Sabrosa! Our wine country adventures

After finishing up our southern Patagonia adventures it was time to head north. We caught a flight to Buenos Aires, where we met up with my aunt and uncle who joined us for the next 10 days. We had a really long layover (7 hrs) and figured they wouldn't be to the airport until a couple hrs before the flight, were we surprised to see them checking their luggage right ahead of us (5 hrs before the flight). It turns out that they had more trouble traveling from Michigan to Buenos Aires then we have had in our 7 months on the road. Luckily, they had planned to get in a day early, so they didn't miss any of the fun stuff. Our flight to Mendoza was delayed, so when we finally arrived at 10 PM we were all ready to stumble into the hotel....none of us where prepared when the driver informed us that it was a 1 hr and 40 minute drive to Posada Salentein!! Luckily the long drive was worth it and we enjoyed our first bottle of wine with a meat and cheese platter at midnight. This late night adventure also resulted in the word of the trip “Sabrosa!” being coined by Bry, which means tasty but can also mean awesome, amazing or pretty much anything else we wished.

After a lazy morning the next day we headed to the winery for a tour and tastings. This winery was HUGE, they make over 16 million bottles a year. This was the first actual winery tour we have gone on, so it was great to see all of the equipment and storage casks being prepared for the harvest which was just about to begin. The tasting was a little bit different then the others we have done so far (only 3 wines), but all 3 wines were outstanding. After the tasting we headed to the restaurant for a 3 course lunch which wouldn't have been complete without more wine! At lunch we were each served approx half a cow (in steak form), some delicious empanadas and a chocolate dulce deleche volcano thing. All three were amazing (along with the 3 bottles of wine), after a couple hours we all rolled out the door, quickly meandered through the art museum and then headed back to the Posada for a relaxing evening. Dinner that night was again HUGE and by midnight we were all in a food/wine induced coma. I'm pretty sure I could have stopped eating after this and been set for the next 10 days, but of course no one in their right mind says no to amazing food and wine!

After breakfast the next morning (because their croissants and fruit were amazing) we headed over to another part of the vineyard to go horseback riding. The weather was perfect and we spent an hour riding around walnut trees, grapevines, and looking at the mountains rising around us. The saddles were definitely different from any I had used before, and we had a lot more freedom to ride then the typical USA trip (no waiver to sign either). An hour on the horses was plenty and we soon headed off to visit another vineyard. This vineyard grew organic grapes and the wine was good, but nothing compared to what we had at Salentein the previous day. We had lunch scheduled in a different restaurant, where they gave us copious amounts of food and we finished off another 5 bottles of wine! In Argentine tradition we didn't finish eating that meal until almost 5 PM. After all of the excitement (and food and wine) of the last few days I was beat, so I took a nice 3 hour nap and awoke just in time for dinner. Since it was Saturday the chef had prepared a traditional grill. I was so full I could only take a bite of each different kind of meat. The boys must have bottomless pits for stomaches because they kept taking more meat, round after round as the waiter brought out the tray. It was a great end to our stay in the Mendoza region, the next morning we headed off to Bariloche for fishing (we thought).

On a side note, the timing of our trip turned out to be perfect. The grapes were all overflowing the vines, with harvest to begin in a couple days. All of the leaves were beginning to change to brilliant reds and yellows before our eyes. Due to this I now have more grape photos then I could ever possibly need!

 

Fishing Camp! Or so we thought...

The trouble with expectations, especially in regards to accomodation, is that they are often too high and can lead to disappointment that bleeds unnecessarily into the remaining aspects of a particular trip.  The trouble with finding out that you have a totally inaccurate itinerary is that no matter how low your expectations were for a place, they go through the roof as soon as you find out there has been a change.

Imagine this scenario: you are supposed to arrive at a small fishing lodge on the banks of a beautiful river beneath gorgeous snow covered peaks and upon landing you are taken to a large hotel 3 kilometers outside of the city which is not on a river and not beneath snow covered peaks.  This is pretty much what happened to us when we got to Bariloche.  The four of us were met by a guide and a driver fully expecting a long drive but soon found out that the hotel was close and right along the route for our half day area tour (also not on the itenerary).  We checked in and dropped off our bags - the hotel was very nice, and under any other circumstances we would have been impressed by the place, but those darn expectations were getting in the way.  We piled back into the van and our guide, Paula, proceeded to show us around.  She was as confused as were were - originally she was supposed to take us 90 kilometers north of town to a small fishing lodge and now she was supposed to provide some sort of half day tour of Briloche and the surrounds.  We drove along the shore of the lake, took a chair lift up to the top of a hill, and drove around the most expensive hotel in the area.  She did a wonderful job and told us as lot about the area, but there just wasn't much to see aside from a couple of nice viewpoints.

Paula didn't know anything about our plans for the next few days (we were staying at the hotel for four nights) so we sent the travel agent an email and went into town to explore and look for some of the places she recommended we eat.  They happened to be building a giant Easter egg out of chocolate in the town square, and we got to catch a glimpse or two of the construction.  Chocolate is a big industry in Bariloche and apparently Easter is when they really show off.  We learned that soon the town would be flooded with people from all around Argentina and nearby South American countries who chose to spend their vacations coming to see the chocolate festival.  There would even be a chocolate bar that extended 5 city blocks along the main shopping street and at some point they would break the egg and cut up the chocolate bar and share free chocolate with all the locals and visitors.  Unfortunately, we would be leaving before the festival got started, but it was fun to watch the town get ready - we checked on the progress of the egg nearly every day.

We got back to the hotel and had a message that our fishing guides would pick us up at 8:30 the next morning - at least fishing was still part of the trip, even if we weren't staying at a fishing lodge.  After breakfast we met our guides Eugene and Nico before heading out of town.  We had to stop to buy fishing licenses (not part of the original itinerary, which said everything was included) before we got to the launch point for the boats on the banks of the Limay River.  They provided us with waders and fly rods and we split up - Julie and I on one boat with Eugene, and Pam and Bryant on the other.  As we got used to casting fly rods again Eugene gave us a few pointers and we floated along, me standing in the front of the boat and Julie sitting in the back.  After floating for a while and not catching anything (not even a nibble) we pulled the raft over and tried our luck wading along an island in the river.  I caught three "fish", each about 3 inches long, before we had to get back in the boat.  The only other action we got all day was Julie catching a nice fish on a spinning rig.  Bryant caught a couple of fish from the other boat and when we pulled ashore for the ride back into town we stood at a total of six fish (including the 4 minnows) between the four of us.

We left again the next day hoping for better luck, but we were floating another section of the same river so none of us were holding our breath.  We switched it up and the boys loaded up with Eugene while the girls went with Nico.  It was a slow start but eventually we stopped the boat in front of a run and Bryant and I each caught several minnows as the girls floated past.  It wasn't the big fish we had been imagining for the past year, but at least it was already more action than the previous day!  In the next run Bryant caught a nice fish and I reeled in one that Eugene hooked.  When we stopped for lunch the girls were still sitting at 0 fish.  After lunch we caught a couple more fish when we stopped to wade at another run, with mine being the biggest of the trip.  We continued to get bites in the boys boat but only landed one more before the day came to an end.  The consolation prize for our fishing outing is that we had an outstanding home cooked lunch each day and also got to drink some more great Argentina wine.  As for fishing, we got that down we'll have to come back some time and try catching instead.

Or last activity in Bariloche was a day trip to go rafting.  We weren't quite prepared for the 5 hours we spent in a van to get there and back, or the fact we were made to pay for lunch even through our itenerary said it was included, but the river was a lot of fun.  It was the narrowest river I have ever rafted and the rapids came quickly - there were nine over the course of 7 kilometers - and all were of the class 2 to class 3 variety.  We lost Bryant on the very first one (I might have helped him fall out when I was thrown into him from my side of the raft) but the rest of only went swimming voluntarily near the end of the trip.  We ended up stopping right at the border with Chile and got pictures next to a sign marking the division of the two countries.  

We returned to the hotel excited to hear about Pam's hike, only to learn that no one ever came to pick her up.  The next morning we were all more then happy to leave Bariloche and head to Buenos Aires.

Hiking...."Climber Style"

We had all morning to kill before leaving for Chalten, so we found a laundry place and used our minimalist spanish to ensure we could pick it up before our bus left.  We spent the rest of the time walking around the nice little town of Calafate and re-packing our things so we didn't have so much to carry while we were hiking.  The laundry and the bus ticket both worked out fine and by 9:15 that evening we were being picked up and driven to our hotel for the evening.  Much to our surprise we were given vouchers for dinner at a small restaraunt in town and enjoyed some meats, cheeses, empanadas, and local wine.  It was a great way to spend our only night in town.

The next morning we were met by our guide, Luis, and driven to the starting point for our 4 day hiking adventure.  Once again it was just the two of us and a guide.  We hiked for about two hours before reaching the Refugio where we would spend the night.  This one was much more rustic then the ones in Torres Del Paine (aka I would have rather slept in a tent). We dropped our heavy stuff and faced a decision - hike further up the valley on a relatively flat trail to a nice viewpoint or hike a steeper trail to an old basecamp for people climbing the peaks around Fitz Roy.  We chose the steep option and were in for a shock when we started climbing.  We gained 1,000 meters (3,000 ft) in the course of two hours, turns out this "trail"  made by climbers was straight up, no switchbacks, and lots of loose rocks.  I'm not sure the distance of the trail but based on what we did on the Colorado Trail I would say we were gaining close to 1500+ ft per mile, which is obnoxiously steep.  At the top we were rewarded with amazing views of Fitz Roy and also of the southern Patagonia ice field in the distance.  It was a great way to spend the afternoon and after we caught our breath we were glad we went with the steep option. The hike back down went faster but was much more painful on the knees and feet so we spent the evening relaxing while Luis made us dinner.

We left the next morning and back-tracked for a couple of hours before joining up with another trail heading South into the National Park.  We bouldered to an overlook of a glacier with Fitz Roy in the background (it looked much more impressive from this angle) and then continued on to another spot we could drop off heavy things before climbing yet another hill.  This hill wasn't as long or as steep as the last one but still proved to be a bear compared to the hiking we did in Chile (it was also full of people).  We were once again rewarded with outstanding vistas, and the view of Fitz Roy and its surrounding peaks from this angle might have been the best of the trip.  There were two lagoons beneath the mountains with glaciers hanging all around.  We enjoyed our lunch and watched all other tourists mill around before heading back down to grab the rest of our stuff and continue on to camp for the night.  We stayed in tents and this time Luis did not have to make us dinner because the people who ran the camp also did all of the cooking.  

We awoke the next morning to one of the prettiest sunrises we have ever seen and the day turned out beautiful once again. We made quick work of the first portion of our hike and by noon we had already dropped our bags at the next camping spot and continued on with only day packs.  We were headed to Glacier Grande and had to cross a river by "zip lining" across a couple of suspended climbing ropes.  This led us to yet another steep climb - today it was short, but we also had to go back down to get to our destination so we ended up having to climb both directions. The viewpoint of the glacier was beautiful but it was very windy and as we ate our lunch we watched the peaks of the Torre range get covered in clouds as it started to rain in the distance.  We took off so we would beat the rain and made it back to camp by 3.  Julie and I played rummy while Luis cooked.  We were the only people staying at this camp which is run by the various guiding companies and Luis told us that we were his company's last group for the season.  Because somebody brought up all the supplies from dinner earlier in the day, and it was only a couple hour walk from town, we got to enjoy a bottle of wine with our dinner.

Or last day was supposed to be spent learning to ice climb on the glacier we had seen the previous day, but we learned that it was too dangerous because of how quickly the glacier was receding. All trekking companies stopped offering that excursion two years ago.  We were a little disappointed in our travel agency - if that activity stopped being offered so long ago why did they include it on our itenerary? That made our last day of hiking very short, with just a two hour jaunt back into Chalten and it turned out for the better because it was raining heavily in the mountains when we got back to town!  We caught an earlier bus back to Calafate and I had a relaxing evening while Julie worked on planning the last few weeks of the trip (have me mentioned we have an end date chosen!).