Rock structure in the Andes Mountains as shown in a May 7, 2023 Google Earth satellite image
Image credit: Google Earth/Airbus
A mountaineer combing through Google Earth has located a previously unknown complex of enormous stone circles more than 3,000 meters (about 9,800 feet) up in Argentina's Andes, and the archaeologists now studying it say they know of nothing like it in the region. The team suspects it is a geoglyph, a large design built or carved into the ground that is best appreciated from the air.
Mendoza climber Carlos Gobbi, who had spent nearly 30 years searching the mountains for archaeological sites, spotted the formations in satellite imagery in May 2025, according to Los Andes. The site sits in the Cordillera del Tigre, a mountain range that runs roughly 100 kilometers (62 miles) north to south through the Andes of Mendoza and San Juan provinces. Reaching the remote location – with no nearby water sources – took three tries. Attempts in September and November 2025 fell short. On February 14, 2026, Gobbi and his companions finally arrived after a trek of almost four days. Gobbi recalls that seeing the site in person was "really striking."
On the ground, the group found stone walls forming corridors, along with trenches filled or lined with rock. From above, satellite images show large circular structures linked by passageways, plus rectangular areas, joined as a single figure. The circles measure 27 to 35 meters (roughly 89 to 115 feet) across.
The obvious comparison is Peru's Nazca Lines, but Horacio Chiavazza, an archaeologist at Argentina's National University of Cuyo who co-directs the ArqueoAndes research project studying the site, sees no parallel in design or construction. The Nazca figures were made by cutting trenches into the desert floor, while this site was built by piling stones on top of the ground. Geoglyphs also exist in northern Chile, Chiavazza said, but they come from different eras and cultures and may have served different purposes. He added that the team cannot yet say the Mendoza site depicts any particular figure.
Nobody knows how old the complex is, who built it, or why. Researchers found no pottery, food remains, or other surface evidence of people living there, which points away from a settlement. Combined with the extreme location, that has led the team to consider a ritual or symbolic purpose, possibly from the Inca period (the empire the Incas called Tahuantinsuyo) or earlier. If it is Inca, Chiavazza said, it would be one of the southernmost geoglyphs of that empire and could be tied to the Tambo de Ranchillos, an Inca waystation in the Uspallata Valley.
Those ideas remain hypotheses until the fieldwork, which starts in December, is complete. Chiavazza and Cristina Prieto-Olavarría, an archaeologist with Argentina's national research council CONICET who co-directs ArqueoAndes, will climb to the site with Gobbi as guide, joined by colleagues from Spain's University of Jaén. The team has permits from Mendoza's provincial heritage directorate and plans detailed mapping, drone surveys, remote sensing, and geochemical work, along with sediment excavation to help date the structures. The Spanish specialists will examine sediments and plant remains at microscopic scale to reconstruct the climate, water supply, and human activity around the site. The researchers also plan to involve Indigenous communities from Uspallata in the interpretation.
