"Hell of a Cats"

 Part of our routine here in Mendoza is to go to our weekly “intercambios” (in English, interchange). These events are organized by the school and are advertized throughout the city.  Locals and foreigners alike get together to practice their English and Spanish.  On Mondays the intercambio is structured; they last two hours, and someone rings a bell every half hour to change from Spanish to English and vice versa. The first few of these were uncomfortable with our struggling Spanish. Nothing makes you feel like a bigger idiot than not being able to convey a simple concept. Especially when you know when you can speak better, but for some reason all that comes out of your mouth is gibberish.  But, as we have found out, making mistakes and trying to speak is the absolute best way to learn a language.

Intercambio in Bar

On Tuesday evenings, there is another intercambio, less structured, at a bar.  It’s been a great way to meet some really great people, but I have to say we did dread them in the beginning. Now that we are feeling more comfortable, they are enjoyable and the highlight of our time here.

At an intercambio a few weeks ago, a couple of new people showed up. They had both lived in the US is the past, one in D.C. and another in Utah. They were promoting a community theater play that was all in English, called “Hell of a Cast”. It was an adaptation of a play called “Noises Off” which you have probably never heard of (there was also a movie adaptation from the 80’s).  Tamara was really excited because she loves theater, and her high school had put on this play way back when, and she knew the script very well.

Hell of a Cast!

The play was in English.  All the actors were native Mendocinos, some had thick Spanish accents, and on top of that, many of the characters were supposed to have British accents.  Because of this, some parts were a little difficult to decipher, but overall it was a highly entertaining performance.  There are were several instances from this evening that we wanted to share which, we felt, were particularly “Argentinian”.

The play was supposed to start at 7pm. We went with some people from the intercambio and got there a few minutes before seven.  After we bought our tickets and went to enter the theater, the usher told us they were not opening the doors until 7:10. We all had a good laugh about the perceptions of time around here.  It is something that we always have to compromise on.  Dan always wants to arrive right on time or early, and Tamara always wants to arrive on time or a little late.  With the compromise, we usually end up getting to place on-time/eary-ish.  We now eat dinner around 9pm every night, but it’s still considered early for Argentine standards.

Hell of a Cats

Dan(Top), Maia (Left), Tamara (Middle) and Kate (Right)

While we were waiting for the doors of the play to open, we looked down at our tickets for “Hell of a Cast” (which is a funny title to explain to a native Spanish speaker.  “Hell of a …” is a compliment?) and instead the tickets read “Hell of a Cats”. Meow. You often see signs where something is lost in translation. Our favorite bar name here is "Very people....good things come in."

After the show, we went to our intercambio at the bar, where all the cats, ahem, I mean cast, showed up. They all got a big laugh after we showed them the tickets.  Another typical Argentine moment: When looking over the menu at the bar, I glanced at the vegetarian options. One of the two options was a chicken breast with vegetables on it (ha!).

We have learned many things during our language learning adventure (for a future blog post).  We have had a great time in Mendoza and are sad that we have to leave.  Next up, we have about two weeks where we are going to travel in the far northern part of Argentina to check out some amazing desert landscape. Then we will travel to Buenos Aires for a few days before flying out of July 18^th!

Los padres de Tamara nos visitan en Mendoza.

Bodega Salentein

On May 9th Tamara’s parents came to Mendoza for a two week visit. We did our best to host. Before they arrived, we found them a nice apartment on Pazoletta Ponce (little plaza Ponce). It had a large living area, included a full kitchen and wine glasses (it was perfect). It also featured, across the street, a small café, which, according to them, was a highlight of their stay.

When they first got here we were not sure how tired they would be after the long trip, but as it turned out they had a great flight, “the best plane ride we have ever had” (with LAN airlines if you are interested). The time difference worked out for them as well. California is currently four hours behind Mendoza, but most things happen about 4 hours later in Argentina, such as Dinner at 10pm. So the whole time they were here they did things 4 hours later on the clock but it was still roughly the same time they would do them in California. I doubt they had much trouble acclimating on the return trip either.

Coffee outside Bodega Andeluna

Night one, we took them to our favorite wine bar, The Vines of Mendoza. Once a week they host a different local wine maker who comes and gives a presentation on their bodega (winery) and their wines. They describe three of their featured wines as you sample them and snack on fine cheeses. It is interesting to hear the winemaking process from the winemakers themselves, who are so invested and passionate about what they do. The winemakers mostly speak Spanish but they have a very talented employee who does an amazing job translating to English.

Just another five course meal in Mendoza wine country.

Winery Visits. There are three main wine areas near Mendoza: Maipu (see previous blog about
riding bikes) which is the most accessible; Chacras De Coria, which is a little further, a little more upscale and probably has the most wineries; and finally Valle De Uco, the “Napa” of Mendoza, with amazing architecture and art museums, view of the Andes, and restaurants that serve you five-course lunches. Our winery visits spanned tours of the facilities from the winemakers themselves, to large scale operations with a designated tourism department. Valle De Uco probably had to be our favorite. It was peaceful, away from the city, with the vines turning red against the backdrop of Aconcagua, the tallest mountain in the Americas.

Tastings are generous here.

A closed-door restaurant? A “closed-door restaurant,” as we found out, is a private home where the owner entertains as a private chef prepares an eight-course meal. We discovered this establishment through the local wine magazine and were not sure what to expect. When pulling up to the restaurant we had our reservations as we passed by the scantily clad dressed “women” (who were actually men) so we asked our driver to wait until we knew for sure that we were in the right place. When I rang the doorbell, I heard a killer dog bark and then the door opens to a large man named Gonzalo who greeted me in English, “Who is Tamara? I thought you were going to be Argentine from the perfect Spanish in your email” (Tamara was very flattered). The interior of the house was, in sharp contrast to the exterior, tastefully decorated and with three tables set and music playing through a stereo connected to a cell phone. The host sat with us and told us his story about why we were eating in his house, we talked about our travels, politics of his

country and his experiences. His dog Tete (TT in English) was highly entertaining. As we sat in chairs and sofas around a coffee table, we were served wine and the first small (but delicious) courses. As the night progressed, we were invited to sit at the table where we enjoyed the main course, filet mignon (It is always steak here). After we went back to the living area, we enjoyed two courses of dessert and a glass of sparkling wine. Though we had some doubts in the beginning, after leaving we all agreed that this was an incredible experience and we were glad we took the risk.

View of Andes as we passed through them

Valparaiso, Chile. Jim really wanted to visit Chile and Tamara and Dan needed to renew our visas (you need to leave the country after 90 days or you will be fined) so we decided to take a trip to Valparaiso, Chile.  The 1st class bus ride lasted about 7 hours and featured amazing views as you pass up and over the Andes mountain range. We spent three nights and two full days in Valparaiso where we had a great time exploring the city. It is one of the most interesting cities We have ever been to. “Valpo” was a major port city before the Panama Canal was built and there was a large influx of European influence who saw Valpo and thought, “Forget San Francisco, I’m staying here.” In fact it has a lot of similarities to San Francisco, but grittier. When the Panama Canal was built, the money left Valpo and the city was left in shambles. But it’s coming back now. The whole city is built on steep hills, so no matter where you go, you get a spectacular view of the whole city and the ocean below. Throughout the city are funiculars, or elevators, to take you from the seaside flats to the neighborhoods above. Unfortunately, due to the economy these are slowly closing one by one.

Going up?

It appears as though the city was created haphazardly, because every street you go down has a tiny staircase or alleyway that connects to another street. The best way to see the city is just take whichever one appeals to you and get lost. Street art has also become common-place. Every wall that does not have a mural on it just gets graffiti-ed. Some of the graffiti is artistic and impressive, but some are just scribbles. Some of the locals have combated this problem with murals. If there is art on the wall, the taggers leave it alone. If you do not have art on the walls, you are committed to painting your building once a week to keep it all one color. However, you have to be careful looking at and taking pictures of all the art, because street dogs and cats are rampant, and so are their little presents.

View from our hotel

While in Valpo we got to tour the house of the poet Pablo Neruda, which was really impressive. Every piece of furniture, every wall, had significance. Not to mention the great view there. We also toured the Open-air Museum, or Museo Abierto. There were as series of murals hidden amongst the maze of alleys and walkways. To see an impressive event of Valparaiso culture, there is an urban downhill bike race every year, down the small alleyways and stairs, dodging street dogs, for a small money prize.

After crossing back into Argentina, Tamara’s parents packed up to leave for their next adventure: Buenos Aires! 

Stay classy Tamara!

Muchas Uvas!

 Spanish for "a whales back side"

ART

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!

Tree growing out of wall (Just like in Yosemite)

Street Art

Gato

Street Art

Key board stairs

Different stairs from different times

Jennie and Delaney and Maipu (whose pu?)

Our friends from Yosemite, Jennie and Delaney, also happen to be in South America.  In fact, they were traveling all over Patagonia the same time we were but, somehow, everywhere we went, we always missed each other by a day or so.  They are currently staying in Santiago, Chile with Delaney’s brother, who lives there, and decided to come over to Mendoza for a long weekend. It was great seeing familiar faces and being able to discuss exciting things like traveling, US politics and Yosemite Institute politics!

Delaney, Tamara and Dan at Hot Springs

We took a day trip to some hot springs in the foothills of the Andes. I guess we should have gone when it was warmer because there was a whole water park attached (closed due to cold weather), with lazy river and all!  However, it turned out to be a misty fall day, so it was nice hanging around in the warmth.

We took another day trip to a mountain town called Uspallata. Turns out, they filmed part of Seven Years in Tibet in this town. We all wondered why they just didn’t film in Tibet, but hey, we got to sit in a Café that Brad Pitt probably sat in. We rented bikes and explored a pre-Colombian smelting site, and then a little further, some Inca carvings. Uspallata also has poplar trees lining all the roads, and they were all turning yellow, along with the multicolored hills, it was a beautiful day.

Poplar trees

Next, we ventured out to Maipu, one of the wine regions surrounding Mendoza to rent bikes and tour some of the wineries.  It all sounds so peaceful; riding bikes in the wine country, but it is actually an amusing adventure.  First, you arrive at the bus stop that is crowded with gringos.  To ride Mendoza’s public buses you need either exact change or you need a rechargeable card.  For some reason the hostels do not tell the gringos this.  Dan and I are always doing our best to blend in and keep a low profile, and the obnoxious gringos on the bus make us cringe a little.  When the bus arrives, everyone piles in, and the clueless tourist looks at the change machine confusedly, while the bus driver rolls his eyes.  This must happen every day.  Both times we have been on this bus, Dan has swiped our card for several people as they hand him the pesos.  We actually make a little profit on this because they never have exact change.

Andes view from Maipu bodegas

Then the bus full of loud English speakers rattles down to Maipu, and the driver signals everyone (Gringos and other English speakers) to get off at Mr. Hugo Bikes.  This is not an actual bus stop. We don’t know if the driver gets a kick-back from Mr. Hugo, or if he’s just eager to get the loud gringos off his bus. Mr. Hugo’s is always busy.  As soon as you arrive, they pour you a plastic cup full of horrible jug wine while you wait for them to bring out bikes.  The bikes cost $8 to rent for the day, but the funny thing is, they don’t take down your name, they don’t keep your ID, nothing. Dan and I were debating just riding off back to city center to have an $8 bike for three months. I mean, we would give it back…

Bike Parking

Delaney, Dan, Tamara and Jenny at bodega Carinae

There is a beautiful sectioned off bike lane…which ends about 200 feet from Mr. Hugo's. Then you are on the shoulder of the narrow road with cars and semi-trucks whizzing by. It gets even more interesting after you have had a few glasses of wine. This does make the wineries accessible for people without their own transportation, and on a budget, and you get a workout at the same time. One of our favorite wineries was a good 45-minute pedal, each way. What a buzz-kill! Literally!




As you arrive back at Mr. Hugo’s at the end of the day they take your bike and hand you another plastic cup of the same awful grape juice.  Waiting for the bus to take us back to city center, you can see abandoned plastic cups all along the sidewalk.

It was sad to see our friends leave Mendoza but we will no doubt see them when we return to the states.

Tamara 

Historic smelting site

Pictographs

Us with some grape vines

Life in Mendoza

Getting to Mendoza
Our plan from the start was to stay in Mendoza for an extended period in order to study Spanish.  Our immediate goals were to find an apartment, enroll in a Spanish school and find a hostel to stay in while we did our search.  When we arrived and found the hostel where we had reservations, we were pleasantly surprised.  In Buenos Aires, we stayed in a hostel that had okay rooms, but the rest of it just felt somewhat grimy and the bathrooms were smelly.  Here, in Mendoza, for the same price we had a nice room with a clean private bathroom.  The hostel was in a cute old house that had a beautiful garden courtyard area and a pool!  However, there is always a catch.

Fountains in Plaza Independencia

Fountain in Plaza Independencia

Mendoza is in a desert but you would not know it from walking around.  Every street is lined with large old trees each of which grows a next to, and receives water from, a 2-foot deep, irrigation ditch.  Water is released through these irrigation ditches once or twice a week in order to water the many thousands of these trees throughout the city.  When the water is shut off, and the water recedes, the ditches are left with water which becomes stagnant.  This must be where the mosquito breeding takes place.  At night, they would visit us in ridiculous numbers.  It was hot enough that we had to sleep with the windows open, but there were no screens, so the mosquitoes would enter in unrestricted clouds.  There finally came a night where we reached out limit.  At about 1 am we realized that there was no chance at sleep under the presiding conditions.   We sealed everything up and went on a mosquito-killing rampage. It was a team effort, we ran around the room armed with magazines using every method possible to kill them.  We learned they liked to hide in the folds of our backpacks so we would stand ready with our weapons before giving one of the packs a good kick and then do our best to be sure there were no survivors.  That night we slept very warm but we slept.  The next day we found another hostel, which, in many ways, was not as nice, but we had a private room with air conditioning and no mosquitoes.

Language School
We looked up the language school that Tamara’s friend Cody had recommended to us, and signed up for a week of “intensive” courses. This consisted of 4 hours of class a day, 5 days a week. The classes had about 4ish people in them, most classmates staying for a week before heading off to a new place. The classes were a bit unstructured, but they did give some good practice speaking.  After the first week, we decided that we liked the school.  We switched from every day classes to attending two afternoon classes per week.  This has allowed us to have more time to do other things throughout our days but still have some structured class time.

Apartment hunting

Our apartment

Apartment searching in another language can be amusing.  We decided that we did not want to spend much money but were willing to spend a little extra if we could find one with WiFi, an oven and air conditioning.
We were able to look at one apartment through a connection with the school. It was a nice enough place, but the location was not great and the living room had these two couches, which converted into the beds, and no oven. Then we met someone that worked at our hostel that had an apartment, which had everything we wanted and the price was right, but it felt a bit run down and dirty.
We started looking online and though the classifieds in the newspaper.  Using classifieds to find an apartment was a challenge for us.  We had to ask around to find out which of the eight or so newspapers we should use, translate the classified entries and call the numbers we found.  Talking on the phone is hard enough English, in Spanish its even worse.  We located a calling center and wrote out a rehearsed speech like “Hi, I’m interested in the apartment that is in Diario Uno [the big newspaper here].”  Tamara did the talking and after reciting her speech, the other person would say something rapidly in unintelligible Spanish and then hang up.  Dan would ask, “What did they say?” and Tamara would say, “I don’t know, I don’t think it’s available anymore.”  Either that or I was supposed to meet them somewhere.  I just didn't know.

Parque San Martin entrance gate

After a week of trial and error style apartment searching, we got an email back from a website called Mihouse.  A woman named Mercedes got back to us and through her, we were able to see two more apartments, and we really liked one of them, which we are now living in.

Lake in parque San Martin

It is very small but it is the only apartment we saw that had air conditioning, WiFi and an oven (which is essential for the baking enthusiast).  Other benefits include a nice BBQ in the backyard, which we are able to use and it is located only two miles from Parque San Martain.  This main city park, though a bit run down, is large and beautiful.  Some of its features include a lake with a row club where you can watch crew teams practice rowing back and forth along the lake.  There are also works of art throughout the park, which demonstrate a time in the past when the city was really prospering including beautiful statues and elaborate fountains.

Now what?





Since our only commitment is now Spanish class for a total of about 3 hours a week you might ask, “what do we do with the rest of your time?”  Here is a small list…

Spiral Staircase

• Living two blocks away from the park allows us easy access to miles of unpaved running trails, of which we have taken full advantage.  
• We spend a lot of time studying Spanish both at home on our own and we attend several evening, school-sponsored activities.  Some of these activities include weekly “intercambio” events where locals and foreigners alike get together to practice speaking.  These intercambios take place both at the school and at a bar where alcohol, we believe, makes it a bit easier to speak Spanish.  These activities are a great way to interact with locals so we are trying to make a point of going.  
• In addition to being a great place to study Spanish Mendoza is also the wine capital of Argentina so we are doing our best to study this topic in great detail.  We have participated in a harvest, attended wine tastings and do as much research at home as possible.

Tamara with Nagrita (she found her way back to us)

Bariloche to Buenos Aires

We have been a bit busy lately and as a result have fallen a bit behind on our blog.  We meant to post this about 3 weeks ago.  Sorry for the delay. 

There was no direct bus from Pucon to Bariloche so a detour with a stop in San Martin de Los Andes was necessary. While in San Martin we were lucky enough to see a hip hop dance competition between local elementary and high school students and it was awesome!  We walked around and decided it looked exactly like Pucon.  And it rained. 

The next day we got on a bus to Bariloche.  Once off the bus, we quickly found “The Penthouse” hostel.  There is no sign for this hostel. The Lonely Planet directions said for us to, “find the tallest building off of the main square, take the elevator to the 10^th floor and look for room 1004.”  As its name suggests it is a hostel located in an actual Penthouse suite.  The views were amazing from the hostels large floor to ceiling windows.  The first two days it rained (no, I’m not joking) and the forecast called for rain the remainder of the week.  Even though we both had been feeling pretty “hiked-out” at this point, we didn't want our total Bariloche experience to be in a hostel so we decided to do one more trek regardless of the weather.

View of Bariloche from our hostel

We caught a bus to a gigantic ski resort where we were joined by other tourists and workers who were making repairs and preparations for the rapidly approaching ski season.  This is also where the trail to Refugio Frey began, and after four hours of easy hiking we were there.  We are told it is a very famous Refugio as far as refugios go.  There are some amazing granite walls with only a short approach, which makes this a popular climber destination.  Frey is an old two-story stone hut on the edge of a lake that looks like it could have been taken right out of the Sierra Nevada mountains in California.  After setting up our tent we explored the refugio which we discovered, to Tamara’s delight, is kitten friendly.  We pulled Negrita out of her super secret backpack chamber so she could chill with the rest of us.  It was a small building with a woodburning stove for heat.  Next to the stove was a beanbag chair with a napping kitten we named “Gato Liquado”.  Negrita curled up with Gato Liquado and they became instant friends.  With mixed feelings, Negrita decided that Refugio Frey was the place for her and decided that she would stay behind and make it her home.

Refugio Frey

For the climbers: Right next to Refugio Frey

Negrita y Gato Liquado!

After some tears, we left Refugio Frey in search for Refugio Jakob.  According to the book, there was a simple trail to follow.  After being “temporarily misplaced” we finally found the trail, and we couldn’t believe that it was a trail at all.  No one ever built the trail.  Someone at some point found a way to cross the pass, straight up the mountain side, which became the trail.  It is marked with red circles and at times becomes 4^th class climbing (all while wearing large backpacks).  After the summit we assumed that the slope would be more gradual for the downhill which, as it turned out, was not the case.  After the vertical hike and walking through a long, glacially carved valley, we realized we still had another pass to go over before the next refugio which turned out to be a repeat of the previous pass experience. Lonely Planet described this trek as “pass hopping through beautiful mountain scenery.”  Pass crawling and sliding was more like it but it was beautiful, no doubt.  The scenery made us feel like we were back home in Yosemite.  When we finally got to the bottom of the second pass and after we made our way through some foot-deep mud we arrived at Refugio Jakob. 

The view from the top. The trail went straight down from here

Pass number 1: The beginning of our "climbing" adventure

The view from Refugio Jakob

The next day we made our way back to the bus, which (we discovered) did not take money (apparently you were supposed to buy your ticket ahead of time) and we didn’t have tickets so we played dumb and got our ride for free.  We spent one more night at “The Penthouse” before catching a 20 hour bus back to Buenos Aires.  Taking advice from other travelers, we sprang for the “cama” class, which gives you a nice wide cushy chair that reclines 120 degrees, you get this leg rest thing, and they serve you meals! How luxurious! Almost all the long distance buses in Argentina and Chile are double-decker buses, so one mistake we made was to reserve the seats right in front of the windshield on the second floor.  We discovered it is better to be completely ignorant on how the driver is driving.  We spent two nights in BA (it rained hard) where we picked up the bag that Miguel and Flor were kind enough to hold on to for us. After spending the last two months wearing the same three sets of clothing, it was like Christmas when our wardrobe suddenly increased to five outfits. Eager to get to Mendoza we booked another 14-hour bus ride. 

Volcanoes and hot springs

From the Navimag Ferry, we headed north to the town of Pucón, Chile. Pucón is a town where the wealthy Chileans come to vacation, and it’s a beautiful town, but a little crowded and touristy. It’s right on a lake surrounded by tall mountains and volcanoes. One of the big attractions is to climb Volcan Villarica (9,341 ft). Since you need an ice axe and crampons to climb the volcano we went with a guide.

The scenery was amazing, you could see the town and lakes in the distance along with another, even larger, volcano.  We were climbing up an active volcano that constantly emits gasses so the guiding companies gave us each a gas mask in case the winds changed.  The interesting thing was that the guides had us leave our packs (with gas masks) below the summit and only bring layers and a camera. As we were slowly making our way to the summit the winds changed direction, and whatever vapors were coming out the volcano instantly made our sinuses and throats burn. Everyone in the group was coughing but it passed quickly. We both have been around other volcanically active areas. The vapors from this volcano did not smell like sulfur, which is stinky, but relatively harmless. These vapors smelled…deadly. We had few moments at the top to snap some photos. You could look directly into the crater and see the smoke coming out but more whiffs of the vapors made you want to get out of there quickly.

Coming down the volcano was the exciting part. The guides gave us a short (too short) lesson on glissading. For those of you not familiar with glissading, it’s a fancy French word for sliding on your butt or feet. You can use the ice axe to brake your speed, but neither of us has had much experience with this. The slides the guides told us to go down were these big long (water-slide looking) trench things in the snow. Sitting in one of these trenches, we assume the position and the girl in front of us goes. We can’t see much around the bend but her scream sounds like she was having fun! We were wrong.

Some of you may have experienced glissading out of control down a mountain and it is not fun. You are supposed to sit on your butt, knees bent, bottom of the ice axe digging in the snow to brake. Tamara went down and it was steep, too steep. She leaned on her ice axe, and there was no slowing down. She was digging her ice axe, heels, elbows, anything in the snow to slow down and nothing helped. Soon her feet were flailing around, and she was rotating side to side when the sides of the chute flattened out and she could see the other people in the group standing far below. She finally came to an abrupt stop at a snow bank, heart racing, hands shaking, terrified. Dan came down a moment later looking just slightly more graceful. There were about seven more of these slides to go to get down before reaching the bottom. It turned out the first one was the steepest and as we made our way down the mountain, the whole glissading thing got a lot easier and a lot more fun.

After we arrived safely down at the vans, we shared our disbelief that the guides take totally inexperienced people up and down that route every day.

The next day, still a little sore and bruised from our ascent, we set off on a 4 day trek in nearby Huerquehue (pronounced Where-kay-way) National Park. Compared to our experience in Torres Del Paine, it was like we had died and gone to another place. It was really our first time in about a month having sunny and warm weather and we got to hang out on a perfect summer day with our feet in a beautiful lake. The first campground was clean and quiet, and the scenery was reminiscent of the high Sierra but with more tropical looking plants. Our second campground and destination was located next to natural hot springs, which were glorious. We camped under some apple trees and soaked our tired muscles in varying pools of hot water. We were sad to leave, but just in time because the rain was coming yet again.