Mendoza

Everyone basically in all of BsAs decided to leave for Easter. Someone should have warned me. I feel like my travel experience was worse that flying out of Chicago or New York for Thanksgiving in a blizzard. I've never doen that, but the girls that were with me from NY said I'm right. Our bus was over 2 hours late. It was in BsAs alright, the issue was that it couldn't get to the bus station because everyone else was trying to get there too. I hailed a taxi to take me safely to the station and he told me he couldn't take me there, so I ended up walking. It was a nightmare. Once it finally arrived, it was the cheap bus (everything else was sold out) so although it wasn't very nice, it still was better than standing outside waiting with my back pack biting into my shoulders. It wasn't that bad in all actuality, and the trip flew. I ate dinner and then slept until morning, and after an hour or so the next day we were there!! And it was beautiful! We had decided to go to Mendoza, on the Argentina side of the Andes mountains. We checked into our hostel, which was precious, and we immediately decided to change into blue jeans and take a horse back riding trip into the mountains. So, we did! It was beautiful, and it wasn't just a walk in the park. It was rather adventurous!! We rode through the foothills with a gaucho, and then we had mate!! We arrived back late, cleaned up, and headed out to a nice dinner that lasted until well after midnight. The next morning we woke up before the sun to eat breakfast and catch a bus out of the city to where we would go on more adventures. From base camp (on a beautiful lake) we headed out even further by bus. We were dropped off with a guide, and we trekked into the mountains. We found a waterfall and scrambled up to the top where we bravely walked off of the edge of the cliff next to it... also know as repelling. It was amazing. We hiked back down after a couple of hours, and took the bus back to base camp. From there, we met up with some guys we knew that were also studying in BsAs. We all decided to go zip lining through the mountain passes and over the lake. It was invigorating! Needless to say, after a full day of physical activity I was exhausted and sure to be sore the next morning. We headed back, freshened up, and found a sad attempt at cheap mexican food. During dinner, I learned that last year while studying abroad, when I went to the Vatican, the place I loved so dearly, those replicas of the popes that were in cases all throughout the cathedral, were not replicas. I thought I was going to throw up. I had no idea those were the actual bodies. I thought that Recoleta was bad, but this almost caused me to pass out on the spot. I just really can't come to terms with these strange ways of burials, or not in this case. I'm really not ok with it. Anyhow, that was merely a side note. I went back and crashed. The next morning we got up and headed out of town to wine country. I faced my fear and the pain of riding a bike (I broke my tail bone twice, it's just not a comfortable experience). We rode about 18 kilometers. We tasted wine, went on tours, and went to an olive oil factory too! We found these british guys to tour around with, and we really had a blast. We had to head back early to catch out bus back to BsAs, so we took off to return our bikes.... when Bella got a flat tire on the bike that I had just traded her. I hailed a policeman in the street, and he called a policeman with a truck who came and rescued us, and then even drove us to another vineyard, because he felt sorry for us. We called a cab from there and went back to pack up and head home. I was traveling with two other girls, so we were getting crabby by that point, so we all just watched movies, and slept. I will say though, my friend pulled a lovely joke on my by convincing me that they were playing changeling for what would have been the 4th time! I believed her and basically flipped out only to begin seeing the bucket list start. Thank heavens! I'm back, worn out, and a little irritable. I'm going to try to stay in town for a cople of weeks. I think I need a break!!