Mendoza, Argentina

As usual I use my first day in a new city to get acquainted. With map in hand I walked the entire downtown area. There are five parks, and I visited them all.  Half the downtown is commercial and the other residential. It is much, much smaller then Buenos Aires. At 1:30pm everything started closing like in Spain or Rome.

A fountain in Independence Park.

Plaza Saint Martin

Plaza de Espana

Plaza Italia

Plaza Chile with the statue taking a siesta.

I think they use Malbac wine to color the fountains.

I sat at a cafe and enjoyed my lunch. A siesta is definitely called for.

Today was a super long day. My tour bus picked me up at 7:30am and I didn't return until 9:00pm. It was the Alta Mountain via Villavicencio. It started very cloudy and I was afraid I wouldn't see the Andes. Our first stop was the deserted hotel at Villavicencia. It was popular when this was the only road to Chile. When the new highway was built, the hotel was abandoned.

We then road another 50 kilometers through 356 hairpin turns, in the clouds with no guard rail. I called this part the tour de terror. It was the scariest ride I've ever had. But at the top of the mountain, about 2500 meters we had clear skies and an amazing view of the Andes and the tallest peak in America. It was breathtaking

Tallest peak in America.

And I'm even taller.

We then continued all the way to the Chilean border and climbed another 1000 meters on 8kms of windy dirt roads. Scary part number two. At the top, we had a panoramic view of Argentina and Chile. I guess it was worth the terror ride. But going down the van had problems. I put on my Ipod and closed the curtain for the ride down. At the bottom of the terror ride three we had a horrible lunch.

Our next stop was the Inca Bridge. You can't criss it anymore. They are afraid it will collapse. Our final stop was a beautiful dammed lake on the way back to Mendoza.

They sell ground up lime stone to help cure the heartbreak of psoriasis.

Trinkets for sale.

Missing Argentine flag

After relaxing I went out for dinner at 10:00pm. The steak was not nearly as good as Buenos Aires.

Today was another day of touring. I saw two wineries and one olive oil factory.

The first winery was ultra modern with the latest equipment. All mechanized.

The second was old fashioned with lots of manual labor. At least they don't crush the grapes by stomping in them, the way Lucy and Ethel did. I tasted six samples, all very good, however can't bring any home, since I have too many flights and I would either drink it or it would break in my luggage.

The olive oil process was very interesting. The key is very low acidity. They use both black and green olives, the smaller varities. I think the guide said it too 8 kilograms of olives to make one liter. Argentina exports almost all their olive oil.

The Andes on my flight from Mendoza to Santiago.