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Basilica
Basilica early evening, 7.20pm
Cabildo
Plaza San MartinWhere is everyone?
We headed to La Rioja for one reason, to visit a couple of national parks and we had no intention of staying long. This was fair enough as on arrival, we failed to see another human being for hours. This place is hot, hot, hot!!! And thankfully dry so it wasnt too hard to cope with but you can understand why the siesta is respected here.
Not until about 7pm did people start waking up and showing their faces - we had arrived at around midday and had been patiently waiting to see what this little town in northern argentina was all about. By night fall and coming up to middnight - the place was buzzing like a holiday resort in high season. People everywhere - kids all over the place, heladarias (ice cream parlours) packed out. It was great.
The next day, we went to a couple of national parks. The first; Talampaya was mightily impressive. The wonderful red rock sandstone was a sight to marvel, particularly the wide bottomed canyon. We wandered around the bottom and had a go at creating echos in the chimney which stretches up the 180mt walls of the canyon.
There were a few petroglphs there but I was too busy admiring the landscape to be very intersted in them. The red rocks, the clear blue sky, the green shrubs dotted into the horizon and the snow capped peaks far in the distance all made for a great view.
Next was Ischigualasto, or Moon Valley as it is better known. The first thing we did was admire some of the dinosaur remnents that they had in their museum - more fantastic evidence of these prehistoric beasts which were found in the area. The on to the park itself. The park has some wild rock formations including, The Worm, The Mushroom, The Submarine - all similar to their name sakes. Plus the Ball Court - a huge collection of perfectly round stones scattered across one particular area. The lunar landscapes were awesome and some parts of the park had wonderful red sandstone cliffs in the distance to add to the experience. Some great views and worth the stop in the dusty, hot town of La Rioja.
