How we spent Laney's birthday

We have been resting this week. We took a vacation in the city of Mendoza, wandered the streets and ate at various vegetarian restaurants. There are tons of these in Mendoza, which is interesting because all the guide books we read said its hard to find vegetarian food anywhere in Argentina except El Bolson. Seeing as we only found one vegetarian restaurant in El Bolson, that wasn't even in the town, and found about a dozen in Mendoza, our conclusion; is guide books lie.

What is interesting about Mendoza is a lack of distinct culture besides consumption. Although its filled with veggie restaurants and some art here and there its done in a very "I'm in my suit on lunch break trying to eat healthy and this painting would look great in my condo" way. Not that there is anything particularly wrong with this, the city is flourishing no doubt about that. But I suppose we are drawn to something a little more DIY, rough around the edges sort of sub culture. This is hard to find in Mendoza.

For Laney's birthday we decided to go to the termas cachuetas, hot springs in the mountains outside the city. Laney's mom offered to pay for wherever we wanted to stay the night. (Thanks mom, it was a great gift). We found these stone cabins by the river with a fireplace and fire heated hot tube out on the deck.
It was wonderful! See attached picture above.

We spent the day playing at the hotspring, which was really half spa half waterpark. They kicked us out of the kiddie pool. So we found an adult sized waterslide that used heated thermal waters and went down is about 20 times. We were being too mischievous though, playing bumper cars in the tube and using each others bodies as surf boards, that they sent a lifeguard to monitor our activity. Too much fun for a "spa".

Later that night, back at the cabin we drank a bottle of locally made wine in the hot tub and saw two shooting stars. Later we played rummy by the fire. In the morning we took full advantage of our late checkout. Jameson made us breakfast in bed and took the rest of the morning trying to reorganize Laneys bag. She's still in the process of figuring out where everything should go.

Today after three days of exploring and relaxation we head back to the farm and go back to work. We won't have any electricity there so don't expect to hear from us as regularly.
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