OH MY GOD!!! (Think Janice from Friends. – (Chris – Eh? I think that`s quite enough Friends references!)) It´s so hot! Having become accustomed to the cooler climes of Patagonia, it´s been a bit of a shock to the system coming to Mendoza where it´s in the low 30s! Anyway, enough of the moaning – I expect this has been met with a chorus of very sarcastic “poor them”, considering the weather in the UK at the moment...
We did indeed leave Esquel just over a week ago and went to Bariloche where we spent a lovely few days with Roberto and Silvia. We probably spent more time there than we originally planned and didn´t end up leaving until Tuesday. We didn´t do a great deal while we were there as we had already done a lot of the tourist stuff. It was nice just to have a meander about and spend some time with Roberto & Silvia relaxing. We did go out for a lovely meal on Saturday night with them. The only other thing worth mentioning was a small incident we had with a bed...
I was woken up in the middle of Saturday night by an almighty crack. Asking not quite so politely what on earth had happened, Chris replied that the bed had broken. I turned on the light to find Chris lying at an angle, facing the wall with one side of the bed having collapsed. I managed to haul him out and we heard Roberto & Silvia moving about. I opened the door and explained that we had a bit of a problem but they seemed to find it quite funny. Luckily, when we took the mattress off the bed, we found that the base had just slipped off the blocks that supported it so it wasn´t actually broken. It turns out that it had actually happened to Natalia (their other daughter) once before. The next day, Roberto put some screws in it to make sure it didn´t happen again and Chris was very careful when turning over from then on!
So, we left Bariloche on Tuesday at about lunchtime. We had decided to treat ourselves to “cama” seats rather than “semi-cama”. A cama is a bed so they are basically supposed to be more comfortable...and they were lovely. Lots of space and very comfy! We got probably the best night´s sleep we´ve ever had on a bus. Sorry to disappoint fans of bus travel, there wasn´t really a lot to report about the bus journey...except maybe the game of Bingo that they put on for us! Neither of us won though...
We arrived in Mendoza at around 7:30 on Wednesday morning and were immediately met by a couple of people offering accommodation. Although we originally said no, after doing a bit of investigation in one of the tourism offices, we decided to go with the first lady who spoke to us – she was only charging 6 pounds per night for the room, breakfast included, and the place is relatively near the centre! We got a nice little room, with a TV and everything, although the bathroom, which is outside the room and supposedly private, seems to be used by the people running the place (not really a problem), and the room overlooks the courtyard bit where people quite often sit and the curtains are a bit thin, meaning that you can see in if we have the light on...no prancing around in the nuddie then!
We booked to go on an excursion of some vineyards/wineries (is winery a word??) on Wednesday afternoon, so we had the morning to have a bit of a wander around the city. My first impressions were all favourable and I immediately liked it, although Chris had a couple of reservations. Being a city rather than a smaller place, like we have been visiting recently, there are obviously a lot more people and we have been hassled a little bit more, but nothing too serious. It has got quite a few nice little squares and seems to have a thriving café culture, with lots of tables on the pavements etc.
In the afternoon, we set off on our tour with the first stop being a relatively big wine maker (is that better than winery?) called Weinert. They combine using some of the traditional wine-making methods, with modern machinery. We had quite an interesting tour where we learned about the process of making wine, and we got to see the cellars which were quite impressive – some VERY big barrels of wine! The final part of the tour was a wine-tasting session – a white, a couple of reds and some grape juice. My personal favourite was the grape juice!
Second stop was a more traditional winery, where they use traditional methods and so only produce 70,000 bottles of wine per year. They only sell directly to the public so their wine can´t be found in shops etc. Again, the tour was quite interesting, although the cellar was a lot smaller, and it culminated in another wine-tasting session, where we were taught how to do it properly. Chris wasn´t so impressed with this session as we were only given one wine each (although we had different ones), I think it was so that we could appreciate the flavour of the one we had. As I don´t particularly like red wine though, Chris ended up with both anyway and apparently, it was nicer than the first one. (Chris – a delightful Cabernet Sauvignon and a splendid Malbec).
The next part of the tour was an olive grower, who makes olive oil. Again, we were told about how they go about making the oil, and they again use old and new methods. We then got to try some olive oil on bread, sundried tomatoes, mustard and olives. The girl who showed us round thought it was quite funny that I´d gone to an olive grower´s, even though I don´t like olives. Chris has developed a bit of a taste for them since being over here though and he seemed to enjoy them. (Chris – they were indeed delicious. John, if you were jealous of the train, this bit must be torturous for you!) The tomatoes and mustard were nice though.
Our final stop was at a church with a bit of a history. I think it was built in the 1840s and survived a huge earthquake in 1869 that flattened most of the rest of Mendoza. It´s history goes even further back than that though. Behind the alter in the church is a statue of the Virgin Mary on a cart, who seems to be some sort of patron saint of agriculture. Apparently, a Spanish family brought her over from Spain, where she was already worshiped by farmers etc., after a typical Mendoza hailstorm (apparently hailstones can be as big as, if not bigger than, golf balls!) ruined their crops. To start with, they built a small wooden chapel for the statue but as more and more people came to pray to her for protection for their crops, they had to build somewhere bigger – the church that is standing today. After that, we returned to the city.
On Thursday, we decided to go and have a wander around the big park in Mendoza – Parque General San Martin. It´s a lovely park – very green with lots of trees and a nice lake. We went on a long walk, which included climbing up the Cerro de la Gloria – a hill with a monument on top dedicated to San Martin, who was the liberator of Argentina, among other South American countries (Chris – he left from Mendoza to cross the Andes to liberate Chile and Peru so is quite big around here). We only just made it to the top as we were both starving and hadn´t taken any food with us but luckily there was a kiosk on the top to save the day. It was really hot though, and we were put completely to shame by loads of people running up and down the hill – some more than once! Nutters! Although, according to the lady in our ´residencial´, it was still fresh for them temperature wise. She seems to have changed her mind today though and said it was hot...thank goodness for that! If today was fresh, I think I´d melt if it was hot!
Yesterday we went on yet another organised excursion – it´s a bit of a pain but often the most economical way to get to see places. We went on the national route 7 as far as the border with Chile (where we´ll be going again tomorrow), stopping at various points along the way. The stops included a bridge that San Martin and his men crossed when going across to Chile, a really cool museum, and a bridge from Inca times.
The museum was called ´Mundo Perdido´ or lost world and we were taken back in time to various stages of history around Mendoza. There were also lots of interesting rocks etc. to see as there seems to be lots of quartz etc. in the area surrounding Mendoza. The guy who did the tour (and presumably owned the museum) was really enthusiastic and very knowledgeable. There was one bad bit when a dinosaur thing jumped out...but I happened to be standing right next to it and anyone who know me knows how jumpy I am. I gave a bit of a squeal, much to everyone else´s amusement!
The Inca bridge was also very cool – the rock formation was really interesting and it was bright orange. It`s a natural bridge and we were able to walk on and underneath it.There were also some thermal springs there and there used to be a hotel there for people to visit them but it was also flattened in an earthquake (although again, the church standing a few metres behind the hotel survived). Photos to follow. Mentioning the orange rock – we drove for quite a long way along the Rio Mendoza (I think), which looks like a river of chocolate milkshake – not quite the beautiful clear water we are used to now! (Chris – we also met a Brazilian guy called Carlos whose favourite band is Oasis – class!)
Today, we wandered around the town a bit again to take a few photos, then went to the park again to have a picnic and visit the museum there (we decided against going in on Thursday but it turned out to be one that Chris wanted to visit as it had mummies found locally according to the Rough Guide). Deciding to trust the Rough Guide that it opened from 3-7 on Saturday (not always very reliable for opening times), we turned up at about quater to 4 to find it open!! Bit of a shock as we´re used to museums being closed when we go to them. It had to be too good to be true though and it turns out that the mummies are currently in Mar del Plata – not far from Buenos Aires...typical! It still had some quite interesting stuff though including fossils, more rocks etc. and artefacts from various cultures, some dating back to as far as 1500BC.
So that´s about it for Mendoza – a nice city although very hot! This evening, we´re off to see ´Los Blackbird´ - a Beatles cover band! Apparently, the best sounding Beatles cover band according to John Lennon´s sister so we´ll have to see how they compare to the Bootleg Beatles. We managed to get seats in the middle of the 2nd row for a whole 6 pounds each...although that´s a night´s accommodation :0) So it´s ´Hello, Goodbye´ from us!
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