The bus ride from Bariloche to Mendoza was the height of luxury bussing it - flat bed, full meal service (including wine) and the highlight - bus bingo! For being the winner I won a bottle of Mendoza Chardonnay which I shared with the girls in my room on the first night here. Can't really go wrong!

Mendoza is all about wine, so I took a vineyard tour on my first afternoon in the city. We visited the Vistandes vineyard which uses machinery and then the family run Don Arturo vineyard where everything is done using traditional techniques and everything is organic (with no sulphites added). Neither vineyard exports much, if any of its wine as they are both fairly bepoke producers. We sampled a number of different wines produced, including a few Malbec's, Cab Sav and Shiraz varieties. Mendoza is a particuarly good place for wine production because of it's climate. It's hot in the day and cool at night and basically is a desert getting only 200mm of rain a year in the city. Water isn't (usually) too much of an issue though as the city is fed from the rivers which are formed from the snow and glacial meltwaters from the high Andes. That being said, the city is currently experiencing drought with household water only generally available between 10pm and 8am as there was little/no snowfall last winter. The wine was all great and it was pretty tempting to fill up my backback... but then I still have 2 more weeks to carry it! After the vineyards we also went to a small olive oil and dried fruit processing factory where we were able to sample lots of beautiful oils and fruit. Again, tempting to bring some home, but the thought of olive oil leaking in my bag put me off! The final stop on the tour was La Carrodilla Church a very important place for the wine makers as a place of worship for the Virgin of Carrodilla, the patron saint of vineyards and harvests. The church was built in 1840 and was the only church to withstand the devestating 1861 earthquake which destroyed much of the city and influenced a lot of how the city looks today.

Yesterday, after an early wake up I went up to home of the highest mountain outside of the Himalayas, Mount Aconcagua at 6962m above sea level. The Andes, often called the most beautiful mountains in the world because of the colours in the rocks created by the mineral deposits of sulphur, iron, salt, gold etc, were amazing and it was great to travel up from Mendoza through all the different vegetation levels to the highest point, 4000m. On the way up we stopped at mineral water springs, incredible viewpoints of the horribly twisty mountain roads, Uspallata valley (the location for the filming of Seven Years in Tibet) and Puente del Inca. Puente del Inca is a natural bridge over the Vacas River and has amazing yellow sulphurus colours which have taken over the old spa building. You are no longer able to walk over the bridge, but it was still very impressive (even in the bitingly cold wind!) At 4000m is the Christ the Redeemer statute unveiled in 1904 as a celebration of the settlement of the amicable border dispute between Chile and Argentina. The statue is on the natural border exposed to the freezing temperatures and strong westerly winds. We didn't hang around for long! We also drove past some tiny ski resorts which have been suffering badly from a lack of snow in recent years. It would be cool to ski under Mount Aconcagua, but I can imagine that it was get extremely cold! Horribly, we had been joking around all day about the windy roads and on our way back down after lunch at Las Cuevas we saw a car that had just come off the road. The car was in a terrible state, but the lady driver did seem to be conscious and had been taken out of/got herself out of the car (which was on it's roof). We went for help at the army base in Puente del Inca and soon saw ambulances racing up the road to assist, so hopefully she was OK. The driver did seem to be more cautious on the way down though.

Another epic bus ride tonight (8.30pm-3pm) up to Salta. Only 2 weeks left of my trip... but still loads to see and do!