Tolar Grande

Tolar Grande is a village of a few hundred people at around 3,500 metres on the puna of western Salta, built beside the old Salta to Antofagasta railway in a landscape so bare and mineral that visitors compare it to another planet. Around it lie the elements of the region's desert circuit: salt flats stretching to the horizon, the Desierto del Diablo with its rust-red badlands, the Cerro Siete Hermanos ridge, and the turquoise pools of the Ojos de Mar on the edge of the settlement. Beyond, in the Salar de Arizaro, stands the Cono de Arita. The village survives on mining, the railway and a slow trickle of travellers, offering simple community lodging and guides who know which tracks are passable. There is no fuel to spare and no phone signal for most of the way in.

History

The village was at its largest around the 1940s, as the end of the railway branch then being built towards Chile to link Salta with Antofagasta, with some 5,000 people living mainly from the railway, while the La Casualidad mine sent sulphur from Mina Julia to its station. The closure of the mine, the halt of the railway project and then of the branch itself emptied the region, leaving the few residents who stayed with hard living conditions (Wikipedia, Tolar Grande).

The main sights

• The salt flats - vast white expanses around the village and beyond.
• Desierto del Diablo - rust-red eroded badlands nearby.
• Cerro Siete Hermanos - the ridge of coloured hills above the village.
• The railway - the high Andean line running through on its way to Chile.

When to go

April to November for the firmest tracks; summer rain can make them impassable and strand vehicles for days. Winter nights are savage, well below freezing. Any trip needs a full fuel plan, spare water and, ideally, a local guide.

Good to know

This is genuinely remote travel: hours of unpaved road, no fuel between towns, no signal, and basic lodging with limited food. Vehicles need clearance and spare tyres. The altitude is high and the cold and wind constant. Going alone in one vehicle is unwise.

Nearby

Ojos de Mar is at the village edge; the Cono de Arita lies far out in the Salar de Arizaro.

Key facts