The truth is I’ve already left you.  I know it’s cheesy but I had to since so many of you made this joke…you know who you are.

Bariloche, Argentina

March 18-21, 2016

I arrived in Bariloche on the evening of the 18^th.  Bariloche is an interesting city that I think wishes it was in Europe. The city center is fun with great restaurants, bars, swiss themed houses and chocolate. The rural areas have beautiful mountains and crystal clear lakes. The areas in between…look pretty rough..very slum like. I think the people in these areas are the ones that Eva Peron was supposed to be helping (see what I did there…linked it all together). So as a tourist of course I spent time in the city center and the mountains.

In the city, I stayed in a hostel that had really great views of the lake so I took a lot of sunset pictures.  I also met some nice folks that I went to dinner, with my first night there. We went to a cute brewery/bar called Manush.  Great food, beer and company.  Here are some sunset pictures, enjoy…

On my second day, I planned a full day of horseback riding.  It was an absolutely perfect day to be outside with just a slight chill in the air and sunny blue skies.  We drove about 30 minutes out of town to beautiful, peaceful, idyllic Lago Gutierrez. The day started with tea/ coffee and donuts in an adorable little lodge with a wonderful little garden with Kermit the Frog green grass and Grover blue lake…well maybe not Grover blue.

I got a white horse named Blue Moon, I think (I couldn’t hear the guide that well).  She was super sweet but kinda lazy so I was given a little stick to encourage her.  Don’t worry, I just needed to tap her with it to speed her up a bit.  There were 5-6 dogs that lived there that joined us on the ride…they were pretty entertaining.  During the day we rode through the valley and the trees.  It reminded me of the Robert Frost quote “the woods are lovely dark and deep, but I have promises to keep, and miles to go before I sleep” original right? but it’s what came to mind.  At one point we came to a clearing where you could see the mountains, cows, dogs, horses…it was amazing.  We also rode past some adorable houses, pebble beach, stunning calm blue lake and beautiful mountains.

We stopped for a nice lunch back at the lodge and hung out at the pebble beach for a bit where there were cute geese hanging out and my favorite photographic subject, drift wood :-). After our break we got back on the horses and climbed one of the mountains.  Definitely a more advanced ride since there was a lot of climbing involved and it was super dusty. Four hours is a long time for a novice…my booty hurt for several days afterwards but it was worth it because the view was absolutely wonderful.  Also, fyi, it’s hard to ride a horse with a giant camera…don’t do it…it’s not worth it.  Some pictures below.

Mendoza, Argentina

March 21 – 25, 2016

From Bariloche, I took a bus to Mendoza, the famous wine region of the country.  This was my last stop in Argentina so I decided to spend a bit more time here and chill out.  The ride to Mendoza was pretty impressive with beautiful changes in the landscape.  At night I could see the stars from the bus window as I went to sleep.  Also, on the bus I watched ‘The man from U.N.C.L.E’ and have decided that I like Armie Hammer…didn’t even know who he was.

I stayed at a B&B in Mendoza since I was going to be there more than a couple of days.  When I arrived I thought that I would have the place to myself but on my second day another guest joined, we hit it off, and ended up having quite a fabulous time together.  The first couple of days ended up being housekeeping days…I did laundry, got groceries, updated the blog a bit, reviewed a resume and even played in PowerPoint again, the new version takes a bit to get used to.

On the next day, the other B&B guest and I did a tour of Aconcagua, the highest mountain outside of Asia, at 6,961 meters, and the highest point in the Western Hemisphere and the Southern Hemisphere. We went through one of the wine regions in Mendoza (Maipu),  the different parts of the Andes mountain range, Punte del Inca (hot springs with a land bridge), Aconcagua and the mountain border between Argentina and Chile.  It was a fantastic experience and a great day.

Punte del Inca

Punte del Inca with Gerda

Aconcagua

Aconcagua

Aconcagua with Gerda

Border between Argentina and Chile

That night my B&B mate and I had a fantastic steak dinner, delicious Argentinian wine and a wonderful evening.

The next day we decided to explore the Maipu Wine region in Mendoza.  We took a local bus which was a fun experience.  We started with the wine museum, which was a bit of a dud but afterwards we went to this beautiful small vineyard named Domiciano de Barrancas. They had a great garden with olive trees and where we had a delightful lunch with charcuterie, eggplant and a bottle of red wine.  After a long, leisurely lunch, we got a tour of the vineyard with a very knowledgeable tour guide who was studying to be a sommelier. It was a wonderful afternoon.

That evening we enjoyed another wonderful dinner together and great conversation.  I had one more day by myself that I used to chill before I headed on to Chile and the next leg of the journey.

I loved my time in Argentina.  It truly is an amazing country with such varied landscapes, unique flora and fauna and generous, kind people.  Even though I had a month in Argentina, there is a lot that I didn’t get to see and I’ll definitely need to visit this great country again one day.

I’m starting to think this year is just a scouting trip to figure out which places I need to revisit.