Walk through the Garden of Poets: a green space in the middle of the arid landscape.

If there is one thing I'm grateful for choosing a slightly longer trip to the province of San Juan, it is that I had enough time to go explore a lot of beautiful landscapes. This province has landscapes for all tastes, and with just a short trip on public transportation you can get close to them and enjoy them. One of the most recommended places to go for a walk and see the mountains more closely is the Quebrada de Zonda, where you can climb a little, go trekking or even sit down for a while and rest. If you like this last option, the Garden of Poets is the perfect setting to spend the day relaxing in a unique green space in this area .

By just moving about 20 km from the city center you can reach the Quebrada de Zonda, even on a regular bus line. The walk there is also interesting, because you head directly towards the mountains until you get as close to them as possible and after turning left, you can travel through the entire ravine. But right at the entrance, before turning and at the foot of the mountains, is this green garden where you can have picnics in the shade of the trees ❣️.

This garden is called "poets' garden" because it has a route with sculptures of famous poets. Although some of them were deteriorated, most were in good condition as was the garden. Everything looked quite neat and green, so you could tell that they take care of watering it and keeping it in good condition. The province of San Juan is mainly dry and hot, so maintaining a place in these conditions must take constant work .

The garden also had a space with perfectly arranged bushes with cubic shapes. This part was also pretty and decorated the garden very well. All around there was a path to turn around and also to take a walk among the trees. Very picturesque and photographable ❣️.

Just in front of the garden is the path to a viewing point that looks directly into the garden. Since my friends and I like to be on the move, we decided to go up to see what views we had from there. The entrance to the trail started with stairs, and that was most of the way. Although they were a little deteriorated in parts, they fulfilled their function of taking you uphill well ❣️.

One might think that climbing a mountain with stairs is comfortable, but the truth is that it can be more tiring than if it didn't have them. In any case, the views we had from up there were very nice and worth it. That day was the first time we saw the Zonda Autodrome up close because we had it right next to the garden .

This racetrack is a mega construction located in the middle of the ravine, but unfortunately it is currently disused. Its history says that there were several accidents due to lack of organization, which led to distrust of this place. Later, another bigger and better racetrack was built just a few km from this place, so it ended up being completely abandoned. It is a real shame that this was their destination, but they also say that some curious people also come to do the circuit on a motorcycle or bicycle .

Finishing climbing to the viewpoint only took us about twenty minutes and from there we were able to have a complete view of the garden and everything we had been seeing below. From that height the contrast of colors of the garden and the ravine could be seen much better. You could also see, a little further in the background, one of the largest cement factories in this region, which extracts minerals from these mountains. What I liked most of all is the tranquility and silence it felt like to be up there, in addition to the great view ❣️.

Visiting the Los Peotas Garden was a good choice to spend an afternoon walking and also doing some exercise in the mountains. It is a good option to get a great look at the Zonda ravine and some of the things around it. And if you're wondering what was in the viewpoint, well, there was supposed to be the sculpture of the poet that guards the entire garden, but instead there was only a stone and no trace of the mysterious author. At least it served so we could go up there and sit down and take some good photographs .

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