Mendoza, Arg

Note: I have not been able to use my computer since I left Bariloche 3 weeks ago because my charger broke. Luckily I was able to Amazon one over to my friend who was coming out here so now I am able to use my computer again!

Week 1

Well after an overnight 20 hour bus ride I was finally here. My first week I had planned to stay with a family and take some more spanish lessons. I was finally experiencing some culture shock being back in a big city. The window in my room backed up to a very busy street and it was always crazy loud outside with so many buses… This was no Bariloche, but thats okay it was time for a change. Cities usually aren’t my thing, but this one had some amazing food and wine. My first meal here was at a vegetarian restaurant which had a self serve option and some amazing tasty cheap vegetarian food. 

This was probably the longest week of my life...I hadn’t even been here a week when I got food ( or water) poisoning again. I was told the water was potable by many people so of course I continued to drink it when i got to the city. For almost the whole week I was staying with the family I spent it in the bathroom and on my bed. This pain was worse than the previous once I had in Bariloche. I wish I could have spent more time with the family and practicing spanish, but my body would not let me. I figured it was probably the water as it was very different from the water in Bariloche so i decided to switch from tap to bottled water. I think I will stick with bottled water for my remaining time in South America to avoid another week like this horrible one. 

My host family was very nice and always had lots of family over. I was finally feeling better by my last night with them so I joined them in eating an asado and chorizo dinner with some wine. They had about 25 people over for this early Easter celebration and it was lots of fun to finally be able to eat some meat and drink some famous Mendozian wine while interacting with so many people in Spanish. 

My double decker bus from Bariloche to Mendoza

Favorite Vegetarian restaurant in Mendoza

They even had vegan pastries :)

My host family's family in Mendoza

Host dads nephew cooking the asado in the "parrilla"

Week 2

My friend Kyle from my old work (wow i guess I am truly unemployed now) had made plans to come down to Mendoza to visit. He is a huge wine and meat fanatic so he had always wanted to come to wine country. 

Since I have not been able to shut up about how much I missed sushi he had found a sushi restaurant that ended up being really tasty! The lomo rolls (steak) ended up being out favorite. Those are now my new favorite type of roll and I really hope I will be able to find them somewhere back home. 

Petrillos Dam

Our first excursion was out to a lake that had been created by this famous dam. It was beautiful with so many snow capped and green/red mountains all around the lake. We sun bathed and had some beer and just admired the view all day. We took a public bus to get there (about 1 hour away from the city) and we struggled to find a bus with enough room for us on the ride home. There was a lack of buses because it was easter and lots of people who had come here for the holiday. Finally after squeezing into a bus and standing the entire ride we made it back to the city. 

Horseback riding - Lujan De Cuyo

We decided horseback riding through the famous Malbecian Vineyards would be a nice way to spend another day. So we took a taxi out towards Rio Mendoza which was pretty much out in the country. This was a very small town with lots of stables. The guy who owned the business was very welcoming and had a great sense of humor. I had the chance to practice some more spanish with him which is always a good time. We rode through vineyards for about an hour and then crossed the very shallow river and had some great views of the mountains and more vineyards. We tasted some fresh pepper and grapes right off the branches. The views were just amazing. Pictures do not do justice…what a beautiful day. 

That night we came back and ate at a famous restaurant here called Cordillera Vinos y Fuegos and it was the most amazing steak and wine I had ever had… It was the second best for Kyle… Well we ended up going back later that week and ordering the same exact thing. 

Wine Tasting- Pulenta, Sophenia, Andeluna wineries

We had booked a tour to do some wine tasting through Trout Tours. We were with a group of about 6 pretty entertaining people. After the second winery an older lady in the group kept saying “Are we all just quiet or really wasted?”. She was hilarious and could hardly handle the wine. My favorite winery was Pulenta because of the way they had us do the tastings and just the beauty of the property… Not to mention the smells inside the processing areas smelled amazing! They had us smell different things like fruits and spices before getting to try the wine to really liven up our senses. I learned a lot about the wine making process here and would definitely go back for another tasting especially because of the incredible views of the mountains in the background. Such a pretty property. The next 2 were okay, but the last one served us a 5 course lunch paired with wines for each course. The food was delicious! Our first day of wine tasting in Mendoza and my first time ever  was a success!

Cerro Aconcagua- Highest peak in South America

So we had been debating if we should rent a car to drive up to the trailhead for this peak or just book a tour. After reading reviews with mixed opinions on whether to drive up to a viewpoint or do the actual hike we decided to book a tour. The drive each way could take up to 3 hours and neither of us wanted to be driving for that long especially with this crazy Argentinian drivers. The bus ride was long, but we were able to stop a few times and sipped on lots of mate on the way up. 

Our first stop was at “Puente de Inca” which was a famous landmark before Aconcagua. The colors on the mountain were made from sulfur and had a similar feel of those in Yellowstone. It was a very pretty area. Then we continued our drive up the mountain to the Chile/Argentina border. This was possibly one of the craziest drives i had ever been on. It was basically a one way road all the way up this dusty rocky road and just being in a bus (medium sized) made it that much more scary. We got up to the top and it was freezing! we were the only ones in the group who didn’t bring jackets so everyone thought we were crazy. Im pretty sure my body got some frostbite on it! We were literally on the border of Chile and Argentina overlooking the Aconcagua peak. Once again pictures don’t do justice for how pretty this site was. 

Termas Cacheuta- Hot Springs

Another day another adventure…Today we went to a hot spring which was about 2 hours away from the city. I went to Glen Ivy last year so I thought I might have an idea of what it would be like. It was completely different than Glen Ivy. We were backed up against some amazing colored mountains and a river. The property was gorgeous and had many different pools with different temperatures. There was one pool that was about 130 degrees farenheit (I think) and we were told not to stay in longer than 5 minutes. We could barely put our feet all the way in! Some people got all the way into this water… we couldn’t believe how hot it was and must have been from the natural run off of the hot spring. We had an all you can eat buffet of food for lunch with sooo much steak and Argentinian dishes. It was a great day! We felt so refreshed when we were done. 

Sushi :) at Itamae... The lomo roll is on the left

Portrillos River/Dam

Beer of choice in Argentina

My horse- Moreno

Mirador of some vineyards

Kyle on his horse Patagon

Crossing some of the river

Cordillera Vinos y Fuegos

Polenta Winery

Wine Tasting with a 5 course meal

Malbec Grapes

Exploring the vineyards

Roadtrippin sipping on some mate

Puente Del Inca

In front of the high peak in South America- Cerro Aconcagua

Another steak and wine dinner- Josefina Resto

At the hot springs

Week 3

Bike Riding Wine Tours in Chacras de Coria Region

The last place we stayed at was away from the city in Chacras de Coria. It was nice to get out of the city and get back into a smaller town. The thing to do in this city was bike ride around to the different wineries. Luckily thats exactly what we wanted to do this weekend. It was forecasted to rain on the day we had bikes to winery hop so we were hoping the forecast was wrong at least for some of the day. It hardly sprinkled on us while we were biking around… we got so lucky. The first winery we got to was the closest thing to mom and pop winery as you could get. They were pouring wine for us directly out of the storage vats and barrels. The woman who gave us the tour was so passionate about her winery and taught us a lot about the business. Kyle bought a bottle of Port for his parents which they bottled for him directly out of the barrel. It was such a unique thing to experience. By the time we got to the next winery I was already needing lunch because of how much wine we had at the first one. They had a restaurant right on the little lake next to the vineyards and it was perfect. The sky had cleared up so the sky looked amazing. Of course we ordered steak and wine. This was Kyles favorite steak out of all the places we had ate at. By the time we finished we didn’t feel the need to do a tour and tasting because of how much we had just ate. The next winery we went to was supposed to be at a higher elevation than the rest of them. We rode uphill most of the way and got there and weren’t that impressed with the winery because it just felt so commercialized and didn’t have anything that special to it. I did really enjoy the white wine we tested here which is becoming famous in this country, but not so much elsewhere because it’s not well known outside of the country. It was called Torrantes which is a special white grape that can only be grown at higher elevations like where we were. I hope I can find this back home. Fingers crossed!

Bodega Pulmary- 1st winery

2nd winery- Clos de Chacras

1/3 courses at Clos de Chacras

2/3 courses

3/3 courses

Alta Vista Winery

Alta Vista Winery

We may or may not have had steak for dinner every single night along with about 25 bottles of wine the entire week. It was such a great time… Thanks for coming out Kyle!