🇦🇷 Argentina · The North
La Poma is the end of the world in the Salta stretch of the Valles Calchaquíes: the last village before Ruta 40 climbs towards the puna over the legendary Abra del Acay, the highest drivable pass on a national highway in the country, above 4.800 meters. Set at about 3.000 meters, at the foot of the imposing Nevados de Cachi, it is a tiny hamlet in the middle of an arid, overwhelming landscape of colored hills, volcanoes and lava fields.
It is a destination for travelers after the authentic and the remote. La Poma holds a dramatic history: the original village, today known as La Poma Vieja, was left in ruins after a strong earthquake in 1930, and its people rebuilt it a few kilometers away. Today you can walk through that adobe ghost town, a moving testimony to the force of nature in these high valleys. Around it, the volcanic landscape and the cinder cones complete an almost lunar postcard.
This guide covers the essentials of La Poma with a practical, warm eye: the village and La Poma Vieja, the volcanic, high-altitude setting, the crossing of the Abra del Acay towards the puna, how to get there on Ruta 40 and what to keep in mind about the altitude and the roads. It is an extreme and fascinating corner of northern Argentina, for those who want to reach where few do and feel the immensity of the Andes.
The La Poma region, at the far northern end of the Valles Calchaquíes, was inhabited from pre-Hispanic times by peoples of Diaguita-Calchaquí stock and by communities tied to the puna and the Andean world, in an area of passage between the valleys and the altiplano. The name 'Poma' itself has Andean echoes (it is usually linked to the puma, a sacred animal of the Inca world). In colonial times the area was land of haciendas, grazing and a point on the roads connecting the valleys with the puna and, beyond that, with Upper Peru. The village of La Poma always lived off high-altitude livestock, irrigated farming and the traffic along these routes. One episode marked its history forever: in 1930 a strong earthquake destroyed the original village, which was left in ruins (today known as La Poma Vieja). The people then rebuilt the present village of La Poma a few kilometers away, on a safer site. The town became tied to the route of Ruta Nacional 40 and to the legendary crossing of the Abra del Acay, the highest pass on the road, which turned it into a reference point for travelers venturing between the valleys and the puna. The full story is on our history page.
Read the full history ↓Salta la Linda: the colonial jewel of the northwest, Diaguita land of the Calchaquí Valleys, setting of Güemes and his gaucho war, of the high-altitude wines of Cafayate and of the legendary Tren a las Nubes.
Read the history of Salta →No exact prices: a scale from $ (budget) to $$$$$ (luxury), with 2-3 options per category.
Origins, formation and what the sources say.
There is a village in the Valles Calchaquíes that is not where it was born. The one that exists today, with its square and its church, was built a few kilometers beyond the original village, because in 1930 the earth shook so hard that it left this high-altitude community with nothing but adobe ruins. Those ruins — known as La Poma Vieja — are still there, intact in their abandonment, and they are the most moving image of a place that has always lived on the edge of nature: the last village before Ruta 40 climbs, above 4.800 meters, towards the highest drivable pass in all of Argentina.
But the story of La Poma begins long before that earthquake. The far northern end of the Valles Calchaquíes, where the village stands today, was from pre-Hispanic times a region of passage and encounter between two worlds: that of the fertile valleys, inhabited by peoples of Diaguita-Calchaquí stock, and that of the puna and the altiplano, the domain of communities adapted to life at altitude. At about 3.000 meters above sea level, at the foot of the imposing Nevados de Cachi, the area was a natural corridor between the two environments.
The indigenous peoples of the region were irrigation farmers and herders of camelids (llamas and, in the wild, vicuñas and guanacos), who used the river oases to grow crops and the heights for grazing. Like the whole Argentine Northwest, in its final pre-Hispanic stage the region came under the influence of the Inca Empire, which extended its rule and its roads into these valleys, folding them into the vast communications network of the Tawantinsuyu.
The name of the place itself holds that Andean root: 'Poma' is usually linked to the puma, a sacred, emblematic animal of the Inca world, present in the place names of many regions of the old empire. So even the village's name points back to the indigenous, Andean substratum that defines the deep identity of this corner of the Valles Calchaquíes, where the valley turns into puna.
Like the whole territory of the Valles Calchaquíes, the La Poma region was the stage of the difficult Spanish conquest and of the long Calchaquí Wars that pitted the indigenous peoples against the conquistadors through the 16th and 17th centuries. After the subjugation of the Calchaquíes and the forced dispersal of many communities, the lands of the area were folded into the colonial order through encomiendas and land grants.
During colonial times, the northern part of the valleys was organized around haciendas given over to high-altitude livestock and irrigated farming, worked by indigenous and criollo labor. The strategic location of the place, on the road connecting the valleys with the puna and, beyond it, with Upper Peru, gave it importance as a transit point: mule trains, livestock and goods moving between the different regions of the old Tucumán and the Andean world passed through here.
The village of La Poma consolidated as a rural hamlet typical of the area, with its church, its square and its adobe houses, living at the slow pace of livestock, farming and passing travelers. That condition of a high-altitude village on the frontier between the valley and the puna would shape its character over the centuries, right up to the present.
The event that marked the history of La Poma forever was a natural disaster. In 1930 a strong earthquake shook the region and destroyed the original village, leaving its adobe houses, its church and most of its buildings in ruins. The area, like the whole Andean Northwest, is seismically active, and that quake proved devastating for the small high-altitude hamlet.
Unable to go on living among the rubble and facing the risk of further quakes, the inhabitants took a drastic decision: to abandon the original site and rebuild the village a few kilometers away, on ground considered safer. That is how the present village of La Poma was born, while the old one was left behind, in time becoming what is known today as La Poma Vieja, a moving ghost town.
The ruins of La Poma Vieja — crumbling adobe walls, the remains of houses, the old church — still stand as a silent testimony to that tragedy and to the force of nature in these high valleys. Walking through them today is one of the great attractions of the place and a way of understanding why La Poma stands where it stands. The episode was etched into local memory and became a central part of the village's identity.
La Poma became tied forever to one of the great landmarks of Argentine road geography: the Abra del Acay, the highest drivable pass on all of Ruta Nacional 40, above 4.800 meters above sea level, north of the village. This pass marks the point where Ruta 40 leaves the Valles Calchaquíes to climb to the puna, on one of the most impressive and demanding high-mountain crossings in the country.
Ruta 40, which runs the length of Argentina from north to south hugging the Andes, is a mythical road for travelers and adventurers, and its northern stretch — with the Abra del Acay as its high point — is one of the most extreme. The road to the pass, gravel, winding and demanding, climbs the flank of Cerro Acay in a series of curves that gain height fast, in a high-mountain setting where the weather can turn suddenly and the altitude tests people and vehicles alike.
That condition turned La Poma into an obligatory reference point for anyone venturing along these roads: it is the last stop with services before the climb to the Acay on the way to San Antonio de los Cobres and the heart of the Salta puna. The village, once barely a rural hamlet at altitude, thus won a place in the imagination of travelers who drive Ruta 40 and want to reach where few do.
The setting around La Poma is not only high and arid: it is also one of the most geologically remarkable in the Valles Calchaquíes. The region keeps the traces of past volcanic activity, with lava fields, cinder cones and formations that give the terrain an almost lunar look. These remnants, together with the colored hills, the ravines and the backdrop of the Nevados de Cachi, make up an overwhelming landscape.
The area is part of a sector of the Andes marked by intense geological processes: the uplift of the mountain range, volcanic activity and the seismic activity that, every so often, recalls its power — as happened with the earthquake that destroyed the old village in 1930. The volcanic cones and the rock outcrops in different colors bear witness to that deep history of the Earth in this corner of the Northwest.
For the visitor, traveling through this setting is an exercise in contemplating nature in the raw: the immensity of the landscape, the clarity of the high-altitude air, the silence and the sense of solitude. La Poma thus offers itself as a destination where human history — the indigenous peoples, the colonial era, the earthquake, Ruta 40 — intertwines with the grand geological history of the Andes, at one of the most extreme and fascinating points of the Valles Calchaquíes.