We spend most of the day in the bus until we arrive to Mendoza at 4pm. We go dee 5 or 6 different hostels, but they are all full with nothing available. We ask what is going on to find out that it's long week-end in Chile and that many come to Mendoza for the week-end. We then go to see a few hotels, because we have no other choices really and finally find one for 450 Pesos a night for three beds (so 150PA each = 31.45$ Can. each), it's a lot but it seems like we have no other choice. We leave to go get a beer after this adventure and the room will only be available at 8pm. A bit of a deception because the room is very small the fan is not working, but we will live through it anyways. It bed early anyways.
Friday Nov. 2nd
We go into town to get some information on stuff to do in the next days. First thing, how to get to the ''Bodegas'' (wineries) closest for visiting and tasting. Second thing, we want to go close to the Chile border to go see ''Puente del Inca'' and the provincial Park ''aconcagua'', where there is the highest mountain in the whole Americas. And finally we want to get info's on how to get to Santiago. After getting the info's we wanted we then have the rest of the day to walk around. We go see the different plazas in the city center while walking around town at the same time. Later we get to a shopping center to hank around a bit, but I also needed jeans and sandals, so I get that done too.
Saturday Nov. 3rd
We get up early and leave at around 8h30 to catch a bus that will bring us to Maipu that is the wineries quarters south of Mendoza. We get a guided visit of the ''Bodega la Rural'' for 50PA (10.48$ Can.) and we will get to use that 50PA at the end of the tour to buy wine. The tour last for over 2 hours and actually closer to 3 hours before the complete end. Very much interesting and we leave with a few good bottles of wine :) We then go to visit a small place that produces derived products made of olives, but also make chocolates, jams and alcoholic beverages of all kind all that is homemade stuff. We have a tasting for 20PA (4.19$ Can.) and tasted lots of good things. We then take back our bikes to get to a small restaurant that makes homemade beers. No beer for me that afternoon. Later we head back to the place we rented the bikes and back in town at around 5pm. We pack out gear in the evening because the next day will be a full day. Leaving at 7am for ''Puente del Inca''.
Sunday Nov. 4th
We take the bus at 7am and get to Puente del Inca at about 10h30. The actual ''Puente del Inca'' is right behind the village. We then take a walk to get to the Provincial Park ''Aconcagua'' to go see the tallest mountain in the Americas. Mountain Aconcagua has 6962 meters at the top. About 3-4 km walk in the park and then another 3km to get back to Puente del Inca. We stop in the park to make a pic-nic with a full view on the mountain. We then take the bus back to Mendoza, we would have liked to simply continue towards Santiago from where we were but it seemed complicated for no reason, so we went back to Mendoza and take the next bus to Santiago, Chile at 10:15pm. We will get to the border crossing at 1am and will need to wait until 4am before being able to go thought immigration (we slept in the bus while we waited, so it was not that bad at all, really). At around 5am we leave again towards Santiago on the Chilean side.
Puente del Inca
Mont Aconcagua
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