Back across the Andes

Mendoza province is beautiful.

I was on a bus all day yesterday, crossing the Andes from Argentina into Chile, and the scenery was amazing -- cactus, green and bright yellow leaf-trees, rocky craig-peaks cut through with rivers and lakes, blue sky against rust-flavored gravel and clay arroyos, roaming horses, desert towns, and snow-capped passes.

Made me think of what Thomas Merton said about a certain area of France: "I drank poems out of those hills."

It also made me feel like buying a horse and moving to Argentina to be a shepherd for a few years.

As usual, I'll post pictures when I can, but I DO have them.

It was my sixth international border crossing in three weeks. I'm in Santiago tonight, at a different hostel than before. I wrote most of this post at 2:30 a.m. Woke up with nothing to do, so I wrote, but the internet died and I didn’t get to post it.

I woke up this morning and walked down stairs, only to find Gene sitting in the common area of the hostel typing on his computer. He and Nicole left Mendoza on Sunday, and I didn’t expect to see them until we were all back home, but I guess they just found the same hostel I did.

Last night I ate at "Vacas Gordas" (Fat Cows). The Mexican guy in Mendoza told us it was a good place in this neighborhood, and he was right. It's a nice restaurant (the kind with 2 forks and 3 knives), and I felt under-dressed (wearing my old untucked flannel shirt and nylon pants), but the waiters said they didn't mind. The place was kind of empty at 6 p.m. anyway. I had a shish-kabob of "lomo" with papas fritas and an IPA.

The place is about two blocks from the hostel in Barrio Brasil. I would recommend them both, but I can't remember the name of the place I'm staying. The address is 151 Cienfuegos. (Now that I think about it, I don't know how I feel about sleeping on a street named for "100 fires"...)

I think I found 2 or 3 hostel options for tonight in Mexico City. They're all about 4 miles west of the airport with decent online reviews. Now I just need to catch my flight this afternoon and find an honest cab driver at the airport after dark who knows one of the addresses. Wish me luck.

Jacob.