Purmamarca & Salta

Purmamarca my last stop in teh Quebrada de Humahuaca a quaint little town sitting in the middle of the most stunning colourful hills. I spent the afternoon walking in the hills around this town and enjoying the scenery. The pile of rocks is a gift to the earth gods of the hills. Even though Catholicism has been the main religion in these areas since the Spanish many traditional rituals are still honoured as well.

Not sure why but I saw quite a few dogs wearing colourful decorative collars in the mountain towns.

I arrived in the city of Salta at night and it had a really nice relaxed atmosphere and though more European in style and approach you can still see and feel the influence of the Andean communities.

The Cabildo (the old town hall) is now the History Museum.

A traditional waistcoat from the 16th century - this one belonged to a famous Army hero.

A very old Renault car from 1911..

A traditional funeral coach.

Feliz tried out these leg restraints that were used on the slaves to stop them running away.....he decided they might have had to make him something smaller!!

Some fancy spurs from the days of the Gaucho (cowboys).

The early filtering system for making Vino....hope they washed their feet!!

There was a whole room of these porcelein statues depicting tradtional life - now I figured where the shop got the idea to sell the statue of someone giving birth!

I stopped at Museo de Belles Artes as well which had some interesting sculptures and art but I particulary liked getting to have a look in the traditional house that is set in. There certainly was a city for the wealthy at some point (still looked fairly affluent).

Iglesia y Convento San Francisco - very beautiful and detailed church.

Some amusing graffati.

Salta is made up of wide tree lined streets and in some areas lots of big houses.

The Anthropology museum had an interesting collection of pre hispanic artefacts - huge vases that would take 3 people to lift, and the skull at the bottom is disforme - some tribes would use various techniques (like the boards on this photo) to re-shape the skull of children. From my (limited) understanding of what I read in Spanish this could be to identify members as belonging to a particular tribe or in some instances to identify those ´royal-important´families in the tribe.

There was also a display on burial rituals - like this mummy in a jar - when buried the bodies would be accompanied by various pieces of ornaments etc like silver lama´s, small vases etc - these were gifts to the gods and supplies for the dead person.



I went to Alta Montana museum as well in Salta which displays the remains of several children mummies from 500 years ago - it was amazing how perfectly preserved they were and sad. It is believed these children aged 6 -13 years were live sacrifices to the mountain gods and would have been the children of important families or the prettiest children in the village. It was really interesting to see how they were discovered and removed but many locals feel that they should be returned to their resting place as it is sacrareligous for them to be in display in a museum.

A lot of stairs to get to the view point.....

But some nice views when we got there ......though feliz wanted to know why he had to climb over 1,000 stairs when there was a cable car!!!

A local at work making some of the souveigners for the tourists to buy.

Traffic chaos as parents pick up there kids from school......sure some of you recognize this scene!

I stayed in a nice friendly hostel in Salta here the staff and some of the guests have a sing along with a traditional Argentina song.

I took a trip out to San Lorenzo about 6km out of Salta - this is certainly a town for the wealthy, I was told that a lot of Salta`s richer residents build these big summer homes in San Lorenzo to get away from the city - think if I was going to go to all the effort of building a summer home I would make it a little further away from my normal one!! But still a lovely setting.

Feliz and I went for a nice walk around the national reserve in San Lorenzo and enjoyed the views and the little birds.

Lunch - Humitas - ground corn and cheese served in a leaf - I couldn`t decide if you were supposed to eat the leaf or not - but after a taste I decided either way I wasn`t!!