Monday, 20 July 2015

Wine Wine Wine - A week in Mendoza

The Mendoza region in Argentina is famous world wide for wine and in particular Malbec. This means we pretty much spent a week just hanging out, drinking wine, eating meat and drinking more wine. 

There are about 4 different wine regions outside the city and the easiest to get to is Maipu. The thing to do here is rent a bike and cycle around, dropping into whichever bodega takes your fancy. As you read that you probably pictured riding down a country road with grape vines either side of you like I did. It wasn't until we got to Mendoza that people told us you are actually just cycling around something similar to an industrial area and big highways. Not so scenic. After hearing this news we decided to splash out and do a top of the line wine tour. We came to Mendoza for wine so we might as well make the most of it. 

We went to four different bodegas during the day, each one had it's own character. We had our first tasting about 10:30 am. By the end of the day it's safe to say we were feeling it a bit. Of course we drank some of our wine in the hostel though. 


The view from the first bodega

We had to try and pair the different foods with the different wines. This was actually quite hard.

Yes, that vine really is from 1928
After the wine tasting at the second bodega we also shared in some yerba. This is a big this in Argentina and is so weird and interesting that under this photo is not the right place to explain it. If you're interested here is the wiki page.


Super fancy cellar
At the third bodega the tasting also consisted of an amazing 4 course meal, each course paired with the right wine.


The fourth and last bodega featured an extensive collection of ponchos (see the walls) and possibly the largest couch I have ever seen. The tasting was in a dungeon like room in the basement which was also fund. 

We didn't do a lot in Mendoza City itself. It was nice to wander around with all the trees though. They need a special irrigation system to survive as Mendoza is essentially a desert.

We were planning on going to Maipu anyway (because wine) when a Germain-Swiss couple in our Hostel asked if we wanted to rent a car with them the next day to visit a specific bodega (owned by the eccentric Swiss Dieter Meier) and get a little closer to the amazing mountain range near by. We said yes and had a fantastic day. It was amazing to feel the freedom of having your own car again. 

The Views from Ojo de Vino

The area around Mendoza was beautiful

We stopped on the side of the road to eat our modest picnic lunch

The view from the lunch spot. Our car looked so tiny.
There are a few sky fields outside Mendoza but they haven't opened for the last 5 years because there has been no snow. When this photo was taken it should have been ski season. A lot of the area relies on the the melted snow as a water source so who knows what will happen in the future. 

Inca Bridge

There was no snow but as you can see it was still pretty cold

Aconcagua - the highest peak outside of Asia at 6 960 m. We tried to go to the view point but for some reason you weren't allowed to drive to it anymore, making it a 1 - 2 hour walk. We couldn't be bothered with that, so this is the best we got. 

We took a different route home that involved some extremely windy dirt roads (that probably weren't covered by our car company's insurance) through a national park. It was worth it for the different landscape and animals we got to see. This fox was right up at the side of the road just hanging around which was amazing (I've never seen a wild fox before). Sadly though some people in another car were feeding it something.

Side Note: Please remember to NOT FEED wild animals. Seriously. We've seen too many people doing this through-out this trip. 

We also got to see guanacos (well we are pretty sure that's what they are.) They are similar to vicunas, being the wild ancestor of llamas. We'd heard about them before on different tours but this is the first time we actually got to see some. 
We really enjoyed our time in Mendoza. Our original plan was to break up our time between Mendoza and Buenos Aires by visiting Cordoba in between but we are really glad that we decided to skip Cordoba in the end and dedicate more time to Mendoza and Buenos Aires.



Update with photos from Alex's phone

So if Alex had been writing this blog there would have been a lot more mention about how the Copa America (an international football/soccer competition) was going whilst we were in Bolivia / Argentina. Here he is, blabbering about that:

Hello! So this competition includes all the countries you're likely aware of in South America, plus a few guests from other parts of the Americas (this time it was Mexico and Jamaica). 

For a few weeks there was football on the TV nearly every night, much to my delight and Vanessa's dismay. It was held in Chile meaning we were painfully close to the action but I thought it'd be a bit cruel to rearrange our travels to spend a lot of time and money on something which wouldn't really interest Ness. I will make it to a big tournament one day! Hopefully in a Scotland top instead (wishful thinking).

We were able to catch a couple of matches in local bars including Argentina's last three matches. We were in Mendoza for the semis and the final, so only a 7 hours drive away from where the matches were taking place. I settled on watching the match in an 'Irish' pub which had a great atmosphere but shocking bartenders. The culture in Argentina is apparently to give the pint as much head as you can unless specifically requested not to.

To my surprise there were a sizable number of Chileans in the bar and they weren't shy of letting you know who they were supporting. Oddly there was a camera crew in the bar when the match ended so when the Chileans started celebrating they only received a couple of threats of violence rather than any action.



Me enjoying some Mate before we went out to watch the football. From what I saw it was uncommon for guys to wear their team shirt but they would often wear tracksuits instead. The girls would all be wearing theirs though.

The bar - it had stools and everything.
The crowd before it really filled up.


Our BBQ at the hostel. A Swiss friend was in charge of the grill. The meat was fantastically cheap yet good quality so you could eat well for a few dollars each.
One of the steaks portioned up. The wine was a Malbec we bought at a bodega.

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