Purmamarca

Purmamarca is the first village of the Quebrada de Humahuaca, and the most photographed. Its adobe houses, its seventeenth-century church and its craft market sit right under the Cerro de los Siete Colores, a hill striped in reds, greens and yellows; a short trail, the Paseo de los Colorados, goes round its back. West of the village, the Cuesta de Lipán climbs to more than four thousand metres and drops onto the Salinas Grandes, a salt flat where the salt is still cut by hand.

One or two nights are enough. The Paseo de los Colorados at the end of the day, when the colours are strongest; a morning with a local potter who works the red clay of the village; and half a day on the Salinas Grandes, with the option of walking part of the way alongside llamas. The road over the salt flat continues to Susques and the Paso de Jama, the crossing to San Pedro de Atacama, which makes Purmamarca the last Argentine stop for many journeys into Chile.

Morning light is best for the hill. After summer rain the salt flat may hold water; winter is dry, sunny and cold at the top.