Week Seven- Mendoza

Sunday- Walked around Buenos Aires a bit and then met up with a friend to talk about going somewhere for our long weekend. We decided on Mendoza!

Monday I had my first class for History of Art and Media Audiovisual with natives and it went really well! I understood everything the prof said and got my signature to take the class. I then went to Retiro to go to the Bus Station to buy tickets to Mendoza, then booked a hostel and then headed back to school to talk to my adviser about getting a signature for my psychology class. It turned out that the director that I needed to talk to had left for the day, so they told me to come back on Tuesday at 8 a.m. Of course. Always have to do everything super early here.

Got up early on Tuesday to get my signature and it turns out that the guy doesn't come to school on Tuesdays. Luckily there was another lady who signed my sheet for me. Went to my Psych class which went well, but was super long. I was told that it ended at 11:10. It actually goes until 12:50 and then I have History of Latin America and Literature of Latin America from 1-4. So I have class on Tuesdays from 9:40-4 with a ten minute break. I'm going to need to start bringing food! Went home and read for my lit class until dinner. There isn't a lot of homework for these classes, but there is a ton of reading!

Wednesday I got to sleep in, went to the school to buy another book and to pick one up that I had ordered. It rained and I didn't have my umbrella, so I went straight home by means of bus. Luckily I didn't have to wait for the bus today. Got home and packed for Mendoza. We met up at 7:30 to grab some food real quick and then head over to the bus station. We left Buenos Aires at 10:00.

After a very long bus ride, we made it to Mendoza. Our bus ride was supposed to be 14 hours which wouldn't have been too bad, but there was a terrible accident during the night and we had to wait several hours. It got kind of foggy and was raining during the night and when this car was passing another car, it hit a bus head on. Sadly, they were all killed as their car caught on fire after going underneath the bus. The bus driver and some passengers suffered some minor injuries, but were ok. I had no idea of any problem until the morning, because I had been able to sleep pretty well on the bus. We ended up stopping at another terminal to grab some lunch since they didn't have food to give us and then about 6 hours late, we made it to our hostel. We got the hostel and found out that some people left their stuff in our room and we had to wait for them to come back. We went up to the roof and talked with this couple that is originally from South Africa, but had been living in London. After almost two hours of waiting, we got settled into our room and walked to the center to eat dinner and see La Plaza Independencia. The plaza was really cool and full of people as it was a national holiday.  We walked around and looked at the different things people were selling and headed back to the hostel after watching this guy paint these incredible pictures with only spray paint. We got back, got everything ready for Thursday and went to bed.

Thursday morning, we got up early to eat "breakfast" which consisted of terrible coffee and stale, dry toast and then headed out to go biking through the vineyards. We walked to the bus stop and took it to Maipú, which is still in Grand Mendoza, but not in the actually city of Mendoza. We rented bikes for the day and headed off. We decided to bike all the way to the furthest winery first, so that way we would have less distance after the wine tastings. After about an hour and a half, we finally got to Carinae Bodega. They gave us a tour of the cellar and told us a little bit about how they make the wine and a little about the company. Then we were able to try 4 different wines. They were all very good and they explained each wine to us and what made it distinct. Then we headed across the street to the olive oil factory. It was really interesting, but pretty short. The tour lasted only about 15 minutes, but we got to see some of the olive trees and some of the old a new equipment. They only have a harvest period of April to July, so they only run the machines during those months, but they make thousands of liters of olive oil. Afterwards, we got to taste some of their products and headed to the next bodega. After a bit of a ride, we made it to Di Tomasso Bodega which is the oldest one in the area. There wasn't a tour, but the wine tasting was more thorough and we got to look around afterwards. We were hoping to grab lunch at this bodega, but it was very expensive, so we decided to wait. We rode up to the place that was supposed to have good lunch, but it had closed minutes before we got there, so we kept going and decided to grab food if we saw any. The problem with the bike tour is that everything is very spread out and there isn't really a path to ride on. You either have to ride on the road (which is usually fine) or it's very bumpy and difficult. There was one section of construction which was a bit of a pain to ride on. After the lunch place, we kept riding Historia y Sabores (history and flavors) which is a chocolate, liqueur place. We got to sample some chocolate and some of the marmalade that they make there. Not really a tour, but we got to look around again. After this we had one stop left. We biked past the bike rental place and head to La Bodega Rural. Because it was a holiday, the winery was closed, but they have a museum that is free. We looked around that for a bit and then headed back to the bike rental. In total, we biked about 15 miles. It was super long, but the weather was perfect and Mendoza was beautiful. We then took the bus back to Mendoza and ate Subway. This was the first we had really eaten all day and I had wanted to try Subway. It was good, but different from Subway in the US. After looking around a bit, we headed back to the hostel to pack and sleep.

Cellar in Carinae

Vineyard

Olive Oil Tasting

Wine Tasting at Di Tomasso

Friday morning we got up bright and early to meet our bus to take us to Villavicencio which is where they get their water that they bottle from. Our bus was an hour late as per usual and we drove about an hour out of Mendoza and up the mountains. It got to a point where it was so cloudy that we couldn't see, so we headed down a bit and they let us out to look around. Continuing down the mountain, we stopped at an old hotel that used to be very popular, but is now closed. We got to look around the gardens and the grounds. It was beautiful, but it was pretty cold on top of the mountain. We had one more stop after the hotel and that was nice, but it was cold and everything starts to look the same after a while. We then headed back to Mendoza and got off in the center. We found a sidewalk "museum" that we stopped to look at. There were dioramas on the street depicting Mendoza throughout the years. It was neat, but didn't take much time to go through like we had thought. We then headed into a few touristy shops and then walked over to an aquarium that we wanted to go to. It was cool, but small. We went across the street afterwards to the serpentario, which is essentially a bunch of snakes in cages. I was not a huge fan, but it was kind of neat. Because we had thought that all of this was going to take much longer, we had a little extra time to kill. We ended up just walking around the city and then headed to the bus station. We left Mendoza and got back to Buenos Aires around 10 a.m. 

Hotel in Villavicencio

Diorama in Mendoza- Museo Popular Callejero

It was a really nice trip! A little rushed, but I'm very glad I went!

Week Six- First Week of the Semester

This week was the first week of the semester and I started my classes! I found out on Saturday that I had an appointment for my student visa on Tuesday, so I had planned to get everything ready on Monday. I went to the school to sign up for two of my classes and had no problems. Then I went to my first class of the week to find out that it doesn't start until next Monday. Still unclear as to why, but no big deal. I spent the rest of Monday running around Buenos Aires trying to get everything ready for my visa. After about 7 hours and many problems, I had everything all set.
My visa appointment was fine on Tuesday. It didn't take very long, but was a little confusing. I have to wait until April 4 to pick it up. I had my first classes on Tuesday. I had History of Latin America and Literature of Latin America. The history class has potential to be interesting, but the prof is really boring. I think I'm going to like my lit class though.

Wednesday is my free day during the week. Spent the day resting as I am fighting off a cold.

Thursday I had my first class with local students. I ended up leaving ten minutes in as it was not a photography class like I had thought. It was about cinematography and numbers and I had no idea what was going on. I went to my adviser to find out when Psychology was and decided to try that instead. Had History and Lit in the afternoon. Lots of reading and it takes so much longer when it's in Spanish.

Friday I had my actual first class with locals. Psychology went really well. The prof spoke really fast, but I was able to understand almost everything! I still have to get it cleared, but I will take care of that on Tuesday as we have two weeks to get our classes set.

Saturday I went to la Calle Florida (Florida St). It's basically a huge street that is pedestrians only. There are a bunch of shops and it was nice just to walk around for a bit as the weather was perfect today. Looked up some info on a possible trip for next weekend, because we have a four day weekend! They seem to have a lot of national holidays here.

Week Five- Bariloche

First off, Bariloche is the most beautiful, incredible place I´ve ever been to. If you ever get the chance. Go.

After a 22 hour bus ride from Buenos Aires, we arrived in Bariloche on Sunday around 11 a.m. The bus ride was not bad at all. We walked about ten minutes to our hostel and got settled in. We grabbed lunch at this nice little restaurant not too far from our hostel and the waitress talked with us for about 20 minutes. She was from Chile and told us some places we could check out if we decided to go to Chile. She was so nice! Sunday was pretty much just exploring the town. We found the cathedral by the lake and sat on a dock for a while. It was beautiful and so relaxing! We then found one of the chocolate shops named Mamuschka and the chocolate was incredible! After walking around some more we got the best ice cream that Bariloche has to offer at Juaju. After looking into some excursions for the week, we headed back to the hostel. We went to the supermarket on our way back to buy some food to make dinner. We got stuff for sandwiches and made them in the kitchen of our hostel. Considering we didn´t do anything big, it was a full day!

Best Chocolate Ever

Ice Cream!

Monday my friends decided to go trekking in the mountains, but as my feet were giving me problems, I decided to pass and walked around the city. There is a big craft show in the town center everyday except for Sunday, so since we couldn´t go on Sunday, I decided to check it out. It was very cool. I really love the ferias everywhere. I kept walking through the city and ended walking past the chocolate museum. (Bariloche is very famous for its chocolate). It was on my list of things I wanted to check out, so I went inside. The factory wasn´t fully running today, because today and tomorrow are national holidays. Because of this, I was the only one in my tour, so I got a private guided tour of the museum. I was a little worried since the tour was completely in Spanish, but even though she spoke very fast, I still understood almost everything! It was really interesting about the history of chocolate and a little bit about how it´s made! Before my tour they gave me ¨hot chocolate¨ and it was incredible, but was almost like drinking a bar of chocolate. Awesome. After my tour, I walked around for about 2 more hours before heading back to the hostel.

Arrayanes Trees

Tuesday we went on an excursion to la Isla Victoria and el Bosque del Arrayanes just outside of Bariloche. We got to our pick up point at 1:00 after trying a different chocolate store (Abuela Goya- not as good as Mamuschka) and took a bus to our boat, Modesta Victoria. We had about an hour and a half ride to el Bosque del Arrayanes. The ride was really cool. We were able to go out on the deck and take pictures and whatnot. There are no words to describe how beautfiul Bariloche is. El Bosque del Arrayanes is the only forest in the entire world to have the Arrayanes tree. We had about 30 minutes to walk around the main path and enjoy the forest. After the forest, we boarded our boat for a 40 minute ride to la Isla Victoria. La Isla Victoria is part of the National Park Nahuel Huapi and because we are students in Argentina, we only had to pay $20 Pesos instead of $60! It was really pretty, but we didn´t have much time to explore by ourselves. We had a guided tour of part of the island and then had a little bit of free time to view the redwood trees on the island. After about an hour and a half on the island, we boarded our boat and headed back to the city. We went to dinner right next to our travel agency to try a popular fish dish here that´s called Trucha. It was very good and it was presented very nicely, fish head and all! That was a little bit of a surprise! Haha. After dinner, we got some ice cream and headed back to the hostel to talk and plan a little more.

My Horse "Grandote" and I

Wednesday we got up nice and early to be picked up at 9 a.m. in front of our hostel to go to an estancia (ranch). Our ride ended up being 40 minutes late, but that´s typical in Argentina. The ride took about an hour and we arrived at the estancia. We were greeted with a small breakfast that consisted of croissants filled with dulce de leche (caramel) and coffee. After breakfast, we headed out to go horseback riding for two hours. It was absolutely incredible. We rode through the mountains and by the water and even through the water at one point! It was definitely the highlight of my trip. Incredible. After we got back from our ride, we were served an asado. An asado is basically just a bunch of grilled meat. Very good. It consisted of chorizo (sausage), chicken, beef, empanadas, salada and fruit. It was a ton of food for what we paid. All in all, it was an amazing day and for just over $50 US, it was a steal!

Las Cavernas

Thursday, we got to sleep in a bit and woke up just in time for breakfast. After breakfast and showers, we walked to the supermarket and bought stuff to make sandwiches and some fruit to have a picnic by the water. It was super relaxing and really nice. It was really cold and rained a little bit, but it was nice. At 2:30 we were picked up by a van to go to Cerro Leones. We arrived around 3 pm and were taken a ways up the mountain and went on a guided tour of the caverns there. They are called Las Cavernas del Viejo Volcan (Caverns of the old volcano). We saw three caverns that were once inhabited by the Mapuche tribe. The first two caverns were pretty cool and we got to see a drawing on one of the walls that is thousands of years old! The third cavern was the best. We literally crawled through a hole in the cave to go to the main "room" of the cave. It was really dark and scary, but totally cool and legit. I was not expecting to crawl through the tiniest opening ever in a cave today. It was awesome. After the last cavern, we went up the mountain to take pictures and enjoy the view. It was incredible. After the excursion, I bought some more chocolate and had my first submarino. A submarino is essentially hot chocolate, but way better. The give you hot milk and a bar of chocolate to melt in the milk. So good. After that we decided that we wanted to cook our own dinner in the hostel, so we went to the supermarket and bought stuff to make pasta and vegetables. We cooked everything our selves in the kitchen and it was really good and way cheaper. All in all, a really good day! 

Centro Civico (Civic Center)

Friday was our last full day in Bariloche. We accidentally slept in a little bit later than we would have liked, but it was nice. After getting ready, we went out to lunch and then headed back to the chocolate museum. It was nice to see the factory and we got a different perspective of the history of chocolate and our guide was much more conversational than the one I had on Monday. We then met up with two other friends to get ice cream one last time. After enjoying our ice cream we walked to the town center to check out the Patagonia (That´s what the southern region of Argentina is called) Museum. It was interesting, but not as cool as the chocolate museum. After this we bought some chocolate to take back with us to Buenos Aires, stopped at the Feria one more time to buy some gifts and went to dinner at this place we found that had different types of food that had a little bit more flavor than Argentine food! It was so good and the waiter was awesome! Now my suitcases are all packed to the brim and I am ready for the 22 hour bus ride back to Buenos Aires tomorrow.

Saturday we got to the bus station around 10 for our 10:30 bus. We didn't end up leaving until about 11. It was pretty uneventful. As far as 22 hour bus rides go, it wasn't too bad. For me, traveling by bus is way better than traveling by plane.  We got back to Buenos Aires around 9 a.m. on Sunday and headed home to get ready for the first day of classes tomorrow!

Week Four

Sunday: Went to a fería (street fair) in Recoleta (a barrio in Buenos Aires) with a few friends today. It was huge and there were so many people! It was really cool though. There were so many interesting booths. A lot of very talented people here. I definitely want to go back before I leave. So many unique things! Spending the night planning our trip that starts on Saturday! Ahh! It's coming up so fast!

Monday: Went to the bus station after class to buy tickets for Bariloche today! The trip is going to be around 22 hours, but it shouldn't be terrible. We booked a hostel for 3 nights today and will extend if we decide to stay in Bariloche until the end of the week.

Tuesday: Went out with some friends to celebrate my birthday, since I was sick last Thursday. It was a good time! We didn't stay out too late due to school in the morning!

Wednesday: Just a normal day of school. We reviewed for our final all day. I had my academic advising appointment at 4:20. It ended up being 5:10, but I got my classes figured out. I didn't actually sign up for them though. I have to sign up for them on Monday the 14th at 8 am and for my native classes, I have to get permission from the head of the department. I will be glad when everything is set in stone in 3 weeks! Right now I'm planning to take:

•  Latin American Literature
• Latin American History
• Photography
• History of Media and Art

Thursday: Had the written portion of my final today. It was pretty easy. Afterward, some friends and I went to pick up our background checks. We found out that if we leave the country during our break (which we might) we have to re-do our background checks. Annoying, but no big deal. Also, I finally figured out where the colectivo (bus) by my house is, so I don't have to walk as far everyday!

Friday: Had the oral portion of my final today. I'm so glad that this class is done! It wasn't terrible, but at 5 hours a day, it was really long. I went to the supermarket to pick up a few things for my vacation and then went to the post office to mail some things. I am pretty much all packed up and ready to go to Bariloche tomorrow!

On Saturday we are heading to Bariloche, Argentina! It's a 22 hour bus ride and we're leaving around 1 p.m. I'll see you all in a week! :)