Mendoza Day 5

Today was another slower day after the big drive. Doug took the kids to a couple playgrounds while I went for a run to and in Parque San Martin. It is the 'Central Park' of Mendoza. It was beautiful and great for running with many dirt paths, trees, beauty. After the kids' naps we walked down the street to the Vines of Mendoza. It's a great place. They & their website helped us greatly in planning which Bodegas (of the 900+) to visit and how to get to them, etc. Many of them are hard to find. Vines also offers tastings at their site from many of the bodegas. This was nice and made it much easier to taste some of the wonderful Argentine wines, since we realistically could only visit 4 Bodegas. We were quite impressed & somewhat surprised at how good the wines are! We tasted several really good ones over the week. Some good Malbecs and my favorites were the blends (or cortes as they call them in Argentina).

doing a puzzle together

I took my little camera running. I ran through town to get to the park. These are some of the single-family homes with yards and everything. It's great, they're in walking distance from everything.

It was a little bit disconcerting, though, that virtually every building had bars on the windows and locked gates. There is still 25% povery here, so there is petty theft. Other than that, it seems like a great place to live.

This must've been one of the nicer, more expensive neighborhoods of today and the past.

an old uninhabited mansion

the entrance to Parque San Martin

great, shaded, dirt paths

with beautiful scenery

at the Vines of Mendoza

We had a great time at the Vines. We met some great people. The kid's favorites were Doug & Lydia, a great couple that were on the tail end of their year long honeymoon travelling from Mexico down thru South America. The kids quickly warmed to them and talked their ears off--even as we were conversing with other people. Their magic tricks kept the kids fascinated as Hudson couldn't figure out how Doug could pass a cork through his head and pull it out of his ear. We exchanged blog links and later found their pictures of Sutton & Hudson online. Its really great how the kids have opened doors for us to meet some really interesting people.

The magic cork!

They even traded shoes :)

From the Vines, we walked to Anna's Bistro for dinner. It was recommended by many. It was a great place with great outdoor seating in beautiful gardens.

So far in all the places we've stayed, it's been a bit difficult to cook meals - especially dinner. There are no stocked spices or condiments, just what we buy at the grocery store. The cooking utensils/supplies are minimal, as well, with no grill (except in Bariloche). We've made quite a few dinners at home, but very simple. So, we decided to eat most breakfasts and lunches from home and a few dinners, but will eat dinner out mostly. Not too bad, though, when the dollar goes a long way here.

Unfortunately, it was too dark to get good pictures. It was a neat restaurant.