Merry Christmas from Mendoza

Merry Christmas to everyone from lovely, stiflingly hot Mendoza Argentina. It was 86 degrees in our hostel room when I woke up this morning. Needless to say it´s a bit difficult to get into the Christmas spirit. Mendoza has been a great place to spend a few days over the holidays though. After one day hike, which I swear will be my last hike in a while (I ¨forgot¨my hiking boots in our last hostel so no one could make me hike anymore) we settled into to some pretty lazy days filled with lounging by the hostel pool and enjoying the fruits of the Mendocinos wineries. Rented bikes one day to tour the wineries which was an experience. We only made it to 3 wineries in 6 hours despite the fact that they are no more than a few kilometers apart. Christmas was nicely subdued. Small Swedish style jul bord and a mini-white elephant gift exchange between Cecilia, Camilla Erik and I.

Waiting to take off on the bus back to Buenos Aires to meet Russ and head out for Punta del Este, Uruguay for a few days over new years. Hope everyone is having a great holiday.

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Bingo on the bus from Bariloche to Mendoza. Just one of the many ways to keep yourself occupied on the 19 hour bus rides. Another is watching terrible American B movies that the sound will inexplicably switch to Russian half way through.


Erik and I in a heated game of ping pong against a couple of Danes.


Interesting sign along the wine route. Bad things must happen to the right.

Our very ¨touchy¨waiter at the first winery, Christian serving Erik, or Vigo (Mortensen) as Christian was so fond of calling him. He told me I didn´t have the actors face, more like a producer.

Sitting amongst the vines enjoying one of our purchases.

Cecilia with our police escort on the way back to the bike rental place. We spent too much time in the vineyard drinking so we were the last tourists back along the route and aparently its not the safest road.

Christmas dinner at the hostel on the 24th.