Mendoza

Where to begin??!! We arrived in Mendoza about 3 weeks ago with the idea that if we really liked it we would stay here for a few months - to learn spanish, to volunteer, to drink wine, and to make new friends. Well, things have taken a bit of a turn...
Turns out that the city of Mendoza is huge. Yep, it´s about a million people, with about a million people´s worth of pollution and sprawl. Not exactly the quaint winery town nestled at the foot of the Andes that we were expecting.

The first few days were definitely difficult. We felt a bit lost, a bit like our plans and hopes were dashed. Well, the question when traveling like this is always what to do when we end up in a situation or place that we don´t like. The answer: CHANGE IT!!! So, we decided that even if the place wasn´t exactly that cool, we were still tired of traveling and being in a different room every few days, so it was time for a break. We signed up for intensive Spanish lessons and rented an apartment. Let´s just say that it´s been a welcome break!!

Learning IS difficult...
We started an intense Spanish school at a place called Intercultural in Mendoza. Imagine this:
7 am: Wakeup in our apartment!!
8:30 - 10:30 am: Spanish class, only speaking in Spanish.
10:30-11 am: Break, more spanish speaking with other students
11-1 pm: Spanish class, continued...
1-2 pm: Lunch, again...only speaking in spanish!
2-4/5pm: Fun daily activity...in Spanish of course

So it´s been an awesome, but really tough time at school. Learning and speaking Spanish has been really difficult (our heads are spinning by the end of the day!), but also very rewarding. For me, I feel like it´s substantially improved how I can communicate, and my real personality actually comes out when I speak in Spanish. For Lisa, she´s done great - she can actually communicate in Spanish. Impressive!

Another cool part of school...we took a "wine and spanish" class all last week. It was AWESOME. Here we are, in the heart of Mendoza´s wine country, learning Spanish and learning all about the winemaking process here. The only hitch is that the class has been completely in Spanish. Awesome and difficult all at the same time. We have, however, been able to try a TON of wine here and visit a bunch of great vineyards. Highly recommended, people!!

We figured that it would be more interesting to post some pictures of wine tasting and the great scenery around the city, rather than pictures of us studying spanish, so here you go!


When we first arrived, every fountain in Mendoza was dyed the color of wine for their annual festival "Vendimia" - wine harvest! Very cool!

Our own little slice of "heaven" in South America...haha - Inside the new apartment

An afternoon in Mendoza´s famous wine vineyards with the beautiful Andes in the background

A typical Argentinian asado nestled amongst the vineyards...sunday funday!

Scott, using the giant paws to help the grapes ferment into wine

This microwinery makes small batches for individual property owners. You can own your own vineyard for a mere $225k investment. Cash flow positive in about 4 years...

Lisa separating grapes from stems, etc. I´d pay her minimum wage...

Some of our new Dutch friends, Johannes and Mette. Good times!!

Our first "ficha" - they give this to you each time you harvest a bin of grapes, then you trade it in at the end of the day for actual money

Lisa, a very efficient harvester in her nice clothes...

Who wants to hang out next to the lake?

Lisa thinks this picture is cute...

Beautiful down here...

Yep, we convinced them to give us some wine directly from the tank. At our favorite winery so far, La Azul

Once you get out of the city, they really know how to chillax down here



Good Peeps and a taste of home
It´s been nice actually being in a place for a few weeks. We really craved a few normal things from home (this is a relative term down here, try to find some peanut butter...not so much!), so we had a few outings to remind us of home. We went to a movie (in English, kind of), went to the zoo, Lisa baked cookies at the apartment, and we actually just kind of hung out. It´s been great.

Another great benefit of being in one place for awhile is actually getting to know a few people. Through the organization that holds the Spanish classes, we´ve met a bunch of great people - a couple from Denmark, a couple who worked in Yosemite (Hi Tamara and Dan!), and other great people. It´s been nice actually having a more-or-less normal life for a little while. Of course, since we´re traveling down here, it can´t last too long, so we´re off to volunteer!

Some funny pictures:
Check out this so-called "broom"...they use this all over Argentina. It´s hilarious. Looks like a large palm tree to me!

Why wouldn´t the monkeys at the zoo be roaming outside of their cages?

The infamous HONEY BADGER!!! spotted at the Mendoza zoo!


Why would there be gas at the gas station??? "No Hay" = We don´t have it


Tuning out until next time...we´re off to volunteer in a place called Cafayate, Argentina. Wish us luck!!

¿Quieres aprender Espanol in Mendoza? and our new apartment!

Our journey has been full of challenges, and a major personal challenge for Lisa and I is to learn Español. I mean, we live in a state where almost 50% of the population speaks Spanish, the least we can do is try to learn the language, right?

We are officially enrolled in intensive Spanish classes here in Mendoza, Argentina. It´s certainly been interesting traveling around both Chile and Argentina hacking our way through spanish conversations and trying to get to know locals without really speaking the language. It´s not very easy, let me tell you! This is probably something that we should´ve done at the beginning of our trip, but I guess hindsight is 20/20, right?

On the "home" front....
As you´ve read before, it´s been interesting staying in all sorts of different places, from guest houses to homestays to hostels. We decided it´s about time to get a bit of a normal life back (if only for a little while) and find a place of our own. No more dirty kitchens, plates that are "clean" with food stuck on them, or showers that have someone else´s hair in them.

Yep, we rented our own apartment! It has been SOOO nice. I think Lisa especially likes organizing and cleaning it, it´s hilarious to me. Also, the cost was almost the same as the cheapest hostel that we were in here too. Life is good, the apartment has been great so far. Last night Lisa even made homemade meatballs and chocolate chip cookies! Mmmmm...delicious!! (although very different than at home, more about this in a later post). We´ll post some pictures of the apartment and area too. If you are interested in checking it out on google maps, we are at 730 Peru Street...1/2 block off of Plaza Italia.

As for Mendoza...
One of the reasons for us to check out Mendoza was to settle down here for awhile, learn Spanish, and to volunteer (oh, and to learn how to BBQ Argentinian style!). We got to Mendoza about a week and half ago and were greeted by a HUGE metropolis. Yep, this place is definitely NOT your quaint little town surrounded by wineries with cool architecture and views of the Andes. It was definitely a surprise to both of us. We were obviously disappointed and have had a bit of a tough time figuring out what to do next. Since the city isn´t living up to our expectations, should we stay here and do the things we originally planned to do (learn spanish and volunteer), or should we move on to a place that is more compelling to us? Yes, these are the difficult decisions that we have to make while down here, I know...

Scott

BIG NEWS!

It´s official, Lisa and I won´t be coming home next week. We decided that we´re going to stay down here for a bit longer than originally planned...we´ll most likely be in South America until the summer!

Of course, as you all know, to do this I had to officially quit my job. So with mixed emotions I will no longer be working at the Bay Area Council.

Hope all is well with your jobs!!

Scott

Girl with the dragon tattoo

So Scott and I went to see this movie last night after finding out we could watch it in ENGLISH !!! Yay! First I didnt think the movie was that great, the book was way better. Second, during many many parts of the movie they either mumbled or spoke way too fast so we actually ended up reading the Spanish subtitles instead of listening! Good thing or scary?!?

A Mendoza...

As we´ve learned on this trip... travel is slow down here and we are embracing it! We FINALLY made it to mendoza. When we originally thought about this trip, I imagined us making our way to wine country much much sooner. But such is life in South America, and we live it ;)

View from the bus crossing through the Andes. Notice our bus is passing the big rig, on the curve, before a tunnel. Yeah.


The Andes are beautiful!


Mendoza turns out is a much bigger city than we imagined, but it has beautiful tree lined streets, tons and tons of vineyards 20 mins away, and the beautiful mountains in the background. We´ve only been here a few days but love it so far. The people are super nice (I mean, how could you not be when you drink cheap wine all day!) and the possibilities for activities are endless. We think we could spend some time here biking around and drinking wine. We will make sure to post good wine recommendations as we come across them.

The city just started harvest so there are tons of people in town for Vendimia (the festival) which is all about food, wine, and dancing. They have an election for the wine queen that took place last night... we thought it would be really exciting and fun to watch,,, not so much. Well just stick to the vineyards from now on!

This place loves wine so much they even dye the water in the fountains to look like wine!!!


More to come soon...

Santiago...or Los Angeles?

Okay, so if Valpo was like SF, the beautiful capital of Chile was like Los Angeles. Joy!

Almost every traveler that we´ve talked to has said that Santiago is just a big city without much personality. I guess you could say the same thing about Los Angeles, right? If you just went to LA you would think it´s a huge city with tons of traffic and only a few cool areas to visit.

Luckily, Lisa and I met a couple from Santiago in our travels and they invited us to stay at their apartment in Santiago. Cristian and Gloria are awesome! Not only did they tour us around literally every cool part of the city (turns out, everything cool is hidden...or at least difficult to find), but made sure we knew where we were going, were safe, and had an overall great time in their city.

Cristian is a consultant who is currently doing work for a mining company in Chile (the north of Chile is full of all sorts of mines, it´s a huge part of their economy) and Gloria is an ex-teacher who has opened an awesome restaurant (called Fides Cafe) with great healthy food (turns out, it´s difficult to find it in Chile sometimes...). They´re both awesome and we hope they come visit SF sometime so we can show them around too!

Views from the top of the San Cristobal Mountain, notice the light grey building in the shape of an old cell phone!(it´s their national cell phone company..)


LA, no...YES!


Humpty Dumpty in their main plaza?!


The presidential palace, home to the 1970's coup where Pinochet bombed the president.


This is what Santiaguinos do at night...visit the water fountain and buy cotton candy. GOOD TIMES


Our new friends and tour guides, Cristian and Gloria. They're awesome!


A tour of the Concha y Toro winery, the second largest winery in the world (after Gallo in Cali)


The famous "Casillero Del Diablo", you´ve seen the bottles of wine on supermarket shelves at home, it means "Devil´s Cellar"

Legend has it that the founders of Concha y Toro noticed that wine kept disappearing from the aging cellar. They thought something fishy might be going on, and since the locals were very superstitious, they started spreading a rumor that the devil lived in the wine cellar. They made up all sorts of elaborate stories...and it worked! No wine ever went missing after that. Crazy, huh?

On another note, we´re finally done with Chile. It was such a great unexpected experience. As you all know, we came down here with the thought of exploring and staying in Argentina, and only Argentina! Things certainly took a detour to Chile. First of all, it turns out that if you visit all the great places in Patagonia, you have to go between the two countries. I think we´ve crossed the border four times so far. Yep.

A few other Chile takeaways:
*They don´t heat their houses. Yeah, imagine this in the mountains!!

*The south is basically like the old west. They use wood fireplaces to cook, heat their houses, dry their clothes, etc. It´s crazy! If you´re not in the same room as the heater you better have layers.

*Transportation in the south is sketchy at best. We´re talking a lot of dirt roads, buses that come only a few times a week, and to be honest...not a lot of good central tourist information. Luckily we were flexible. Imagine taking a bus that only runs to a town only twice a week, total, not every hour!

*The simple life. Imagine going to the grocery story and having your choice of ONE type of pasta, ONE type of pasta sauce, and ONE type of oil. Certainly makes things easy...and made us realize how many freakin choices we have in California!

*French fries. They LOVE them. With an egg on top.

*Yep = (in spanish) Si-po (not Si), Nope = No-pu (not No). You can even say okey-dokey = Ya-pu! It´s hilarious to hear.

*"Did you get it?", or "Do you understand" = ¿"Cachay"?. We heard it like a million times every day!

*The Chilean people are great, super friendly, open, and have no attitude.

*The country is just a bit rough around the edges in comparison to Argentina. Subtle differences like central plazas that aren´t manicured, roads with no sidewalks, etc. Very interesting.

*Excellent wine. So far we may like it better than Argentinian wine...and cheap!

That´s all we got for now, hasta ahora, adios Chile!!

Scott and Lisa

Valpo or San Francisco?

I´ve never been to a place like San Francisco. Living there, we all think it is a one of a kind in the world. Turns out that Valparaiso, Chile is the a close sibling to SF.

SF
*Just one or two hills...
Valparaiso
*Just one or two hills...

SF
*Surrounded by water
Valparaiso
*Surrounded by water

SF
*Artists and lots of culture
Valparaiso
*Artists and lots of culture

SF
*Dirty
Valparaiso
*Dirty

Okay, okay, you get the drift. The cities are a lot alike, have great views, very interesting port and maritime history, and both have crazy activists preserving buildings and keeping the city "as it was".

One of the things about traveling that we´ve mentioned before is the variability of places we´re staying. I mean you really never know. A place could look awesome online or sound great in the guide book, then you get there and it´s a complete dump in a crappy part of town. For Valpo, we got lucky. It was the end of summer here in Chile so basically the entire country is traveling on holiday, so it was really important for us to book things ahead of time. Lisa booked this place for Valpo that was way cheaper than any other place (finally good prices...about $30/night!). We get there and the place is awesome. Just check out the picture of the outside below. The owners, Ken and Carolina, are awesome. They are a family that basically runs the place as their own house with about 8 rooms. The place was really clean, the rooms were like actual bedrooms that we would have at home, the kitchen was normal, and best of all there was a deck and bbq with awesome views! It totally reminded me of my old place in SF before Lisa and I moved in together.

Staying here really made our visit cool, all the people staying at the house would hang out on the deck and cook dinner together every night (it rotated - we barbecued, of course!), then just chill. It was awesome. These are the kind of places that you want to find when traveling, a home away from home with good people.

Our awesome home away from home, Hostel Mariposa


Some of the crazy street art, it´s everywhere...and super cool.


The City of Funiculars - there are I think 13 funiculars around the city, with only 3 actually working. The hills here really take SF hills to a whole new level, it´s like you get to the top and then there are two more hills to go!


More building art


The city


The Valparaiso port. Valpo used to be a huge stop on the way around Cape Horn, before the Panama Canal was built. It´s more about touristy harbor tours now...kind of like SF.


A few other tidbits..We also visited Pablo Neruda´s house, a little taste of culture. He is like an icon in Chile and won the Nobel Prize in the seventies. The city has a ton of character, from the different colored and shaped houses to old bars that look like the inside of pirate ship. Pretty cool.

On one of our days we decided to take a trip down the coast to check out the famous Vina del Mar and some of the nearby beaches (Con con, Renaca). I have never in my entire life seen such an overdeveloped beach in the world. It is amazing. There are skyscraper condo units literally back to back, lining the entire city and beach area in Vina. Basically, if you live in Santiago (a Santiaguino) you come here to vacation and buy a condo. It is ridiculous.

Beautiful coastline...except the HUGE skyscrapers in the background


If you look closely there is a yellow bulldozer next to the ocean. Looks like they are about to build another highrise condo complex...this one about 10 feet from the ocean. This ugly disaster would never make it in Cali. I guess some of our environmental protections are a good thing...


Is this the Cali coast or Chile??


Despite all the development, it is still very beautiful here and we had a great day at the beach. Every year they have an end of the summer blowout (like our Labor Day), called Vina 2012 (this year), it´s like a HUGE party on the beach with concerts, dancing, you name it. We were there the day before this started, so it was pretty packed. So we´re finishing up our beach day and decide to try to get the bus back to Vina. We get to the bus stop just as the beach starts to get cold, and literally hundreds of people swarm around us trying to get on the buses from the beach. Hundreds I tell you, all at the same time. It was ridiculous. The buses were more packed than the 30X on an SF morning. What did we do? Well, we had no time pressure, so we hopped over to a beach bar, grabbed a nice cold beer, and waited it out. Perfect. Even caught the sunset on the way back to Valpo. Sometimes it just works out.

Sunset over the Pacific, oh how we´ve missed you!

Pucon & The Volcano

Welcome to Pucon... where everyone stays longer than planned and everyone leaves bruised and tired. This is a very active down where you can do everything from mountain biking, hiking, climbing a volcano, hydrospeed (aka boogie boarding down white water rapids...), rafting etc etc. You can see why Scott wanted to spend his birthday here...right?!? he even made some new friends on one of our hikes ..



So we get there the day before his bday, get to know the lay of the land and decide we MUST hike the volcano. You get equipped with crampons and an ice pick and climb your way up a very very steep glacier to the top. When you get to the top you are above the clouds which is kinda scary. You can see directly into the smokey active volcano. and trust me you dont want to stay up there long.. after 2 minutes our eyes and throats were burning from the fumes. I think we stayed long enough to take some good pictures and then down we went... SLEDDING!!! we used our ice picks to slow us down (or not) and had such a great time. It took about 4 hours to climb up and maybe 45 minutes to get down. Cheryl- you would have loved it !!!

We also did some mountain biking and sailing for Scotts bday (pics on the last post). We were going to do more activities but the weather wasnt really in our favor and unfort we both got a little sick the day we left ;( Needless to say we had a great time in Pucon and rang in Scotts 33rd bday in style.

Here are some pics of the hike ....

The view of Volcano Villarrica from town. Lets hike that thing!



WALK WALK WALK WALK.. UP WE GO... TO THE TOP. yes, it was that steep and not gonna lie it was kinda scary.


Ya thats right, we made it to the top of the Volcano (9,341 ft high!) We hiked 3,000+ ft of that! Up next... glisadding (aka sledding) down!


This is what the inside of an active volcano looks like. crazy!!

The birthday....

We ended up being in Pucon, Chile...the "adventure capital" in Chile. More about the city and other good times in another blog post, but the birthday was a good one this year!

Thanks everyone for the birthday wishes...here are a few pics from a great birthday weekend! We also hiked 3000 feet up a volcano to celebrate the birthday...awesome times!

Birthday Mountain Biking down the volcano, holler


Birthday Sailing...awesome! This was classic - we were walking along the beach and I was jealous of all the people sailing and windsurfing on the lake. A local guy comes up to us and asks if we want to go sailing with him. Awesome, huh??!!


We kicked off the birthday evening with a preparty, notice that huge bottles of wine are cheaper than Heineken 6 packs...interesting...