Ladies of the Sauce

Helloooooo troops! How are we?

Well, apparently people actually read this blog and are vaguely concerned about the fact that we haven't written since Valparaiso. What's more it seems that rumours of the separation of Ro and Lion seem to be floating around the internet creating even more scandal than the Braniston saga. I am currently in the worst internet cafe in the world - well, actually it is very nice: well-priced, modern, and comfortable, but they have a violently foul habit of blasting hip hop when I am trying to Skype my loved ones, a perpetually impossible task - so I thought I should update y'all on the haps.

Haps are good! Ro and I are still travelling joyously together so don't you fret your little heads about it. We did split up for one single night, it is true, but we are back where we belong now.

We've spent the last couple of days in Mendoza. Mendoza is a pretty nice place although truth be told, once you've done the Wine-And-Bikes thing there is not so much to see. So tonight we are headed for Cordoba. I'm pretty excited for Cords! I loved Valparaiso, which is reputed to be the Cultural Capital of Chile. Cordoba, though, is reputed to be the Cultural Capital of South America! Far out that's a lot of Culture! Imagine the hijinx!

The last couple of weeks have been pretty low-key. We spent Easter with our lovely English friends Rosie and Anna in a tiny town called Vicuña, in a tiny valley called the Valle de Elqui. The Valle is a great little place, surrounded with cactus-coated hills and avocado and papaya groves, and it is where much of the pisco in Chile is produced. Pisco is a type of brandy that they use to make the Pisco Sour, a Chilean specialty containing pisco, egg white, lemon juice, maybe some other stuff that I forgot... it is surprisingly tasty. Not revolting at all. Nor is it my drink of choice (I seem to have developed a recent fondness for mojitos, of all things) but I felt the need to try a couple of pisco beverages whilst in the valley and enjoyed them a decent amount.

Actually, the four of us walked out to Capel (!!!), the biggest Pisco distillery in the region. That's just a guess but I think it's a fair guess given the sheer volume of Capel advertising that saturates the Valle. Actually it's a bit revolting really, all the advertising. We couldn't be bothered forking out the big 1000 pesos they were asking for a tour and tasting (a grand total of around $2.50) so we shared a strawberry milkshake instead. I can wholeheartedly recommend it.

Judging from this post you would think all we do is ingest various beverages. But don't worry Mum, we haven't been drinking much really. Once we head into Bolivia it's all horrible anyway, apparently, so we are making the most of the tasty and cheap wine culture around these parts. Although to be fair, most of the Malbecs we tried on the Wine-And-Bikes day were really not that great.

After Cords we are heading to Salta, and across the salt flats to Boliv. Pretty excited! Apparently the salt flats are amaaaazing (also apparently 'amaaazing' is a very Australian thing to say? I never knew!)

Right well that's enough information for you all I think.

Love love love
Lion