Land of vino and large lumps of cow...

Hmmm....

At this rate, I will not only be getting a new pair of running shoes when I return to Darwin, but that will be doubled with many a trip to the gym (Adam - I am in need of a Spin class or 6), and a diet of lettuce and celery for two weeks - the only thing that will compensate for the many calories consumed in the past few days, and indeed those to be inevitably consumed in the coming last couple of weeks here in Argentina.

We have just spent the past couple of days in the delightful town of Cafayette, about (by bus) 3 hours south of Salta and 6 hours west from Tucaman (where we are currently residing for the night).

Cafayette, for those of you who don´t yet know, is one of the finest wine growing regions in Argentina, with vinyards up to the door of many of the residences of town. It is surrounded by beautiful mountains, has rivers close by, and is a very pretty part of the world. It has a beautiful plaza in the centre of town, which just calls for many a glass of wine or cup of coffee to be drunk, either before or after that two hour siesta in the afternoon (Alf, I hope you are working on Aunty Clare - I expect progress when I return...). Life here is blissfully difficult to take.

In order to see as many wineries as possible, we decided to hire bikes for the day and see if we could fit in all Cafayette had to offer (well, as many wineries as possible until intoxication prohibited balancing on two wheels anymore). Unfortunately, the standards of up keep on bikes in this part of the world is not quite what it is in Australia, so only a few kms up the road (up hill I might add), the handle bars of Craig´s bike decided that they no longer wanted to be attached to the bike, so we had to hike it back to town and replace it with one that had them firmly attached.

That dampened our spirits some what and we decided that it was getting too hot to head back where we had already ridden (winery was 5 kms out of town), so we opted for a few that were a little closer by.

The wines here, particularly the whites, have a very distinct flavour. Me being one who doesn´t drink, or particularly like, white wine, I was decidedly impressed with what was on offer. I was even more impressed with the Malbec and Cab/Sav wines and managed to get my fair share of tasting in during our adventures. We visited three wineries in total in the end (after attempting many more in the morning - bloody shonky bikes!!!), and were sufficiently impressed to say that Argentinian wine is certainly to be experienced.

Along with good wine, the other thing that Argentina is well known for is beef, and the serving of huge lumps of cow at any one sitting. Craig had tried ´bife de chorizo´ on our first night (in an exceptionally rare state I might add - too much for my liking) in Cafayette, however I decided to ´do as the Romans do´ on our second night (with it cooked a little more to the medium side of things), and sampled some myself. The steak here is quite good, although certianly not ´eating with a spoon´quality just yet (I still have high hopes and am assured that BA is the place to sample...). The fantastic thing is that Argentina is dirt cheap when it comes to eating almost anything. For the bargain basement price of about $20AUS we can both have massive cuts of meat, huge salad, at least half a bottle of wine between us (and generally more so) and dessert. See what I mean about having to put my running shoes to good use when I get home...

I sure could get used to this life. Seems there will be more to come as we head to Mendoza - I am sure copius amounts of wine and beef await our arrival...