Mendoza is the wine producing capital of Argentina. Therefore this blog is mostly about the making and drinking of wine. If you don't like wine, you probably won't be that interested in reading it (sorry Mum). Also if you like wine a lot but are heavily pregnant and unable to drink it you probably don't want to continue reading either (sorry Rosie).

For the rest of you, we had four wine-tastic days in Mendoza. To get from Santiago to Mendoza is a seven hour bus journey across the Andes. It's quite a spectacular journey so we decided to do it by daylight. The border between Chile and Argentina was our first experience of a land border crossing. If a border crossing gives the first impression of a country, then I was slightly concerned about what to expect from Argentina. Passport control was about 10 miles after the actual border, though there wasn't really anywhere to escape to, so I suppose it doesn't matter. The Chilean exit side of the border was modern, swift and efficient, with an attractive young man swiping our passports and then handing us over with a big smile. The Argentinian entry side was staffed by a man with a mullet who stamped the first few passports from our bus with the wrong date - not a couple of days out, but a whole twelve months out. Quite an important detail on a visa. We also had to do a collection of loose change to get us through customs quickly. For the grand total of about 30p each, we overtook 2 other buses queuing to get through the border which was obviously worth it. We had to fill in triplicate forms, and there must be thousands of people going through there every day, so thousands of pieces of paper being stamped. And then what?? Where do they go?? It distracted me for much of the rest of the journey into Mendoza.

Mendoza is the most well-known of the wine producing areas in Argentina, with the surrounding area big producers of Malbec and Cabernet Sauvignon. Grapes aren't native to Argentina, like in Chile they were brought over from Spain to make communion wine when the Spanish invaded. Unlike in Chile, where they only drink 16 litres of wine per person per year, in Argentina wine is a big part of life. They drink 33 litres of wine per person per year, nearly as much as the French, and more than the UK (although I think the UK figures can't include the FSA netball team as no one ever asked us, and I'm pretty sure we get through that just on Tuesday nights, let alone including special occasions…). However only recently has the emphasis shifted from producing quantity of wine to quality of wine. 15 years ago it was unheard of for an Argentinian winery to make wine for keeping, which develops over time. Wine was for drinking. To quote Frank, a Chinese-Australian on our tour, "Why we sniff the wine? It just smell like wine. Wine smell good. " But in the last 10 years Argentinian winemaking has developed, enabled by lack of restrictions like in the old world wine countries (most notably France). Actually there may be restrictions, but as with all other rules in South America, they probably just ignore them.

There are three different valleys at different altitudes that produce most of the grapes in Mendoza - Maipu, Lujan de Cuyo and Valle de Uco. By carefully devising an itinerary that took us to 10 wineries in 4 days (they are shut on Sunday so that put us behind for 24 hours) we managed to see much of what the region had to offer… We've summarised them all below

On our first day we decided to head to Lujan with Ampora wine tours - this is how wine tasting should be done. We were collected by minibus from the hostel and met up with the rest of our intimate private tour group (2 mature Australian ladies, an American couple from Washington state, and Frank and his wife who immigrated to Australia in the 70s and were in the catering business in Perth), as well as our personal guide for the day, Rosario. Ampora had carefully selected from the regions wineries to show us different aspects of wine production in the area. Each winery provided an English speaking guide who gave us all the details on the production, and guided us through the tastings. Though unlike when we went champagne tasting on my hen do, I was disappointed that there were no videos of Scarlett Johannson talking about the elegance of effervescence… We visited an old winery which is now owned by Tattinger, but which still makes its wines in concrete, not stainless steel tanks. Then we went to a producer which included a tasting straight from the tank of young wine to compare to the finish article. Finally we headed to a new boutique producer, before heading to the fourth stop of the day and having a four course lunch with wine pairings. As jolly lovely as the whole day was, we did taste 22 different wines before 3pm which always seems like a marvellous idea at the time…

On the second day, armed with everything we had learnt the day before we decided to head out by public transport to Maipu and hire a bike to take us to a range of vineyards there. We caught the bus to Mr Hugo's bike hire shop and realised that this is probably not how wine tasting should be done. In fact it was diametrically opposed in almost every way to the previous day. Although Mr Hugo is rightly legendary amongst travellers in Mendoza, and it was good fun.

As we got off the bus we headed to Mr Hugo's with a number of other independent travellers who had the same plans. Mr Hugo decided that as bus buddies, we would become a tour group for the day, and we were partnered up with 3 Australians, and two kiwis who were on uni holidays. We recognised the kiwi girls because they had been on the same free walking tour as us in Santiago, though they were two of the ones who decided not to pay. At that point I decided not to mention my uptight British attitude towards the whole 'no free lunch thing' so as not to spoil the atmosphere… Mr Hugo gave us a map and told us which vineyards were closed, then suggested we lined our stomachs first by heading to the olive oil producer for a tasting as it also included 2 shots of liquor. Then he gave us 2 glasses of free wine before we headed off. This set the tone for the day…

After the free liquor shots (pepper flavoured liquor before lunch is not something I would recommend), and about 2 hours after arriving in Maipu we went to our first winery. It was shut, at which point the Australians decided to go to a beer garden to decide what to do next. With only 4 hours before all the wineries shut (and 20km round trip still to do), Jon and I decided to break away from the group and try and see something of Maipu while we could still remember what we had tasted the day before. Unfortunately at that point I got a puncture. Jon didn't believe I had a proper puncture so I made him swap bikes. About 5 minutes later he believed me, but I biked off ahead and he couldn't catch me and make me swap back.

We stopped for lunch (and tasting) at Famillia de Tomassa, an Italian, family owned winery and ate while waiting for Mr Hugo's assistant to come and fix the bike. At the next winery we met back up with the rest of the group who had made it out of the beer garden, and were tasting by the bottle as it worked out to be more cost effective. We missed the tour at that place, but watched the end of a premiership match on the telly. Finally after our third tasting of the day we got back to Mr Hugo's at 6pm and the free wine began once again. All the wineries shut at 6pm, and there is a policeman on a motorcycle that waits outside each of them to escort the drunken masses back to their bike hire shop - whilst some of the trip is on tree lined country roads, other bits are on a dual carriageway between two major roads in and out of Mendoza, and they don't hire helmets with the bikes. I was pleased to see that our policeman thought we were sober enough to make it back alone, although I really wanted a picture of Jon with a police escort. I don't remember much of the next 3 hours' worth of wine fuelled conversations back at Mr Hugo's with the rest of our group but it was grand fun at the time. We also ate a lot of crackers as that was the only snack anyone had with them. I don't know if you've ever had butter flavoured crackers before but they are an acquired taste, and surprisingly bad at absorbing cheap wine. At 9pm Mr Hugo escorted the remaining 40 or so stragglers back to the bus stop, and bought us tickets back to Mendoza, which I thought was jolly nice of him until I realised he made 60 cents per ticket and got to grope the drunken young ladies as he hugged everyone goodbye.

The next day we had a lie in, and all the wineries were shut, so we got to see a bit of Mendoza itself. Although we were pretty tired so ended up sitting in the park for much of the day after eating pizza.

Finally, feeling brave and convinced we had learnt from our experience on the Saturday, we headed back to Maipu on Monday morning to hire more bikes and complete the wine tasting circuit. This time we did not go to Mr Hugo, but rented from Bikes and Wine. To be honest the bikes were a lot worse, and they don't give out free wine before and after, and as we had an overnight bus to catch that evening that was the key feature in choosing them this time. We were sensible and biked to the furthest winery first so we were always heading back towards base, and made time for a good lunch

It only rains in Mendoza about 35 days a year, and lucky for us we got to experience that. At lunch we were sat on the roof terrace at Tempus Alba when it started to spot with rain. Jon was getting a bit wet so I went to move my chair back and the back leg completely gave way underneath me. I proceeded to fall off the chair in the slowest move known to man. A normal fall off a chair takes about a second… this one took me at least six seconds to fall slowly backwards and onto my side, landing painfully - but carefully - on the metal frame. Two lovely young Argentinian gentlemen leapt out of their chairs to help me up, while Jon sat there pissing himself laughing at me. I tried to explain to the staff what had happened, and that I hadn't had much to drink (I actually hadn't at that point), but they didn't speak English / believe me…

After lunch at our final tasting place for the day, the rainstorm came in so heavily the force of it caused the automatic doors in the tasting room to open. The tastings weren't that good there but it provided good shelter from the storm for while so we hung around and only ended up paying half price for them which was good. Someone had brought children with them who were running around everywhere making lots of noise, and a German woman shouted at Jon to control them. I'm not quite sure why she thought he was the man for the job but he said he just ignored her and hid in the loo until she had gone away.

When we got back to Mendoza we had a couple of hours to kill before getting to the bus station for our night bus to Cordoba. First we decided to go to the Park Hyatt hotel and have a glass of locally produced fizzy wine - obviously they can't call it Champagne, but it is made by Chandon so I thought worth a go. We've been staying in hostels for the last 2 months, so the Hyatt was a bit intimidating to start with, and we spent a good 15 minutes pacing outside the hotel trying to decide if we could get in. Then we decided that if challenged we would pretend to be Americans who often walk round on holiday in Teva's and shorts - my accent is more passible than Jon's so I would do the talking. We got in without challenge though and enjoyed an hour being in reasonably civilised company.

After our champagne at the Park Hyatt we went to Kinga Burger. There's probably not many people who would start a conversation with that. Think Burger King mixed with EasyJet - there is a lot of orange. Everwhere, really everywhere we looked in Mendoza there were adverts for a Godzilla burger - twice the size of a Big Mac, with FOUR hamburgers in one double bun. Inspired by all the 'Man versus Food' episodes we have seen on Latin America Fox Life we decided to try it. Man won easily, woman struggled but made it through. It nearly broke my jaw trying to open it wide enough for the first bite. Man 1, Food 0. And so to Cordoba, and perhaps a spot of detoxing…

This week we...

STAYED

· At Hostel Internacional, a HI hostel in the south of central Mendoza. For the first two nights it was a massive party hostel with bands playing until 4am then nothing. I wouldn't really recommend it, but it was quite cheap.

ATE

· At Patio Jesus y Maria, on the outskirts of the park (under a football stadium where there was a pre season friendly going on much to Jon's dismay). It was a really good typical Argentinian grill and I had steak, and Jon had a mixed grill that beat him - he turned away more meat as it was being brought out for him. We ordered a good bottle of wine which earnt the respect of the waitress. Unfortunately this was after Mr Hugo so I was half cut for most of it, and can't remember it as well as I would like.

· At Florencia restaurant, on the recommendation of our posh wine tour guide. We got there at 11pm, but the place was still half empty, and when we tried to pay their credit card machine wasn't working so they suggested we just come back tomorrow….?!?

· At Kinga, for the Man v Food challenge (see above). I haven't felt 100% right since eating the Godzilla burger so if you ever feel inclined to eat 4 burgers in one bun you may need to train for it.

LEARNT

· Apparently it is customary to have a glass of champagne after your dinner. Or at least it is on the Andesmar buses.

· Much about wine. Most notably not to drink oodles of the cheap table stuff and then get on a public bus back to the city centre afterwards.

· A glass of champagne in a 5* hotel doth Jennifer a happy girl make.

· I have found my calling - I am going to export cider to South America. I will do to the international cider market what Bulmers did when they started selling in big bottles with ice. It will be too late for me, but not for the hordes of other British travellers who visit.

· 'The maceration process' is an amusing turn of phrase in many languages.

THE WINERIES IN FULL

· ALTA VISTA - now owned by the people who make Tattinger, but an old winery which primarily makes wine in concrete vaults rather than Stainless steel tanks. Makes 2.5 million litres of wine a year, and exports to the UK, but difficult to find single vineyards and 'Alto' brand wines outside of Argentina (though we now have one in our backpacks, and it seems to have lasted ok for the last couple of weeks).

· KAIKEN - owned by Chilean company, and one of the first to move from quantity to quality wines in Mendoza. Make a Malbec Rose by macerating red grapes for only one day instead of one month (for red wine). Gives colour but tastes dry - worth trying. Export to UK supermarkets. 2008 Cabernet Sauvingnon was best.

· CAELUM - Owned by a family from Argentina, unlike most wineries in Mendoza now. Relatively new and began life as a pistachio farm but expanded into making wines 'with structure' i.e. that can be saved. Each vine in the vineyard is prepared for a specific type of wine and tended to accordingly - for the best wines, it takes one full vine for each bottle. Made an awesome desert wine by drying out Malbec grapes - like making wine from raisins. Not one for the diet conscious as has 150g sugar per bottle (compared to 1g for normal red wine). Does not export to UK, but we have a bottle of the desert wine in the backpack.

· RUCA MALEN - Fabulous food, but too many wine samples at this point to remember the full details. I think they export to the UK.

· FAMILLIA DE TOMOSA - very old, traditional winery, and some of the concrete vats are listed so can't be used anymore. Nice Malbec, less nice blends.

· MEVI - Very modern winery, good blends. I can't remember whether they export or not as our tour got hijacked by the Australians / football.

· VINA EL CERNO - Small winery that we visted at the end of our Mr Hugo day. As such, memories are limited.

· CARINAE - family owned vineyard (from France who came to Mendoza a few years ago with no knowledge of the wine industry - they are living the dream - MY DREAM). Wine was not one of our favourites, but the winery was lovely. They do everything by hand, including labelling each bottle individually. All wines have some link to astronomy (names etc) as the owner has that as a second hobby. Export to UK.

· TEMPUS ALBA - my favourite wine, despite the incident with the chair. A-may-zing 2008 Malbec. Go out and buy some now.

· TRAPICHE - The beast of Mendoza wineries - so big it has it's own railway line. Export to UK, but a lot of the mass produced wines weren't great.