This is more like it. We awoke eyes wide open on our luxury cama bus coming from Buenos Aires, to the two dimensional snow capped backdrop of the Andes some 100km away. Still completely in awe when we arrived at the bus terminal, we decided to walk through the city to our hostel rather than catch a cab. Mendoza es Bonita. Every road in this low riser grid city is symmetrically lined with Carob trees. Open viaducts run along side them flowing continuously with the ice melt from the mountains. There is a sense of pride here, the streets are clean, the pathways are tiled and the traffic runs slow reflecting the pace of life here. And then there is the Malbec.

We spent the first couple of days meandering the city, sinking the vino tinto and adjusting to the pace. The third day we decided to explore a little further afield into the foothills of the Andes byway of a trek and a spot of absailing. Caroline took this in her stride, I however found scaling down 45meters of sheer rock face supported by a six stone, five foot two senorita a little daunting. Afterward we dropped into some thermal spas set amongst the mountains to iron the days aches. We partyed that night with our new friends from the day till the early hours. The next day we decided to suppress our hangovers with a wine tour so we hired bikes with some fellow hostelers and spent the day dipping in and out of wineries and knocking back the local nectar. The sun was out the air was crisp it was perfecto.

We left Mendoza the next day feeling revitalised, esp Caroline, to head south towards Bariloche, the lake district. I just wished we had checked the bloody weather forecast.