Wednesday Dec 17 - Sydney to Santiago
We left Sydney on LAN Chile Airlines at 9:30am travelling in our usual business class award ticket style - after a brief stop in Auckland it was onto Santiago. We landed on time around 11am - cleared customs and immigration (where I had to pay the $132 USD reciprocity fee). We caught a taxi to our hotel, the Ritz Carlton in a snazzy part of the city - right beside one of the subway stations (El Golf). Fortunately we were able to check-in immediately. Since we had a Club room, after settling in, we had a light lunch in the Club then went back to our room for a siesta - later afternoon we had a walk around our neighbourhood followed by showers. We elected to skip dinner and just have drinks and canapés in the Club before hitting the sack.
Thursday Dec 18 - Santiago
Our first full day in Santiago got off to an early start as neither of us had much sleep; however, after not really having any dinner the previous evening we were a bit hungry so we headed to the Club for breakfast as soon as it opened at 7am. We had already decided to have a well deserved and certainly needed "jet lag recovery day”. We ventured out by subway to the old town which had not improved at all since our previous visit in June 2011. We had planned to visit a museum on the main plaza but it was closed for renovations. We did walk over to the food markets where we were impressed by the mountains of beautifully berries and gigantic cherries (white and red) all at $1-$2 per kilo.
Since we were still zonked we went back to the Ritz where we had a late lunch at the Club followed by a siesta. Around 4:40pm we went for a longer walk around our local neighbourhood checking out all the up-market houses and condos - all were surrounded by high fences and razor wire. We had dinner at the hotel’s tapas restaurant - the chef is a well known 2-hatted guy. The tapas were just right for 2 weary tourists.
Friday Dec 19 - Santiago
Cripes - another night of tossing and turning - we both felt very jet lagged - so again we had an early brekkie followed by a lie-down before heading out around 10am. We used the subway and walked around Lasterria and Bueno Vista stopping at a cafe for a light lunch of salads. We again cut the day short in the early afternoon and returned to the hotel for a siesta before sixes at the Club then dinner at the bistro in the hotel - we both had fish - all round a 10 out of 10.
All in all we felt the Ritz Carlton deserved top marks - particularly for service; even a little hiccup when checking out the night before departure (to save time in the morning) was dealt with swiftly by the manager (we wanted to use our remaining pesos for part of the bill but were first told this would be fine then told we would incur 20% local tax …. long story but it was all sorted out).
Saturday Dec 20 - Santiago to Mendoza
Off to Mendoza, overland via the Andes - our van & driver were scheduled to pick us up at 7am so no brekkie for us as the Club only opens at 7am. We were ready early so we grabbed a coffee in the hotel lobby to get the blood flowing for what was to be a very long day - estimated time of trip was given as 8-10 hours.
We made great time and arrived 2 hours later at Portillo (the famous ski area with one hotel - Hotel Portillo) - we stopped for a coffee and bathroom break.The hotel setting is really picturesque - at least it would be in winter when all the grey rock would be snow covered. The hotel is right at the ski lifts surrounded by towering peaks and overlooking a glacier lake. The lobby had many signed photographs of various Northern Hemisphere ski teams who train there in summer. Our waitress who spoke pretty good English spoke fondly of the Canadian ski team who train there every year.
To get to this point we had traversed many switchbacks climbing to about 3000m - there were many huge trucks going up and down as this is the main road (i.e. only) between Santiago and Mendoza. At one point about half-way up there was an over turned semi which had very recently gone over spreading a load of boxes of something - most fortunately they and/or the semi did not block the road so we could still get through - otherwise we could have been stuck for hours.
We reached the border crossing around 10:30am where there was a long line of cars waiting - our van could use the bus lane and fortunately we were the only vehicle in this lane so we got through in record breaking time of 30 minutes - this crossing is clearly a total disaster - a national disgrace to both Chile and Argentina - the reason for the time taken was totally unclear - no apparent reason - fortunately our driver knew the ropes and many of the officials.
We stopped for photos at various viewpoints including Mount Aconcagua (6959m - highest mountain outside the Himalayas) and Potrerillos (a green area / city), Uspallata, Puente del Inca (a rock formation that forms a natural bridge over the River Caves and a “Hot Spring").
Then it was onto Mendoza - downhill all the way from the border crossing - since we were making such good time we elected not to stop for lunch and made it to the Park Hyatt around 1:00pm.
Our room (the Presidential suite (sort of) - 120 sqm) was not ready so we had a light lunch at the hotel restaurant which was surprisingly exxy. Once checked in, we unpacked then had a bit of a rest before checking out our local neighbourhood, showering and heading off to dinner at the hotel BBQ restaurant.
Sunday Dec 21 - Mendoza
After an average breakfast, particularly for a Park Hyatt, we set off on a self-guided walking tour of Mendoza heading for a large park where we walked around a lake. At the suggestion of the concierge we later walked (15 minutes or so) to Bistro Ana for a light lunch which was again pretty so-so. Still struggling with jet-lag we had an afternoon siesta, followed by another walk then dinner at Ocho Cepas, a near-by steak house - again at the suggestion of the concierge. It was about a 6 out of 10. Mendoza is a sort-of no-where place - the only attractions for tourists seem to be wine tours (still to be undertaken by us) and various adventure activities (e.g. white water rafting, rock climbing and of course Mendoza is the jumping off point for those serious climbers who climb Mt Aconcagua.
Monday Dec 22 - Mendoza
We started out the day by going to an exchange house to change our USD to ARS at the “blue rate” - we got 12.5 ARS to the USD instead of the official rate of 8.5 - we changed $1500 but wished we had brought more USD with us.
We had booked a “remise” (car & driver) to take us to a vineyard, Casa del Visitante - Familia Zuccardi for a tour and lunch; we set off at 11am. We had an amazing visit mainly due to the excellent wine we tasted and an equally excellent lunch - we retuned to the hotel after 3pm - a bit wiped out so we skipped dinner and had a lazy remainder of the day.
Tuesday Dec 23 - Mendoza
After our blow-out lunch on Monday we decided not to take the small group tour we had planned - a visit to 3 different wineries with biking in-between and lunch - all too much over-indulgence for us tourists. So we had a relaxing day - after brekkie I did some hand laundry followed by a long walk to a local park then a light lunch at the bistro at the hotel sitting outside near the pool. We had dinner at a local Italian restaurant (Francesco) which was pretty ordinary particularly the wine which seemed to be slight off - amazingly for us we left part of the bottle and 2 half glasses behind and headed off to bed.
Wednesday Dec 24 - Mendoza to Buenos Aires
We had an early breakfast (6:30am) then it was off to the airport for our flight to Buenos Aires (AEP) - all uneventful - landed on time (before 11am) - took a remis to our hotel (The Alvear Art Hotel) in the new trendy area called Plaza San Martin adjacent to Recoleta and were able to check-in right away. After settling in and unpacking - we took a long walk past the shopping center (Gallerias Pacifico) where we had lunch at an outdoor cafe (same one we visited some 4 years ago) then walked around Puerto Madero. We also booked return ferry tickets to Colonial (Uruguay) for Dec 26. We had a gala Christmas Eve dinner at the hotel - a total blow out. I won one of the door prizes of a 3 course lunch for 2 with wine - yippee.
Thursday Dec 25 - Christmas Day in Buenos Aires
We had a sleep-in and late (for us) breakfast at 8:30am. We also cancelled the Christmas Day lunch we had booked at the hotel as we felt it would be a bit too much too soon, food and wine wise. It was a wonderful warm and sunny day - in the high 20’s. We set out by taxi for La Boca, the area of BA known for it’s colourful houses and one we had not gotten to on our previous visit. We had our taxi driver wait while we walked around taking pictures - the area was beginning to wake up in spite of it being Christmas Day. From La Boca we drove (by taxi) to the huge garden on the other side of Puerto Madera planning to walk through the gardens and eventually back to our hotel. Alas, the gardens were closed for Christmas and Boxing Day - but we still managed a long walk along the water and though Puerto Madera arriving back at the hotel just after 1pm. After a short break we walked over to the Recoleta area (the most up market area in the city) and found a cafe that was open - we had light refreshments before walking back to the hotel - around 4pm - just in time for a siesta. We had a light dinner in the hotel bar and went to bed early.
Friday Dec 26 - a day in Colonial
We had booked a day trip to Colonial (Uruguay) - one hour by fast ferry from BA. Since this is an international trip they stipulated you need to be at the ferry check-in one hour prior to departure. The travel guide recommends avoiding weekend for such the trip as the ferries are very crowded - Dec 26, being a holiday, was probably the busiest day of the year; in fact they were running additional services which is why we were able to get a booking only a couple of days prior. The check-in was a zoo and the ferry ran 45 minutes (with no announcements what-so-ever even in Spanish) - you had to spend 1.5 hours standing in the boarding queue so you could get a good seat (read any seat) as there are no assigned seats - and as it turned out it was standing room only. All this luxury for a mere $US90 pp - we later realised they offer a first class service on the ferry but we did not know about this - anyway $90 was already very exxy in our opinion.
We finally reached Colonial - an old and scenic water-side town, around 2pm (Uruguay is 1 hour ahead of Argentina), just as a thunderstorm rolled in. So we walked briskly to the old town in the rain wearing only our shorts and short sleeved shirts and caps. We found a restaurant and had a pleasant lunch - then continued our walk - the rain had turned to drizzle which stopped after a while. Since we were on the 5:15pm return ferry we really only had an hour to do site-seeing before heading back on the return ferry which was only 1/2 hour late.
Back at the hotel - we showered and had bar snacks for dinner over happy hour.
Saturday Dec 27 - the start of the tour
After breakfast I reorganised our luggage then we took a whip around the Galleria Pacifico checking out all the high-end stores before checking-out of our hotel and taking a short taxi ride from the Alvear Art Hotel to the Caesar Park Hotel where Saturday night’s accommodation was included in the tour package. We were able to check-in no worries at midday - we stopped by the Lindblad hospitality desk to get the final details for the rest of the day and the following day when we were scheduled to fly to Ushuaia.
We then walked back to the Alvear Art for our free gala lunch (the one I won on Christmas Eve) - it was a very nice end to our stay in BA. Then it was back to Caesar Park for more packing and showers in time for the 6pm expedition briefing. After the briefing where we met a number of our fellow travellers we had a light dinner in the hotel bar then off to bed early in anticipation of the 5am wake up call.