When in Mendoza

27th January 2013

 

After a nice long overnight trip from Buenos Aires, it wasn’t until mid morning when we finally rolled into the town of Mendoza.

 

And both TwoBadTourists and Rexyedventures were here especially for one thing. Wine. Wine, wine, wine, wine and did I say wine?

 

Reputed as the eighth capital of wine in the entire world, we weren’t going to miss it even especially if it meant going on top of the Andes foothills and getting very close to the Chilean border!

 

After a fitful 15 hour sleep journey on the bus sitting in an semi cama, we were very appreciative to arrive at our home for the next 3 nights – independencia hostel. Situated in a very good location, literally around the corner from the central plaza de independencia, this secure and safe place welcomed us with open arms and what better way to welcome us than ‘free wine at 7pm?‘

 

Settling in, we looked out of our window to the west to see the majestic Andes jutting above the Mendoza skyline. What a great way to experience the powerful force of the pacific tectonic plate being forced underneath the South American plate forcing the latter to push up and form the tremendous Andes.

 

As we had the whole day to ourselves, we decided to do what the Argentineans like to do in their siestas, grab a coffee and enjoy it on the terrace in the shade. We were there for a pretty long time and then we returned back to the hostel to do some blogging work. Of course, we aren’t just backpackers but we are travel bloggers! So what better, after setting up our computers, than a huge bottle of the local brew, Andes, to see us through?

 

Before we knew it. Free wine hour came! We were pretty excited. Our first taste of Argentinean wine where it was exactly produced! There was probably a lot of messing around…

 

 

But if we are drinking, it’s highly advisable to have some food! So we wandered down another road and found a pizza place to our liking. I was getting frustrated about finding some Argentinean food. What are they? I’ve heard that the Argentinean steaks are great but looking at the prices, I decided to eave that for another time. But what else is there? Other than an extreme love of ham and cheese that Argentinians seem to relish, as advertised of having ‘jamon and queso’ sandwiches EVERYWHERE. Even on the long distance buses, breakfast was ham and cheese sandwiches, lunch was ham and cheese sandwiches and dinner? You guessed wrong…it’s not ham and cheese sandwiches…Argentineans like to go crazy and mix it up by producing cheese and ham sandwiches! Those crazy fools!

 

But as we stopped by this pizza restaurant, we were greeted with yet again another Spanish menu. I really got to work on my Spanish. If I would be going to Spain in a few months, I best get to work now and what better way to get started properly than in a Spanish speaking country! Playing guess the food, I was dismayed and amused by that the fact we ordered a ham and cheese pizza. But this time had olives, green peppers, red peppers and some eggs. And oh, yeah, we ordered a bottle of wine as well. Oops, when in Mendoza!

 

Walking back, we stumbled upon the night market in Independencia plaza and we had fun checking out a few places 🙂

 

Afterwards, despite the fact we haven’t done much but that’s the beauty of travelling. Sometimes you just want to sit back and enjoy the way of life there without doing any activities. This time, drinking wine and having ham and cheese sandwiches. Rock and roll dude.