true story: buenos aires was named the same way the vikings named greenland, as a farce. the air here smells like smog and garbage fires, which to me smells a bit like peanut butter. hundreds of garbage fires behind us now, michael finally agrees with that analysis. anyway, we're in buenos aires.
michael says all the hostel owners here regarded us with suspicion when we first pulled up, at 10pm. all said they were full. the place we finally did end up staying originally told him they were full, then saw the car and me inside of it and realized he wasn't a bum, and the desk lady ran out to the street and gave us a room, sans heat or wifi, but for cheap. (it's still cold here... we were hoping this was finally where our toes might thaw) anyway, we found a comfy bed, and tomorrow i guess we're going to try to leave the car somewhere around here and take a ferry to uruguay.
yesterday was our wine country bike tour day. we didn't make the entire 40km circuit, probably because we got off to a late start, and we spent a lot of time at the first winery. we went to a total of three, which actually is plenty of winery for both of us. each place wants to give you the tour before the tasting. we were excited to take the first winery's tour, but then they're kinda all pretty similar, and after biking all over maipu (that's the rural-ish suburb of mendoza where many of the wineries are grouped conveniently for you to bike around to) we really just wanted to sit down and drink wine. we went to two small family-owned vinyards and one huge corporatish-one. i hate to say it, but the big winery had the best wines. anyway, we had single-speed cruisers, both of which had frames that were way too small for us, so we didn't exactly fit in the entire 40km loop as planned. all told we spent about 6 or 7 hours out with our bikes, but a lot of that time was spent with a wine glass in hand. if the aim of the bike/wine concept in mendoza is to burn the calories you consume, i'm not sure it's effective. but we had a great time in the sun, which was warm, which is such a rarity on this trip.
after the bike/wine tour we feasted on pizza #24,506 of this trip (south america really likes italian culture) and then headed for the plains, driving across the entire south american continent. we landed on the east coast, in buenos aires, a couple of hours ago, thinking it would finally be warm. it's not, at all, but at least it's warm enough that the hotel rooms don't automatically come with califactiones (heat) and you still don't feel like throwing in the towel and heading immediately to the carribean coast.
so tomorrow we are off to uruguay for a whirlwind trip via ferry - probably just a night - and then back here to pick up the car, and we'll head north to paraguay then iguazu falls, then to brazil to meet tanmoy for two weeks of hopefully WARM beach & amazon time.
pictures!
michael says all the hostel owners here regarded us with suspicion when we first pulled up, at 10pm. all said they were full. the place we finally did end up staying originally told him they were full, then saw the car and me inside of it and realized he wasn't a bum, and the desk lady ran out to the street and gave us a room, sans heat or wifi, but for cheap. (it's still cold here... we were hoping this was finally where our toes might thaw) anyway, we found a comfy bed, and tomorrow i guess we're going to try to leave the car somewhere around here and take a ferry to uruguay.
yesterday was our wine country bike tour day. we didn't make the entire 40km circuit, probably because we got off to a late start, and we spent a lot of time at the first winery. we went to a total of three, which actually is plenty of winery for both of us. each place wants to give you the tour before the tasting. we were excited to take the first winery's tour, but then they're kinda all pretty similar, and after biking all over maipu (that's the rural-ish suburb of mendoza where many of the wineries are grouped conveniently for you to bike around to) we really just wanted to sit down and drink wine. we went to two small family-owned vinyards and one huge corporatish-one. i hate to say it, but the big winery had the best wines. anyway, we had single-speed cruisers, both of which had frames that were way too small for us, so we didn't exactly fit in the entire 40km loop as planned. all told we spent about 6 or 7 hours out with our bikes, but a lot of that time was spent with a wine glass in hand. if the aim of the bike/wine concept in mendoza is to burn the calories you consume, i'm not sure it's effective. but we had a great time in the sun, which was warm, which is such a rarity on this trip.
after the bike/wine tour we feasted on pizza #24,506 of this trip (south america really likes italian culture) and then headed for the plains, driving across the entire south american continent. we landed on the east coast, in buenos aires, a couple of hours ago, thinking it would finally be warm. it's not, at all, but at least it's warm enough that the hotel rooms don't automatically come with califactiones (heat) and you still don't feel like throwing in the towel and heading immediately to the carribean coast.
so tomorrow we are off to uruguay for a whirlwind trip via ferry - probably just a night - and then back here to pick up the car, and we'll head north to paraguay then iguazu falls, then to brazil to meet tanmoy for two weeks of hopefully WARM beach & amazon time.
pictures!
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| we drove down from chile through those mountains in the background. they're a lot larger than they appear here! |
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| bikes & wines |
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| old winery - from 1898 |
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| new winery - built in 2007 |
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| someone's tired of tours and ready for the tasting part |
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| this is how you boot a car in argentina. not very effective. |
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| i ordered the chef's special, gato sopa |
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| i didn't really eat a cat. here he is, alive and well and on my lap. |
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