Finding Home

Whew. I have a lot of information to catch up on. It all started when we decided to take a "vacation from vacation." It wrapped up with our unprecedented decision to settle down. I think we have found a home at last. Now the work begins...

After staying in Cordoba for about a week, we decided it was time to move on. The city is nice, very charming in its own way. Filled with old churches, universities, and of course, many cafes and bars, it is especially beautiful at night when all the ancient buildings (some dating back to the 1600's) are lit from underneath. I would definitely recommend it as a stop on any tour of Argentina. However, as a place to settle, I found Cordoba a little lacking. Although it is a large city (among the top three in Argentina) it lacks the bustle of a real metropolis, while simultaneously being too crowded and cramped to evoke the peace of a small town. More persuasive yet, the cafe in Cordoba was consistently burned. Since I officially got hooked on Argentinian cafe in Buenos Aires, this was a decidedly undesirable situation. Also, I guess I felt that Cordoba, for all its unique regional identity, was in some ways trying to imitate Buenos Aires, which just cannot be equaled. Everything in Buenos Aires is big, loud, passionate, or perfection. Cordoba, in many ways (including the cafe) came off as somewhat second-rate.

So, after being worn down by the crazy go-go of Buenos Aires, and the cramped hustle of Cordoba, we decided it was time for a vacation from our seemingly indefinite vacation. Off to the mountains! We took a city bus up into the Alta Sierras, to a small town called La Cumbre. Nestled among ski resorts and mountain lakes, La Cumbre has perfected the image of a sleepy mountain town. For two blissful nights, we holed up in hostel El Condor, an old colonial English house complete with a woodstove in the kitchen and a glassed-in solarium. The weather steadily worsened, eventually bringing freezing temperatures and icy rain. Cozy and warm inside, we drank homemade wine with Fidel and the family while stoking the fire and playing with Juanicito, a three-month old poodle puppy. When it was time for bed, we retired upstairs, where I got to enjoy the pleasures of my own bedroom fireplace. Turns out, fireplaces six feet from the bed are actually not so enjoyable, particularly when the icy wind sends plumes of smoke into the room. Nonetheless, we slept soundly and were reluctant to leave. Fortune must have heard this sentiment though, because when we tried to leave, the bus driver decided to take the day off, and we found ourselves stranded. We ended up boarding a "red-eye" bus at 1 am, after waiting outside in the rain for 45 minutes.

Upon finally arriving in Mendoza, we were dazed from the early departure, the cold weather (my backpack was considerably lighter because I was WEARING most of my clothes), and the dizzying vision of morning mist rising from vast acres of grapes. Ah.... wine country, Argentina style.

From the beginning, I loved Mendoza. The wide avenues are lined with towering deciduous trees irrigated by flowing ditches that run alongside every avenue in town. Sprinkled with expansive and picturesuqe plazas, dotted with cafes (perfectly brewed cafe inside), restaurants and wine bars, this place is exquisite. Of course, it also comes included with the prerequisite South American trash heaps on all street corners, but thankfully there is a city-wide campaign using mimes to encourage recycling. Really. Mimes. Yes...

Mendoza feels like a city. It is really happening all the time (excluding siesta, strictly observed here), with music, tango shows, lots of cultured and crazy wine drinkers, museums and sidewalk art shows, and a nice Saturday market. It is also slow, with an easy-going attitude evinced most profoundly by our jovial innkeeper, Javier. Everything here is centered around the good life- good food, wine, friends, art, and fun. I like it. I like it a lot. In fact, after 5 days here, we feel wholly disinclined to depart. So here we will stay, settle, and hopefully find some work and an apartment soon. So it begins: life after vacation. But what a fun trip its been so far, and how lucky I feel to be able to cruise just a fraction of this vast land, dipping my toe here and there until I found a place to call home.