Mendoza Argentina - our Napa Valley

When I was a kid in geography class so xxxx number of years ago (not tellin'), we studied South America - almost as an after thought;  if there was a North America there had to be, by default, a South America...oh the brains of a 10 year old at work. One of my classmates, (name withheld) came up with the idea that if we stood upright in North America that those folks in South America were standing upside down. It made perfect sense.  It still does in some obscure way but we will let that pass.

I was in the store the other day, minding my business behind the counter doing whatever, when one of my gadfly friends dropped in. He learned that our tasting this week was going to feature Argentinian wines and was all into things from Argentina. It struck us that we know so little about what looks like a pretty nifty place. 

Mendoza, Argentina appears to be at the heart of wine country there...our Napa of sorts or to be fair, our North Fork without the mountains.  We are intrigued of course as a city named "Mendoza" seems out of our realm of understanding. It rests against the Andes and Santiago is just on the other side of that big mountain in the picture.  You take Route 7 from there to this town and go through the Andes Pass. No thanks but it would be exciting and doable after several liters of something to "coax the courage".  Mendoza is a city of about 800,000 folks and was founded or settled about 80 years before Suffolk, our local town.  It is, importantly on the route from Santiago to Buenos Aires. 

So we are going to explore this a bit in the next couple days. Our interest is pricked and to think that you could own a vineyard with the Andes in the background, a temperate climate, great soil and a very cosmopolitan town just up the road...well..... the things dreams are made of.