The deafening sound of silence in Argentina's high Puna

Silence. 

Have you ever really encountered it? When I’m away I revel in the peace and quiet. Going to sleep to the hush of waves on the shore outside my little bungalow in Costa Rica was incredibly special. Waking to the twitterings and rustlings in the Amazon jungle in Peru was a true luxury. 

But I have encountered real silence. Just once. It was oddly daunting, disorientating. 

I was exploring the Puna region in north-west Argentina. We drove on deserted and perfectly paved roads, leading nowhere except further from civilisation. We moved on to dirt roads. Then finally, sand. Perfect blue sky contrasted with the rusty red mountains and the impossibly-white dunes. Somewhere on the way we stopped at the lake with the highest population of flamingos in South America. Up to this point, the noisy thud of the 4x4 engine had been filling the air. 

We got out of the vehicle. 

I was immediately hit by a wall of silence. I walked up one of the dunes to take it all in. Here, nature is untouched by anything. As I sat, it struck me. No vegetation, no roads, no birdsong, no wind. It felt like another planet.

Complete silence. Almost tangible, bearing down upon me. 

I was the only source of noise. I became oddly aware of the thump of my heart, the hiss and sigh of my breath. There was no filter for my thoughts, which came flooding in. It was unexpectedly overwhelming. Too overwhelming. I got up and rejoined my guide to break silence’s spell. To step back into the world of sounds once more. 

We all crave a little quiet from time to time. But, as I learned from those minutes up on the dune, true silence is anything but quiet. 

By contrast, it is precisely because we can hear nature that we love it – the friendly sounds of what we sometimes perceive as silence. Give me birdsong, give me rain in the cloudforest, give me crashing waves. For me, that's tranquillity in its truest form.