27 December 2012

Cueva de los Manos “Cave of the hands”. Argentina

We left Ushuaia and headed north. We had to cross into Chile to then head back into Argentina again. We had a couple of long drive days and some bouts of dodgy weather before stopping in the middle of nowhere in order to visit the Cueva de los Manos, in English the cave of the hands. Most of us woke up to a lovely sunny day and decided that the 18km walk over and into a gorge to visit the cave was a great idea. The other group members who wanted to treat their feet to a rest got a lift in the truck to the cave. The scenery was great but the sun hot so we were happy to see the truck parked half way up the gorge.

The caves are a UNESCO site and most of the art in them is approximately 8000 years old. There are paintings of guanacos but most are negative prints of left hands suggesting that the locals were right handed as they placed their left hands on the cave wall and blew natural paints through a tube and onto their hand creating a negative. It was interesting to see how all the art has been interpreted but i'm a bit skeptical as to the genuineness as some of it looked very 'new'.

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