On the wine trail

We've travelled about 200km and have been resting in Cafayate for the last 3 days. It's a slow-paced pretty town famous for its Torrontes white wine. They even have a place that sells Torrontes ice cream, which works surprisingly well.

So far the cycling is really great fun. I was enjoying it so much on day 3 that i was mentally preparing my top 10 reasons why travelling by bike is best... but then I got a puncture so that particular blog post will have to wait (and besides, I'd only got to number 7).

We left Salta after a 5 day intensive Spanish course, and were both pleased when we got beyond the motorways to the open road, with few cars on the ruta 68. On Tuesday we took a small detour to a reservoir/holiday resort before heading to La Posta de las Cabras - as recommended by Andrea.

Wednesday's ride through the Quebrada de Cafayate was wonderful despite involving 57 miles and a 600m climb. But we had a 15mph tailwind which basically pushed us up the hills. I'm not saying I wasn't tired at the end of it, but the journey seems less daunting than previously.

On arrival in Cafayte we reached the end of Ruta 68 and turned onto Ruta Nacional 40 - this will be our main road most of the way south. The Lonely Planet can't mention RN40 without preceding it with the word 'spectacular' but if we mention it to the locals they tend to try to persuade us to take the larger less interesting roads through the cities, or to take a bus.

Today we had a delicous lunch of picadas (literally chopped up things) at a vineyard at 1850m.