This trip had only a couple of markers. The first was Cusco and the Inca Trail; we’d booked that and we weren’t bloody missing it. The second was meeting our dear amigos in Chile and spending two weeks shooting the shit with them. Otherwise it’s all a rather laissez-faire jobby, which means we’ve enjoyed a glorious degree of freedom. It also means that by the time those amigos eventually got home, we had no clue what to do with ourselves.
So we entered a brief period of mourning, and pathetic fallacy snuck itself into the narrative. Zonder is basically a sweeping, swirling windstorm of dust and matter coming in over the Andes. In its midst, it made sense to us that they’d shut the Chilean border. It also made sense to sink £1 pints and watch the Rugby World Cup Final.
Apocalyptic scenes the next morning, with fallen trees, much detritus, and otherwise major upheaval on the central streets. Folks in baggy cord trousers and loose fitting shirts sweep up what leaves they can, but the wind’s still stirring and it seems a thankless task. We’re told Zonder used to be a once a year phenomenon; now it can be as often as once a month.
Alas, when the dust settled we felt we should probably leave Mendoza. What a lovely, lively, liveable city.
Following the raucous path of wind came a collection of drizzly, miserly conditions, which is how we’ll remember Cordoba. Mostly we walked between cafes and ornate churches, trying to figure out what to do in the coming weeks. We did a good job.
In seeking inspiration, we’d asked a few locals in Mendoza where to go and why to go there. Salta and Jujuy Province were common suggestions, but it seemed nutty to head up that far again given we’d been in southeastern Bolivia before. Constant decision-making.
Anyway, we ended up en route to a couple of small towns you’ve never heard of. Nor had we. Not typical features on the Gringo Trail by any stretch, which seems odd given their distinctly Gringo conception and ongoing Gringo feel. The first was Villa General Belgrano, a quite staggering slice of Alpine life in the heart of Argentina, complete with bratwurst, sonorous, weaving streams and endearing Bavarian architecture. Place has the ‘third most important Oktoberfest in the world’ for goodness sake. The stop after that was La Cumbrecita, a smaller, sunnier spot with its own European eccentricities. They both felt like a most amicable meeting of Germany and Austria by the streamside, where they bump into Switzerland and northern Italy. Warm introductions all round. A regular party, but what the hell’s going on?
Well, a bunch of Germans settled in Villa General Belgrano and developed the community after their ship sank off the shore of Buenos Aires in 1940. Others from that realm of Europe came over at the behest of some Argentinian government, who pitched them its likeness to home. This was the case all over the nation. Why? For agricultural and economic and social development, back when Argentina was an ambitious but sparsely populated vision. Hence these pockets of Alpine splendour. Hence this proper melange of a country.
The 19th and 20th centuries saw millllions of Italians come over, an influx that outnumbered native Argentines. So like 75% of the current population has Italian heritage and the Spanish spoken here is inflected with various Italianisms, not to mention a heightened sense of one speaking with one's hands. You've also got the Scandinavians (who were sold the south in all its chilly, windy wonder), European mountain dwellers (as discussed), and so on and so forth. Some I’ve forgotten. That’s all ‘so on and so forth’ ever means.
Villa General Belgrano, then. A day passes up rocky hills and alongside the streams, eating varieties of cooked sugary apples. It takes a bite apiece to establish that both crumble and strudel are perfect accompaniments for long meandering walks. They don’t tatter in a bag. They don’t go off quickly. They are delicious. They give your blood and muscles a vital lift. Let this start a revolution.
It’s gorgeous here.
Green.
Serene.
A ruptured spleen.
Not really.
In seeking more nutritious pastures, a horse had gotten itself all tangled around a tree. Here’s the warm, soft truth: Georgie can not pass an animal without devising a way to improve its life. A beautiful trait, sure, but also an occasionally tricky one. Here, for example, in her extended musings, she fully considered untying this horse and letting it roam free. You can’t do that Georgina the horse belongs to someone. Some back and forth as such. Eventually we managed to cajole it back round the tree and it responded with a gleeful prance into the stream, which at the time appeared erratic and scared the shit out of us.
One evening we ate Solomito Cerdo Manzana. It’s pork and apple and gravy and it’s juicy and it’s good, and most of all it seems mental to me that that of all the dishes we’ve adored this one has merited a special mention? I’m very inconsistent. And so on and so forth.
La Cumbrecita is northwards, closer to that big laguna I know not or care not the name of. Little swarms of ink black tadpoles dominate the shallows. They’re everywhere. We walk into a restaurant and the slide door draws the attention of patrons. The couple to the right are both tadpoles.
There’s a trout lake nestled between a bunch of big gnarly rocks, where slopes of algae render entry difficult, but I manage to splash around in there for five minutes or so with some trout but even more tadpoles as G tackles some cramps.
Cramps? Ah yeah. Something especially special unfolds here. Both of us had a quickfire bout of sickness, but due to closures and strange schedules, we ended up once again dining at both the potential culprit restaurants. My precise to words to Georgina: ‘ah what are the chances of the same place doing us dirty twice’? Lo and behold, after this ballsy move I then entered 24hrs of complete incapacitation — the worst bout by far of this Latin American jaunt. We’re talking bin in the hands and ass on the seat. Gorgeous scene really. I’m not fond of Health apps and the sorts, but I did myself the honour of checking the stats, and my stepometer for the day was 43. Unreal effort. Somehow Georgie swerved the second sickness iteration. As such, she saw daylight and even went for a solo lunch — the first in her 32 years. Very proud. Very much a creature of company.
INTERLUDE! Here's a good boy. Big boost for the readership.
Other than these hiccups, La Cumbrecita was a fine fine stop. We climbed a mountain called Cerro Wank, which is obviously quite funny isn’t it. Wank. We swam in the stream and basked on the bank listening to Fleet Foxes records. We we we. What about you? What are you up to? Let me know in the comments, and I’ll be sure to do absolutely nothing about it, because we’re busy doing stuff over here. Have some decorum.
I’m not really a crime thriller or mystery novel man. My dear amigo Jamie is. This has always been a source of great debate and amusement, so when he sent me a John Grisham novel with a note asking me to be his best man next year, I felt a) abundantly happy for him and his fiancé, b) warm with honour, and c) aghast that I’d definitely have to bloody read it because I couldn’t shun it in the wake of that gesture. Turns out that a) food poisoning fatigue is a good time to fly through a page-turner, b) the Grish is indeed gripping, and c) I need a new suit.
And just like that we’re bound for Buenos Aires.
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