CARRETERA AUSTRAL
Day Thirty Five - Cueva de las Manos
Posted on 24th Mar 2016
Photo: Cueva de las Manos painting on the rock
A perfect day for trekking to the Fitzroy viewpoint; unfortunately with Easter looming, our hotel was booked up and other hotels had upped their prices to cash in on the long weekend. So today we were heading north back along the 'Ruta 40' to the Cueva de las manos (cave of the hands).
Cueva de las Manos (Spanish for Cave of Hands) is a cave or a series of caves located in the province of Santa Cruz, Argentina, 163 km (101 mi) south of the town of Perito Moreno. It is famous for (and gets its name from) the paintings of hands. The art in the cave dates from 13,000 to 9,000 years ago. Several waves of people occupied the cave, and early artwork has been carbon-dated to ca. 9300 BP (about 7300 BC). The age of the paintings was calculated from the remains of bone-made pipes used for spraying the paint on the wall of the cave to create silhouettes of hands. It was entered on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 1991.
After leaving the Cueva de las Manos we took a short cut via a back road to save some time en route to the town of Perito Moreno. We had been advised that there were a few ups and downs and to be careful with a low clearance car. It wasn't the low clearance that was the problem but the steepness and looseness of the gravel road. We didn't make it up the first hill without a few attempts and Gaby getting out to walk, the same for the next sections of the hill.... at one point we thought we would be spending the night alone and in the middle of nowhere but after a lot of wheel spinning and some rather ominous burning smells we finally made it up and continued on to Perito Moreno arriving late at night. We ended up staying at the most expensive hotel we came across as the others were depressingly basic.
Tomorrow we head back across the border to Chile and retrace our steps from our trip down the Carretera Austral, but hopefully this time with better weather.