Mendoza

So I met Naresh randomly at the bus stop and we got the Andesmar bus over to Mendoza. The journey seemed pretty standard and I had opted for the night bus to save on time. The midnight-early morning border crossing in the middle of the Andes was interesting but pretty straightforward. Arrived in Mendoza and went to Internacional Hostel (one of the HI chain) it was comfortable and I met some cool people there including the manager Ivan and Simon from Netherlands and spent some fun nights in the cosy bar (complete with wood burner). Mendoza, best known for it´s velvety Malbec, lies in the shadow of the Andes on the Argentinian side (North west) and is the heart of the winelands! Therefore, so I was told, a winery tour was compulsory!

We went on the organised hostel wine tour and to be honest it was pretty lame... ok it was cheap but you really didn´t get to taste too much and it felt a bit structured. The following day a group of us went out to Maipu on the bus (take note... you need the exact change in coins!) and went to see Mr Hugo for his cheap ($30 peso a day) bike hire! This was fantastic, we got several glasses of vino tinto before even clapping our eyes on the bikes, and then rather foggy eyed clambered on (amazingly, to working brakes) we chose our first winery destination on the provided map. First stop: Trapiche, and the largest exporter of wines in the region. The vinyard was housed in a beautiful renovated building complete with the old train tracks outside used for transporting the wine to Buenos Aires back in the day. After a full tour we sampled blanco (torrentes) tinto (syrah) and their reserve (petit verdot).

Next stop: Tempus Albus, and my favourite wine of the day! Here we had lunch and a selection of their suggested wines to taste, the best (and best of the day) being the Pleno Reserve. We drank and ate on the beautiful balcony overlooking the vines and andes in the distance. A short wobble across the road, was the smallest vinyard of the day Vina el Cerno - with only 11 staff it had an intimate feel as we sat amongst the grape vines to drain our last glass of the day. Back the hostel, an organised BBQ and general party night... great until the tequilla came out and ruined me!

Next stop, Buenos Aires and (hopefully) eventual spanish fluency!