Day 66 - Thursday 10.28.2010
A HEY-L-MUT FOR YOUR HEY-UHD
(Mendoza, Argentina)

First thing that pops into your head about Mendoza, Argentina?

No, not that thing. That´s gross. They cleaned that up years ago. Ok, fine. Second thing that pops into your head about Mendoza? Yes, the wine. Of course. Victoria and Joseph and that laggard of a brother Jacob make their way to nearby Maipú (yes, the word is as funny as it looks) to drink wine and ride on bicycles. For some reason this is condoned here. We don´t know why. But we wore helmets.

Wine: The bike rental place gives out cups of wine while you wait. Hands down the best wine we´ve had while waiting at a bike rental shop.
Bike: We decided, somewhat smartly, to bike the long distance now and then work our way back. Roads are a bit crowded with trucks and the like, but it eventually clears up and turns into beautiful tree-lined country roads through vineyards and olive groves.
Wine: Bodega Carinae. We get a nice tour of the relatively new winery, with old school equipment brought from Italy (fact check?). This vineyard is slightly unusual in that it mixes acreage to grow both grapes and olives. The wine is slightly pretty good, nothing mindblowing. Better than we could`ve done ourselves.
Bike: Back up through the trees, with Joseph heading up the peloton, Jacob in a forward chase position, and Victoria on a breakaway at km 11 (but only because she´s on steroids).
Wine: Viña el Cerno. A definite favorite. We each opt for the taste-4-glasses deal, and spend about 2 hours passing around the various cabernets, merlots, malbecs, and syrahs, some young and some aged in wooden barrels. Overconfident as a result of the midday consumption of alcohol, we convince ourselves that we can tell that 2007 was a good year in the region.
Bike: Hey, we`re still moving...
Chocolate and Liquers: For no real reason whatsoever, there`s a chocolate and liquers shop near some of the wineries. To top off our day of conspicuous consumption, we partake.
Bike: We arrive to return our bikes, each in one piece, respectively, and refuse the offer of more wine.

In the evening time, in search of a nice salad, we end up at a tenedor libre... perhaps Joseph`s favorite piece of Argentine culture. Literally translates as ¨free fork,¨ i.e., a much more classy way of saying all-you-can-eat. While the concept of all-you-can-eat in the USofA conjures up images of the Ryan`s Steakhouse minibar or a questionable Chinese food buffet, the Argentinian tenedor libre frequently is a finer dining alternative. Vegetarian Jacob is happy (turns out man can survive on gnocchi alone), as are the two resident carnivores at the table.

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Day 65 - Wednesday 10.27.2010
CENSO!!
(Mendoza, Argentina, with a side trip to Potrerillos and back)

Arrive ear-lie in the morn-ing to Mendoza and rendevous with little Jacobcito Nussbaum at the bus station. We fight our way through the mob of hostel representatives, bargain a little bit, and find ourselves a lovely room at the frattiest lame-bag of an Americans-and-Australians-only hostel you could imagine. We decline to sign up for that evening´s pub crawl, despite the fact that everyone attending has signed their name with an exclamation point. We look down the bridges of our noses at such frivolity.

Two big things to mention. First, we realize immediately that when people said ¨oh, everything´s gonna be closed on Wednesday because of the census¨ they meant everything. To put it bluntly, there wasn`t shit open in the town. Why? Because everyone has to sit at home all day until the census takers show up and ask you the census questions. No joke. Furthermore, store owners get fined if they open their stores during the day. Real mature, Argentina, real mature. Joseph gets quite a kick out of comparing this to another famous census that used similarly advanced polling methods, making cracks like ¨perhaps we should go hop on a donkey and travel back to Bethlehem¨or ¨don´t the Argentines know what statistically-significant sampling is.¨ No one listens to him, as usual.

Second, the former president of Argentina, Nestor Kirshner, has died. He was the hubby of the current president, Cristina. The nation is abuzz with news of his death. Jacob is a bit abuzz himself with his conspiracy theories, that Nestor died earlier but that the government waited until the census day to announce it for its nationalist symbolism. Jacob is a total nut tree. Gracias Nestor, Fuerza Cristina.

Main event of the day is a total flop. In search of decent hiking, we take an hour bus ride to Potrerillos. I´ll be brief. There is no hiking in Potrerillos. There is a lot of wind, and a beautiful large lake near the mountains (really a reservoir), some census takers, and some very helpful policemen. On that last note, Joseph kind of left his glasses on the bus and, as a result, had to wear his sunglasses all afternoon... again, long story condensed... the policedude called the company, we talked to the driver, and a few miracles later the glasses were recovered upon arrival back to Mendoza. We thought it was too late for divine intervention now, but maybe something about the Biblical tone of the day (Herod-style census, ruling figures passing away, ominous weather, etc.) convinced the Good Lord to lend a hand and return the glasses to the bridge of Joseph´s nose... of course allowing him to look down the bridge once again and discern with optical clarity the images of those lame-ass pub-crawlers at whom he was scoffing.

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Day 64 - Tuesday 10.26.2010
IF YOUR KNOWLEDGE OF THE DIRTY WAR IS SORT OF FUZZY, DOES THAT MAKE IT A FUZZY WAR?
(Córdoba, Argentina to bus...)

Main event of the morning: a visit to the Museo de la Memoria. This museum is housed in a building that was used as a prison and interrogation center during the Argentine ¨Dirty War¨ under the military dictatorships from 1976 to 1983. The location of this building itself is frightening in itself -- it`s on one of the main streets in the pedestrian center of the city, right near churches and schools and shops. The museum focuses on some of the people who were arrested and brought to this building to be interrogated, tortured, and killed. Lots of students and political activists, artists, writers, intellectuals, etc. Mostly young. There`s a section devoted to displaying some of the victim`s donated personal effects to humanize them a little, with photos and letters, and then some of the cells are left intact with graffiti on the walls. The recentness of all of this is, of course, startling. We leave wishing we´d been given a little more actual info... the place is really more of a living monument than a museum full of facts. We both agree that we should learn more.

Main event of the early evening: Some very exciting news. Some of the more careful blog readers out there who noted that we purchased a gourd for mate on day #60 may have been left wondering how we have been filling said mate with hot water. If you`re new to the mate game, basically you put a bunch of the tea-like leaves in the thingy, fill it with hot water, drink it through a straw with little holes in it, and then fill and repeat. The stuff is strong enough for a great number of fills and repeats. So the news: ladies and germs, we are now the proud owners of a shiny new hot water thermos. Argentines may not have done much over the years (squandered a great country´s natural resources, defaulted on some massive debt, failed to conquer the Falkland Islands, and failed to invent any other pen besides the ballpoint), but man oh man, have they perfected the art of keeping water warm and creating absolutely spill-proof ways to pour it. This thermos is a work of art. I can´t even begin to describe how the spout works, but it´s ingenious. Can you tell how much excitement this has generated?

Late evening: get on another overnight bus, this time with bigger seats (it´s worth the extra cash, trust us) and with a thermos of hot water.