September 4, 2009
Thin Air.
A good-night's sleep had passed seemingly in an instant since I lay down. Now long shadows ran up the valley beneath bright yellow sun-rays breaking over the hills in the east. And it was cold in the shade waiting for the sun to creep down the hillside and across to the table on the riverbank where Is sitting boiling water. There would be no holding me back today: I was fully rested and had the busy road out of Salta far behind me. Today I would be on empty road through sparsely populated country.
I stirred avena into the boiling water and let it simmer until the faint smell of burning reached my nostrels; then, quickly withdrew the saucepan from the flame. Of coarse the alcohol stove is a good no frills burner but it cannot be turned down. Modulated. I had already made tea. I should do as Argentines do of a morning, drink mate I thought. But tea would do for the present.......
The campsite owner stood in the doorway of his stack as I rode up the track to the road. I had had the would place to myself which was nice but, it looked as if Is the only person that had camped there in many months, which if so, meant the owner led a pretty solitary exsistents; though, he did have a collie dog that began following me until beckoned back.
Turning onto the road I started where I left off yesterday afternoon on a long gradual climb across the side of the valley; then over a crest and a little further to a road sign which signified an end to smooth travel inasmuch as it read "A 200M FIN PAVEMENTO"; literally, the tarmac road would finish and thereafter the way ahead would be rough going; possibly stones, lose sand or more usually powder dry clay which rises in a cloud of dust in the wake of vehicles. The day would prove though that the surface was hard packed albeit bumpy but I soon didn't notice it at all; and the few others I shared the route with were tourist traffic driving slowly to take in the scenery. None of the urban tractors spinning up dust in a mad rust to get to B in the shortest time possible.
I dipped down and forded a stream gushing out of a gully in the slope on the left; then, rode up out of the hub-deep water up a demanding incline and at the top turned a corner round a rocky chunk protruding out into the valley, which brough into view an old iron bridge at a right-angle to the way ahead where it spanded across the gravel dry river to the opposite side of the valley. The rusty mecano-girder structure had possibly been a railway bridge in another place before being relocated here as it was narrow; single vehicle-wide, with trusts overhead and planks rumbling under my wheels.
I don't remember much from the next stretch until eleven thirty when I reached a roadside cafe and an early lunch of empanadas. Then as I set off again I had the long climb called "Cuesta de Obispo" before me. I had though ridden this way three years previously so knew what was in store. The first steep incline refreshed my memory to that day in two thousand and six; then above that initial climb I saw again the drystone walls on both sides of the road, and the next section which wound it's way upover a gentel grassy slope to rocky escarpment where the road continued across near vertical cutting to the uppermost part of the valley. There I paused then and also today looking up at the road; a cutout scar zigzag up the mountainside. I waited a while watching a car which had passed about a quarter of an hour earlier move like in slow motion along each upward terrace; eventually round the final turning with the sun beaming from the windsceen like a mirror and continue away up near the mountaintop and disappear out of sight through a gap against the sky.
The climb took me to an altitude of around three and a half thousand metres which isn't too extreme in these parts but is where the effects of thin air kicks in especially if a novice in the high Andes which I was at that time. I've ridden at four to four thousand five hundred a few time since and my body has aclimatised. Three years ago it was hard to beathe because the air was thin as they say and suppositely the lack of oxigen causes instant exhaustion as my limbs and my whole body felt totally knackered and I'd to stop about every hundred metres and sit down and rest. Today I rode on and up round each bend and reached the sumit without much fuss.
There was a car and a mini-bus stopped; their occupants out taking photos as well as taking in the air and high vista. And there was the usual man or woman with dropped jaw expression looking at my bike then at me. The man in this case made a pedaling motion with his arms and exclaimed "todo en bici!" I replied "Si" and told him I'd rode the whole way here. I didn't see anything extraordinary in that but none the less grinned as if I'd achieved something unique. Tommorrow the road could very well present a real chalenge. They then all got back in to their repective vehicles and slambed shut the doors and drove on leaving me to myself again.
The long climb had taken a large chunk out of the day as it had now gone quarter past six and I'd still thirty-five kilometres left to Cachi. I could camp like the last time, but it's quite frosty of a morning up here in early September, and I remember losing sensation in my fingers during the first stretch cycling that morning. For this reason I wanted to avoid camping if at all possible. But meanwhile, time flys when racing against the waning sun. The minute hand on my watch had gone into overdrive. After what seemed a short time cycling I looked and saw quarter to seven, then eight minutes to the hour when I glanced at the watch a little later.
I pedaled an incredible long line of a road which dipped gradually down, levelled out, then rose gradually up and all the time ran parallel with an elongated wall of mountain called Tintin on the left across scrubland and beyond pickly cactus.
I saw it was quarter past seven as I laboured slowly up as the sun hovered low over the mountaintops and the thin streams of circa cloud began glowing red. At twenty five to..., I reached the end of the tilted up plain and the road swung left and descended down the furthest edge of Tintin just as the sun sunk behind the dark mountains ahead. Then, in the distance I saw the lights of a village.
Not Cachi but a place called Payagasta, ten kilometres north of my gold. I cycled between two rows of low flat roof houses with a shop on a corner outside of which, I asked a man if there was a hotel: he pointed ahead saying "Adelante!" Then just as I passed out into the country again, on the right was a large white house with a lit HOTEL sign out-front.
When I'd filled in the form at reception, Is shown through an archway to an inner large courtyard with white archways around all four sides. The interior of the room was white-wash too with two single beds. No doubt the two hundred pesos was a doubleroom price. The guy in reception didn't have the most economic option in mind for me; though, the beds were comfortable even though one was all that was called for; and in the bathroom I could see my reflection in the all-round tiles: no need for a mirror though there was plenty of that too. The shower spinkled warm water at both modulated temperature and pressure imediately on turning the tap. There was also a sofa where I sat down in comfort and picked up a September copy of National Geographic edicon espanol from the low coffee table in front of me. Leafing through the pages I stopped in the middle at a six-page feature on Monterey in northern Mexico. I was a little too tired to practice my Spanish reading but the pictures looked inspiring. I especially liked the bar room with what looked like a country rock band on stage. The dance floor was full with couples dressed up in cowboy outfits, the men wore white stetsons and the girls blue jeans. A fancifull end to a long day but I don't think I'd have the energy.
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