Gambling on some Malbec ice cream

Firstly, can I just apologise for the tardiness in these blog entries, the entry Im about to write - in fact this goes for pretty much most of the past few blogs - have been written days and sometimes a week (s) after the actual occurrence. You see, travelling it would seem is quite a full time business. What with getting from place to place, meeting people and visiting sights, there really is little time for admin days. Not that Im grumbling. No way. I wouldnt have it any other way. Its just I had hoped to have kept you all a little more up to date with current events. I hope you forgive me ;-p


Anyway, enough dwelling on things, on with this entry...


The BF and I didnt spend too long in Santiago, Chile as you really only need a couple of days there, so off we set to our next destination, Mendoza. 


Mendoza is situated roughly seven hours east of Santiago in Argentina. In order to get there you have to cross the worlds longest mountain range, The Andes. These range of highlands  run along the western coast of South America. The road to in between Santiago and Mendoza which runs through these highlands is called the Trans Andean highway which we had been told was stunning and had to be crossed during the day so the view could be admired in all its glory. 

One of the views we saw...there were many but they can be tricky to capture when on a moving bus!

So off we went on the bus (a nice one thankfully albeit with one rank warm ham and cheese sandwich each for breakfast and lunch) admiring the view of the road which looks like a giant Scalextrix track snaking its way up the mountain. Being sat in the top deck of the bus was great in that it gave us great vistas of the journey, however, it also meant that each time the bus turned a corner you had to take a breath as all you could see was a sheer drop!

Id like to see this road appear on Top Gear...

The BF thought the Andes looked like the mountain peaks in Wales but on steroids. I guess that is one way to describe them as they were pretty mighty...


As we were crossing from Chile into Argentina, we had to stop at the border to have our passports checked. The border crossing was literally a giant warehouse with loads of vehicles piled in to go through the same process - which incidently takes forever and they then make the bus wait an hour on the other side but dont tell anyone why?

Lots of people wanting to cross the border...

Only the best : D

Taking pics to fill up time whilst we waited for the bus to move on - check out the altitude!

We finally arrived in Mendoza where it was absolutely boiling hot - almost 40 degree heat!


Arriving at the hostel, the only room they had available for us as a couple was a twin room with bunk beds. Cue mattresses on the floor again. We did have our own bathroom though which was like a wet room as the shower was attached to the wall inbetween the toilet and the sink. We both found weird pleasure in using the mop which was like a giant windscreen wiper to wipe all the excess water off the floor...


That evening the BF had his first of Argentinian steak and a glass of his favourite wine, Malbec which is the most famous wine of the region. The steak whilst good, unfortunately wasn't great but that didn't matter as there were to be many more steaks eaten throughout his visit. 


On our first day in Mendoza, we really didnt do very much apart from walk around the neighbourhood to familiarise ourselves and visit the big park that there is in the north of the city. Wed both been looking forward to visiting the park, especially the Museum of Natural Sciences which housed Egyptian mummies and taxidermy. However the museum turned out to be closed for refurbishment (a running theme Im finding!) and most of the park was a little unkempt. There were some nice parts by the lake although we had been warned not to venture too far north as it became a bit dodgy. 

This part of the park reminded me of Cuba!

Pretty ornate fountain in the park

Upon leaving the park we arrived at an ice cream parlour and couldnt resist popping in. They had every flavour of ice cream imaginable, including a vanilla and malbec one. The BF decided this had to be tried so he ordered a cone full. Now, either the icecream was off or malbec really should not be made into an ice cream, either way it tasted disgusting. 

Not amused...

Given I have a lactose intolerence I ought not to eat ice cream as it doesnt agree with me, however the pistachio flavour looked too tempting so I succumbed and had some. I wish I hadn't. It tasted like washing up liquid :(


With both of us feeling deflated by our horrible ice creams, we decided we had to find an alternative so we went to the other parlour across the road. Thankfully their tiramisu and mint choc chip ice creams were delicious. My stomach unfortunately did not agree...


We stopped via a park on the way home and the BF decided to work off his ice cream by climbing on the climbing frame, the result was hilarious...

Step one

Step two 

Step three

In the evening we met up for dinner with some of my Pachamamarites who were also in Mendoza. It was great to catch up with them both and excitingly for the BF we ate the most delicious steak yet at the restaurant we went to!


Afterwards the BF and I swung by the local casino on the way home. You may recall in earlier blogs how pretty much every touristic town I've visited in South America has its own casino. These casinos tend to be the most elaborate and largest buildings in the whole town. We therefore felt obliged to contribute towards these money taking mausoleums : D


Im not overly familiar with casinos, with the exception of having visited a few whilst at uni (one of my house mates was quite the gambler) and having the worst aptitude for card games I left it to the BF to navigate us around the tables there. We started playing blackjack which we did quite well at, although being gamblers (I discovered I am one also - I blame my abuelo!) we pretty much lost everything we had won. No biggie though as we had ensured we were playing with very low amounts of money. The next table was roulette which we didn't win a thing at and I didn't like so much as it was just chance the whole time, whereas with blackjack you can at least think you have some idea of the cards if you pay close attention and have a photographic memory!