jack and ken's grand adventure

HOLA!! Jackie and Kendra here.... we´ve worked our way from East to West via the most dreadfully long busride imaginable (36 hours!) and find ourselves in the beautiful city of Mendoza, and we absolutely love it. The ride from Iguazu was pretty bad... long, stuffy and hot during the day and freezing at night, we nearly starved to death (you can only eat so many crackers), babies cried, sleep deprivation occured, hippies with really stinky feet sat behind us. You know, the usual bus ruckus. WHEW... but we made it and we´re pleased to say that it was well worth the trip. Mendoza is a cute city with wide cobbled sidewalks, forested parks, friendly people, and LOTS of vino! We´re staying at a hostel just outside of downtown in a very trendy neighborhood with lots of cute cafes to chill at, and an enourmous park nearby. We´ve been very good girls and actually squeezed in several runs through the park, exploring everything. Our first day here we walked for 6 hours through the various trails in the park, eventually working our way up El Cerro de Gloria, a very steep hill which offered great views of Mendoza and an even greater bum workout. We worked up quite a sweat, it doesn´t help that it was in the high nineties. We´ve made lots of friends at our hostel, its a very friendly and eclectic bunch, and much more welcoming than in Buenos Aires. Mendoza is less pretentious all together. It was my birthday on the 21st (this is Kendra by the way) so we celebrated with a few bottles of great Mendozan wine, barbeque, and lots of cool new friends. What a great way to spend my 23rd birthday... definitely my best birthday ever! We´re headed to Chili sometime this week... it will be sad to leave Mendoza, but the coast awaits! Before we leave were headed to wine country to ride bikes from winery to winery, sounds like a fun way to experience the vast array of Mendozan wines to me :) More later, CIAO! Kendra and Jackie!