March 7 – Mendoza to Vina del Mar

Travel day today. Six or so hours on the bus. We have front row seats on the upper deck so we should get a good view. This is the same route we did the other day, but we'll continue on further.

Last view of Laura as we escape the Quinta Rufino. Quaint place, run down, not much for breakfast, but it's OK.  Oh, I forgot to mention, Laura found a cockroach skeleton in the bed.

Some photos on the way to the pass: 

Looking to get off the freeway - no exit?, no problem. The freeway is level to the roads adjacent, so if you need an exit, just make one.

Very practical people, these Argentineans

On the way to the pass.  I took a bunch of  photos of the part we've already seen, but I'll only add this one.

Sorry Julie, but we blew right through the Inca Bridge and it's markets, so no snow globe today.   Cherish the photo from a few days ago :)

You can see the arch I talked about the other day.  The hill to the left is the windy one lane dirt road we went up.  It doesn't show up well in the photo.

New photos now.   These are the entrances to the 3 km long tunnels under the mountain - the highway on top and the closed railway tunnel below.

The Argentinian side of this pass is relatively gentle inclines, whereas the Chilean side is a set of crazy switchbacks.

This is actually 3 lane road.  It is being repaired so the road markings are missing.  I don't know if they have barrier on the open side - I didn't see any stockpiled.

 The bottom half of the switchbacks.  I saw a number of other tunnels going down, which I assume were for the railway.  The grades on the railway must have been hard to maintain - I wonder if they had to construct some spiral tunnels ( a Google research project for a rainy day).








I wonder if this guy regretted his decision to cycle this way???

Laura says she still wants to do it.  


The Chilean ski hill of Portillo is right here as well.  It is famous as a summer (June - September) training site for various nation's ski teams.  I had a hard time picking out the ski runs; they seem pretty crazy.  One of the lifts actually goes down the Chilean side and crosses over the switchbacks.

No pictures of Chile between the mountain and Vina del Mar.  It is perhaps a little more lush than the countryside south of Santiago.  Intensive agriculture of a variety of crops:  grapes corn, vegetables, etc.  A mixture of expensive, medium and inexpensive (read slum) housing. The road was good with a lot of it being freeway.  We made it into Vina del Mar in the late afternoon and checked into our hotel, the 'Cap Ducal."

This is it.  A good example of location, location, location.

Yes, it looks like a boat and yes, it is perched right on the rocks.  It's been there since the 1930's so it won't fall off unless there is a hell of a shaker.

View of the 'stern' of the hotel.  Our room is just below the penthouse, on the right side.  (For reasons of good taste I hid my just washed underwear that was hanging out on the balcony from view).

The view to the north from the 'bow' end.  The elevator is an old hydraulic type, with a cage door on the elevator and single wooden doors on each floor.  Two of us and our packs are a tight fit.

We ate in the seafood restaurant downstairs.  They make an awesome pisco sour and the meal was delicious.  I frowned when the waiter put my dessert in the middle of the table with two forks, so he very ceremoniously moved it to my side and removed Laura's fork.  If she wants dessert she can darn well order it herself.

Enough for March 7 - we'll wander around Vina tomorrow.