The alarm buzzed us into semi-consciousness at 5:45 in the morning. Our dormitory-style hostel housed three other deep sleeping tourists who, I’m sure, wished our batteries had worn out long before we even set the alarm. From the top bunk I surprised myself by quickly sitting up and kicking the covers off of me as soon as the alarm grated its good-morning scream like knuckles on a cheese grater.

I climbed down from the top bunk and squeezed between the militarily ordered others as I made my way to my bag. Not having had any clean clothes for the better part of a week, I decided to dress in the same apparel I had worn in succession the two days before. One was just as good as another at this point, and it would save me the trouble of rooting around my bag in the dark like a pig searching for truffles—smelly and noisy, threatening to wake up the other sleeping travelers. As I retrieved my pants in the dark, like uncrumpling a piece of discarded paper from a waste basket, the pocket knife that is eternally sheathed in the often forgotten change pocket freed itself from the denim imprisonment and plunged itself toward the hard-wood floor, thudding a waking traveler alarm that echoed throughout the high ceiling room and animating my previously sedated fellow backpackers. A silhouetted head jerked forward from its pillow and turned from side to side. I toyed with the idea of whispering into the dark, (this is aaall a dreeeam) and hoping for the best. Instead I blended into the shadows until heavy sleep pushed back on the silhouette and cradled it back into the pillow. I forsook the pocketknife and reminded myself to look for it when the possibility of waking unfortunate travelers would be at a minimum. I stuffed my wallet into my front pocket, slung my camera bag around my shoulder, fitted my cap to my head and headed down the stairs to await the arrival of my tour guide.

Today’s tour promised to introduce me to El Canyon Del Atuel San Rafael (the Atuel Canyon of San Rafael). The day before I browsed through a tourist brochure, trying to find something to give my stay meaning. I came across a picture of a lake imprisoning an island in its middle and offering spectacular mirrors of the canyon walls that surrounded it. I read nothing of the description, leaving the picture to do the convincing, and two hours later had booked myself on the tour for the next morning. This morning at 6:30, I was to be outside in the slim light of the morning, eyes crusted over with sleep and head groggy from the four hours of sleep I reluctantly gave myself after a Saturday night here in Mendoza, Argentina, where the bars scene starts at 2 am. Seeing that I went to bed at 4:30, by Argentinean standards I had a short night and I should have had no problem remaining conscious throughout this trip.

At 6:30 I was still waiting for my current traveling partner to come down from the room. At 6:45 our guide had arrived, and at 6:55 we were still waiting. I went back up to the room and found her quickly stuffing what she might need into her bags like a chipmunk squirreling away nuts for the coming winter.

After an abbreviated stutter start, Kay met us at the front gate and we followed the guide to our idling Mercedes van awaiting us across the street. We said our good mornings to the half-full van and sped off to other hostels and hotels to collect the other tourists.

At the beginning of any tour there is a moment of silence amongst the members of the trip. Each one is awaiting the other to make the first connection, the first communication. The earlier in the morning the trip begins, the longer the introductions take. As soon as the last passenger had been collected, our guide flicked a switch on his microphone and the speakers in the bus crackled to life with his alto voice providing them with animating vibrations. The city passed us by in fledgling light as we headed for the promised canyon. Our guide, a 25 year old goatee-sporting Argentinean, ushered in our greetings by forcing us awake for a short duration by asking the names of everyone on his tour, and accompanying their titles with some personal question or another. "What’s your favorite soccer team?" "Where do you come from?" "What do you think en el sexo fuerte?" (The last one directly translates to “what do you think of strong sex?”). Being that it was roughly 7:30 am in a city I knew nothing about, surrounded by people I knew nothing of, with lack of sleep dictating the flow of thoughts into my head, this question stood out to me. Of course it could have been the directness of his seemingly sex-driven, provocative, and entirely too private question directed at the mostly retired Argentinean tourists, taken with the calm answers given by the other travelers. Remembering that I was also serving as Kay’s interpreter (I’d have to remember to charge for the service), I wondered if I should translate this last question for her. Seeing that each female passenger was receiving the same question, I thought it best to warn her before it was her turn at center stage so the sex question wouldn’t catch her with her pants around her ankles, or so it were. I leaned over to Kay and translated what I heard. She laughed and worried over when it would be her turn. I could see her wondering if the question was serious and how she should answer, if at all. I thought of playing the "Gringo card" and feigning ignorance to the language, but can never bring myself to ignore something I have learned. (Those that have watched Jeopardy with me know the pain of my inability to hold random facts to myself). When the question would have fallen to us, our tour guide changed tactics and stuck with only the basic questions, nothing about strong sex. Whew, dodged that bullet. But I was still confused as to what exactly had driven him to ask that question of his tour group, and what had compelled the touring residents of a 90% Catholic orthodox country to respond so calmly to an otherwise free-love-neo-hippie-pro-liberal-contra-conservative question. I thought on it. Then it stuck me. He wasn't asking about "strong sex," he was asking about "the strongER sex." Ah, epiphany. I was apparently a bad example of said stronger sex as I had definitely over-rated my language abilities. Respect again reigned, and I held our guide in much less uncomfortable contempt. The important question now was whether or not I should let Kay know what he was really asking. Nah, I’d let it sit on it for a while, let her wonder herself. Two days later I realized that I never did tell her. I’m sure she’s forgotten anyway, although I do wonder what her answer would have been.

After our engaging round of introductions, our guide took pity on the curtain-closing eyes that groggily lay unfocused on his early morning whit. He bade us sleep off the earlyness of our trip to be well rested after the two hour ride to the canyon. We all took his advice without staying awake long enough to hear the electric click of the microphone as it was turned off.

Two hours later, sun beat down on cracked asphalt and we lifted our lids to an already warm day. Heads bounced on the upholstered seats as the van rolled over long stretches of road that lay straight, curving only with the spherical arc of the earth. The electronic thump of the microphone a few moments later removed the sleep from the rest of the van, and for the first time on the trip we became conscious entities.

Thanks to the endless whit of our guide, our tour felt much like an informative comedy hour. His speech was so fast and his one liners so quick that I had trouble translating them for Kay, lest my own voice drown out the next good humored nugget of information that he played off of us.

We came to the edge of the precipice as he was telling us about the history of the canyon in relation to the "conquering" Spaniards. Apparently one of the last battles/blood baths between the indigenous Argentineans and the iron clad Spanish was fought in the Atuel Canyon where, some say, the indigenous people were trapped by advancing Spaniards and hacked to pieces or shot through with barrel loading muskets. The now hydroelectric controlled river that had cut the mountain from the ground had filled with the blood of a dying culture. A more romantic view holds that although the indigenous were corralled within the bordering cliffs of the canyon, they were not slaughtered, but instead escaped up river and saved themselves from brutal slaughter. Hopefully the romantics are right, but as the guide told us this version, his facial expressions showed us his own, non-romantic beliefs. Knowing the stories of the invading Spaniards, I tended to side with his interpretation of the events.

The canyon itself was unimpressive. It was a fissure in the middle of a desert where water no longer flowed as nature intended. The water had now been bridled and led to dikes and dams where it slaved to turn turbines and provide electricity for the area’s inhabitants. Dry, smooth rocks replaced the ripples of water that had once been blown across its own surface. Starching sun brittled mud and plants as thirst shriveled their roots and deeply creased the once wet dirt. The land showed obvious signs of being rich in natural materials. The foundation on which the river normally ran was exposed, and the sediment that had been carried for miles along the belly of the river had been excreted and left as a testament to what had once been as much the river as the water that carried it. The graying sediment banked high against walls of concrete erected to control flows and power outputs. A natural wall of slush, pressing with the patience of erosion on man-made impediments to its natural flow. Sulfur yellows, oxidized copper greens, and iron grays painted the radiating rocks with their chemistry. Our guide pointed out their faces and told us their names as we descended into then skirted along the winding canyon walls.
Rock formations stood like sentinels along our path. The scenery, being as repetitious as a stutterer begged for imagination. For this need our guide supplied the remedy. To his eyes rocks anthropomorphized into creatures that a Dr. Suess imagination would inspire. Sun bleached rocks at the top of the cliff became stately owls curiously studying passing tourists. Dinosaurs rose from cliffs frozen in time as the waters had defined them. Whales breached from petrified oceans of rock, forever caught in a postcard pose for picture happy and imaginative tourists.

After a few hours of exploring the canyon, our van lifted us back to level ground and we continued on to lunch. Our drive back would be interrupted by the still flowing portions of the river and a few adventuring spirits. The river again regains its composure after passing through its controlling dikes, providing campgrounds along its bank as well as rafting over its body. On the way to our lunch stop, we came across a rafting outpost. Stacked like rubber playing cards, boats sat idle awaiting rafters to give them direction down the river. Our van stopped and our guide asked us who wanted to raft to lunch instead of driving. Half the van raised their hands, and mine was among them. For 15 pesos, or about 5 US dollars we were offered the chance to raft over class two rapids (little more than giant ripples on a calm day for serious rafters) and work up a hunger before an all you can eat lunch. We were given splash resistant gear in exchange for our mostly sponge like cotton clothes, sun faded yellow helmets whose straps were stuck at one size setting, life vests that fit well enough to slip from our chests and encase our heads should we fall out, and a five minute crash course on rafting safety, given exclusively in Spanish. Let’s test my language ability again, shall we? "OK Kay, if you fall out of the boat float down feet first while trying to look ahead of you." I think that’s what he said anyway, although I was trying to inspire confidence in an already timid Englander, so I spoke with feigned confidence. When it came to when and how to paddle with our Lepris paddles (that looked as if they had left parts of themselves in the river over the years), I thought it best for her just to watch the native speaking Argentinean in front of her for direction. I felt a do-as-I-do format would be safer than a mistranslation. With our safety gear loose around our bodies, a quick shore based lesson, a shove of the boat into the quick flowing river and a hail Mary for the devout Catholic, we paddled ourselves closer to the lunch I was hoping I’d get to taste. The ride down saw us over speed bump sized "rapids" that were still large enough to douse us in cold water and find gaps in our waterproofing, soaking the boxers I had decided to keep on. We all laughed as water filled the boat then bailed itself out with the next boat smashing splash of the rapids. "Siga remando!" (Keep paddling!), came the intermittent instructions from our river guide who coerced the path of the boat through the dictating currents. From time to time our paddles would collide as our rhythm was far from expert, and our legs held tight to the side of the boat as we fought to not be the first in the boat to fall out. After 40 minutes of laughing, floating, and paddling we banked our boat outside a restaurant that abutted the river and where the rest of the group was awaiting our arrival. Wet and happy, we changed back into our clothes that had been brought down by our van from the starting point. With underwear soaking through my jeans, I sat down to eat a meal of world renowned Argentinean beef, chicken, sausage, coke, watered down wine (an Argentinean custom), bread, and ice cream for desert.

Having stuffed ourselves with seconds, thirds, and fourths, we boarded the bus again and headed down the dirt road for our final stop, "to see Coco," our guide told us. I translated that for Kay and hoped she wouldn’t ask me who Coco was. I had no idea. Assuming she should know the name, much as I assumed I should, she saved me from admitting ignorance. When our van again stopped we found ourselves surrounded by fruit trees and grapevines feeding themselves green on the cloudless afternoon sky. We stepped down from the van and our guide introduced us to Coco, a giant pig that looked like it had swallowed a Scandinavian tourist and taken on its long blond hair as well as the added girth of a full-grown sumo wrestler. To say Coco was big would be an affront to giants everywhere. Coco was huge. I would have been able to ride him had they provided me with a stepladder to straddle its rotund figure. Coco was kept in a pen and was violently snorting food from the inside of half a tractor tire doubling as its trough. Loud snorts erupted from pig nose on balding rubber as Coco searched for every kernel of feed. Next to Coco, and much dwarfed by their neighbor, meandered two llamas who took much more interest in the group of tourists gawking at the pig next to them than Coco himself, who seemed perpetually engulfed by finding every last bit of food in the serving platter of a tractor tire. In a third pen, a female pig one quarter the size of Coco lay on her side as her baby pigs suckled from her teats. One little porker per nipple, all furiously feeding from the motionless mother, as their little behinds wiggled between the curly tailed bottoms of their brothers and sisters as they jockeyed for space like stock brokers on the trading floor.

We were then met by the farm owner. A middle-aged man who spoke passionately about his giant pig, his vineyards, and his fruit trees. He took us on a tour of the grounds showing us how they dried prunes in rows upon rows and stacks upon stacks of flat wooden crates that never saw much sun light in order to keep their deep purple color shiny and unfaded. Apparently that brings in more money than the dulled and faded ones touched by the abundant commodity of too much sunshine. He then took us to his winery. A single rusting grape press painted red to hide rust spots and a dozen wooden barrels firmly stood within a barn shed. While not appearing to be much, the press crushed grapes that provided some of the best wine I have ever been introduced to. In the gift shop (what tourist stop lacks one), we sipped of the five different kinds of wine they produced. I bought two bottles of a red whose name was stamped across a sticker and pasted crookedly across the bottle for a bank account breaking three pesos each (just over $1 US). These two bottles would not last through the night as they begged to be tried straight down to the glass bottom, and my mind reasoned that carrying red wine in a backpack full of white shirts was a proof of Murphy’s Law waiting to happen.

The rest of the trip back to town we slept off the long canyon tour, the short river raft, the fifth servings of food, the wine tasting, and the gringo burning sun. The van dropped us off at our individual hostels in even less light than when it had originally picked us up. We waved good bye to our fellow travelers as they disembarked, then left ourselves. We shook hands with our guide, thanking him profusely with words and a tip, and meaning it when we told him he was one of the best guides we’d ever had. He left Kay with an Argentinean kiss on the cheek, which I didn’t need to translate, and a strong handshake for me with a grand smile. He then bound back on the bus, waved a farewell from an open window, and drove off.

Kay and I walked across the street to our hostel and immediately opened the red treasures we had gotten at the winery, enjoying the experience all over again with words and wine until only the light bending curvature of the empty green wine bottles remained.

Mendoza, Argentina