Judge Not (yet)...

I must stop doing this. We arrive in a new city after a ten hour night-bus ride, feeling hungry and anxious because even though we've never been so comfortable, we can't sleep on those buses. Invariably we arrive at 6am on a Sunday, and in a bus station which is situated in one of the less salubrious areas of town. If I had any sense I would know that a bus station at 6am on a sunday doesn't figure highly in most city's promotional literature. But I have no sense. So I get fractious and ball my fists and flounce a bit 'I hate it here!' And then I fire an email off to one of my parents, barking 'this town is a dump!'. And then later I put down the rucksack and wash my face and look around and realise I've done it again. I've maligned a perfectly pleasant place and now I have to backpedal.
So, pedalling at the ready. We went to Cordoba and I got in a huff because we had to walk for- oh, about a year- to get to the youth hostel. And then they put us in separate dormitories for the night! Goodness, I was so angry I ate all the biscuits. Over the next few days I gradually noted that Cordoba- the Cultural Capital of the Americas 2006 (how I had scoffed!) - had many pleasing aspects. It has millions of bookshops, for one thing. It is in fact the oldest university town in Argentina- a sort of Argentine Oxford, if you will, only with fewer bicycles and pillocks. It also has a lot of nice old buildings, including a church called 'the Jesuit Apple'. Why, I know not. It also has several well appointed small museums including a really thought-provoking and scary one on the Disappeared, thousands of people who went missing or were murdered by the military dictatorship in the 70s and 80s. There was a room with scrapbooks made of some of the victims by the relatives, showing their childhood photos and old school diplomas. It was a terrifying place, and really well done. I would definitely recommend it. For once we can't blame the guidebook for not knowing about this one, it only opened a few years ago. Well worth a visit.

The only thing to do, once you've been somewhere sobering and thought provoking, is to counteract the sombreness with a trip to a giant cuckoo clock, so this is what we did the nextday. The guidebook had promised us 'Vegas-like' levels of tat and tackiness so obviously I couldn't wait. Unfortunately I misread the book, so I was expecting a ten storey high cuckoo clock. It actually read two storeys. And this I feel was stretching it a bit. We had travelled for an hour to get there and there were TOUR BUSES parked by it so I really was expecting something massive and overwhelming. It wasn't. Don't go. If you are ever invited to see the Giant Cu-Cu in Villa Carlos Paz, politely decline.

If, however, you are invited to go to Che Guevara's childhood home in Alta Gracia, go at once (preferably on a Wednesday because all the museums are free). Alta Gracia is a delightful place, with a lovely Jesuit mansion to visit and then a really good Che museum detailing his childhood and showing pictures of him as a kid, and with his bedroom and toys and the bathtub the young revolutionary took his baths in. The gift shop was on the whole disappointingly tasteful, and the Che themed Cuban-Argentinian fusion snack bar was closed, but this minor setbacks aside, it was a grand day out.

We are now in Mendoza, the Argentine wine capital, and tomorrow morning we shall be embarking on the long expected bicycle wineries tour. Quite how the combination of a hot sun, cycling and wine tasting will affect us is not precisely known- I had a bottle of beer two days ago that made me distinctly wobbly- but since I cannot cycle very well perhaps an inebriated wobbling will act as a corrective. We shall see. I may have plenty of time to practise, as the Argentine-Chilean bordercrossing is currently shut due to snow. This is causing a bit of a headache in the scheduling and planning department. Fortunately Lovely Chris is on hand with map and spreadsheet and will doubtless save the day while I am guzzling the wine we buy on the tour. Que sera sera. I have finally noticed that's Spanish.