Crossing the border between Chile and Argentina was interesting (almost like every border you could say!). You are going up until you see lot of snow around you and you pass through a tunnel. No exit stamp for the first time of our trip... Finally, we stopped at the immigration office in Argentina to get a new stamp. Then, after 2/3 hours, we arrived in Mendoza Province. Quite easy we could say!
Argentina: A Relief (Sort Of)
Argentina was a relief for us! It's clearly cheaper than Chile, but there is a real scam there... Any ATM you use to get cash will take huge fees — between 5 and 10€ every time. And the worse is you can take only small amounts, a maximum of 50€. We saw it on the Internet and we didn't really take care of this point. At least, when we go back, we will be ready!
We found a nice Airbnb but a bit far from the center. Our plan was to rent a scooter for 2 days to be free as much as we want. Surprisingly, it's not very popular there. We rented it from Mendoza Renta Motos — a very nice guy who really loves his job and motorbikes. A must for us in Mendoza :-)
Bodega Carinae: A French Story in Argentina
The first day we went to the south of the city, the closest place to visit bodegas. But lucky as we are sometimes, it was Sunday and nobody was open. So, we were driving by instinct in the middle of vineyards with an amazing background of white mountains. This is how we found people walking who advised us to go to the Bodega Carinae. We found it and guess what? The owners are French! Very nice couple, Brigitte & Philippe. We had a really nice visit of their vineyard. They bought this property more than 15 years ago, which was abandoned. They totally changed their life, renovated the vineyard, bought new ones and nowadays they produce several different good wines!
We started to come back to our Airbnb, but stopped at a local event where different countries' food was represented (France was there of course...). There was also music, animations and little handcraft shops. It was a good hour stop to eat and drink!
The Uco Valley: 5-Course Lunch and Too Much Wine
The next productive day: renting a car to go to the Uco Valley, very famous for vineyards and bodegas. It's an interesting place to see different sizes of vineyards, from family ones to very big ones producing more than 50,000 bottles. We stopped on our way to the Azul Restaurant — a family business. We had a short, but nice visit of their wine production and started a 5-course menu! Everything was good and we had 3 different wines during lunch. It's a very good place to stop with a view of the mountains nearby.
Our next stop was at the Bodega Salentein - Killka. We just did a short walk and visited their art gallery. Then we found a smaller vineyard owned by a local family: the Bodega Garage Laureano Gómez. One of the 5 children came to welcome us (Augustin, easy to remember). He was in a hurry but really took his time to do us a very nice degustation of their wines. It was one of the best moments of the day. He even offered us the tour! I can tell you that William was not legally authorized to drive whatever the vehicle anymore. It was a good day :-)
The Dramatic Return to Santiago
The time to come back to Santiago had come! We woke up so early and achieved to find a taxi at 5:30AM as our bus was leaving at 6:15AM. And guess what? The weather conditions on the mountains were so bad that they decided to stop the circulation. We waited until 9:45 to finally leave the bus terminal...
Our old, very old driver was not skilled at all to drive under those conditions... and our minibus slid in a tunnel! We avoided a big truck at a few centimeters... His mirror hit the truck. Then, it was the moment to cross the border and all our backpacks were scanned again. Chile is a bit picky on procedures... Our onion and two potatoes (bought in Chile) were taken... Not a big deal but just boring.
We arrived around 5PM in Santiago and went directly to meet Chilewheels Adventure to rent a motorbike for 10-15 days! We really enjoyed this short but very nice visit to Argentina!
October 13–17, 2018