Every other year, my day job takes me to Chile for an event the company takes part in. I am so lucky to have a boss that I have become close with to make the trip south. Our daughters are 2 months apart, we are ourselves a year apart in age and we have very similar passions and tastes. All of this makes it very easy to take an extra week of vacation while we are there to do some exploring around the continent.

In 2015, we vacationed around some Chilean wineries in Santiago and then ventured to Peru to see Machu Picchu (which is incredible and I HIGHLY recommend it to anyone who appreciates a bit of adventure). Because Brittney and I loved the wine in Chile, it inspired us to bucket list Mendoza, Argentina–an area known for its amazing Malbecs. Fast forward two years, and the both of us now have one-year-old girls, making the decision to pursue the vacation plan this go around extremely difficult.

Our husbands graciously encouraged our trip this year, and agreed to two weeks of intimate daddy time with the girls. We both decided to embrace this trip as a celebration of surviving our first year of motherhood. We also think that this might be our last hoo-raw before making another addition to our families. That being said, we invited some family of ours to make it the ultimate girls getaway in Mendoza.

Planning for Mendoza

This part was easy. We all knew the main event was wine so that remained the focus. The runner up and almost equally important was the food. I did some research and found that there are three must see and taste regions of Mendoza, all boasting some of the best wine pairing experiences. Where we stayed was also important to the group. We all appreciate authenticity, so we ventured outside of the city. Last, getting around was also important. We all wanted to make sure we could appreciate the wine without the worry of getting back to our hotel. Hiring a driver was the best option for our group.

All this in mind, we decided to book everything through Uncorking Argentina. This tour company is amazing. We gave them an idea of how we wanted our trip to be and in return they gave us the perfect itinerary. All of our reservations at each winery and our hotel were taken care of and we had our own English speaking driver the entire week we were there. This made the trip completely stress free. And that was the goal.

Over the next few weeks I will be sharing the details of our wine tasting excursions, but for now I thought I would share some photos and an overview of our trip. If you enjoy wine and good eats, I would definitely look into booking a trip to Mendoza!

Resources

• Experience Mendoza – I CONSTANTLY referred to this site for suggestions on wineries, restaurants and accommodations.
• Trip Advisor – I would look up possible destinations we were interested in to see what other travelers had to say. These reviews were mostly spot on and helped us narrow down our options to make decisions.
• Uncorking Argentina – We worked with Eric, and he made everything so easy! Responses were quick and informative via e-mail.

An Overview

Logistics

Uncorking Argentina took care of everything but our flights. Before we booked our hotel, they made recommendations on wineries and hotels that matched up with the research we had done. It was also amazing to have a driver for our party of five that met us at our hotel each day. It was so nice to get to know him throughout our stay and he popped in to surprise places that was not on the itinerary if we had time – making our days that much more special.

Accommodations

I cannot say enough about Finca Adalgisa. This was the best hotel I have ever had the pleasure of staying at. I call it a hotel, but it is more like a bed and breakfast. The estate (finca in Spanish) is family owed, produces its own wine, has a renowned chef running its restaurant and the staff treated us like family. Breakfast was included each day with small buffet items as well as a home made options off of the menu. Each night, we were treated to a tapa and glass of wine that was also included with our stay. The beauty of this estate is hard to describe in words. When I go back to Mendoza I will be staying here again. A hotel review post is in the near future on the blog….

Sights

We did make ourselves try a couple of other things besides wine. We did tour nine wineries total between the Maipu, Lujan de Cuyo and the Uco Valley regions. For our more adventurous day, we decided to meet a traditional gaucho for some horseback riding. The horses only took us through a beautiful winery (we didn’t ever want to be too far from wine). I was so happy we decided to take the cooking class at Finca Adalgisa as well. I learned so much I have already used some of the techniques chef Cristina shared with us.

Stay tuned! I am going to share more details about all of this in four upcoming blog posts on each region of Mendoza’s wine country that we toured and a review on Finca Adalgisa!

Safety

Mendoza is a modern city and safety was not really an issue for our group of girls. Outside of the areas our driver took us to, we used cabs to get around and we had good experiences each time. When we did not have an English speaking driver, we were able to give them an address and we always arrived at our destination without issues. Safety is so important – especially when it comes to female travelers. Here are some things that we always did for our piece of mind:

• Always asked for recommendations for meals, sight seeing, shopping, etc. Hotels and tour companies have safety and experience for their customers top of mind, making them a reliable source.
• We never took more cash than we thought we needed, and our passports always stayed at the hotel in a safe in each of our rooms.
• The water is safe to drink in Mendoza. In some parts of South America you have to be extremely cautious about consuming water from anything other than a water bottle. Here, everything comes fresh and straight from the Andes.
• Confidence is key. There are those people everywhere that love to target tourists, especially if you don’t speak the local language. Being confident helped with this, but those occasions in Mendoza were rare.
• We did have international phone plans, which are surprisingly cheap depending on your provider. This is something I would highly recommend. Being able to look at Google Maps at any given point during the trip was extremely helpful, especially when we were in a cab and wanted make sure we were headed in the right direction.

Resources

• Experience Mendoza – I CONSTANTLY referred to this site for suggestions on wineries, restaurants and accommodations.
• Trip Advisor – I would look up possible destinations we were interested in to see what other travelers had to say. These reviews were mostly spot on and helped us narrow down our options to make decisions.
• Uncorking Argentina – We worked with Eric, and he made everything so easy! Responses were quick and informative via e-mail.