We are staying at a delightful, small hostel called El Refugio. The beds here are amazing! So wonderfully large and comfy. I think they are the best beds so far. Its small and cozy so we have been chatty with the other guests here and its been delightful.
We are in Pucon, we came here hoping to climb the Villarica volcano. It is an active volcano and thus its weather dependent. We arrived an immediately booked on to the first tour leaving in the morning (lucky for us its 6:30 am). Our first attempt was a no go and so we hung around for a second try. This will not be happening, the conditions are too hazardous. Oh well. Pucon is still really cute. The town itself is charming and small, easily walkable.
We are going to go to the hot springs instead. The Termas Geometricas is crazy. We are headed there with most of the other folks from the hostel that we have gotten friendly with through the rainy day. The springs were built by an arichtect and it takes an hour and a half to get there. There are 14 or 16 different pools carved out of the rocks. I am so excited to chill out by the hot springs and enjoy. It is not a cheap adventure, costing us roughly $32 a person to get there, back, and enjoy the hot pools. Seeing as how we didnt get to do the volcano, we are splurging on this instead.
Tonight, we take an overnight bus to Santiago, and Tuesday EASTER ISLAND!
Saturday, March 28, 2009
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
Bariloche
From El Chalten, we were booked on a bus for 2 straight days to Bariloche. It was supposed to be 12 hours each day, but ended up--lucky us!--being more. Again, we see several faces that we already know on our bus day 1. We rode up ruta 40 most of the way and the scenery was uneventful. After our first 13 hour day, we were all dumped out at a hostel. Most of us had been booked there by the bus company and the place was not very exciting. It did have a yummy resteraunt that wasnt too much money attached to it, so we sat down for dinner with 3 aussies we had become friends with since Port Natales. Dan, Brian, and Joel are a bit crazy. They felt strongly that since we had all day to sleep on the bus, we might as well stay up all night. I got out the cards for drinking games and we closed out the restaurant and bought all their large 1 liter beers before heading back to the boys rooms for more fun.
We arrived in Bariloche late in the evening, but thankfully near the center of town. Mike and I wanted to stay at 1004, the best hostel in town according to all the travelers we have met, but it was booked. We tried another place to stay, which was also booked, before ending up at Tango Inn (we are at the downtown one). Of course, one of the girls from the bus was booked there as well. They serve real breakfast -- with your choice of pancakes or eggs. Yummy! Mike and I strolled through town, had a fabulous sandwich for 8 pesos from the street vendor we´d been told was amazing. The sammies were delicious!! We then ran into our aussie pals and took the bus with them to Cerro Campanario. Cerro Campanario has ski lifts for you to take up and gaze upon the city. It was yet another lovely view. We saw lovely large lakes and mountains. I rode the ski lift up for 25 pesos with the boys, Mike opted to hike it up with a Canadian we met on the bus. I am still a bit worn out from the buses and trekking, I am glad to have spent the extra cash on the ride up.
Tomorrow, we are slated to bike around the lakes. Apparently, there is a 35 KM loop that is relatively easy to do. From here, we head back to Chile on Friday. We are planning to go to Pucon to ideally see the volcano. :-)
We arrived in Bariloche late in the evening, but thankfully near the center of town. Mike and I wanted to stay at 1004, the best hostel in town according to all the travelers we have met, but it was booked. We tried another place to stay, which was also booked, before ending up at Tango Inn (we are at the downtown one). Of course, one of the girls from the bus was booked there as well. They serve real breakfast -- with your choice of pancakes or eggs. Yummy! Mike and I strolled through town, had a fabulous sandwich for 8 pesos from the street vendor we´d been told was amazing. The sammies were delicious!! We then ran into our aussie pals and took the bus with them to Cerro Campanario. Cerro Campanario has ski lifts for you to take up and gaze upon the city. It was yet another lovely view. We saw lovely large lakes and mountains. I rode the ski lift up for 25 pesos with the boys, Mike opted to hike it up with a Canadian we met on the bus. I am still a bit worn out from the buses and trekking, I am glad to have spent the extra cash on the ride up.
Tomorrow, we are slated to bike around the lakes. Apparently, there is a 35 KM loop that is relatively easy to do. From here, we head back to Chile on Friday. We are planning to go to Pucon to ideally see the volcano. :-)
El Calafate & El Chalten
As we began to learn, Patagonia is generally a small area and all the tourists do similar routes. We were often finding ourselves on the buses with the same folks again and again. It makes it nice and easy to see familar faces. Our bus from Port Natales to El Calafate was full of the same folks from the home stay & the trek in the park. We crossed without incident from Chile to Argentina.
El Calafate is a small town with all sorts of cute touristy shops. It was great fun walking through town and seeing everything. Our hostel was absolutely perfect and we met tons of chatty folks. Of course, they have no website for you to click onto. Everyone at our hostel that we met was surprisingly American. We dont often meet many other Americans traveling. El Calafate is close to a beautiful large glacier. The glacier is one of a few in the world that is maintaining the same size, not getting smaller. We took the bus out to Glacier National Park to see it and opted to pay extra for a short boat excusion to get even closer. The Glacier is amazing and cool, certainly not cheap. It was about $40 for the roundtrip bus ticket, the enterance to the park, and the boat ride. We are over budget, so its not great to be spending lots of money but we have started cooking and making our own food to help us get our budget back in line.
We took the evening bus from El Calafate to El Chalten. Along the 3 hour ride, we stopped at a small farm that had pictures of Butch Cassidy, Ethel (his wife), and the Sundance Kid. Apparently, they were hiding out here before heading to Chile for another bank robbery. That was sort of entertaining place to stop. We arrived to El Chalten at about 9:30 pm and found the first hostel booked out. We were able to find a nice place, very luckily, a short distance away. We walked in to find a friendly couple we had met on our plane to Port Natales. (They were also on our bus to the national park & El Calafate.)
El Chalten is a tiny town, we were warned in the tour book that there are no ATMs in town and to hurry up and get there before they pave all the roads and the town is ruined by tourists. The town is nestled in the base of the Fitzroy Mountain range and has lots of trails that are day hikes from the town. Mike and I were set on the camping bit after our return from the Torres del Paine, so we were happy for easier day hikes. We spent the next two days doing some fun day hikes and returning to town to chill out, cook supper, and drink wine. I love the wine down here and drink it as often as possible. We are able to buy a liter of wine for about $1.50, the same price roughly for Mike to buy a 12 oz can of coke. While it is simple table wine, it is very drinkable and cant be beat for that price. If we werent overbudget, Id be buying the nicer wine that runs $5-$6 and is readily available.
El Chalten was a delightful 2 days and we were able to chat with our reoccuring friends along the way, before heading north.
El Calafate is a small town with all sorts of cute touristy shops. It was great fun walking through town and seeing everything. Our hostel was absolutely perfect and we met tons of chatty folks. Of course, they have no website for you to click onto. Everyone at our hostel that we met was surprisingly American. We dont often meet many other Americans traveling. El Calafate is close to a beautiful large glacier. The glacier is one of a few in the world that is maintaining the same size, not getting smaller. We took the bus out to Glacier National Park to see it and opted to pay extra for a short boat excusion to get even closer. The Glacier is amazing and cool, certainly not cheap. It was about $40 for the roundtrip bus ticket, the enterance to the park, and the boat ride. We are over budget, so its not great to be spending lots of money but we have started cooking and making our own food to help us get our budget back in line.
We took the evening bus from El Calafate to El Chalten. Along the 3 hour ride, we stopped at a small farm that had pictures of Butch Cassidy, Ethel (his wife), and the Sundance Kid. Apparently, they were hiding out here before heading to Chile for another bank robbery. That was sort of entertaining place to stop. We arrived to El Chalten at about 9:30 pm and found the first hostel booked out. We were able to find a nice place, very luckily, a short distance away. We walked in to find a friendly couple we had met on our plane to Port Natales. (They were also on our bus to the national park & El Calafate.)
El Chalten is a tiny town, we were warned in the tour book that there are no ATMs in town and to hurry up and get there before they pave all the roads and the town is ruined by tourists. The town is nestled in the base of the Fitzroy Mountain range and has lots of trails that are day hikes from the town. Mike and I were set on the camping bit after our return from the Torres del Paine, so we were happy for easier day hikes. We spent the next two days doing some fun day hikes and returning to town to chill out, cook supper, and drink wine. I love the wine down here and drink it as often as possible. We are able to buy a liter of wine for about $1.50, the same price roughly for Mike to buy a 12 oz can of coke. While it is simple table wine, it is very drinkable and cant be beat for that price. If we werent overbudget, Id be buying the nicer wine that runs $5-$6 and is readily available.
El Chalten was a delightful 2 days and we were able to chat with our reoccuring friends along the way, before heading north.
THE W
(Sorry for the lack of blogging, o faithful readers! Down in Patagonia, there is poor internet connection, its slow, and expensive.)
THE W might not be the W youre thinking of. W3 and W4 are important people in my life (my dear uncle warren and brother, respectively), but alas this is not the W to which I refer. I am talking about the W trek which is in the Torres del Paine national park. The trail forms a W on the map and you have to backtrack parts of it. To get to the park, you have to get down to Port Natales. We flew on Sky Airlines, which was absolutely fantastic. We were served 2 meals and offered complimentary wine with lunch (and its a domestic flight!). The airport in Port Natales is so small, there is no baggage carasel. A guy gets your bag and hands it to you. We assumed there was a bus to town, but were wrong and had to wait for the guy to call a taxi. We stayed with Evelyn at her house, basically. She had 4 rooms she rented out to folks coming and going. She was very helpful and booked the bus for us to the park, explained the route, and what we would need. She has equipment to rent, if you like, as well.
How do you prepare for a 4-5 day trek? Well, we hit the grocery store to load up on food and snacks to maintain us. (Chef Boardie type Rav, sausage and cheese for sandwiches, granola, bannanas, nuts, breakfast bars, etc.). We had read that you can rent all the equipment that you need through the park, so we decided to pay more and trek without a tent or sleeping bags. We only took our small backpacks, loaded with food. I also purchased a hat, gloves, and a nylon pair of leggins to keep me cozy and brought all my layers.
Bright and early, we hopped on the bus to the national park. Its about 2 and half hours away and is full of trekkers. The weather was pretty crap for day 1. After paying our park fee, we were attempting to decide our route and one of the guys recomended doing the trek in reverse since it was not the best day for seeing the peaks. We hopped on a short ferry ride to get us to the start. The ferry drops you off at a large refugio, which is a place where they rent the gear, beds in a sort of cabin, and usually sell some food, as well as meals. It is possible to trek the whole way without gear or food and just pay through the nose for everything. The refugios even have flushing toilets, although I assure you it is the middle of nowhere.
Mike and I trekked up to Glacier Gray for day 1 through ugly rain. It was also pretty cold and I had all my layers on. It was not too difficult and we would go for long stretches without seeing anyone else. We decided to camp at Glacier Gray, which was mistake numbero uno for the trip. It was a chilly night, but we had managed to get 2 extra sleeping bags for free and were plenty cozy in our tent. We should have pushed ourselves a bit more and walked back to the camp where we had started off from the ferry.
Day 2: AKA Hell. We woke up early and trekked back down, thinking ourselves ahead of schedule and smiling at how well we were doing. We learned on day 2 that only certain spots on the map rent gear, and the 2 campsites that were the next closest were the ones that do not rent gear. Thus, we set out on this chilly and windy day to get across the park. Due to our poor planning, we had to skip the top of the middle line in the W since we didnt have gear to camp there and couldnt hike it up and then back by the time we arrived. We hiked clear across the park on Hell day going 35 KM. During the last part, I was unable to talk. I was so exhausted and in pain that I would let out a grunt every so often. When we arrived to camp, we first saw the hotel that is 200 plus USD a night and then had to wander our way for 10 more minutes up to the refugio to get dorm beds for $37. A bit ironicly, these were the most expensive beds we have paid for. (In the middle of nowhere, youd expect them to be cheap!) We fell into bed to exhausted to even fuss with eating dinner and slept for hours in wonderfully comfortable beds.
Day 3: The view in the morning, is of course exceptional. We slept in as late as possible (9:30) and made a lieserly breakfast. It was painful at first to get moving due to our exhaustive day 2, so we agreed to do a very short hike upward and make camp. It was St. Patricks day and was delightfully sunny and warm. I hiked in my tank top and shorts, while just 2 days prior I had on 4 top layers and 2 bottom layers and raincoat. I would like to think that St. Patrick or perhaps my mother or Emily were smiling down upon us with the beautiful weather.
Day 3: Finally nearing the end of our trek, we got to take off for the hardest part but most rewarding. We hiked up to see the Torres del Paine and found it to be sunny and cloud free. We snapped our hard earned shots and then the route was 95% downhill, literarlly. We cruised easily down the hill to catch the bus shuttle back to town. The bus was full of smelly, dirty folks like I have never been around in my life (including us, since we didnt get to shower either).
We arrived back to Evelyns and were welcomed back like family. Our packs were still there and she booked us on the next bus to El Calafate....
THE W might not be the W youre thinking of. W3 and W4 are important people in my life (my dear uncle warren and brother, respectively), but alas this is not the W to which I refer. I am talking about the W trek which is in the Torres del Paine national park. The trail forms a W on the map and you have to backtrack parts of it. To get to the park, you have to get down to Port Natales. We flew on Sky Airlines, which was absolutely fantastic. We were served 2 meals and offered complimentary wine with lunch (and its a domestic flight!). The airport in Port Natales is so small, there is no baggage carasel. A guy gets your bag and hands it to you. We assumed there was a bus to town, but were wrong and had to wait for the guy to call a taxi. We stayed with Evelyn at her house, basically. She had 4 rooms she rented out to folks coming and going. She was very helpful and booked the bus for us to the park, explained the route, and what we would need. She has equipment to rent, if you like, as well.
How do you prepare for a 4-5 day trek? Well, we hit the grocery store to load up on food and snacks to maintain us. (Chef Boardie type Rav, sausage and cheese for sandwiches, granola, bannanas, nuts, breakfast bars, etc.). We had read that you can rent all the equipment that you need through the park, so we decided to pay more and trek without a tent or sleeping bags. We only took our small backpacks, loaded with food. I also purchased a hat, gloves, and a nylon pair of leggins to keep me cozy and brought all my layers.
Bright and early, we hopped on the bus to the national park. Its about 2 and half hours away and is full of trekkers. The weather was pretty crap for day 1. After paying our park fee, we were attempting to decide our route and one of the guys recomended doing the trek in reverse since it was not the best day for seeing the peaks. We hopped on a short ferry ride to get us to the start. The ferry drops you off at a large refugio, which is a place where they rent the gear, beds in a sort of cabin, and usually sell some food, as well as meals. It is possible to trek the whole way without gear or food and just pay through the nose for everything. The refugios even have flushing toilets, although I assure you it is the middle of nowhere.
Mike and I trekked up to Glacier Gray for day 1 through ugly rain. It was also pretty cold and I had all my layers on. It was not too difficult and we would go for long stretches without seeing anyone else. We decided to camp at Glacier Gray, which was mistake numbero uno for the trip. It was a chilly night, but we had managed to get 2 extra sleeping bags for free and were plenty cozy in our tent. We should have pushed ourselves a bit more and walked back to the camp where we had started off from the ferry.
Day 2: AKA Hell. We woke up early and trekked back down, thinking ourselves ahead of schedule and smiling at how well we were doing. We learned on day 2 that only certain spots on the map rent gear, and the 2 campsites that were the next closest were the ones that do not rent gear. Thus, we set out on this chilly and windy day to get across the park. Due to our poor planning, we had to skip the top of the middle line in the W since we didnt have gear to camp there and couldnt hike it up and then back by the time we arrived. We hiked clear across the park on Hell day going 35 KM. During the last part, I was unable to talk. I was so exhausted and in pain that I would let out a grunt every so often. When we arrived to camp, we first saw the hotel that is 200 plus USD a night and then had to wander our way for 10 more minutes up to the refugio to get dorm beds for $37. A bit ironicly, these were the most expensive beds we have paid for. (In the middle of nowhere, youd expect them to be cheap!) We fell into bed to exhausted to even fuss with eating dinner and slept for hours in wonderfully comfortable beds.
Day 3: The view in the morning, is of course exceptional. We slept in as late as possible (9:30) and made a lieserly breakfast. It was painful at first to get moving due to our exhaustive day 2, so we agreed to do a very short hike upward and make camp. It was St. Patricks day and was delightfully sunny and warm. I hiked in my tank top and shorts, while just 2 days prior I had on 4 top layers and 2 bottom layers and raincoat. I would like to think that St. Patrick or perhaps my mother or Emily were smiling down upon us with the beautiful weather.
Day 3: Finally nearing the end of our trek, we got to take off for the hardest part but most rewarding. We hiked up to see the Torres del Paine and found it to be sunny and cloud free. We snapped our hard earned shots and then the route was 95% downhill, literarlly. We cruised easily down the hill to catch the bus shuttle back to town. The bus was full of smelly, dirty folks like I have never been around in my life (including us, since we didnt get to shower either).
We arrived back to Evelyns and were welcomed back like family. Our packs were still there and she booked us on the next bus to El Calafate....
Friday, March 13, 2009
Santiago
We have successfully arrived in Santiago, Chile. We are staying at Aji Hostel and I like it a lot. We arrived really early, after a miserable bus ride. Note: if ever going to cross from Mendoza to Santiago, do it during the day!! It is a long windy road that is a bunch of SSSS back and forth. You wont be able to sleep, but more importantly its a beautiful passageway that we totally missed. You cross through the Andes and it probably was gorgeous. We arrived exhausted around 5:30 or 6 am and navigated the way to the hostel. When the receptionist let us in, she actually showed us to our beds. YES!! Even though check in is not until 12 pm, we got to snooze all morning in fantastic, comfy beds. These beds are probably the best so far. The hostel isnt super clean, but the only one that has been was the brand new one we stayed at in Montivedeo. Love it here. BBQ tonight, hopefully will be fun.
We were able to see a lot of things in a short time in Santiago. Its an extremely walkable city. There are lots of pedestrian only streets, which is great. Its also very safe here. We went to the Museo Chileno de Arte Precolombino, which is a musuem of artifacts from the indengious peoples of South and Central America. It was pretty cool and free with my expried student ID, awesome. All of the information was translated perfectly to English, even in their special exhibit. Best museo so far.
We also went to the Museo Historico Nacional. Ha. All in español, so that was sort of a waste, but again I got the student rate of like 45 US cents, so we walked through and learned nothing. Oh well. And to make it a good trifecta, we went to the art musuem too. This one happened to be free on Thursday, but was sort of average overall.
We enjoyed a crazy dinner at a place called the Patagonia Cafe. We went all out (we dont always act like backpackers anyway) and got the big monster dinner. We sampled wild boar, deer, deer sausage with roasted veggies and Chilian red wine. Yummy!!
Now its off to Patagonia and some trekking!!
We were able to see a lot of things in a short time in Santiago. Its an extremely walkable city. There are lots of pedestrian only streets, which is great. Its also very safe here. We went to the Museo Chileno de Arte Precolombino, which is a musuem of artifacts from the indengious peoples of South and Central America. It was pretty cool and free with my expried student ID, awesome. All of the information was translated perfectly to English, even in their special exhibit. Best museo so far.
We also went to the Museo Historico Nacional. Ha. All in español, so that was sort of a waste, but again I got the student rate of like 45 US cents, so we walked through and learned nothing. Oh well. And to make it a good trifecta, we went to the art musuem too. This one happened to be free on Thursday, but was sort of average overall.
We enjoyed a crazy dinner at a place called the Patagonia Cafe. We went all out (we dont always act like backpackers anyway) and got the big monster dinner. We sampled wild boar, deer, deer sausage with roasted veggies and Chilian red wine. Yummy!!
Now its off to Patagonia and some trekking!!
Wednesday, March 11, 2009
Malbec & Mendoza
We traveled to Mendoza, a lovely area in northwestern Argentina specificlly to enjoy the malbec wines from this area. After checking into Casa Peubleo which took a bit of time since we arrived early, we went to find the wine trail.
We took a bus to Maipu (which is pronounced my poo, giggles all day!) and hopped off at Mr. Hugos bike rental. Mr. and Mrs. Hugo great you as you depart the bus and usher you in to get you comfortable. For 25 pesos, we were able to rent a bike, get a bottle of water, and sort of listen to what direction they were telling us to go. The first part of the ride is through a scummy bit of town and was not at all like the romantic vision I had of peddling my way through the countryside and vineyards. Uggh. Thankfully, the view improved the further from town we got.
We biked out to the Familia di Tomaso winery for lunch and enjoyed our first malbec of the day. It was a small vineyard and winery, our sandwiches were nice. I had an avacado, ham, and cheese on really delicious bread. It was rustic looking and we sat on the veranda.
We continued further up the road to Carinae. This small vineyard is owned by a French couple and is distributed in St. Louis for my fam and friends back home. The Carinae is a constallation that is only visable during the harvest. This vineyard had not begun harvesting yet, some of the others are just getting started. Here, we did a tour and enjoyed some rose, a malbec, and a nicer malbec that had been aged longer. This was a pretty nice tour and we saw a gal hand labeling the bottles. From here, you are able to see the beatiful Andes in the distance that frame the city of Mendoza.
Next, we went to Vina El Cerno, which was the least exciting vineyard on the tour. The guy was too laidback and not really giving any information. The wine here was decent and the pours were extremely generous.
Feeling a bit tipsy, we missed the next winery listed on our map and skipped to Trapiche. Trapiche is a very old vineyard, it was founded in 1912 by an Italian immigrant. The vineyard and winery was purchased by an American company recently and they decided to completly restore the old buildings to the original look. Our tour guide explained that most of the buildings that are old have been destroyed by earthquakes and that it was a point of pride to have the buildings and vineyard restored. Here, we sampled a delicious cabernet, a malbec, a sparkling rose, and a torrontes. I have never had a torrontes before, it is a young, white wine and was yummy. The tasting room was built ontop of the barrel room and has a clear glass floor for you to gaze at while enjoying the wines. And the bathrooms were very cool, too.
As we peddled our way back to Mr. Hugos and were welcomed home like family. Because I hadn´t enjoyed enough wine yet, Mr. Hugo invited us to sit down and passed us another bottle of red wine. This one was unlabeled and probably very low quaility but at this point it doesnt really matter. We chatted with other drunks hobbeling back from the vineyard tours and enjoyed more wine that was included in our measely 25 pesos.
This morning, I awoke ready to take on more wine. Mike called uncle (he´s not that into wine anyway) and I departed on another tour. My legs are tired from yesterday, today I paid extra for the minibus shuttle with an English speaking guide. We started off at Weinert, another large and old vineyard similar to Trapiche. I didnt bring the camera along because I didnt have any pockets, but they had really old and large barrels for their wine making. We got to try some grape juice (to compare it to the fermanted wines), another torrentes, a malbec rose, and a malbec. Yummy.
Next, it was off to Carmine Grouata. This vineyard is a smaller producer and was founded by an Italian immigrant in 1910. His grandson is the current winemaker and their wines have won many awards. We tried a cabernet and a malbec here. Our tour guide offered for sale a bottle of wine for 280 pesos (about 85 usd) a select bottle of their 1999 vintage. Its only sold to private collectors abroad and retails for 200 euro.
My tour ended today with a tour of Laur olive oil factory. It was a bit boring and we only sampled their extra virgin olive oil. I have done other olive oil tastings where you sample a few and compare, but oh well. Another wonderful day in Mendoza!
We took a bus to Maipu (which is pronounced my poo, giggles all day!) and hopped off at Mr. Hugos bike rental. Mr. and Mrs. Hugo great you as you depart the bus and usher you in to get you comfortable. For 25 pesos, we were able to rent a bike, get a bottle of water, and sort of listen to what direction they were telling us to go. The first part of the ride is through a scummy bit of town and was not at all like the romantic vision I had of peddling my way through the countryside and vineyards. Uggh. Thankfully, the view improved the further from town we got.
We biked out to the Familia di Tomaso winery for lunch and enjoyed our first malbec of the day. It was a small vineyard and winery, our sandwiches were nice. I had an avacado, ham, and cheese on really delicious bread. It was rustic looking and we sat on the veranda.
We continued further up the road to Carinae. This small vineyard is owned by a French couple and is distributed in St. Louis for my fam and friends back home. The Carinae is a constallation that is only visable during the harvest. This vineyard had not begun harvesting yet, some of the others are just getting started. Here, we did a tour and enjoyed some rose, a malbec, and a nicer malbec that had been aged longer. This was a pretty nice tour and we saw a gal hand labeling the bottles. From here, you are able to see the beatiful Andes in the distance that frame the city of Mendoza.
Next, we went to Vina El Cerno, which was the least exciting vineyard on the tour. The guy was too laidback and not really giving any information. The wine here was decent and the pours were extremely generous.
Feeling a bit tipsy, we missed the next winery listed on our map and skipped to Trapiche. Trapiche is a very old vineyard, it was founded in 1912 by an Italian immigrant. The vineyard and winery was purchased by an American company recently and they decided to completly restore the old buildings to the original look. Our tour guide explained that most of the buildings that are old have been destroyed by earthquakes and that it was a point of pride to have the buildings and vineyard restored. Here, we sampled a delicious cabernet, a malbec, a sparkling rose, and a torrontes. I have never had a torrontes before, it is a young, white wine and was yummy. The tasting room was built ontop of the barrel room and has a clear glass floor for you to gaze at while enjoying the wines. And the bathrooms were very cool, too.
As we peddled our way back to Mr. Hugos and were welcomed home like family. Because I hadn´t enjoyed enough wine yet, Mr. Hugo invited us to sit down and passed us another bottle of red wine. This one was unlabeled and probably very low quaility but at this point it doesnt really matter. We chatted with other drunks hobbeling back from the vineyard tours and enjoyed more wine that was included in our measely 25 pesos.
This morning, I awoke ready to take on more wine. Mike called uncle (he´s not that into wine anyway) and I departed on another tour. My legs are tired from yesterday, today I paid extra for the minibus shuttle with an English speaking guide. We started off at Weinert, another large and old vineyard similar to Trapiche. I didnt bring the camera along because I didnt have any pockets, but they had really old and large barrels for their wine making. We got to try some grape juice (to compare it to the fermanted wines), another torrentes, a malbec rose, and a malbec. Yummy.
Next, it was off to Carmine Grouata. This vineyard is a smaller producer and was founded by an Italian immigrant in 1910. His grandson is the current winemaker and their wines have won many awards. We tried a cabernet and a malbec here. Our tour guide offered for sale a bottle of wine for 280 pesos (about 85 usd) a select bottle of their 1999 vintage. Its only sold to private collectors abroad and retails for 200 euro.
My tour ended today with a tour of Laur olive oil factory. It was a bit boring and we only sampled their extra virgin olive oil. I have done other olive oil tastings where you sample a few and compare, but oh well. Another wonderful day in Mendoza!
Monday, March 9, 2009
Boca Juniors vs. Los Diablos Rojos
Football (what we call soccer) is kind of a big deal down here in Argentina and Brazil. Perhaps you´ve heard. Mike and I were able to enjoy the crazy Boca Juniors verse the Independiente at the Tomas A. Duco stadium on Sunday.Boca Juniors is one of the best known teams in Argentina. They are like the Yankees, with the most titles and the most fans throughout the country. Their logo or team bage should pop up on the left side of this post. The bright blue and yellow are easy to spot and when we visited the La Boca neighborhood, their logoed apparel was everywhere. They were founded by Italian immigrants and so I was really excited to go to the game and cheer them on.
Unfortunetly, it was an away game and so we couldnt sit with the fans from Boca. The fans have seperate enterances to the park and there are large police barracades between the fans so that there is no mixing. When the game is over, the Boca fans are escorted out by the police and the other fans have to wait until they are all out before they open the gates. CRAZY!Los Diablos Rojos or the red devils beat Boca 2-0.
Sunday, March 8, 2009
Buenos Notches!
The free walking tour of Buenos Aires was great. Our guide Sol was friendly and knew lots about everything. She freely answered any questions we wanted and stopped wherever we wanted on the tour. We were the only backpackers on the tour and went out for a chill lunch with our new friends afterwards. We are meeting some of the same folks this evening for a Boca vs. Independiente Futball match.
Last night, we had a wonderfully fun time at the La Bomba de Tiempo performance. It was 25 pesos to get in, roughly 8 usd. Its a group of 19 or so percussionists. We danced, clapped, swayed, jumped, tapped, yelled, sang, tried to avoid the smoke that was all around us, and moved with the crowd. They preformed for about 3 hours and it was a very interesting experience. Afterwards, we enjoyed the fun of trying to find the bus back to town. It was a long ride back into the city (we were off the map to go to the show) but enjoyable all the same.
Last night, we had a wonderfully fun time at the La Bomba de Tiempo performance. It was 25 pesos to get in, roughly 8 usd. Its a group of 19 or so percussionists. We danced, clapped, swayed, jumped, tapped, yelled, sang, tried to avoid the smoke that was all around us, and moved with the crowd. They preformed for about 3 hours and it was a very interesting experience. Afterwards, we enjoyed the fun of trying to find the bus back to town. It was a long ride back into the city (we were off the map to go to the show) but enjoyable all the same.
Thursday, March 5, 2009
Evita!
We have arrived in lovely Buenos Aires, Argentina. It is the captial of this lovely country and home to many lovely sights. It is the NYC of South America, full of crazy taxi drivers that rip you off, a subway, buses, a broadway type district, the projects, and heros. It also boasts many beautiful buildings and lovely architechture.
We are staying at El Firulete, which has been an interesting experience. The building itself is charming, with lovely tile floors and a balcony in our room. The breakfast is alright (fruit, ceral, toast, and CROISSANTS!! i love croissants) and its clean for a hostel. However, the staff at the front desk totally suck. They are unhelpful and unfriendly. We have an 8 person dorm to ourself and havent met a lot of other travelers. Its nice to mix it up and chat up other people about what they have done and where they have been.
We have had the opportunity to see several sights related to the infamous Eva Peron, or Evita.
Her final resting place is La Recoleta Cemetery. La Recoleta is an elaborate and beautiful maze of mausoleums. Some look like mini churches with a steeple and stained glass. Elaborate statues are common for the decoration of them. Some are well maintained and when you peak at the windows, you can see the coffins neatly arranged with a cloth covering them. It was really interesting to see and you can wander around for quite some time seeing different things each time. We also went to the Evita museum. They have some of her clothing and accessories on display, along with videos important to her life, radio recordings, and some information about her life. Its a little sparse on all the specifics, more broad strokes leaving you wanting to know more about her life.
We had the pleasure of walking through San Martin square and just so happened to be there when they unvailed the United Buddy Bears. Its a group of bears represented by each country reconized by the UN and designed by a local artist from that country. It was a very exciting thing to stumble upon.
We have been to La Boca, a neightborhood with interestingly bright colors and tin houses. We also saw tango on display in the streets and art was everywhere for sale. We got to meet up with the Saras - our Scottish friends that we met in Rio both named Sara. We wandered the streets with them for awhile and then went to the national history museum. It sucked since it was all in Spanish and apparently, its under renovation until next year. On to the next.
Last night, we went to Cafe Tortoni. They are a very old cafe and do tango shows in the evening. The show was 60 pesos and was a combination of tango, singing, and orchestra playing. The live music part was great, the singing was very emotional. I would have liked to see more tango. The dancers did change their outfits every single time, which was cool. We shared a table with Carmen and Alister from Toronto and went out for a steak afterwards. The steak is very reasonably priced and always delicious.
Carmen recommended a free tour of BsAs and that is where we are off to now....
We are staying at El Firulete, which has been an interesting experience. The building itself is charming, with lovely tile floors and a balcony in our room. The breakfast is alright (fruit, ceral, toast, and CROISSANTS!! i love croissants) and its clean for a hostel. However, the staff at the front desk totally suck. They are unhelpful and unfriendly. We have an 8 person dorm to ourself and havent met a lot of other travelers. Its nice to mix it up and chat up other people about what they have done and where they have been.
We have had the opportunity to see several sights related to the infamous Eva Peron, or Evita.
Her final resting place is La Recoleta Cemetery. La Recoleta is an elaborate and beautiful maze of mausoleums. Some look like mini churches with a steeple and stained glass. Elaborate statues are common for the decoration of them. Some are well maintained and when you peak at the windows, you can see the coffins neatly arranged with a cloth covering them. It was really interesting to see and you can wander around for quite some time seeing different things each time. We also went to the Evita museum. They have some of her clothing and accessories on display, along with videos important to her life, radio recordings, and some information about her life. Its a little sparse on all the specifics, more broad strokes leaving you wanting to know more about her life.
We had the pleasure of walking through San Martin square and just so happened to be there when they unvailed the United Buddy Bears. Its a group of bears represented by each country reconized by the UN and designed by a local artist from that country. It was a very exciting thing to stumble upon.
We have been to La Boca, a neightborhood with interestingly bright colors and tin houses. We also saw tango on display in the streets and art was everywhere for sale. We got to meet up with the Saras - our Scottish friends that we met in Rio both named Sara. We wandered the streets with them for awhile and then went to the national history museum. It sucked since it was all in Spanish and apparently, its under renovation until next year. On to the next.
Last night, we went to Cafe Tortoni. They are a very old cafe and do tango shows in the evening. The show was 60 pesos and was a combination of tango, singing, and orchestra playing. The live music part was great, the singing was very emotional. I would have liked to see more tango. The dancers did change their outfits every single time, which was cool. We shared a table with Carmen and Alister from Toronto and went out for a steak afterwards. The steak is very reasonably priced and always delicious.
Carmen recommended a free tour of BsAs and that is where we are off to now....
Monday, March 2, 2009
Punta del Este
Punta del Este is a very nice beach town in northern Urguay. It is a small area, but is the international vacation hot spot for this area. It has a little bit of what I envision Miami to be like. There are tall hotels and condos that line the beach, upscale shopping, and plenty of fine dining.
We stayed at 1949 Hostel which has a fantastic location! It was a short walk from the bus station and we could see the ocean from our 2nd story room. The staff that worked there were a casual bunch--listening to Bob Marley and in a hurry to do nothing. Oh well.
We got to spend two days hanging out on the beach and found beach umbrellas on the beach to relax under. We found some lovely sea glass (one of my favorite things to find at the beach!!) and soaked up the sun. It was a very enjoyable two days!!
We are now in the capital of Urguay, Montivedeo and we are saying at Pocitos Hostel. It is again, just a short walk to the ocean and the beach. The tempture here is much cooler (70s) and almost cold since we are used to 85 degrees or warmer weather.
We stayed at 1949 Hostel which has a fantastic location! It was a short walk from the bus station and we could see the ocean from our 2nd story room. The staff that worked there were a casual bunch--listening to Bob Marley and in a hurry to do nothing. Oh well.
We got to spend two days hanging out on the beach and found beach umbrellas on the beach to relax under. We found some lovely sea glass (one of my favorite things to find at the beach!!) and soaked up the sun. It was a very enjoyable two days!!
We are now in the capital of Urguay, Montivedeo and we are saying at Pocitos Hostel. It is again, just a short walk to the ocean and the beach. The tempture here is much cooler (70s) and almost cold since we are used to 85 degrees or warmer weather.
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