Wine Country

---

Neil:

Hola everyone. We have finally left the miserable wet conditions in Chile and crossed the Andes into a wonderful sunny and warm Argentina and to a town called Mendoza.

Mendoza is one of Argentina´s most famous wine regions, and the glass or two we´ve had already have been excellent - the best wine of any country we´ve been to so far. More on this later...

We found ourselves a brilliant hostel owned by an English chap and his Argentinian wife. (Called Hostel Lao). The first thing i noticed arriving in Argentina from Chile is how much more European it looks; the cars are mostly old Renaults, Fords and Volkswagens with the odd big american pick up. Mendoza also has a big street cafe culture so most days we´ve spent some time people watching. May 25th is Independance day for Argentina and it´s a national holiday to celebrate Buenos Aires independance from Spain. As a result the town closed for the day but we were fortunate enough that the owner of the hostel was going to throw a small celebration. Mike´s ( the owner) Argentine mother in law cooked a Locro which is a traditional dish much like a spicy stew and the whole family came including wife, mother in law, father in law and sisters etc. The father in law turned up dressed as a gaucho complete with a really, really sharp sword (which was later drunkenly used to cut bread). He also brought some lethal wine in an old wooden barrel. It all turned out to be a great afternoon/evening sitting in the sun and getting drunk with the locals and a few hostel folk.

Nicola: When you are travelling it doesnt matter how many museums you vist or how much people watching you do the only way to really get a feel of the country is to live with a family or get involved in a family occassion. We were so lucky to be able to do that on sunday and by the end of the evening I felt more like a friend at a party than a paying guest. The owner´s mother in law had cooked the most amazing food, including empanadas, the locro that neil mentioned earlier and really delicious if ridiculously sweet pastries filled with apple. It was all washed down with litres of red wine and the local tea called mate. It is a herb drink which you have usually with lashings of sugar and drink through a metal straw. I thought it tasted like asparagus and Neil thought it tasted like tobacco so you can tell it is an aquired taste. Saying that I would have it again!!
Despite the amount of wine we had on Sunday we still wanted to go and try and tour one of the local vineyards so after a bit of a lie-in we headed to Bodega La Rural. It is probably one of the most famous in the region because it produces Rutini. The vineyard had a museum which was full of ancient wine making instruments and old pictures and it was really interesting learning about how the vineyard came to South America. You dont get to try a huge number of wines but to be honest I think our livers were thanking them even if we weren´t.

---