Ah… wine tasting. One of the most fun and yet daunting things to do – nothing gives me more pleasure than cracking open a good bottle of ‘vino’ to enjoy with friends (or dare I say by myself too!) but the thought of having to analyse and talk about said wine in front of other people still brings me out in a cold sweat (that’s before the morning after).
“You live here? Why?” is the most frequent salutation from any Argentines I meet. With shock and disbelief, locals wonder why any European would leave the greener grass the other side of the Atlantics and actually choose to reside in a country with villas (slums), cowboy politicians and out-of-this-world inflation.
The simple fact is that Argentina is a great country, and their second question demonstrates why: “But don’t you miss or love your family?”
Always instantly feeling like an inhumane, cold and uptight Brit at this question I respond with red cheeks burning, explaining that yes, I do miss and love my family but I want to travel and experience different countries and cultures while I am still young and can (and probably when I am much older too – but their big surprised eyes always steer me away from furthering their disappointment in my life choices.)
Many people have a romantic image of grape picking: fuelled by holiday packages grape in Southern France, sun soaked paintings of pickers at dawn and Russell Crowe movies. Even Mendoza’s Vendimia festival gives the impression that the harvest is somewhat glamorous. But beauty queens (who rarely visit a vineyard), parades and cocktail parties are a mile apart from the tough reality of grape picking… Hours are long, conditions are difficult and payment is poor.
Mendoza can be a daunting destination for wine amateurs. Gentle bar chatter in a city with a swollen population of sommeliers, oenophiles, wine snobs and fiercely-proud locals (where everyone and their grandmother would happily correct Michel Rolland) can be a somewhat bewildering prospect. So how can you fake your way as a wine expert?
My parents introduced me to wine from a young age and having slurped my way up from sickly sweet Blue Nun (shameful but a necessary rites-of-passage) to some rather more expensive (and ergo surely better?) wine, I figured I was ready for joining such a community. How naive!
‘Organic’, like ‘sustainable’, often appears as a marketing term hijacked by companies aimed at giving stay-at-home, yoga practising, yummy mummies an affordable sense of wellbeing.
On a recent trip to an organic vineyard in Valle de Uco called Occioverde, I learnt that beyond the marketing phenomenon there is actually an inspiring motive. But before donning my hemp shirt and Birkenstocks, I asked owner and winemaker Paolo Addis to explain what ‘organic’ actually is and why there’s all this fuss about it.
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How to survive a hangover in Argentina: Argentina’s best hangover cures
In a land with cheap booze, late night bars and no spirit measures, things can get a little rough around the edges by the end of the night most likely culminating in a banging resaca the following morning. Here are the top five ways to get around a hangover in Argentina, like a local.
Mate: ‘Hair of the dog’ doesn’t really wash here however hooking yourself back onto your caffeinated life-support is perfectly acceptable. Grab your mate, fill it with the powerful herbs, hug your warm thermos close to your needy hungover body and drag on the bombilla (straw) to pull out all that caffeine goodness that will spring you back to life in no time.
The Vendimia celebrations are over, the weather is cooling down and the leaves are turning brown – for many of us this becomes a time to look to hibernation and relaxing after a busy Summer, but for the vineyards this is the busiest time of the year: harvest.
Paintings of deep burgundy and green and old photos of land workers plucking at the vines spring to mind when you think of the harvest and this romantic image is not too far from the truth. The vineyards are beautiful and the sun creates a sullen golden glow, but don’t let any Russell Crowe movie lead you to believe that wine making is effortless.
Hundreds of grape pickers flock to Mendoza to work the season pulling at the year’s bounty on the vines. They work long, hard hours and are usually poorly paid, earning an average of around two pesos per bucket of grapes. And these buckets are very big and very heavy.
Everyone and their grandmother believe that they know something about wine, especially in Mendoza. Even I thought I did. But everyone and their grandmother also know that there is a large gulf between being an amateur wine lover and a sommelier.
I learnt the names of the main grape varieties in my teens, I learnt at University not to drink a wine when the cork smells funny and since arriving in Argentina six months ago I even know that you should gurgle the wine in your mouth before glugging it.
I am not sure if those Ancient Greeks, Romans or even the medieval European peasants who started kicking around a ball ever thought it would become such a big game. Perhaps they did. But I doubt very much that they envisioned the fireworks, riot squads and toilet paper apparently essential to a football match here in Mendoza.
I went to my first football match last Sunday. I have watched the game on television once or twice and I think anyone who is remotely conscious during the World Cup can just about understand the concept of getting the ball through a net to gain points. So the football itself was no surprise. It was everything around it that took me aback.
A beer at a bar in Punta can cost more than a night’s accommodation in any other South American country and during high season (December to March) prices are at a premium.
A black hole in the credit crunch universe, luxury apartments are still being built across the peninsular and with demand increasing the popularity of the city doesn’t look set to wane anytime soon.
Full of rich Argentineans, blinging Brazilians, moneyed Mexicans, wealthy Europeans and the occasional lost Uruguayan, Punta del Este is one of the most popular tourist destinations in the continent.
