Greetings from Mendoza peeps where I’ve been drinking (even more) copious amounts of red wine & eat (even more) delicious meats so I’m basically paleo again minus the whole not consuming carbs thing cus empanadas are cheap and beers are great too.. and hey if I’m gonna be wearing a bikini and competing with the bootylicious behinds in Brazil for the next few weeks .. i gotta do it riight!! i just treated myself to a fancy schmancy lunch at a melipal bodega in Mendoza after a recommendation from a friend.. wineries are called bodegas in Argentina and they are definitely the polar opposite of the ones i'm used to frequenting back home where i could purchase my 10cent icies, tall boys, utz super spicy potato chips and/or wise deli jalpeno chips (those were my jam!) & loosies (hollller!!1) no no, this was a bit pricey (for south america standards cus i justified it by thinking how much a 5 course meal woudl cost in NYC) and since i've been doing a lot of trekking.. EQUILIBRIUM baby!
But in all seriousness, i’ve been having lots of fun venturing outdoors cus what else do u do in Patagonia.. plus a few of my girlfranz (and wife!) came to visit... i had been anticipating their arrival for the longest time and now they’re gone which broke my heart a bit and left me with some separation anxiety.. BUT never mind tht. LETS TALK ABOUT THE GOOD TIMES!!!
after announcing to everyone at the hostel that my friends were coming, they were a bit delayed so i’m pretty sure everyone thought i was making some story about about these imaginary friends ...but they finally came and they were super pooped from almost 25 hours of flying.. needless to say we went straight to a little outdoor bar/restaurant where we caught up and also had a random chinese lady come up to our table and take a photo with her before she strolled outta there… GOOD STUFF. then we all went to bed cus we had to wake up early the next day to put on some cramp-ons and do a mini, 2 hour trek on Perito Moreno, a massive, beautiful glacier.
Trekking up Perito Moreno was probably one of the coolest experiences on my trip.. and not just cus we were on a glacier (!!!) but because it was incredibly surreal. we did a minitrek on the glacier for about 2 hours and barely covered any ground.. its incredible to think that only 10% of a glacier is above the water, while the other 90% is submerged. Perito Moreno is 97 sq mi and 19 mi in length and it's the world's 3rd largest fresh water reserve. It's also amazing shades of blues…. which btw is because the red wavelengths part of white light are absorbed by the ice while the blue (short wavelengths) is transmitted and scattered. … (YEAHH SCIENCE!!!!)
The tour was super amazing and just when we thought it could not possibly get any better.. they gave us whiskey at the end chilled with glacier ice. seriously.. so coooool. afterwards we visited the balcony which had even more picturesque views.
the next day we left to el chalten.. some of us wanted to do different things so we split up.. raina and alli did some horseback riding while kaleigh, kate and i went on a short trek to laguna capri, which had a really pretty viewpoint of mount fitz roy. we took fun pictures which were not so NSFW and some less fun, but still very pretty pictures. we tried going out at night but we were all so tired and then there was an electrical outage soo wompwomp..
the next day alli, raina and i did the trek to laguna torre which was soo beautiful. alli and i decided to jump into the freeeeeezing water.. later on a man brought us a piece of glacial ice and we ended up posing for a fitness photo since some lady who we met had a sister who was publishing an e book on fitness and wanted her to capture some travel photos.. they came out pretty awesome.. When we got back, we ended up treating ourselves to a beer, which turned into a pretty big night out (as big as it gets in El Chalten) where we consumed bottles of wine, a few gin and tonics (sososososo deeeelicious) and more beers… i woke up a little hungover/exhausted and sadly, the girls left in the morning, so i moped around the whole day and consumed vast amounts of food.
the next day to feel a little better about all the food i inhaled.. i ended up doing a huge hike to Lagunas de los Tres which is at the base of Mt. Fitz Roy.. it was probably the prettiest mountain i've ever seen with beautiful turquoise water, huge lake and ginormous waterfalls flowing from down the mountain.... unfortunately it was supposed to take about 8 hours in total, but really took me only about 3.5 hours to get to the 8KM mark, which was where I got completely lost cus they stopped having route markers.. and then it took about another 3 hours to do the last 2km cus i made up my own path and climbed up this steep path to the top, which had a spectacular view, but it was not where i needed to be/was supposed to goo.. so i ventured back down after finally spotting the lake, and then crawled across all these stones to get to where i was originally meant to end up. fun timesss.. and then it took about another 2.5 hours to get back down so it was almost a 10 hour day.. which would have been fine except i had anticipated it being 8 cus i had a 22 hour bus to catch, which i ended up making, but i didn’t shower so sorry to the person next to me.
the bus ride was basically the bus ride from hell. it was full of a young noisy group who lacked basic bus etiquette and thought it would be great to blast their music and have loud conversations at 2:30AM.. we also had to randomly switch buses in the middle of the night without any prior warning or explanation.. and then we had to switch buses again at 730AM.. but anyway, i made it in one piece and made it to el Bolson, which is known for being a hippy town. it was really cute, extremely tranquilooooo and had super yummy beers. my favorite was a beer mixed with raspberry juice which was the best.. surprisngly there were no cider companies so i'm thinking aboutttt a business opportunity!! anyway, i only spent a night since i needed to head to barilochee...
when i finally arrived to bariloche, since I was already stinky and dirty, i decided to do another minihike as soon as i arrived to the top of cerro campanario which had a beautiful view of the various lakes surrounding the city. i hate comparing things, but it really reminded me of Guatape in Colombia. i ended up doing the drive through the 7 lakes route the next day, and spent the day at San Martin de los Andes sand Villa de la Agonstura, which was OK. Since Bariloche and the surrounding cities are known as the Switzerland of Argentina because of its pretty mountains and lakes and yummy chocolates which i happily consumed after all that hiking! (for those who are concerned about me sticking to paleo.. dont worry guys had the dark chocolate!)
Speaking of hikes, I climbed up to Cerro Catedral and Refugio Grey the day after, where i was followed by a guide dog who guided me to the place i was not supposed to go, but it was an adventure and he was good company :) afterwards i hitched a ride back to the main entrance since i ended up being my farther out than i thought i was on the map, and ended up meeting some nice girls who i got beers with... i was super pooped/want to save all my energy for Brazil, so i ended up falling asleep quite early, even though i met some other super cool girls who wanted to go outtt.. the next day i caught a bus to Mendoza which is where i am now...
So excited to get to Brazil in the next few days! Carnival will be nuts.. I'm splitting my time between Salvador & Rio.. not sure when I'll have a chance to update this shiiiiz but i promise i'll come back with some good stories
Till next time XOXO