MENDOZA!

Sorry I've been so long in putting up a blog post. All last week was parciales and I have a few this week too. (I had my grammar one early this morning.) But aside from the parciales, this weekend I went to the province of Mendoza!

So anyone who knows anything about Argentina, or wine (hint, hint) knows that Mendoza is famous for all of the wineries and fine wines it produces. It also just happens to have a beautiful landscape, and is a prime spot for some outdoor sports, (which is mostly what we did.)

The trip was with the entire CC-CS program of course, and a few of the Speaking Partners as well. We all left by a private omnibus at 10pm Friday night, and arrived at Valle Grande and went straight to our first activity, rafting, right away.

This was my second time rafting ever, but a first for a lot of people there. The company that ran the rafting had us all wear these wetsuits that looked a lot like clown suits. They were more for keeping us warm rather than keeping us dry. And everything was one size fits all. This includes life-jackets and helmets. I have to say, as a former lifeguard, the life-jacket situation had me nervous. They didn't fit everyone, and even with the people they did fit wouldn't tighten all the way, including mine. But luckily only one person fell out of any of the rafts the whole time, and the river wasn't really all that dangerous.

Before we left in the rafts, we were explained that rafting rivers in Argentina are categorized 1 through 5, with 1 being the easiest, and 5 being the most dangerous, and that this river was a 2. For being a 2, it was pretty easy. It was also a pretty short rafting trip. (At least it was a for me, since my first rafting experience was with Hollins, and that trip was ALL DAY) The rafting in Mendoza took less than two hours.

There was a friendly competition between all the rafts to see which team would reach the finish first. Although my raft was the last to leave, we were the first to finish! ¡Somos Ganadores!

After rafting, we had asado for lunch. After lunch, there was an impromptu concert courtesy of Hendrix. Hendrix is the youngest of the group here at CC-CS, and also the one that knows the least bit of Spanish. She's still going through the college application process, and only took one year of High School Spanish. She technically doesn't even qualify to be in the program according to the requirements, but CC-CS has 32 slots for each place each semester, and they were not all filled. (CC-CS also has programs in two different cities in Spain, and used to have one in Cuba.) But we're glad she's here.

Anyway, Hendrix brought her guitar on the trip, and took it out, and started playing and singing. She's really good, and a has a great voice. (I'd like to get a video of her performing sometime) She plays a lot of folk songs, that I don't know (I don't listen to a lot of folk music, y por supuesto . . .) but a lot of the girls knew some the songs she was singing, and sang along, and Olivia accompanied her on harmonica. And before we knew it, it was time for the next activity.

It was a little two-for-one. Rappelling and tirolesa, which is known as zip-lining for you English speakers. We had our choice of doing either activity first, or only doing one of both. I did rappelling first.

I've done rock-climbing, and quite a bit of other Outward-Bound activities over the years through summer camp, Girl scouts, and the Hinterbrand Lodge program in sixth grade, but this was my first time rappelling.

It wasn't that high up, but the height was still intimidating. The guy that was hooking everyone up to the safety line before going down started a conversation with everyone, and got everyone's name so he could get their attention and yell instructions at them should anything happen. Anyway, when he hooked me up and I told him my name was Victoria, he said he had a sister named Victoria too, but that they don't get along well. I was a little nervous taking the first few steps, but when I realized that I wasn't holding all of my weight with one arm, and that I was totally in control, it was easier. I'm glad I did it, because I stopped a few times to look at the scenery and it was gorgeous! I wish I was able to take pictures from there, but I needed both hands for rappelling, and I didn't want to rick dropping it. But the mountains were incredible!

At the bottom was the line for the tirolesa. It was fun, but the actual zip-lining was too short for me. I know it's fast, but I've done zip-lines that lasted a bit longer. But I guess it's just as well, since I almost lost my grip right before I landed.

Afterwards, we went to our hotel in San Rafael and had a close to 2-hour break before we all went to dinner at a restaurant called Malbec. Malbec is a type of Argentine, wine, but we didn't drink any at dinner.

We didn't see much of the city, our trip was so short. After dinner, it was about 11 and not that many people went out because they were so tired from the days' activities. But Jennifer, Alexis, and I were adventurous enough to join Alfredo and Vicky to a coffee shop. We all ordered something and spent an hour in these short lounge chairs, just chatting until about 12:30. I don't actually really remember how late we stayed out, I just know we didn't stay out as long as is normal for a typical Argentine weekend. But I have to say, it was interesting having a conversation about the differences between sexual and gender standards in Argentina and the US with the Program Coordinator and his assistant. Mostly it was with Jennifer, because she's a Women's Studies major and loves to discuss anything to do with feminism.

I don't know what Jennifer did after coffee, because I know she didn't come back to the hotel room at least an hour after I did. But I just went back to the room and crashed.

The next day, Sunday, our breakfast was brought to the hotel room. There was coffee, hot milk, and medialunas. The medialunas were delicious, but the coffee was complete crap. Probably the worst I've ever tasted in my life. No matter how much milk and sugar I added, I couldn't make it taste any better.

We packed out of our hotel rooms and got on the bus to go and visit a bodega by 10 am. The tour was a bit short, but it was cool. They let inside the chambers where they store the grapes before they press them. They also showed us how they put the labels on each of the bottles by hand, and had a few people try out the machine that they use to push the corks into the bottles.

There was a fountain of a woman holding a wine jar outside in front of the wine shop attached to the bodega. It was interesting, because water was flowing from everywhere except for the jar, which had red wine flowing from it instead. It had stained the stone from years of wine being poured over it, and of all fell to mix with the water at the bottom. I guess they make enough wine to just use some for their fountain.

At last we got to the wine tasting. We were able to try it two ways. Plain, or heated and mixed with chocolate and sugar. The chocolate and sugar wine was delicious. I think I found a new favorite drink for Christmastime! (And of course this was mixed with their special 'Wintertime' wine. And just to remind you all, winter has pretty much just arrived in Argentina.)

Now the wine plain, wasn't that good. It wasn't bad, but it almost had close to no taste at all. It was like drinking water that had a little bit of wine accidently poured in it. I think the problem was that all the wines that had us taste and try were selling, were all no older than 2007. It's like they don't wait to let the wine age long.

A lot of people went and bought bottles, and some boxes, of wine, because it was so cheap. Like 12-24 pesos a bottle (which is like $4-8.) But I didn't buy any because I'm not quite sure on regulations on bringing alcohol in luggage through customs. Gabriel suggested I just buy it and drink it in the country, but why would I go through all that trouble and money if I didn't like it? I did buy some novelty wine souvenirs for me and my mom though.

We then returned to San Rafael for lunch, and then went back on our way to Córdoba. We left San Rafael around 3 in the afternoon, and we were supposed to arrive back in Córdoba around 11, 11:30 at night, but the driver took a waay wrong turn, and we didn't get back until 2am. And we all still had classes the next day! Good thing none of my Monday classes start until after noon. But it was still pretty late, and we were all very tired.

I really enjoyed the outdoorsy stuff, but I felt the weekend was still too short for me. I would have loved to have had more time looking at the scenery, and doing a wine tour since that's what Mendoza is famous for. But I can't complain since this weekend was free. Maybe one day I'll be able to go back to Mendoza and have more time to appreciate it.