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Published: April 15th 2007
Crossing to Argentina
The spectacular Andean Mountains as we cross from Chile to Argentina, this picture really doesn´t do it justice As we hadn't gone off the wine just yet, we took a trip over to Mendoza, wine capital of Argentina.
The bus trip in itself was stunning, including a slightly scary and winding road to take us up over the Andes. The mountains are stunning but it feels rather odd to be up with the ski lifts when there isn't any snow. We also had to go through the passport control again - and now have at least 6 Argentinian stamps in our passports.
Mendoza was suprisingly big and the bus station again chaotic. We had been warned that there could be a lot of bag theft at the station so were very alert. Fortunately all was good, and we left the station only slightly scathed after seeing a fairly physical fight between a local couple.
Arriving at our hostel they greeted us with smiles, but only to tell us they had given our room away! Since it was now already 9pm we werent happy with trying to troop round and find another place to stay so Rich artfully negotiated for us to stay in their rather upmarket apartment overlooking the main town plaza. Very exciting to
Central Mendoza
Due to a double booking mishap, and a bit of good fortunate/agressive persuasion we ended up with a superb apartment overlooking Plaza Independencia, RESULT! have very clean space with big bathroom and a kitchen all to ourselves. With these home comforts and on soon discovering what Mendoza had to offer, we soon decided to stay put for 5 nights.
Rich had been banging on at me to go horse-riding since we´ve got here so that was our first trip. The location was at the foot of the Andes which of course was stunning but more amusingly, Rich was last to get allocated a horse, and one of our comrades declared that it looked more like the donkey from Shrek than a steed worthy of Zorro!! Donkey he was named thereafter...
Both Rich and I were rather pleased at our abilities to 'control' the horses at first. However mine soon seemed to get narked about being near the back, so tried to push his way past the others - clearly no idea about personal space. He also then decided to do a little run now and again, which as my legs got more tired, it became much harder to hang on... so control perhaps not the best description of my horsemanship skills. Rich's donkey didn't have the energy to run so he didn't
Mendoza Horse Riding
A little apprehensive ahead of our forthcoming activity Miss Hicks chills contemplating what this morning will bring.. have this problem...
The next day we hired bikes to do another wine tour. As always health and safety are top priority, and there seemed to be no issue about us cycling on roads, having no helmets, brakes that didn't work and obviously getting drunk at the same time. Hey ho...
Again the tours were great, ranging from vineyards that produce just 25,000 to over a million bottles a year. Our favourite one was owned by a french couple who had bought their vineyard just 4 years ago as a 'project'. Philippe was also an astrologer and the vineyard, wines and even the labels all reflected his passion.
On our final day, we decided to spend a bit of the money that our ma's and pa's had kindly given us for a few treats.
We went to 1884, a restaurant inside one of the vineyard's in Mendoza, and which had been rated the 7th best restaurant in the world, by Restaurant Magazine (not quite sure of their credentials to make these statements but you get the picture...).
We had a fabulous 4 course meal and wine (from a bottle this time rather than our usual
Mendoza Horse Riding
This positive smile was not long lived as the horse soon took control in this relationship (Rich wondered how???) cheap box) which totalled less than 40 pounds for the two of us. If only you could do that back in the UK...
Departing Mendoza, it felt like this had really been one a top place to visit, although Rich slightly disappointed that Henry's promise of the most beautiful women in the world being in Mendoza didn't quite hit the mark ;-)
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Rob Newport (on behalf of Raj Kay)
non-member comment
Mendoza Girls
I'm disappointed that there are no photos of the Mendozan girls so we can make up our own minds about the quality. Please improve this in future blogs. Also love the remark about Health and Safety - I recall seeing a man shoeing a horse on the streets of San Jose in Costa Rica, including heating the horseshoe up until it was glowing red in a little fire he'd set up in an iron barrel in the gutter!