Sorcery and stout beer
Pierre Heistein explores an Argentinian town with German roots
“HAVE you tried the wizard’s potion?” the sign asked. I had, in fact, not tried the wizard’s potion. While in any other context this would seem like an absurd thing to ask, in the small Argentine town of La Cumbrecita, it was strangely relevant.
La Cumbrecita — which means “the small summit” — is Argentina’s first pedestrian village and I found it by accident while poking around the famous hills of Córdoba.
It’s a peculiar little town made up of two types of inhabitants: real human beings, and a subculture of various species carved into the trunks of felled pine trees. Among this sculptured community, I came to meet wizards, goblins, elves and a small German girl serving draught beer.
The area is famous for its German heritage and craft beer and every October in the nearby town of Villa General Belgrano, real human beings can be found in their thousands, replicating the annual Oktoberfest of Munich, Germany. La Cumbrecita is far quieter and home to fewer than 500 permanent residents.
I arrived in the late afternoon by bus and was made to enter the town by foot over a bridge, which gave me the sensation that a troll might mistake me for one of the Three
Billy Goats Gruff. The atmosphere of the streets was infectious. Holding a sandwich in one hand and dragging my suitcase up the dirt hill with the other, I was greeted by every person I passed, most sharing a cordial “buen provecho”, the Spanish version of “bon appétit”.
There are many attractions within a short walking distance of the town itself. After checking in, I got my feet back out onto the street and headed up to a small waterfall on the edge of town. The trail was marked by steps carved into rocks along the way — partly etched out by a hand chisel, partly worn away by the millions of shoes that have passed that way since the town was founded in 1934.
From there, I went down to a pool called “El lago de las truchas”, which translates directly to “The lake of the trout”, which I assumed was a romantic reference to times gone by when nature thrived.
As I watched the golden sunset, my assumptions were rudely shattered when a specimen of the said trout leapt out of the water and barely missed my lap in its vain attempt to challenge the cascading water in front of it.
The next day I woke up early to find out what the famous sierras of Córdoba had hidden among their contortions. A guided tour on horseback was an option, but, knowing that I am far more infantry than horseman, I decided to brave it on my own by foot.
The path wound steeply up from directly behind the lodge, passed an old cemetery embedded in the shrubbery, and led me out of the wooded area of the town and up onto the higher levels of the landscape. As I looked back, the valley of La Cumbrecita opened up to show how isolated the town is in a savannatype landscape that stretches from one horizon to the other.
The form of the path alternated between well-trodden dirt in the grass and a shallow trough snaking over enormous slabs of rock. The rock, a type of mica, is particularly soft and has crumbled quickly due to water and human erosion. In doing so, it produced a film of powder that caught the morning sun and caused every hard surface to glitter silver — a sharp contrast to the islands of grass illuminated in gold.
The entire outing, including about two hours staring mindlessly into the clear pool of a 3m waterfall, took the better part of the day. Dropping down into the shadow of the town as I returned, my mind felt like it had been away for a week and my stomach felt like it hadn’t eaten in the same length of time.
La Cumbrecita is a good place to be hungry. Sprawled across thick wooden shelves in the numerous deli-style shops of the town, I found jars of pickled pheasant, rabbit and olives stuffed with mushrooms or cured ham. For afternoon tea or dessert, one small bakery sold a loaf of bread called Früchtebrot, which cost the same as a three-course meal. No larger than my hand, it weighed about 1kg and was made from walnuts, cashews, almonds, dried apricots, dried peaches and prunes. The grey-haired baker told me that the dough was used to bind together the fruit rather than add content to the bread.
Sitting down to dinner was an equally interesting clash of cultures. I could choose between a lomo, a traditional Argentine cut of meat, with salad and mash, or dig into a goulash with spätzle. While both sounded appealing, I settled for the platter of knackwurst and Frankfurt sausages with sauerkraut and a local beer.
The beverage was a dark stout made by the local Bergbräu brewery, the “brewery of the mountains”, served on a coaster boasting a picture of the same waterfall I had visited earlier in the day. The beer’s smooth texture and lack of bitterness were surely due to the brewer’s artistry, but I had no doubt that he was greatly assisted by the quality of the local river water — surely of bottling quality but best drunk from a scooped hand.
The town owes its existence to the then
Reminded of his native Germany, Helmut fell in love
managing director of Siemens. Having immigrated to Argentina in 1932, two years later Dr Helmut Cabjolsky grew tired of the popular holiday migration from Buenos Aires to the nearby beaches of Mar del Plata, and chose to head inland instead. At the time, La Cumbrecita was simply a reference point on a map with the nearest settlement 11km away and only accessible by foot. Reminded of his native Germany, Helmut fell in love with the area and bought 500ha of untouched land with the intention of setting up a summer house for himself and his family.
His two brothers-in-law arrived from Germany shortly afterwards and together, living in tents and transporting material by donkey, they began to develop a nursery and plant the first of the large pines that characterise the town today. In 1935, construction began on the family home — what is now La Cumbrecita Hotel.
La Cumbrecita remains as it began, a place to disconnect entirely from city life. Traffic is measured by the number of feet. Rush hour is waiting more than five minutes for a beer. Penthouse apartments are owned exclusively by condors and office hours are defined by when you wake up. It’s quick to take you in and slow to let you go. I offered no resistance to its seduction.