12th February 2015 – La Rioja to Cafayate

We left La Rioja this morning driving below lush green trees at the base of steep sided mountains that are covered with cactus.After leaving Cafayate the scenery changed from lush green vines and vegatation to sand desert.We have another big driving day of approximately 500 kilometers to our overnight stop at a winery resort in Cafayate. We have about 100 Kilometers of dirt roads through lots of little villages where we received lots of smiles and waves.  Our morning tea stop was off the side of the road in the desert, not many trees around here. Our lunch stop was on the side of the road through the desert.When we arrived at Santa Maria the GPS was giving us the wrong directions to Quilmes where the pre Incan ruins are, then a few locals tried to show us the way out of town. A couple of us consulted another map and Blue B tried to follow it and ended up getting bogged in mud. Green B came to the rescue with 5 tow ropes tied together and pulled blue B out.The locals were trying to tell us not to go this way & they wanted us to follow the sealed road, but that took us 2 sides of a triangle whereas the dirt road took one side. We eventually found our way onto the dirt road and arrived at Quilmes to look over the ruins that are terraced on the side of a high hill, which would’ve been a fabulous vantage point for a city, as you can see for miles at the top of the hill. We arrived at our winery resort overnight stop hot & dusty and collapsed into their beautiful swimming pool, before having a delicious meal in their restaurant. Cafayate is famous for its white wine – Torrontines. Their climate is perfect for growing the grapes for making this wine as they have hot days, cool nights and altitude. It’s a very nice drop indeed and went very well with our meal.