. We saw the very birth of a river, where
the ice melts down and turns into powerful spring of water. We saw the
sun reflected in the bubble-like ice. We saw the surrounding mountains.
We were in a unique place, and we thanked our luck. To go down wasn't
easy, it was easier to go up. The rocks were loose, and we were about
to fall in more than one occasion. We had to be very careful. Tired, I
went for the baths. I chose the hottest: it was called "El Pelambre", untranslatable
expression to mean something really hot. 45 or 50 Celsius degree (122
Fahrenheit), and I was at home inside that water. 
I stayed there for a long time, feeling the
water coming and going on warm bubbles. We ate a delicious, just killed
lamb, and went to sleep. On the next day we couldn't get to the top of
the volcano, because we were told it would take two days, and not
everyone was ready to accomplish such a trip. So we came back to
Malargüe, and we said good bye to the nice people we met there.
Next target: the capital city of Mendoza.
Back to Mendoza
There's a place famous because of the
rapids to go rafting. We naturally went there: Potrerillos. The Mendoza
river runs fast there, and soon we were rowing and fighting against the water. The rapids were very funny, and so
the people doing it with us. Nothing to be compared with that poor
experience in the Atuel the week before. As usual, many Scandinavian
people were there to try the thing, and they fell in the water many
times. Finally we went to the city, and Mendoza is friendly and clean.
We felt almost at home: probably it's the only place I would move to
from Buenos Aires, in case I am forced to. The people is also nice, and
they have many parks and a rather high nightly activity.
We went to the main park, and the many trees
there kind of absorb all of what is dirty and filthy on the city. It
was complex to get a hotel, as too many tourists come from Chile, now
that our currency is lower than theirs. Our last journey was to get
near the Aconcagua, the highest peak in America. 
The road is
impressive. You always seem to be walking among giants. The
Aconcagua can be seen from a particular place, but if you want to climb
it, it could take several days, and a good physical condition. Many
try. Near the mount, there's a cemetery where the andinists are buried,
those that can't reach the top, for one reason or another, and die
while trying. Close to the cemetery there's an old hotel that was
buried too, because of a landslide. You can visit it, and with the
fascination we, twenty centurers, have for ruins, it's lovely.
It's all rust and rock,
but in one time it was a hotel for the rich people, very exclusive,
with hot spring baths and all. Inside you can see the rooms, and the sun enters through the windows
making a rare impression. It's like a ghost hotel. It's called "Puente
del Inca", the bridge of the Incan indians, but I don't know why. Few
kilometers from there it's the limit with Chile. We came back to Buenos
Aires on the next day, full of sensations and totally satisfied. 
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