Mendoza, Salta #1, beginning of Cafayate...
Yet another successful night bus experience, yay! I arrived at my hostel, interneted as per usual, then went upstairs, showered, met my very sweet Swiss roommate, Julia, then conked out to recover from a less than restful night. I went to dinner that night with Julia and her new Mexican-Swiss friends (that’s a new combination for me!) and was happy to find Mendoza prices, like Cordoba prices, a bit lower than those in BA. More happiness! The next day I intended on doing the winery touring by bike and ended up getting caught up in a boy conversation with two cute American girls who are studying in BA. One of them actually goes to PLU and works in the development office with Kari, and I was reminded yet again of just how small this world is. J Winery plans sort of got aborted, and we ended up walking and exploring the enormous San Martin park and enjoying the sunny weather, exchanging boy stories. My story just never gets old and I don’t get tired of telling it!
I did manage to make it out to the wine country the next day, though. I hopped on the bus all by myself, went to Mr. Hugo’s to rent my bicycle, and set off for the wine museum! At the end of the one-hour tour, I was befriended by a group of hostelers that were staying at another hostel and ended up hanging out with them for the rest of the day. An Israeli guy, four Irish, a Dutchman, an Englishman, and me. It was good fun, wine tasting (even though I still don’t like wine all that much) and riding bikes through beautiful wine and olive country surrounded by mountains in perfect autumn weather. We went to three wineries, an olive oil factory (P.S. fresh olives off the true, or at least the particular variety we tried, are nasty!), and a chocolate/liquor factory. It was such a beautiful day! When I went to drop my bike back off with Mr. Hugo, I received yet another free glass of wine (that great Mr. Hugo…) and as I was relating how one of my new friends’ bikes broke in a not particularly amusing way, I heard what sounded like an old lady laughing behind me. I turned around not to find the family grandma, but to find a little green parrot laughing at me. It was hilarious! Never in my life have I seen a laughing, nay, cackling parrot. And it wasn’t the same laugh over and over again, it was quite varied and it didn’t sound at all as though he was copying someone! What a happy bird…
The next day I began the 19-hour bus ride to Salta. Oh the joy of long, long bus rides! The thing about the bus rides isn’t the fact that they’re so long, it really has more to do with the fact that they’re so cold. Not only do the windows let in an incredible amount of cool air, but they put on the air conditioning. Air conditioning! It’s so dang cold, who would need air conditioning?! However, I have taken to traveling with a blanket, and although Ben calls me a nana for it, I don’t care because my arse is warm on that bus! Sometimes I love being sensible. : ) Other times, I resent the fact that I’m carrying around yet another item...I think I need to tell you how it was the worst bus ride I have had so far. I got on the bus in Mendoza and realized that my seat was broken, so I would get it to a height I wanted, but it would never stay. My seat rode the bumps of the bus, pushing me up and then plunking me down over the bumps. Uhhhhh, not good, but the bus was full, so I figured, oh well. Then there was the fact that instead of just having one person sitting behind me, I had a girl with her little brother sitting on her lap, who decided that kicking my seat every now and then was good fun. I sent back some warning looks that worked for a few hours at a time, but the kicking would always start up again. Then about an hour or two into the bus ride, a horrible stench filled the back of the bus. Little boy had an accident, and it took about half an hour of smelliness for the mom to take her boy to the bathroom to clean him up. There were also about five babies on this bus, one sitting just across the aisle from me, and there was some crying to help the ambience filling the back of the bus that day. Mm hmm. Let’s also throw in the fact that the bus was stopping nearly as much as it was going and the surprise bus change in the cold, rainy darkness of the morning, and you have a pretty good idea of how much I liked that bus trip. I just tried to think of happy thoughts, to distract me (I lived in Tina-Marcus world during most of that trip!).
But I arrived in Salta safe and sound and I reunited with Banana Ben. After wiling away the morning by telling our latest traveler stories, we headed out to San Lorenzo with a few other friends, Zoran from Croatia and Caleb, a strange guy from the states to search for some recommended cake. Uh, go to another city just for cake? You bet! I mean, I’m not a huge cake fan, but the thought of going to another city for sugar was good enough for me. San Lorenzo was nice, definitely a ritzier suburb of the city. And we found our cake in a beautiful castle-like building (fitting, since its name was El Castillo…genius!). Huge ceilings stacked with bricks and wooden beams and grand arches. Very European. And the cake prices were pretty good, too, better than Buenos Aires dessert prices. The cake was SO good, and actually cheesecake—easily the best cheesecake I have found in South America. One was a ricotta cake with peaches and the other was regular but light cheesecake with frutas del bosque (which I think meant raspberry in this case, maybe mixed with some other berries). Ben and I also ordered submarinos, and they were the prettiest dang submarinos I have ever seen!
After the amazing cake, Ben and I indulged in the best street food I have had on this country (Salta’s adding up to have some really strong points). There are three little sandwicherias across the street from the bus station, and they were advertising milanesas for four pesos. An unheard of price, they’re usually twice that much! We decided to risk the street food factor of it and we ordered our sandwiches. There was much delight in watching the lady take fresh meat out of the refrigerator and put it on the grill, right in front of us, and put the fresh bread roll halves into the handy toaster beneath the grill. She added lettuce and tomato and our selection of sauces (and I have arrived back in aji country! Yay for some spice!), and even added a fried egg. I cannot even tell you how wonderful the sandwich was, it may even be better than the hamburguesa especial from Mancora. That is tough to beat!
We made a lovely dinner that night…well, we had really good corn on the cob, anyway. Can you tell that I’m becoming more and more obsessed with food as we go along? Ben and I totally fed off each others’ cravings, it was both wonderful and dangerous to the figure! Anyway, the next day we took off for Cafayate (after having a sandwicheria milanesa for lunch, of course) and arrived in this gorgeous, picture-perfect little town, surrounded on three sides by mountains with cotton candy-like clouds sitting in between, and vineyards and cornfields in the middle. No building was more than three stories tall and that particular building happened to be our hostel. We had an amazing rooftop terrace (I am so in love with rooftop terraces and patios!—as if you couldn’t tell) that was all wooden, with a little cubby house on top that’s supposed to be used as a bar, but not a drop of alcohol was sold during our happy little tenure in the hostel. Anyway, the so-called bar had 360 degree windows so when it was windy we could sit inside and look out at the surrounding beauty, over the rest of the town. Absolutely beautiful. Our first afternoon we walked around the center of town to get our bearings. And when I say get our bearings, I mean we found the alfajor factory and the bakery (which we frequented every day) and then bought some vegetables for making soup! We paid less than $2 and ate that soup for dinner for the next three nights, and it was good! Thanks to Ben, because I just peeled some vegetables…
The next day we headed out bright and early, at 10:30 am, to do some wine tours. Now, I am far from being a wine connoisseur, but even I could tell that the wine in Mendoza was of good quality. At these next bodegas, though, we tasted easily the worst wine I have ever had in my life! My lovely traveling partner likened it again and again to cat pee. If that gives you any kind of an idea… After that less than moving tour (it was free, so who can complain?) we went on a tour of La Quebrada (which apparently means canyon or gorge, and there are quebradas all over this area). This particular quebrada? It had the most amazing mountains I have ever seen in my life. In one region you have red mountains, tan mountains, brown mountains, green mountains, and yellow mountains, and they’re all squished in right next to each other. They’re also of all different shapes and sizes, craggy, smooth and round, rocky, some that have been wind beaten until their shape looks completely unnatural.
I did manage to make it out to the wine country the next day, though. I hopped on the bus all by myself, went to Mr. Hugo’s to rent my bicycle, and set off for the wine museum! At the end of the one-hour tour, I was befriended by a group of hostelers that were staying at another hostel and ended up hanging out with them for the rest of the day. An Israeli guy, four Irish, a Dutchman, an Englishman, and me. It was good fun, wine tasting (even though I still don’t like wine all that much) and riding bikes through beautiful wine and olive country surrounded by mountains in perfect autumn weather. We went to three wineries, an olive oil factory (P.S. fresh olives off the true, or at least the particular variety we tried, are nasty!), and a chocolate/liquor factory. It was such a beautiful day! When I went to drop my bike back off with Mr. Hugo, I received yet another free glass of wine (that great Mr. Hugo…) and as I was relating how one of my new friends’ bikes broke in a not particularly amusing way, I heard what sounded like an old lady laughing behind me. I turned around not to find the family grandma, but to find a little green parrot laughing at me. It was hilarious! Never in my life have I seen a laughing, nay, cackling parrot. And it wasn’t the same laugh over and over again, it was quite varied and it didn’t sound at all as though he was copying someone! What a happy bird…
The next day I began the 19-hour bus ride to Salta. Oh the joy of long, long bus rides! The thing about the bus rides isn’t the fact that they’re so long, it really has more to do with the fact that they’re so cold. Not only do the windows let in an incredible amount of cool air, but they put on the air conditioning. Air conditioning! It’s so dang cold, who would need air conditioning?! However, I have taken to traveling with a blanket, and although Ben calls me a nana for it, I don’t care because my arse is warm on that bus! Sometimes I love being sensible. : ) Other times, I resent the fact that I’m carrying around yet another item...I think I need to tell you how it was the worst bus ride I have had so far. I got on the bus in Mendoza and realized that my seat was broken, so I would get it to a height I wanted, but it would never stay. My seat rode the bumps of the bus, pushing me up and then plunking me down over the bumps. Uhhhhh, not good, but the bus was full, so I figured, oh well. Then there was the fact that instead of just having one person sitting behind me, I had a girl with her little brother sitting on her lap, who decided that kicking my seat every now and then was good fun. I sent back some warning looks that worked for a few hours at a time, but the kicking would always start up again. Then about an hour or two into the bus ride, a horrible stench filled the back of the bus. Little boy had an accident, and it took about half an hour of smelliness for the mom to take her boy to the bathroom to clean him up. There were also about five babies on this bus, one sitting just across the aisle from me, and there was some crying to help the ambience filling the back of the bus that day. Mm hmm. Let’s also throw in the fact that the bus was stopping nearly as much as it was going and the surprise bus change in the cold, rainy darkness of the morning, and you have a pretty good idea of how much I liked that bus trip. I just tried to think of happy thoughts, to distract me (I lived in Tina-Marcus world during most of that trip!).
But I arrived in Salta safe and sound and I reunited with Banana Ben. After wiling away the morning by telling our latest traveler stories, we headed out to San Lorenzo with a few other friends, Zoran from Croatia and Caleb, a strange guy from the states to search for some recommended cake. Uh, go to another city just for cake? You bet! I mean, I’m not a huge cake fan, but the thought of going to another city for sugar was good enough for me. San Lorenzo was nice, definitely a ritzier suburb of the city. And we found our cake in a beautiful castle-like building (fitting, since its name was El Castillo…genius!). Huge ceilings stacked with bricks and wooden beams and grand arches. Very European. And the cake prices were pretty good, too, better than Buenos Aires dessert prices. The cake was SO good, and actually cheesecake—easily the best cheesecake I have found in South America. One was a ricotta cake with peaches and the other was regular but light cheesecake with frutas del bosque (which I think meant raspberry in this case, maybe mixed with some other berries). Ben and I also ordered submarinos, and they were the prettiest dang submarinos I have ever seen!
We made a lovely dinner that night…well, we had really good corn on the cob, anyway. Can you tell that I’m becoming more and more obsessed with food as we go along? Ben and I totally fed off each others’ cravings, it was both wonderful and dangerous to the figure! Anyway, the next day we took off for Cafayate (after having a sandwicheria milanesa for lunch, of course) and arrived in this gorgeous, picture-perfect little town, surrounded on three sides by mountains with cotton candy-like clouds sitting in between, and vineyards and cornfields in the middle. No building was more than three stories tall and that particular building happened to be our hostel. We had an amazing rooftop terrace (I am so in love with rooftop terraces and patios!—as if you couldn’t tell) that was all wooden, with a little cubby house on top that’s supposed to be used as a bar, but not a drop of alcohol was sold during our happy little tenure in the hostel. Anyway, the so-called bar had 360 degree windows so when it was windy we could sit inside and look out at the surrounding beauty, over the rest of the town. Absolutely beautiful. Our first afternoon we walked around the center of town to get our bearings. And when I say get our bearings, I mean we found the alfajor factory and the bakery (which we frequented every day) and then bought some vegetables for making soup! We paid less than $2 and ate that soup for dinner for the next three nights, and it was good! Thanks to Ben, because I just peeled some vegetables…
The next day we headed out bright and early, at 10:30 am, to do some wine tours. Now, I am far from being a wine connoisseur, but even I could tell that the wine in Mendoza was of good quality. At these next bodegas, though, we tasted easily the worst wine I have ever had in my life! My lovely traveling partner likened it again and again to cat pee. If that gives you any kind of an idea…
Okay, I'm running out of time, but I'll do more writing soon! And maybe I'll even be able to upload pictures, too!
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