Purmamarca - Wild West With Salt Flats

With incredible memories of Patagonia in our minds, we were now heading from the south of Argentina to its very north. More specifically, to a region called Jujuy, which, with its rather dry climate, would provide a stark contrast to the Patagonian mountains.

Once we arrived at the airport there, we picked up a rental car and drove to Purmamarca that would be our home base from which we would explore the region over the next few days. First order of business was to explore the tiny town and get a feel for the place.

Upon strolling through the tiny streets, I couldn't help myself but to compare Purmamarca to two things: San Pedro de Atacama in Chile that I visited a few weeks prior and an American Wild West movie. Picture dusty, sandy streets, a dry climate, red mountains/hills surrounding the town, flat, single-floor houses and one square in the middle. The only thing missing was a cowboy on a horse riding through the town.

Anyway, we had a delicious local lunch, checked out the little open-air market that was taking place on the square, had a drink at a nearby bar with outside seating to soak up the atmosphere, planned the next few days and generally just enjoyed the surroundings and contrast of Purmamarca to Patagonia. It was peaceful, not overly busy and just generally a cute little town.

On the following day, we decided to go on our first roadtrip to check out some salt flats.
Obviously, I have seen them already in Uyuni, but for dad it would be a totally new experience. What we didn't anticipate was that the drive towards the salt flats was incredibly beautiful. The colours of the mountains changed multiple times from green-ish, to yellow-ish to red-ish. Basically a photo opportunity behind literally every corner. This certainly dragged out the drive, but in a good way.

In addition, we also had to drive over a mountain pass to get to the salt flats. And the elevation of the pass was no small feat. We were no at the edge of the Andes after all. Luckily, our car was in a good mood and got us there. The road to the top was beautiful with lots of zig-zags, viewpoints and heavy trucks that were driving slower than a snail. The top was at 4170m and finally I got dad to experience high altitude oxygen - even if it was just for a short while. He coped well.

Driving down from the pass, we could see the salt flat starting to unfold in front of us after a short while. It looked like a giant mirror on the ground. We parked there and hired a guide to take us around the most beautiful and interesting spots in the salt flat. I already enjoyed my tour in Uyuni and enjoyed this one as well - especially to see dad's reaction to this type of nature.

We first stopped at the pools that had crystal clear, but obviously very salty water. Our guide told us that this is basically what the salt flats look like just 20-30cm underneath our feet and the main way to extract salt for commercial and industrial purposes.
There is no visit to salt flats without some perspective-bending photos, of course, so we did that as well with a good laugh. There are some funny results for sure!

Next we went to a little - let's call it lake - where the water was so clear that the reflection in the water was just mind-blowingly realistic. The entire scenery was spectacular: the white and endless salt flats, no clouds in the sky, the heat and the crystal clear blue lake. In other words, simply stunning.

We drove around the salt flats for a bit longer before visiting another part of them without a guide and then driving back to Purmamarca. On the way, we did a couple more stops for viewpoints, cactees (didn't understand my dad's obsession with them, but ah well), before settling into the bar at the square in town to listen to a live band, have my dad try tamales and winding down, looking at the colourful mountains surrounding us and reflecting on the amazing day that we had.Read more