Mendoza: Day 3

Great last day in Mendoza. The weather has been perfect, sunny with a nice breeze. We rented some bicycles and rode from vineyard to vineyard, in a small town outside of Mendoza called Maipu ( yes, it's pronounced how you would guess). The scenery was incredible, with the Andes in the background.

If you don't do the wine tasting, the tour of the vineyard is free! And we got to eat the grapes right off the vine, they were the sweetest and juiciest I've ever had, but the skin was pretty tough (I guess that's typical of wine grapes).

They also have a lot of olive trees here - the climate is right, and since they have leaves year-round, they act as a windbreak for the grapes, and provide much-needed shade. At lunch we got to taste some local olives (yum), and at dinner the other night we dipped our bread in some very strong local olive oil. Amazing.

All in all, it's been a great trip. The people here are really friendly and really proud of what their region has to offer.

We're trying to get back to the hotel and then the airport now, to go back to BA, and there is not a cab to be found...ah, Carnaval.

Mendoza: Day 2

Some of you are probably wondering what a Mormon does in Mendoza, when 99.99% of people who visit here come for the wine. In fact, our tour guide on the bus this morning said "El que vino a Mendoza y no tomó vino, porque vino?". It's a play on words in Spanish, but it means "He that came to Mendoza and didn't drink wine, why did he come?"

Well. I am loving this trip. It's beautiful out here, it reminds me of the western United States, and the mountains are breathtaking.

Fun fact the tour guide just told us: Mendoza produces more garlic than anyone in the world except for the Chinese.

Also, the guide just said "We want to thank our bus driver Jorge today - he doesn't have a drivers license and he doesn't suffer from alcoholism, he enjoys it". Love the sense of humor (I'm fairly sure it was just a joke :)

Mendoza also hosts the tallest mountain in the entire Western and Sourhern hemispheres, Aconcagua (22,837 feet) but the road to the base was out due to mudslides. We did see the second tallest in the area, Tupungato (21,555 feet). It's a volcano!

Since we couldn't go see Aconcagua, the tour company took us south to Valle Grande. The three hour drive reminded me even more of the American west. There are "oases" where the major rivers are (Mendoza, Tupungato, San Rafael, where all the major vineyards are), and in between it is very arid. Our destination was a canyon, which we drove through, and saw a series of hydroelectric and irrigation dams, which they're very proud of. We took a boat ride on one of the man-made reservoirs, and I swear we could have been on Strawberry Reservoir in Utah.

It was pretty crowded in the canyon - people were zip-lining, rafting, kayaking, swimming, and drinking lots of mate. It seems this is definitely a hot spot for Argentines to come over Carnaval, a bit like Memorial Day.

More tomorrow!

Mendoza! Day 1

We are spending the weekend in Mendoza, and we are having a great time. We arrived yesterday on an overnight bus, which is how most Argentines travel around Argentina. The terminal in BA was PACKED (it's a holiday weekend here, Carnaval).

Mendoza is a 12 hour drive from BA. It's famous for being the wine-growing region of Argentina. It is about 2500 feet above sea level, dry but still fairly green, and at the foot of the Andes, near the border with Chile. Mendoza is a much smaller city than BA, and you can tell that most of life here probably revolves around the vineyards (and other agro industries like olive oil and chocolate making). When the bus crossed the provincial (state) line into Mendoza, there were dozens of signs and checkpoints for agricultural control. One sign said something like "Mendoza: the province free of pestilences," and other said "Roll up your windows and prepare for insecticide spray-down."

One fun connection I have with Mendoza is that one of my cousins is serving his LDS church mission here. I thought "how is he going to get anyone in Mendoza to want to be Mormon when their whole life revokes around wine?!" But he loves it here, and loves the people and culture. One thing he wrote home to his family about was "siesta" time. This doesn't happen in BA, but I guess out in the provinces the towns completely shut down for several hours each day. I tried to catch this in a picture yesterday: there was no one on the streets, it was eerily quiet. We actually aren't sure if it was siesta time, or because it was a Saturday or Carnaval, but every single little shop was closed. I could sure go for a siesta every day (though the Argentines actually need it because they don't even usually eat dinner until 10).

I also took a picture from our hotel window of "the Andes.". Funny thing: those are actually just tiny foothills, the real Andes are behind them, and even though the Andes are extraordinarily tall, when you're right up against something else, you can't see them!

Today we've just started out on a driving tour of the region, and I should get some good pictures of the real Andes.

More to come!

Pictures From Rio!

Rain and clouds were threatening the whole time, but sure made for some great pictures!  Check them out here.

Mike found us a great hotel right on the beach in Copacabana.  We had a great time sightseeing, and spent a fun day catching up with family friends my dad has kept in touch with since his mission.  They fed us a great authentic Brazilian lunch!

Thanks to Mike for surprising me with flowers when we got home.

Loving the Married Life

Well, Mike and I just hit our one-year anniversary on the 21st (we celebrated in Rio, pictures to come!). And I'm sure all of you are very interested to hear how our first year went (probably not, but I'll tell you anyway).

The first 5 months were absolute chaos - we spent 3 months on different continents, then 2 months visiting family and friends, and then we moved overseas to the bottom of the earth.

Then things slowed down and we could breathe. We both have been working in the consular section, just like old times in Caracas, and we spend lunch talking about the interesting people who we interviewed that day. We've settled into a routine, we live in a great city, and have been doing what we love most: traveling.

And though we do each occasionally have an activity or invite that doesn't involve the other, we generally spend all our time together. We work in the same office, we cook dinner together, we go out on weekends or to parties together, we go to church together.....and although some people might go crazy from that much togetherness, I still feel like we are a great team at work and at home, and that we get along very, very well. Mike might chime in on his own post, I sure do talk a lot more than he does at home, and very well might drive him crazy :). I am so grateful for Mike and the good times we have, and that our love for each other keeps developing (and for his patience with me. I actually remembered on my own to go to the bank yesterday, and I think he was a little surprised when he came to remind me and I had already gone. But I had to go again today and I forgot :).

Today we had beautiful weather and early release from work so.....we had a 2-hour lunch at an outdoor cafe, then went to an art museum. We talked about work, current events, Mike's world travels, art, food, and it was just so amazing to me: you can spend 24/7 (figuratively or in our case literally) with someone, and still learn more about them and more from them. It was a great day today.

Love my neighborhood

Saw this beautiful sight as I was walking through my neighborhood to visit with some ladies from church -- great walk, and I think I made some friends tonight, who live close by!

Sushi!

I LOVE SUSHI!

And tonight I fulfilled, well, not a life-long dream since the first time I tried sushi was in 2006, but a long-time dream. I made sushi! Mike helped me (he's made it many times before) and it turned out pretty well!

The ingredients went a long way - 2 cups of rice made 5 rolls! So, we'll be doing that again.

We got the sushi rice and seaweed in Chinatown this weekend! I can't believe we hadn't been there yet, it was fun to explore. Lots of shops with imported goods (not just asian - plenty of Tabasco sauce and salsa too). And the street food was pretty tasty, we had dumplings and bubble tea and a sesame sticky bun. Yup, we'll be going back.