The hairpins
A zigzag road.
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The Cuesta del Obispo is a steep, zigzagging stretch of Provincial Route 33 that climbs about twenty kilometres from the Escoipe valley to the Piedra del Molino pass at some 3,348 metres, linking the Lerma valley, home to Salta city, with the high Calchaquí valley, about 57 kilometres from the city. Its name recalls a seventeenth-century bishop who had to spend the night halfway up. The road winds through endless bends on the flanks of green valleys, clouds often hang halfway up the mountain so travellers drive up through them, and condors sometimes glide close by. Just below the top a viewpoint reveals the whole slope with its stacked hairpins, and from the summit the road continues through Los Cardones National Park toward Cachi. The road is free and part of the classic Salta-to-Cachi trip; take the bends slowly. Mornings are usually clearer; fog can fill the bends in the afternoon.
A zigzag road.
Halfway up.
The pass top.
Provincial Route 33, between the Escoipe valley and Piedra del Molino, about 57 km from Salta
It starts about 57 km from Salta on Route 33 toward Cachi and climbs for about twenty kilometres.