Author: marionvermazen

I am a traveler, hiker, avid reader, Sun alumnus, computer geek, Spanish and French language student, knitter and genealogist. I am retired after working for almost 30 years in the Computer Industry. I live in Reno, Nevada with my husband Duke.

Buenos Aires

We had a busy and fun day today in Buenos Aires. We started out looking for a coffee shop for breakfast. We found a great one. Several times we have had small croissants with a light sugar glaze. They call them medialunas. They are soooo good!

Coffee, juice and medialunas

Next we did a one hour tour of the Buenos Aires Opera House. It is a beautiful building and according to our guide has the best in the world acoustics for opera.

Our opera house tour
Inside the opera house

Next we had tea and snacks at a nearby cafe that we remembered from our last time in Buenos Aires.

Tea and snacks

After a short break back at the hotel we walked about a mile to Recoleta Cemetery where we did a walking tour. Our guide was excellent and the cemetery and mausoleums were fascinating.

Waiting for our tour. That’s the cemetery gate in the background.
Recoleta Cemetery
Our tour guide
Some of the mausoleums were neglected.
Others were resplendent

We had a great steak dinner at a nearby restaurant. Argentinas really do steak deliciously!

At dinner
Dinner

Salta to Buenos Aires

The San Lorenzo suburb of Salta where we stayed last night is very upscale. We went out for a walk this morning and walked by some beautiful big houses.

We drove to the airport about 11 and turned in our rental truck. It was quite windy and the air was full of dust.

At the airport in Salta Returning our truck
Getting on the plane

Our flight to Buenos Aires took two hours. We took a taxi to our hotel on Avenue 9 de Julio.

Our hotel room

The first thing we did was change some dollars to pesos. On Florida Street where the money changers work you couldn’t walk 20 feet without somebody saying “cambio?” to you. The first guy Duke and Brian talked to tried to give them a bad rate but the next guy changed the money with no problem. Last time they changed money a couple of days ago they got 830 pesos for a dollar. This time they got 970.

Changing dollars to pesos

In the evening my we went to a dinner History of Tango show.

My steak
Duke’s desert
Tango of the 50s
Modern Tango

Cafayate to Salta

Today we drove about 125 miles from Cafayate back to Salta where we started a week ago. We made lots of stops along the scenic road.

First we filled up with gas
Our road
Some of the mountains along the way
More views
Rock Window
Vista along the way

Tonight we are staying on the outskirts of Salta because tomorrow we fly to Buenos Aires

Our Hotel Rincón del Cerro
We played pool for a bit before dinner.

For dinner we had dinner outside at a nearby Italian Restaurant.

Molinos to Cafayate

This morning before leaving Molinos we went for a walk across the river and the dry river bed near our hotel.

Walking across the river by the hotel
The view on our walk

We loaded all our luggage in our new trash bags to protect the luggage from the dust.

Preparing for the dust.

The road was again very rough today. Even though the drive was only 74 miles it took us between three and four hours. The terrain was varied and some of it was really stunning. We made several stops.

Along the road between Molinos and Cafayate.
More of the scenery and our road ahead
One of our view points.
Bonnie and her balancing skills
That’s Brian in the distance.

Tonight we are at Grace Cafayate resort in a villa overlooking the vineyards. It’s a lovely spot. We had lunch soon after we arrived.

Lunch
My corn tart
Our room

Molinos

The last few nights have all been in different places so it was very nice to be spending two nights in Molinos. Before we headed out exploring this morning we did chores.

We did laundry
We bought bottled water at the grocery store
We bought heavy duty garbage bags to protect our luggage from dust in the bed of the truck.

Then we headed out of town to check out wineries. The terrain we drove through would never make you think there were wineries on this road.

On the road to Tacuil winery.
The last mile or so was on a narrow steep road.

When we first arrived at Tacuil there was no one around. We were greeted by a very friendly dog that was carrying an animal paw in his mouth. After Duke rang the big bell a couple of times someone showed up and we tasted a few wines.

The dog who greeted us
Wine tasting at Tacuil

Then we headed to Colomé winery where we had a reservation for visiting the art museum and tasting their wine. Our guide was named Sabrina. She was absolutely fantastic. Her English was excellent and she knew a lot about the Colomé winery and their wines. Colomé was established in 1831! We tasted three wines.

Sabrina our guide
Getting ready to taste.

After the tasting we took at tour of the James Turrel Art Museum. I knew the art was all about space and light but I had no idea what we were going to see. Some of the pieces we saw were large rooms with surprising and amazing effects. We couldn’t take pictures and it is very difficult to describe the museum but I think we all were blown away by the experience.

The James Turrell Museum