In Mendoza there was also a lot of hype about the Fiesta Nacional de la Vendimia, the national celebration of the yearly grape harvest that occurs every March. Our tour guides explained to us how the festival has evolved quite a bit from 1936 when the the first harvest queens were selected. Each of the 18 different departments of the Mendoza province is represented and now it is more like an all out pageant. Although Mendoza has all of the prime ingredients for wine production, it can have some volatile weather with the possibility to produce golf ball sized hail, so the celebration of a successful harvest is especially important in this region.
Another thing I noted about being on the other side of the Andes was different light, different views, and just a totally different perspective all together. Unfortunately, on the second day the clouds got in the way a little of my mountain views, but as you can see it's still a beautiful place.
There are also plentiful olive trees in the region and we even had the chance to do a little olive oil tasting here...
Sometimes it's also fun to visit some of the smaller more family run operations so you see more things like this...
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| Like mother, like daughter. At this particular place there is also a wine named after each child in the family. |
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| One of the best parts of the day, tasting some unfinished sparkling wine right from the tap! |
