Roughing it in Mendoza

Mendoza is a modern city full of wide, tree lined streets. Although it is a big city, on Sunday mornings it is almost deserted, as it is any day during siesta time. Even though autumn has begun in the southern hemisphere Mendoza is still hot, and a siesta mandatory. On the roads leading into the city trucks are laden with fresh fruits and vegetables bound for the many small Fruterias and the larger fruit distribution centers.

The fruits and vegetables are fresh and delicious, tomatoes are perfectly ripe, and sold in bulk on roadsides and out of gardens for salsa de tomates. There are plums, peaches, watermelons, white melons, squashes, corn on the cob, green with freshness, as well as apples, onoins, spring onoins, sweet potatoes, potatoes, and many other vegetables.

The city is overlooked by some of the biggest mountains in the Andes, and you can follow in their shadow to the small vineyards, wineries, and olive groves that surround the city. Cycling or driving you can skip from winery to winery, enjoyign a short tour and a generous tasting session. Most famous for the Malbec wines in the area, there is the opportunity to taste differently aged wines side by side, slowly developing an awareness for the tastes of age.

When the wine and sun begins to go to your head you can head to a traditional restaurant serving food slow cooked in a clay oven, often in a light wine sauce, covered in vegetables and served with ubiquitous potatoes (native to the andes).

Iguazu in pictures

We are in Patagonia now, and loving it! We just finished a 4 day trek (trip report and pictures soon). But now a few pictures of our trip to Iguazu Falls.

Us in front of one of the smaller waterfalls; Salto Bochetti.

A Capuchin monkey, on the nature trail in the national park, we also saw a greater pit viper, but decided not to pause for a photo!

A shot of the big Cataratas, known as the Garganta del Diablo (Devil´s Throat). To be honest, pictures don´t do it justice!

Raquelita y una mariposa.

Iguazu

Well, after a month at mama roja we hopped on a bus and went north to Iguazu Falls it was amazing and a great way to finish this section of the trip. Today we head south to Buenos Aires for a few hours before gettting a bus to El Bolson, in Patagonia.

We are looking forward to cooler weather and less bugs! and we will be there in about 2 days...maybe a bit longer! That´s a lot of crocheting and a lot of reading .


Pictures to follow, time to get on the bus!

Milk that cow

This week, Saturday is our day off, and there is a much needed rain storm outside. It has been really hot (38 - 40) and humid and will hopefully clear now! Over the last week we have been busy building up the stone walls of the bathroom, setting a fire in the well in progress to break through the bed rock, and looking after Paloma the cow and her calf Suki.

On two occasions we have cow sat Paloma and Suki, to let the farm owners Kim and Marcelo go into town. Paloma is a moody cow with horns, but Suki is lovely. After enticing Paloma into her cow shed, we both milked her (4 litres on Thursday), then led her of to graze for the day. We didn't realise how much stronger than us cows are! Pictures to follow soon!

Our spanish has improved lots in the past week, since some Argentinians arrived at the farm a week ago. We get much more practise and our confidence is growing. Rachel´s crocheting has progressed, and this week´s project is some trousers for yoga and general merriment. handsewn, no less!

Farming - The Mama Roja way

It has been a week and a half but we have been busy, and are thriving! After a day and a half of travelling and a day off around the Jesuit ruins at San Ignacio, we arrived at Mama Roja. It sits deep in a valley in the middle of sub tropical jungle. It is such an amazing place, very hot (35 degrees most days), and there is life absolutely everywhere. We work in the mornings then stop at lunch, and enjoy a siesta or tinker about in the afternoon shade. Although it doesn´t sound like hard work, in the heat it can be! But more than anything it is so enjoyable.

We have a little tent snuck up a jungle track near the yoga platform (in progress). There is no electricity, a compost toilet, and everything is cooked on a wood burning stove. When in San Ignacio, we realised that we would not have another opportunity to have a shower for a while... but who cares when you can bathe in a river whenever you like. Yesterday, after 55 mm of rain in the morning the waterfall was flowing beautifully.

It feels so remote at times, expecially as we are at the bottom of the valley and all around us is jungle. We are learning to live with nature, we work when we can rather than to a schedule, and half our clothes have gone pink from the red soil. The different pace of life really hit us when we arrived, you can't rush things. Ben has even learnt that the snakes (only three sightings so far) are not out to get him, and if you leave them alone, they leave you alone too. Today is our first day in the outside world in 10 days.

We took the opportunity to buy yarn (Rachel is learning to crochet) and buy some meat and nuts, (the farm food is vegetarian, and slightly lacking in protein, so we thought we would stock up). Next stop is the pizza restaurant, the food is great and very healthy, but it is nice to have something different. Mostly we eat, potaotes, eggplants, carrots, squash, tomatoes, onions, garlic, cucumber, eggs, and milk from the farm cow - Paloma.


During the mornings we have learned to make adobe bricks, dug a well (partially), laid foundations for a bathroom, gathered and chopped firewood, learned to cook on a wood burning stove, and learned countless little things like how to make good compost, water saving tricks, and how to dig burrowing insects out of our toes.


Still to come while we are at Mama Roja, building the walls for the bathroom, finish the yoga platform, milking Paloma, building a natural damn, experimenting with solar cooking and lots more!

Watch this space!

Uruguay

We are in Uruguay! Whilst staying in the hostel in BA we met a couple who had just come from here, and we decided it would be an interesting way to get up to Misiones. At the moment we are staying in Colonia del Sacramento. We took a rather hairy one hour ferry ride across the estuary from BA yesterday. We arrived in the morning and had a relaxing day wandering through the streets of the old town, looking at handicrafts, eating ice cream and empanadas (not all at the same time). We decided to stay here another day, with the beach in mind, but it is raining so we may have to rethink. Either way it will be a slow relaxing day adjusting to the pace of travelling, and enjoying the peace after busy Buenos Aires.

Buenos Aires

We have arrived! yesterday was our first day in South America, and it was a great place to begin. It is hot and sticky here, and very different from what we are used to, especially this tiem of year! We visited the famous Recoleta cemetary yesterday, which was an insight into Argentinian culture. Each mausoleum was like a small architectural marvel, and there were stray cats everywhere, eating cat food. Someone must have left it there for them, perhaps they are the guardians of this maze like city of the dead. Evita´s grave was anticlimactic (no fanfare or fireworks, just tourists), but the rest of it was fascinating.



We spent the rest of the day basking, wandering, and pootling, it way a joy after the rushing we have been doing recently in preparation to get here.



Today is a day for exploratrion of some of the other districts in BA, San Telmo and La Boca, and for a big juicy Aregentinian steak!

Computrer is acting up a bit, so we will add the pictures later,

Have a great day everyone, (we certainly will)!