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Day 47 (cont’d) – 2/24/07 – Travel to Mendoza

After a nearly full day in Buenos Aires, we hopped a LAN flight to Mendoza. The single room airport was a cinch and we walked outside into a vineyard. That’s right, they grow grapes at the airport. It was beautiful (and immediate) welcome to Wine Country.

We took a 30-minute cab ride into the town of Mendoza to The Hotel Argentine. It was tourist class hotel right on the main square. The rooms were big and very simple and a bargain compared to the Park Hyatt next door.

After a quick Scotch, we strolled around the main town square, which was a large park. There were street performers and puppet shows for kids, a huge fountain and an evening market. We meandered around killing time before our dinner reservation at Azafran.

Oddly, the restaurant couldn’t take us any later than 10:00pm. We thought it was because they were closing and wanted to go home. Wrong! They were completely booked after 10:30pm and only had openings earlier in the evening. The meal was superb. They offered two 3-course chef’s tasting menus, so naturally, we ordered them both.

One of the appetizers was avocado extravaganza. At one point, Julee had fried avocado dipped in guacamole with a fresh avocado on top. The main dishes, one steak and one pasta, were divine and we can’t even talk about the desserts. It hurts. It was at this dinner that we coined the phrase “Eat yourself to misery”.

Day 48 – 02/25/2007 – Mendoza Wine Country

And Night 47 was the last night Julee felt like herself. Something happened after that diner that changed her GI track for the next three weeks. But being the champ she was…

Julee went down to the desk in the morning to arrange for a private driver through the wine country. The hotel hooked us up with Gustavo who was fantastic. He spoke nearly perfect English and was a wine fanatic. He gave us great tidbits about Mendoza, life in Argentina and the vineyards.

The first thing we learned is that Mendoza is really a desert oasis. All the parks are man made and were built to provide the town with natural air coniditioning and a higher level of oxygen. All of the trees are imported, the parks are man made, and all the small lakes are filled and drained every few months to keep the water fresh.  We also learned that having a dry climate allowed them to very preciesly measure the amount of water that the grapes receive.  Since all water is controlled they don’t have to worry as much about having a bad season because of to much rain.

He took us off the beaten path to some lesser known, privately owned operations. The only difficulty was that we couldn’t buy any wine. It was just too fragile and too heavy to carry with us.

Although Julee started the morning with enthusiasm, she basically broke down as the day progressed. By Noon she was lying on the floors of the wineries trying to convince everyone it wasn’t the wine. By the third winery, she was BITB (barfing in the bushes). But, back at the tasting with a smile when she felt better.

Since everything was closed on Sundays, our driver suggested we head to the Mendoza Mall Food Court for lunch. Here’s where we concluded that Malls are the common denominator. The Mendoza Mall looked exactly like any Two Story Mall, USA. We were surrounded by KFC, McDonald’s, GAP, Timberland, Sunglass Hut, the works. And the quality of food is just about the same. Lou had a nasty meat sandwich with an egg and Julee had a French fry and a diet coke.

That night we did nothing. Absolutely nothing. Julee was miserable and Lou took that as his cue for a well-deserved rest. We ordered soup from room service watched 5 hours of Red Carpet at the Oscars on E! It was the only English programming we could find. We were all ready to watch the live broadcast in its entirety when the pre show started over again. After all that waiting and listening to banter, they didn’t show the Oscars live in English on any of the 60 channels that came into the room. So I think we changed over to “Cheaper By the Dozen II”. It was not our best moment.

Day 49 – 2/26/2007 – Mendoza

Sick, schmick. Julee was not going to miss an excursion! So after lunch, we both packed up and prepared for the afternoon’s adventure – paragliding.

Our pilot and his wife picked us up at our hotel. We drove a couple miles outside of town and then headed 20 minutes up the dirt road to the top of the mountain. Once at the top, we got our instructions. “Look straight ahead. Run when he says run. Sit when he says sit. Landing instructions will be given at the bottom. “

Within seconds, the pilot hooked Lou into the harness and told him to look straight ahead as they waited for the wind. And whoooosh, they were gone.

From Julee’s perspective:
The pilot’s wife drove us back down the mountainous windy road to pick up Lou and the pilot. At the bottom, I asked Lou, “How was it?” And, all if could say was “fine.” It wasn’t until the ride back up that I could see he was green. Apparently, they had chased an eagle and all that spinning did Lou in.

Back up the mountain we drove and within seconds I was strapped into the harness with the pilot reassuring me that all I had to do was run. And with the next gust, we were airborne. It was incredible. The skies were unusually clear and the view was fantastic. Paragliding with a pilot is absolutely effortless, especially when the pilot told me I could release my death grip on the handles. Once I relaxed at sat back, it was like floating in a lazy boy. My favorite part happened after the pilot asked if I liked roller coasters.

The landing was perfect. The pilot simply stalled the canopy and we dropped what felt like two inches to the ground. Based on my other experiences of hot air ballooning and sky diving, this was by far the gentlest landing.

That night we headed out to the Park Hyatt for dinner. The restaurant was a plush, modern outdoor patio. Since eating was still not on the top of my list, I took it easy with a pumpkin soup while adventurous Lou had the goat entrée, which he says he’s glad he tried, but given the choice of goat or lamb, would definitely chose the lamb.

Not ready to turn in, we went to the casino at the Hyatt. The casino was about the size of a large cruise ship and had slots and tables. For those who are a bit sheepish about gambling, Mendoza is an excellent place to start. The low bid tables have a 2 pesos minimum, which was about 60 cents. So we played Roulette for an hour of so and we were up muy, muy pesos and tried out luck at the blackjack tables. We weren’t quite as lucky there but had a hilarious time.

Day 50 – 2/27/2007 – Mendoza

After breakfast, we headed to the airport and we were shocked when they couldn’t find our flight reservations…

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