Valparaiso to Mendoza: Peace out Pacific Ocean!

We ended up spending 4 days in Chile´s far-out coastal city of Valparaiso, sneaking in a quick side trip to Viña del Mar, just a short metro ride away. The coolest thing to do in Valparaiso was to hike up it´s many hills to catch epic views of the huge port and colorful houses the city is famous for. Full disclosure: we did get a little lazy 2 times and take an ascensor, a type of tram/elevator. There are about 20 ascensores all over the city, most built in the late 19th century, and many Valaparaiseños use them to commute to work and whatnot, so riding them is a bit of a cultural, historical experience in it´s own right.

At the tops of Valparaiso´s cerros (hills), there are typically tourist attractions like musuems, overpriced restaraunts, hippies doing tricks, ect. As usual, most of the attractions we were most excited to see were closed...so, we opted for a more free-form, city exploration strategy of touring: walk up everything and around everything that looks pretty. We found some really cool stuff we never would have seen otherwise! First on that list is Pablo Neruda´s house (okay, finding this one was a little less free form), which we adored. We got a great audio tour, which helpfully detailed Neruda´s wild drinking habits while we gazed upon his well-equipped art deco bar, recited poetry for us in his smoking-lounge style study, poked fun at his bizarre china collections, and, in general, made sense of his particularly quirky house. It definitely lent us greater appreciation for Pablo Neruda. He is the man!

A highlight of Valparaiso is the street art -- the city is covered with mural-like graffitis that, stylistically, range from cyberpunk to old-school surrealism. We stumbled into a really cool photo exhibit in a museum dedicated to Admiral Chochrane, some swashbuckling british dude that helped the Chileans say ¨step off, Spain!¨. The musuem didn´t say much more than that about the admiral, but it did have an exhibit on a photo competition of pictures of Valparaiso. While we didn´t quite agree with the judges picks, they might know a little more about capturing the spirit of Valparaiso than we do.

Add in a few more art galleries, funky cafes, and glasses of delicious wine (love that carmenere!) later, and you have our experience in Valparaiso. As mentioned earlier, we also spent a day in Viña del Mar, which is known as a beach town. Unfortunately, we managed to show up on an exceptionally cloudy day. We walked through the city, which is not nearly as charming as Valparaiso, more like a classed-up Ocean City, MD, though Viña does boast a pretty colonial palace. We despaired, running out of things to when our big plan had been to go the beach, but miraculously found our way to an artisanal brewpub! In the time it took to sample their tasty beers, the weather brightened, we headed to the beach to catch some rays, and take some naps.
After Viña del Mar, we both decided it was time for something new...a new country! Chile is fabulous, don´t get us wrong, and there´s probably more to see there. but it´s also a little pricey...plus, Stew and Tori have developed quite a bit of wanderlust, and we yearned for the next adventure. And our ride to Argentina was quite the adventure....it was a doozy. We were told the bus from Valp to Mendoza, Argentina, would take 8 hours. This time estimate was correct, only it failed to include SEVEN hours waiting in line at the border from 1AM to 8AM. Also, for the entire time we waited in this line, our bus driver kept the lights in the bus illuminated. By the time we arrived in Mendoza, we were exhausted and starving. After 18 hours without eating, we ordered an enormous Roquefort, ham, roasted red pepper, and olive pizza. It was even more exorbitant that we exected it to be. The ham and cheese weren´t sprinkled, per se, they covered the entirety of the pizza! We know, not typical Argentine food, but we were starving and pizza was the first food we found. After this, we napped contentedly.

Mendoza is &!*·% awesome/hot! That´s hot in terms of temperture, folks. While we never did manage to stay in a hostel with air conditioning in our 4 days in this fantastic city, we had a great time...and drove off any potential thieves with our rank odors. In Mendoza:
-- we went for a walk in a giiannt park in the middle of the city, tried to climb Cerro Gloria (in the middle of said park, we failed to locate it), later returned to Cerro Gloria with Chilean tourists who had a car (A security gaurd got Stew in trouble for climbing on the monument),
-- went to one of the most famous zoos in South America (children harrassed monkeys, monkeys got back by escaping. No security guards yelled at anyone.),
-- went on a wine tour of the Lujan Valley, including visits to Clos de Chacras, an itty-bitty super old botique winery where we tasted malbecs and merlot; Terrazas de los Andes (Chandon), a muuch larger vineyard where we tasted torrontes, malbec, a cabernet sauvignos, and a ¨new world grand cru¨, had lunch at Ruka Malen -- five courses with wine pairings!; and, lastly, visited Susana Balbo´s winery, famous for its Crios line. She is also one of very few female winemakes in Mendoza. She is badass. It was a fantastic, gluttonous, and mildly intoxicated day.
-- went to the fabulous restaurant 1884 Francis Malmon in a antique vineyard (thanks to Tori´s Mom for a pimpin´ Channukah present -- the best meal on this trip!)
-- Got interviewed on Mendoza radio, where we may or may not have publicly made fools of ourselves due to difficulties deciphering the Argentines´ crazy accents


Mendoza was fabulous, and we are seriousy considering coming back in a few weeks for the wine festival. We may even rent an apartment here for a month, we liked it so much! Now, we are on our way to Malargue, where we are hoping to do some serious hiking after such a luxurious time in Mendoza.

Love,

Tori and Stew