Mendoza

Due to frustrating technical problems I´ve had yet another stand still in my blog entries. I am now going back about 3 weeks to Mendoza Argentina. In Buenos Aires we said good bye to Johannes and headed west to Cordoba, then Alta Gracia where we saw the disapointing Che museum in his families old house, and then to Mendoza where we stayed for a week in awsome Winca´s Hostal! The hostal had great people and even a swimming pool which was key with the 40 degrees weather without a cloud in sight. We had an awsome week in the capital of Argentinas famous wine producing province. We went of a few winery tours, learnt how to taste wine like the pros, ate too much steak, and more. I went white water rafting too with our new friend Daniela from Buenos Aires who was in our dorm room at Winca´s.
It just so happened that we were in Mendoza for the annual grape harvest festival (Festival de la Vindemia). There were two strange parades, one on the friday night and another Saturday morning. The town centre was closed off for the stream of 18 giant floats displaying each of the 18 region´s Wine Queen and their respective Wine Princesses. The Queens and Princesses threw fruit, vegetables, cookies.... even water melons into the crowd. One of the 18 Queens was then elected as the official Wine Queen of the province....

After the wine the second highlight of our week in Mendoza was Paragliding!! Here I am all geared up with my guide Pacho ready to run down the slope and then jump off a cliff 700 m off the ground! What an amazing experience!











Amélie brought her camera along for the ride so here is a little taste of the view from around 800 m above ground!


After Mendoza we headed far north to Salta where we stayed for 3 incredibly lazy days. The hostal staff were so much fun. Here we had our last evening of Argentine steak and wine before leaving country number 2 on our journey.