Our trip from Buenos Aires to Neuquen to Villa Regina

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The flight was very nice!  Much nicer then our connecting flight from Boston to Dulles.  On that flight we got a pathetic bag of stale pretzels...on the Argentine flight we were given each an entire ziploc bag of goodies, very tasty chocolate treats I might  add;-).  I gave my bag to my little cousin Abril;-). 

In 2006 Argentina passed a non smoking ban in all restaurants, bars, cafes...etc...it isn't the Argentina from 39 years ago anymore;-). The smoking really has not bothered me..some places have separate smoking rooms entirely...others u just don't see it.

We were greeted upon our arrival in Neuquen by a beautiful lightening storm... just as we landed I witnessed two bolts of lightening strike the ground in the distance.  

We thought security was a little lax at the Jorge newbury airport, which by the way was absolutely gorgeous!  Beautiful architecturally as well as location.  One whole side of the airport was a glass view across the Oceanside!  We were able to bring our drinks onto the airplane including my small bottle of red wine which I had been sipping on for the better part of three hours;-)  Then as we arrived in Neuquens airport (by the way, Neuquen is one of those words pronounced the same forward and back... I forget the term but Katie caught that;-), as we arrived in Neuquen airport we were greeted by this odd glass wall separating the awaiting onlookers from the passengers and their bags, it was 20 min or so until our bags came off the plane and we saw Mama thru the glass...it was difficult to see because there was a painted line every half inch or so...mom kept bobbing her head back and forth to see thru the lines until she saw us;-). I went over to the glass and threw myself onto the glass and mom threw herself on the glass so we did a virtual hug;-). We couldn't hear one another tho...it was a moment mixed with humor and a bit of sadness;-)...but it was only 20 minutes.  As we pulled our bags forward through the line that had formed to get out, we were surprised to see that all of our belongings had to be scanned thru a scanner once again...this time however the scanner was looking for organic produce or vegetables and lo and behold my companion Katie was trying to smuggle in a Macintosh apple from New Hampshire that she had forgotten about at the bottom of her book bag;-)...well the next thing you know the security takes her to the back room for a full body search, lol, just kidding about that last part;-). However Katie was read the riot act in Spanish which could not be understood, basically they are keeping all produce that could contain disease out of Patagonia area which is very sensitive if I understood correctly.  Katie had to sign some declaration so she signed it John Dilor...or something similar to that;-)

So finally I got to meet my cousin Sergio again who I had last seen some thirty years ago...how did time go buy so quickly that I was never able to return in my 20's;-?  Sergio looks very good...well built!  

He has a nice Volkswagen golf that we were carpooled back to Villa Regina in.  It was a drive that will not be forgotten;-). Let's just say he is a very fast driver...posted speed limits of 80 km clearly meant 140 km;-). Add to that the fact that it was raining, I was passing pictures to my mom which she proceeded to show Sergio who was trying to drive so I quickly stopped that;-). Lol!

We spent some time chatting and reminiscing...upon arrival we checked into our room which was a very nice apartment above a hotel restaurant literally right behind Lydia and Beto's house where I played so much as a child those two summers;-). Beto and Lydia looked good and so does Mom by the way;-). The talk of the town was all around the Chilean miners rescue which was finally happening at midnight right in front of us on tv...crazy to think we are only six to eight hours away from the actual mine now and we've been hearing about it in the news for over two months...

Moms cousin who I'm not sure I've met cooked a pile of empanada's which were oh so yummy...I think I ate five or six of them at least but I lost track because Beto was pouring me quite a few glasses of wine by now;-). Fantastic wine!  Only offered locally but it is the wine of all wines or should I say the vineyard of all vineyards;-). Interesting name comparable to a Canadian beer company called fin du monde;-). So this particular red wine from the fin du monde winery was a mix of malbec and syrah grapes which beto served from an open bottle out of the refrigerator...it went quite well with the beef empanadas for sure and was delicious served cool, not sure why he was letting them breath so long but I will find out!!!  Even if it takes a few more bottles of wine I assure you I will get to the bottom of this;-). 

Fascinating story Beto was telling about these cannons, five to be exact, that the local collaborative of wine growers use to fire into the clouds to prevent hail from falling on their very sensitive grapes...apparently they use computers to track the exact locations to fire these cannons which explode in the sky destroying the collection of ice crystals that were forming...

I almost forgot to mention how beautiful the buenos aires skyline was as we flew out just after sunset at 7:30 pm, we circled around and the view of the massive city below us all lit up was spectacular...I'm having trouble loading pictures unfortunately:-(

Talk to you soon

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Comments

[John DiLorenzo]

I found the blog
Hi Guys, Well that was very interesting, I am now signed up and should get any further updated as they are posted. I found it by using same group you used last year and seaching Argentina. I look forward to reading your postings. Butch