Jan 3, 2006
I left Santiago yesterday around noon and came back across the Andes, intending to take a leisurely ride through the Mendoza wine country of Argentina. I am a big fan of touring wine country, having spent many a happy afternoon in the Napa and Sonoma valleys during the harvest season riding from winery to winery, the air ripe with the smell of fermenting fruit.
Touring the Mendoza wine country would be more like touring the Gallo vineyards around Fresno, in the California central valley. Vast expanses of vineyards and fruit trees, and guys in beat up old Fiats on the side of the road selling wine and peaches off a card table. The wine sells for 5 pesos for 5 liters. It is 3 pesos to the dollar, so my first thought was too bad my motorycle won´t run on the stuff.
I´m sure they have a different marketing strategy for the good stuff.
San Luis is in the middle of the route to Buenos Aires, and I know absolutely nothing about it.
The drive into town goes past factories and warehouses, and then suddenly you are in a town alive with people on vacation, three and four star hotels, bars and restaurants full and spilling out onto sidewalk tables. Evidently it is either a tourist destination, if you believe the brochures, or a nice place to spend the night on your way to other places.
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