The night we arrived coincided with the start of the Mendoza wine festival (and this was definitely a coincidence), so we took a walk into the centre to see what was going on. It was very busy with people lining the streets, so we decided to find a spot on the side of the road and wait to see what all the fuss was about.
After about 20 minutes the carnival started, with people going past on horses in costume. It was like a set for an American western film. The carnival also included a lot of floats, which we concluded were from all the different wine company's, each one had a theme and girls dressed up in fancy clothes. It turns out they were all competing to become queen of the festival. The carnival was good to see, even though we had the constant fear of receiving a pear to the face as the people from each float insisted on throwing random bits of fruit into the crowd. We still have no idea what this was about.
The next day we spent walking around the city a bit. We thought it would be a little quieter but it was just as busy as if turned out there was another parade. We stumbled across the location of where it started and found a spot to watch. It must be a big deal as it seemed to be being televised. After a band, some dancers and more of the same floats we saw the night before, we moved on. This was mainly due to how ridiculously hot it was standing in the sun, plus it didn't really seem to have the variety you might see during the Blandford carnival.
The next day or so was spent chilling out and wandering around different parts of the city.
Yesterday was more of a busy day for us. We decided to take advantage of an offer our hostel had which was a days free bike hire in Maipu for spending 4 nights there. Maipu is the area where a lot of the wineries and vineyards are. After a half hour bus journey we arrived in Maipu and collected our bikes. We decided to visit the furthest away winery first. The map made it look like it was just up the road, but it was in fact 10km so we were already feeling tired when we got there. After a quick tour we were able to taste 4 of their wines. Neither of us are massive wine drinkers but we didn't mind, was all part of the fun. Unfortunately Emily sustained a bad cycling injury to her ankle which inhibited her cycling.
After this we cycled to a nice little beer garden where we sat for an hour in the sun. We then visited another winery and a place where they made olive oil, jams, chocolate and liquors. The chocolate was good, the liquors not so much, although we did like a mulled wine one. We left feeling a little sick. By this time we had to return our bikes to Mr Hugo, who was probably the nicest person we have a met here. We didn't have a clue what he was saying, but he was smiling and laughing a lot so we can assume it was all nice. It was a pretty long day so our evening was less than productive.
Today we move on again, leaving Mendoza and Argentina for our next stop, and next country, Santiago, Chile.
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