Mendoza: Vino, vino y más vino!

So it has been a while. We’re here over 8 months and the end of our travelhood is coming to a close. Ame is heading home March 3 and I will be heading back to the states May 19, but not arriving home until June 2, 2011. I will be one year out of NYC to the day and I am looking forward to my homecoming. This week Amy is visiting Iguazu with Courtney, and I am sure they will have some fun stories of their excursion. However, Amy and I took one last trip together after Patagonia with our friend, Alison, from England, who headed home last Wednesday. We called this our último viaje—we took our first trip to Bariloche with Alison, so it was only fitting that we took our last trip with her too.

Well what better last minute get-away than a trip to Argentina’s wine country—Mendoza. The three of us boarded an overnight bus on Tuesday evening and arrived bright and early on Wednesday ready to taste some wines. And while we truly did have good intentions of doing some mild trekking, the weather just did not cooperate with us. While walking towards the park it started to down pour (by down pour, I mean drizzle) so we took that as a sign from a higher power to get a jump start on the wine tasting.

The Vines, an US owned tasting room, opened at 3:00pm, so we arrived promptly at 3:15pm to start tasting some wines. We had a really nice server, Julien, who basically let us taste wines and chat the afternoon away. I think we were there for at least 3 hours and by the time we left, we were all feeling quite happy. We decided to be true tourists and go to an early dinner- 8:30. We went to a really great restaurant called Bistro Alice (or something like that) and we all had delicious meals. Ali and I continued to sample some wine, but Amy was well behaved and decided to hold off until our 9AM tour departure the next day.

Amy and I in the tasting room at The Vines

That’s right; we tasted our first set of wines at 10:30AM or as I like to call it: the breakfast of dignitaries. The tour we went on took us to four boutique vineyards. I liked the first one we went to the best. This is probably because not only did we taste 4 delicious wines, but we also got to taste delicious champagne! It’s sort of hard to top that even though all the other vineyards had great tasting wines too. We ended the tour at a vineyard were you could walk around and taste all the different varieties of grapes right from the vine…well at least that is what Juan our tour guide told us so we all went ahead and sampled under his instruction.

Breakfast at Dante Robino vineyard. Buy a bottle of their wine if you see it! Delicious!


Amy, Alison and Juan getting ready for lunch. Check out all the wine glasses on the table!!

Tasting grapes right off the vine, Alto Vista.

Juan was such a knowledgeable guide and he also turned out to be extremely hospitable and invited our entire group (7 of us) to his house the next day for an asado and a dip in his pool! So not only did we get to hang out by a pool all day we also got to enjoy a delicious traditional argentine BBQ our last day in Mendoza. We literally left from Juan’s right to the bus station. We headed home with full stomachs, new friends, and an overall great último viaje!

Sitting down for our asado at Juan's

A my name is Amy ...!

Remember that game?  Turns out it's even fun as an adult, as Cait and I discovered when we used it to pass some time on our long hikes in stunning Patagonia.  I couldn't believe some of the hikes we completed, especially with our annoying minor injuries (blisters, knee strain) -- and cheesily enough, I am really proud of what we achieved!  A few experienced hikers said that some of the trails we all did were more difficult than what they were labeled by the parks (i.e. medium trails should have been coded as difficult trails), so guess it means that we are not as non-hiker-ish as we originally thought.  :)


Given the amount of hiking we did throughout our 2.5 week trip, I thought it best to give you the goods - i.e. the photos that captured it all.  Don't worry though, they're labeled, condensed to the very best (I started with 400), and many shots contain people.  


Even though it's summer in BA, it was definitely not summer down south (we sure do love that winter, huh).  The wind was insane in some towns (ahem, El Chalten, I'm talking to you!) and it was difficult to walk even to the waffle house next door. I thought I had seen rough wind in Tribeca when I nearly got knocked over walking to work, but that was the wind of a hand fan compared to the winds in these towns.


Anyway, click below for a virtual tour of our trip. :)

Patagonia 2011 (AR & CH)

I had so much fun on this trip and hope that you all have a chance to go someday!!  Next stop Mendoza (i.e. where all those delicious malbecs are grown), starting on Tuesday.  Ah, the joys of having some free time!


p.s. If you're curious, A my name is Amy and my husband's name is Arthur, we come from Alabama, and we sell Apples!

Guest Blogger: Lisa in BA!!

Jan 4-5: Amy welcomed me with open arms on the sunny streets of BA!  She introduced me to some neighborhood sights and Caitlin joined us for dinner at my first parilla (steakhouse)! The steak was muy bueno, especially with a pinguino of Malbec:)  The next day was spent wandering the city and on a great walking tour of the neighborhood Recoleta.  I learned all about Argentine history as well as the beautiful plazas, palaces, embassies, and apartment buildings lining the streets of BA.

Wine is always better in a pinguino!

Vatican embassy on Avenida Alvear

Jan 6-8: Amy and I headed to Punta del Este! It was probably the shortest flight (30 min) we've ever been on...as well as the bumpiest and scariest.  Luckily Amy is a better flier than I am, so I was able to squeeze her arm for the whole 30 minutes…even though she was still at the end of her what we think was the flu… My friend Florentine picked us up from the airport and we headed straight to the beach. The sun did not set until 9pm. I then truly understood why Argentines and Uruguayans don't eat dinner until 11pm!! We spent our 2 nights in Uruguay in a share-house with  Flor and Nico's (her husband) friends who rent the same house there every year. It was not the best of accommodations…since they slightly overbooked…but it was a beautiful house with great beaches, perfect weather and new friends!  

At the beach in Punta del Este - it was around 8 p.m.!

Lisa & Flor with the beautiful 9 p.m. sunset

A photo of the cool house

On our way to lunch - we're shielding ourselves with our towels because we neglected to put on sunscreen!

Jan 9: We made our way to Plaza de Mayo to see Casa Rosada (the presidential building) and then to the San Telmo market, which was filled with leather goods, vintage items and Amy's favorite Argentine cartoon, Mafalda:) We had a leisurely lunch, walked along the water in Puerto Madero, and dinner was at Casa Felix - a closed-door restaurant.  A lovely couple (yes we had a girl crush on the wife) opens their home to approx 20 people Thurs-Sat night and prepares a 5-course meal with unique flavors and local ingredients, including fresh herbs from their wonderful garden. We ate in the courtyard, enjoyed savory food and wine, and even ate pulpo (octopus)…well some of it at least! It was definitely one of my favorite evenings in BA:)

Din at Casa Felix with our friend Lindsey

Jan 10-14: We spent the next and last few days sight-seeing, shopping, museum-ing at the amazing National Museum of Decorative arts, Evita museum and Malba.  Amy and I also proved our true athletic abilities as we braved the streets of BA via bicicletas!  The bike tour through the parks and rose gardens were lovely, but we almost didn’t make it back on the streets of Palermo.  Let’s just say BA drivers are not the most biker friendly... We also attended a great cooking class, saw incredible graffiti, ate meringue, drank mate, didn’t get anything stolen and enjoyed excellent wine for very few pesos. My last two dinners were at Amy’s favorites - Don Julio and La Cabrera - both delicious and memorable.

One of the stops on our bike tour - the very pretty rose garden in Palermo

Walking around Recoleta

Muchas gracias Amy and Caitlin for opening your adorable home on Paraguay street to me, giving me a preview into your lives over the past eight months, and sharing your most favorite new sights, activities and culinary favorites.  It was a perfect trip.  Can’t wait to have you back in NYC now!!

Muchos besos!

Lisa

And the moral of the story is...

Seven months in Buenos Aires and I am still learning the tricks of the trade. Fortunately, yesterday I learned an important lesson by example and not through personal experience.

The lesson learned: never help a little old man (viejito) into his building unless you are absolutely positive of your exit strategy.

Last night I went to a pub quiz/intercambio and afterwards I was going to meet Amy and Lisa (her friend visiting from NY) at a neighboring bar. I left the pub quiz with a friend, Roger, from Australia- a real character, think Sean Penn in Fast Times at Ridgemont High- and while we were walking to meet Amy, we heard frantic knocking on a door. When we turned to look, we saw two people trying to get a passerby’s attention. We approached them and they begin to explain in really bad Spanish that they needed help getting out of the building. I told them that I spoke English and they explained that they had helped an old man into the building and on to the elevator and when they went to leave the building they realized that they could not get out without a KEY!! This is extremely common in BsAs, for security reasons, you have to use a key to unlock the door in order to exit. Unfortunately, these two turistas did not know this tidbit of information and they found themselves trapped in the vestibule between two locked doors! It was a guy and a girl from England and the girl seemed to be on the brink of a full blown panic attack. They asked us to ring some bells to see if a neighbor would come down and let them out. Well, without hesitation, Roger begins to ring as many bells as possible in order to solicit some help. However, no one is willing to come down and help these two people leave, because I am sure they all thought this was a complete scam. I have to say, I can sympathize, I don't know if I would be running down to let a stranger in my building, especially one with some strange foreign accent.

Instead, I stopped an Argentine and asked for his help. He rang for the doorman, but of course there was no answer. He then had a very good idea of ringing the bells of those who lived on the first floor so that they would not have to go very far to help the trapped turistas. Well, they didn’t want to help either. The Argentine then went to get a police officer. The policeman came and assessed the situation, but he too realized there was little that could be done. The kind Argentine took off, almost in a light jog, so I decided to follow his lead. I motioned to Roger to let's get going and of course, he had to take a quick snapshot before we too left the scene. (I'll try to have him email it to me for viewing pleasure)

As we were walking away, I asked Roger what he thought the moral of the story was and he looked at me, obviously perplexed by the question, and said: “What? Never help old people into their building.” Exactly. So with that said, I would like to apologize in advance to the viejitos of Buenos Aires, I will not be helping you into your building anytime soon…

P.S. Don’t worry, I walked pass the building this morning and the turistas had been freed.

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas?

I have been following the blizzard in NY and cannot believe I live on the same planet as you. It is 37 degrees here- I've taken to the Celsius system because no one I talk to here (besides Amy) knows Fahrenheit, but I believe it is equivalent to almost 100 degrees. But what makes the heat even worse is the humidity; Amy has had to take two showers a day the past two days because of it. So you can imagine that it has been a tad difficult to get into the Christmas spirit: you can't bake cookies because you don't dare put the oven for fear of heat exhaustion and the smell of evergreen trees in the streets obviously doesn't exist here either. I can honestly say that Christmas crept up without me even realizing it. Fortunately, Amy and I got invited to a potluck Christmas Eve at an Argentine’s apartment, there was tons of food and drinks and we were in great company of people from all over the world. The holiday gathering was donned the moniker “the orphans Christmas party.”

Photo: An impressive non-traditional Christmas tree made out of green cerveza bottles

Christmas is celebrated a little differently down here. For starters, everyone gathers on Christmas Eve, which they refer to as Nochebuena, and have dinner at normal Argentine dinner time, anywhere between 9:30PM- 11PM. At 12 midnight you have a champagne toast and the children promptly open their gifts left for them by Papá Noel. Usually, the night lasts well in to the early morning hours. Christmas day is typically used as a day for catching up on sleep. So Amy and I followed suit. We left the party shortly before 5AM, and por suerte found a cab to take us home, we both slept in the next day, me till 2PM and Amy until slightly before!

Photo: Amy enjoying the fiesta with two Aussies: Allison & Marlo

Photo: Me dancing in the street to a drum parade down defensa with Anabel, another party-goer, cerca 3AM

Since most ex-pats are used to celebrating Christmas, well, on Christmas, we were invited to a roof-top asado (BBQ). Amy's Aunt Ro and fam arrived Christmas day so she obviously skipped out on the asado, but I moseyed my way on over to the asado at around 8PM. The asado was hosted by a New Zealand ex-pat and he made a great spread! Delicious food and the guests brought great desserts! This night I managed to get home by the reasonable hour of 3AM.

We are still smoothing out are plans for NYE, but I am sure it will some more good times.

Photo: Waiting for the Christmas meal to be served

Wishing you all a Happy, Peaceful Año Nuevo!

Visits + Trips = awesome!

Around the same time that the Murphys arrived in BsAs, my good friend Lauren and her good friend Lanny from high school came to visit.  We had a blast!  Since I'm working, I couldn't spend the days with them, but they made their way around BA (and Colonia, Uruguay) like true portenas.  Impressive ladies, impressive.  


On their first night, a Saturday, I hosted a bunch of friends (I use that term loosely - some people I had only met once and the portenos don't consider those people friends) at a bar to usher in the last year of my 20s.  It was such a happy birthday, definitely because of my visitors and BA friends, but also because of the amount of love I received in card or other form from back home!  Thank you to all.  So lovely.


My birthday actually was on Sunday and the 4 of us (Cait, Lauren, Lanny, and I) went to our first futbol game.  It was so awesome.  We all dressed in red for the occasion to route for the River Plate team and sat with the crazy yet amazing fans.  I have never felt energy in a stadium as I did at that one.  People did not stop singing, moving, throwing paper, etc.  It was wild!  They don't serve alcohol there because it's rowdy enough without it (or when people drink beforehand), and when the game is over, as a fan of the home team, you have to wait about 20 minutes before they let you out of the stadium so that the visiting team fans can escape safely.  When everyone lined up at the end waiting to get out, I thought there might be a stampede or something the way people looked.  Fortunately, we got out safely and got to enjoy a nice Mexican meal at a restaurant down the road.

On most days, it's incredibly hot here now.  Fortunately, we got to experience one of those days poolside at my friend's apartment building.  She lives in one of the luxury high rises in the Puerto Madero neighborhood (supposedly the most expensive place to live in the city) and invited us over for a swim, which I was ecstatic about - I definitely wanted to see her apartment and I also wanted to alleviate the strong urge I've been having to swim!   We bought stuff for mimosas and made our way over there.  Our friend Marlo was there too, so the 5 of us set out for the pool, overjoyed to have some relief from the heat.  Unfortunately, my friend hadn't learned the pool rules yet after almost a year of living there - and the guest limit per apartment is 2.  Oops!  She graciously let me, Lauren and Lanny stay at the pool first, with a rotation plan to take effect in 20 minutes.  Well, 2 hours went by and there was no sign of the girls.  We were really happy not to be released from the pool, but we were baffled that they hadn't kicked us out as planned!  A half hour later, my friend came down and reported that they had just enjoyed the apartment and didn't need a swim.  So, we got to enjoy the full last hours of the sun without interruption.  Amazing.


This past Sunday Caitlin and I ran the hash again.  It was supposed to be 75 degrees, max, but lo and behold, it must have been in the 90s.  We were melting.  Luckily, the hash hosts had a pool, so I got to jump in right after the run (yes, with my running clothes on - who has time to change in that heat!). An awesome asado (bbq) followed and it was definitely the highlight of the hashes so far!


In Amy-Caitlin trip news, we are planning our trip to Patagonia for January.  It will be about 2.5 weeks.  We have flights and most hostels booked and it's sure to be amazing.  Obvs there will be a report when we return.


In the meantime, work ends 12/30, my aunt, uncle, and cousins arrive on Christmas, and several other folks I look forward to seeing will be here around then as well.  My friend Lisa then arrives in early Jan.  Yay!


Lots of other things I can report on, but for now, I'll leave you with this already long post.  
Happy holidays to everyone!

Guest Blogger: Mama Pat Murphy!

On November 30th Brian and I arrived in EZE airport BsAs for the start of our Argentine vacation and visit with Caitlin. The 11-hour trip was not nearly as bad as we anticipated. We got through immigration and found the driver who would take us to our apartment that did not look as good as it did online and the promised American kitchen did not exist. And yes the Bunsen burner did run out of gas and the rain on the roof sounded like gunshots but it was in a nice area and Caitlin was able to stay with us so all in all it was fine. Our first day consisted of eating lunch, visiting with Caitlin and having dinner. The following day began our series of “forced marches” through the city of Buenos Aires. Caitlin walked us until we could go no further most days! Our first stop was the Recoleta Cemetery where Eva Peron is buried. The cemetery is filled with the beautiful mausoleums of the rich and famous of BA. Caitlin has taken all her visitors to the cemetery and by now it is a little boring for her. She spent her time in the shade while we explored the cemetery.

During the following days we took 3 tours – 2 BA FREE tours that were super. The guides were hilarious and informative. The tours took us many areas of the city; we saw all the major buildings, plazas, the cathedral and neighborhoods. We experienced the protests which occur daily, learned not to be careless and step out in the street without looking (you WILL get run over), and were careful not to step in anything the numerous dogs left behind.

Protest

The bus tour, as Caitlin said, was the worst by far but it did take us to the Boca area that was colorful and interesting.

On our longest march we walked about 8 miles from Congreso to Puerto Madedo, walked an ecological reserve and then walked back to San Telmo! This is the day we managed to find bad beef in Argentina!! And while the meal was not great, we barely cared. We were happy to be sitting down!

Reserva Ecológica

We spent a day in Tigre a 45-minute train ride outside BA. It is part of the river delta area. We took a boat ride along the river, walked the riverfront and visited the art museum. The museum, a former casino, was a beautiful building housing Argentine artists.

We spent Sunday visiting the street markets in San Telmo and Recoleta. In San Telmo we watched Tango dancers demonstrate their moves and I found a Bolivian artist selling great watercolors. I bought 2 small village scenes I am delighted with.

On Monday we boarded a plane and headed for Puerto Igauzu and the Igauzu Falls. The Falls were spectacular. It is hard to imagine the power and grandeur of the many falls that roar out of the rain forest to empty into the river. We took a boat ride up the river to the Falls the first day. It included a truck ride through the jungle. We were surround by the noise of birds, dense vegetation and had our first experience with the friendly butterflies! Not long into the ride one landed on the woman seated in front of me and rode all the way to the river with us!

Approaching the falls from the river was amazing - you heard nothing but the roar of water and felt the spray of the Falls. We got soaked and stayed wet for the rest of the day. It was near 100 degrees and over 100% humidity. It was also the rainy season and the trail through the jungle we hoped to walk and spot túcans among other creatures was to muddy to hike. The park was a great place to visit. It had good trails, a train to take you to some of the furthest points, good restaurants and rest stops. And like the national parks in the States, visitors from everywhere. Our stay in Puerto Igauzu was delightful. It is a very small town with friendly people, easy to walk to and interesting to see after the city of BsAs. We found a great taxi driver, Basileo, who took us to and from the park each day and showed us the “Three Frontiers”, the area where Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay meet. On the third day he took us back to the airport where we waited for hours for our delayed flight back to BsAs. Our complimentary lunch from LAN Airlines was a no choice milanesa – breaded steak – which topped this worst meal list by a mile. We arrived back in BsAs in time to pick up Amy and go to dinner. We went to a wonderful restaurant in a truly beautiful building with a great tango band! It was a perfect last supper. The next day – our last – we had our only rain. We did a little site seeing, went to a museum, hugged Caitlin goodbye and headed for the airport. We had had a wonderful trip. Good food. Great sites. Time with Caitlin. Laughs with Amy. Plenty of exercise and stories to tell. The woman who checked us through customs kept looking at my passport and then at me. I was beginning to think I wasn’t going home when she indicated that I looked better then my passport photo. She waved her hand and said Bye Bye Patricia. And with that we were on our way home.