Apr 20, 2010 - No more wine for you

So where does the day start, seems quite a while ago. Thats right, I did a waking tour of the cities museums and also the municipal aquarium. The aquarium is straight from the 40's when it was built and hasn't been changed since then. Seriously it hasn't. People have better setups at home. Anyway for 5 pesos it was the cheapest aquarium i've been too. Kind of like paying to visit a pet shop in a way. Some interesting fish thats for sure and then I found the sea turtle. It was way too big for the tank it was in, it kept banging against the...

Apr 18, 2010 - Meandering in Mendoza

So I did make it to Mendoza, which is just as well, because today is a beautiful day to wander the sunday streets of Mendoza. The hostel staff thought I was insane and would be bored and should go do a horseback riding tour instead. after all no one com,es to Mendoza to see the city. Ignoring the hostel staff and using my sense of direction, I wandered down towards the central plaza in Mendoza, called Plaza de la Independencia. Mendoza has a large central plaza about 4 blocks in size then 4 other plazas only one block in size. They are...

Apr 17, 2010 - Long way to Mendoza

Firstly no photos today. Its been a long day of travelling that has taken me to all sorts of places. I got up early and walked into El calafate town for the last time. Then while I was waiting for my bus to take me to the airport, I explained to Nico who was working there today, all about marsupials and monotremes, in the best spanish I could muster. I think the conversation started from asking me about kangaroos, which is the standard question Australians get asked overseas. My flight to Buenos Aires was as uneventful as it could be....

Apr 11, 2010 - WINE COUNTRY

After the theft and violation of our kit and beloved third snapper, we went to Mendoza and Cafataye, Argentina’s capital wine making regions. We´re still quite bummed about the whole business but we keep bumping into people who it’s also happened to, but that doesn´t really make much difference. Some people, however, have lost all their photographs, passports etc, but the secret is to try and stay positive and optimistic and not view every single person you meet as a potential bandit who needs to be punished exquisitely´. You can´t help but...

Feb 22, 2010 - Argentina North to Jujuy

Penguins,Sea lions, Pampas, Rock Canyons and Wine This section of the trip took us from one end of Argentina to the other. We spend almost 5 weeks doing it. From Ushuaia we drove up the east coast on highway 3, to small pueblos that Magellan and Darwin had visited. We visited Tombo provincial Park where the largest Colony of Magellanic Penguins is located. Then on to the Valdez Peninsula, where the Southern Sea lion Colony and Oracas, and Moras(a rabbit like creature) were found. From the Peninsula we drove across the hot Pampas to the...

Dec 11, 2009 - Mendoza

After flying on our last long journey it was back to the buses for our trip from Buenos Aires to Mendoza. The journey takes 13 hours and therefore we were not looking forward to it. But we had nothing to worry about as the journey was great and we slept better than the previous couple of nights in the Colonia hostel. We probably need to admit that we booked a suite on the bus and therefore had our own little area and seats that turned into horizontal beds, we also got supper and breakfast! Mendoza was nice, but not really what we expected....

Dec 10, 2009 - Mendoza - waiting for the evening bus

The day was pretty eventless. We decided to sleep our heart’s content as the hostel we stayed in has a 11am check out time meaning that we can have more of a lie-in and didn’t have to set an alarm clock to wake us up. At 11am we have eaten breakfast and checked out and decided to head for a walk in town instead of staying next to the murky swimming pool as originally planned. The city of Mendoza isn’t particularly interesting if it wasn’t for its surrounding vineyards. We strolled along the streets aimlessly and was mainly chatting instead...

Dec 9, 2009 - Mendoza - Wine tasting

Today is the wine tasting day. We have chosen to go with a tour instead of visiting the wineries ourselves (which is another popular option). The reason being is that we have met a traveler who happily recalled being given a big plastic cup of wine everywhere he went with a fairly minimum tour so not to waste precious wine tasting time. We thought we would want something a bit more sophisticated than merely getting drunk as I am pretty interested in wine itself and hence we opted for the more expensive, yet more informative organized wine...

Dec 8, 2009 - From Chile back to Argentina

As neither of us liked Chile too much we decided that it wasn’t much point staying in the place any longer when we can go to wine tours in Mendoza! We left early in the morning from our lovely swanky Santiago hostel and headed for the Metro station 8 blocks down the road. The bus station was only 3 stops away and at around 8.15, we have arrived at the station. Marcus has looked up the Tur bus (one of the biggest bus operator in Chile) website and found that the first bus to Mendoza was leaving at 8.40am and we aimed to catch that bus. We...

Nov 2, 2009 - Kein Tag ohne Alkohol

Die 14-stuendige Fahrt im Doppeldeckerbus, war ein wenig wie fliegen. Es gab genauso eine Saftschubse und Essen. Auch ein Film wurde gezeigt. Allerdings viel mehr fasziniert haben mich die Blitze draussen. Es war kein Donner zu hoeren und auch von Regen keine Spur, aber am Horizont der platten kargen Landschaft waren stundenlang gigantische Blitze zu sehen, die den gesamten Bus erhellten. Irgendwann hab ich dann aber auch geschlafen. Recht bequem sogar. Am spaeten Morgen dann kam der Bus in Mendoza, auf der anderen Seite von Argentinien an....

Nov 1, 2009 - Argentina - Pete´s Special Birthday Edition

T and I have been keeping a daily journal of our own through out our trip. The write up of the 28th October (my birthday) was, in honour, passed onto Pete to provide us with his crazy representations of how he saw the day unfold! What follows is the extract from our journal, in Pete´s own words! Please be aware this man has lost his marbles during our tour! Morning everyone, hi, hello. As I sit here in the town, San Martin de los Andes in northern Patagonia i am filled with the inspiration of Vern and Boggo from the book "Spud - Learning...

Nov 1, 2009 - Argentina - Part 1

ARGENTINA - PART 1 (Teneale) Iguaza Falls There was no better way to begin our Argentinean experience, than standing at the Devils Throat of Iguaza Falls with millions of litres of water cascading into a smoking abyss. We complained about the rain in Brazil, however the upside to the torrential downpours we experienced, was that the Iguaza Falls had 14 times more water than normal. This resulted in the most unforgettable experience at the falls. Defying all laws of gravity and force, there are walk–ways along the falls which provide the...