Minimoon in Mendoza, Argentina

I first heard of the term "minimoon" a few years ago, and I'm pretty sure it made me roll my eyes - yet another way that weddings are getting more and more ridiculously complex and making people part with even more money, I thought to myself.

However, a few years on, following my own wedding in December 2024, I in fact did end up having a minimoon myself, though kind of by accident!

Despite living in Chile for most of his life, my husband Claudio had actually never been to Argentina before, and seeing as we had a couple of weeks left in Chile after our wedding, we decided to take the opportunity to go on a little trip over the border to the city of Mendoza.

I got on to the task of booking a hotel on Hotels.com, and discovered that I had two promotions available to me: Member Prices reduced the price of most hotels by a large percentage, and I also had £73 of OneKeyCash built up that I could apply to my reservation. We had a think, and eventually decided that in order to celebrate our recent marriage, we should book the fanciest 5-star hotel in the city, the Park Hyatt Mendoza. This hotel would have been around £220 for a night, but with the two promotions applied, it worked out at less than £90 - still more than we'd generally spend on a hotel (we usually go for budget hotels, like Ibis), but an amazing deal for what we were getting. So that was how we ended up having a rather fancy minimoon!

We decided to go by car, as the journey between Santiago and Mendoza is really picturesque with several interesting sights to see along the way. I took this journey by bus in 2023, and enjoyed it a lot, though I wished I could stop, get out and look at some places more closely. Of course, in the car, we were able to do just that, starting with Laguna del Inca, a lagoon high up in the Chilean Andes, right next to the border with Argentina.

Interestingly, there is actually an Inca legend based around this lagoon. It is said that an Inca king's wife was buried there and that the colour of her eyes turned the water emerald green. Supposedly, you can occasionally still hear the king crying with grief at night...

Despite the spooky legend, the lagoon is a very beautiful place, and very peaceful at this time of year (it gets busier in winter when people come up there to ski). Apparently, you can go kayaking on the water - something we'd like to try in the future!

After crossing into Argentina, we arrived at Parque Provincial Aconcagua, where we could park the car, and walk for a few minutes to a viewpoint, in order to look at the tallest mountain in the western hemisphere, Mount Aconcagua. It's hard to appreciate how tall it is from this distance, but it's still incredible to know that you're looking at the highest point in the world outside of the Himalayas.

We then drove to the official border crossing, which was where we hit a problem. Though we ourselves passed through customs with no issues, the car was not allowed through, as it apparently had an unpaid motorway tax from 2017. We knew this was an error, as Claudio had recently paid all the car's taxes, and there certainly wasn't an outstanding one from 2017 - obviously, it hadn't been correctly cleared from the system at the time when it was paid. But as it was Sunday, we couldn't phone up to ask about the error, so there was nothing we could do. We were beginning to think that we would have to give up our trip, but then one of the customs officers told us we could leave the car at the border, and pay to go the rest of the way in a bus if there were any spare seats. Fortunately, there was a bus just about to leave which had two seats free, so we did get to Mendoza after all! Unfortunately, we couldn't stop at Puente del Inca or Potrerillos Dam as planned, but the important thing is that we got there.

Once we arrived at the bus station in Mendoza, the first thing we did was book our return tickets for the following night. Frustratingly, we had to pay a full price ticket, even though we were only going to be doing less than half of the journey, which did make the trip as a whole a lot more expensive than we were expecting.

But once we got to our hotel, all the stresses of the day melted away. The Park Hyatt Mendoza was definitely one of the most special places we've ever stayed in! It's located right in the heart of the city, in front of Plaza Independencia, and is an absolutely beautiful building.

Our room was also pretty special. It was so spacious (the bathroom was like three rooms in one!) and had all the nice extras you get in a posh hotel, like dressing gowns, fancy toiletries and a Nespresso machine. I think it was my fourth time staying in a 5-star hotel and Claudio's first, so it was really a cut above what we're used to, and we definitely made the most of it!

After settling into our room, we were pretty hungry, as all we'd had to eat all day were the road trip snacks we'd packed - we'd planned to buy a lunch from the vendors at the border, but couldn't in the end, as we'd had to quickly jump on the bus.

Fortunately, in Mendoza, there's a lot of good food to enjoy. As a country, Argentina has a lot of Italian food, as most people there have some Italian ancestry, so we decided to go to a nearby Italian place, Pizzaiolo, where I had pizza and Claudio had an Argentinian steak.

Afterwards, Claudio went for a walk around Plaza Independencia, but I had stomach pains from the long day of travelling, so went back to the hotel for a soak in the bath and a cup of tea in the big, comfy bed. A nice way to end the day!

Our bus back to the border was at 22:00, which meant that we had pretty much the entirety of the following day to enjoy the hotel and the city. We started off with a delicious breakfast at a café called Chiamo, where we had avocado and eggs on toast, freshly squeezed orange juice, Argentinian coffee and a medialuna.

Following a little walk around Plaza Chile, one of the city's squares, we went back to the hotel to pack up our things and check out. But luckily for us, even after checking out, we still had the rest of the day to use the hotel's facilities, including the swimming pool and spa! So we spent a few very happy hours making the most of that!

For lunch, Claudio wanted to try milanesa, a typical dish from Argentina. However, he didn't realise quite how massive the portion was going to be! I had cannelloni, which was also pretty huge but very nice!

We then spent the rest of the day exploring the city on foot, including its squares, avenues, train station and Parque General San Martín. Given that we walked many kilometres, of course we also had to stop for gelato at Famiglia Perin! 

I didn't take many photos, as it was my third time in Mendoza (I first went in 2018 and visited for a second time in 2023), so I could just enjoy the experience of being there. To be honest, I hadn't really enjoyed my first trip there that much; I went on a big coach tour in the middle of winter, and we spent a lot of the time being shuttled from one photo spot to the next (most of which, I didn't find that impressive) and getting on and off the bus. We also stayed in the most horrible hostel imaginable, which didn't help matters! 

The second time I went was a solo trip in order to renew my Chilean visa, and although I had a strange and slightly scary experience of being harassed by another guest in my hotel on my first night there, it was overall a much more pleasant trip. I realised that Mendoza is a city that is perfect for strolling around and relaxing, particularly in the warmer months. I think it's a city that grows on you over time; it's not somewhere with lots of famous landmarks or super Instagrammable streets, but it's a great place to have some good food and drink and take things a bit more slowly.

I actually felt quite sad when it was time to collect our luggage from the hotel and head for the bus station, as I didn't feel like leaving Mendoza just yet - though that probably had quite a lot to do with not wanting to leave the Park Hyatt!

In any case, the bus ride to the border may not have been a 5-star hotel, but it wasn't as far off as you might expect! The seats were huge and could be reclined 180 degrees (why they don't offer this on long-haul flights, I can't understand), and so we dozed off easily during the couple of hours' journey to the border.

We were woken up by the bus attendant around midnight and dropped off on the side of the road to go and collect the car. Fortunately the journey home was smooth sailing, and we arrived back in our Airbnb in Santiago in the early hours of Christmas Eve, tired but very happy!

Overall, I found it was a really nice idea to have a minimoon - it was great to have a (mostly!) relaxing time away together and to treat ourselves with a luxurious hotel stay for the special occasion. I also think it makes sense to have a smaller, lower key trip straight after the wedding and to have the big honeymoon later, which is what we're going to be doing. We did consider going straight from Chile to another destination after the wedding, but I'm glad we decided against it, as it would have been a pretty full-on itinerary. Plus, it's nice to spread out the festivities and have our honeymoon to look forward to for a couple of months! So maybe I'll take back my initial eye roll over the minimoon trend (though I'll still retain it for anyone who flies abroad for several days and calls that a "minimoon" - that's definitely a honeymoon in my book!)

Following our arrival back in Chile, we had another week left to enjoy the sunshine, as well as Christmas with Claudio's family. In total we spent three weeks in South America, and I plan to publish a write-up of what we got up to outside of our wedding and trip to Argentina, very soon, right here on this blog!

My Year of Adventurous Travel

As this blog is called Charlotte's Travel Adventures, it seems only right to write a post about adventurous travel!

Of course, I like going on holiday to relax, and visiting places to see interesting sights...but travel is also about having new and different experiences.

The 15 months that I spent living in Chile were a time when I made an effort to go on some exciting and sometimes a little extreme adventures. Though of course, there were plenty of challenges during that time (which I wrote about in this recent post), I feel like I really made the most of it and had a lot of fun travelling and trying new things across South America.

Here are 5 of my biggest adventures from the year!

Indoor Surfing in Santiago

Though I'd tried windsurfing in 2016, I'd always wanted to have a go at classic surfing. Surprisingly enough, even though Santiago isn't by the sea, you can surf there - Mall Sport offers indoor surfing lessons, and Claudio and I took one in May 2022. 

This experience was actually the most extreme of them all, I'd say! You basically get have to try to stay afloat against powerful jets of water, and if you don't manage it, you get thrown across that big curved area you can see in my pictures. Though we had plenty of bruises and even a couple of scrapes afterwards, we had a lot of fun. 

A Speedboat Ride in the Pacific Ocean

Our weekend in Papudo was one of our most low-key trips away during my time living in Chile, but it was actually one of my favourites. We saw so many beautiful animals there, from adorable pet cats to incredible marine life. Plus, the town and its beaches are absolutely beautiful.

Our time there was mostly very relaxing, with the exception of a boat trip we took to Isla Los Lobos. To my surprise, the boat was actually a dinghy with an engine, and it went incredibly fast - it was fun, though I was slightly scared that either I or my stuff would fall in the sea!

But the sights we saw on that trip were incredible: Humboldt penguins, sea lions and even a beautiful dolphin. We finished off the ride with a jump into the water at a beautiful, secluded beach. It was such a memorable experience!

Ziplining in the Andes

Another extremely memorable experience was going ziplining in the Andes mountains. This was something I'd always wanted to try, and I was really excited about it...until we actually got there and saw it!

The experience took place at Cascada de las Ánimas activity centre in Cajón del Maipo, which is such an enchanting and beautiful place. But the zip-line is suspended 25 metres above the River Maipo and looks pretty daunting! We were both pretty nervous when preparing to set off, but it was such a fun and exhilarating experience!

In fact, we liked it so much that we did it again a few months later at Parque Aventura in Santiago. 

White-Water Rafting in Argentina

White-water rafting was another sport I'd wanted to try for years, and I took the opportunity to try it while renewing my visa in Argentina. Although my day at the activity centre was rather long without a lot to do, the activity itself was so much fun, and the landscapes of the Andes and the Mendoza River were beautiful. I definitely plan to go rafting again at some point!

Backpacking Solo to Machu Picchu

We had several adventurous trips during the 15 months, but the most adventurous was when I went to Peru for a week on my own with just a backpack. 

During my time there I took in the sites in and around Cusco, and travelled around the Sacred Valley of the Incas, before taking the train to Aguas Calientes and hiking up hundreds of stone steps to the famous citadel, Machu Picchu.

It was a trip I'd dreamed of for several years and took quite a lot of organising, but it all turned out really well. I had an amazing time!

In my opinion, trying new experiences and adventures like these are a great way to get out of your comfort zone and create memories that will last forever.

There are still several other adventurous experiences I want to try, such as surfing at a beach, paragliding, and maybe even scuba diving.

Perhaps there will be more extreme adventures to come on this blog!

Newport and Caerphilly

Last Saturday, I had a nice little trip out of the country and visited Wales! This was a trip taken partly for practical reasons and partly for touristic reasons; my morning was spent in Newport, seeing what the city would be like as a potential place to move to, and my afternoon was spent visiting Caerphilly Castle!

My job is based in Bristol, and I go into the office twice a week, so I need to live somewhere within reasonable commuting distance, but not necessarily in Bristol itself. At the moment, I'm living in a flat share in Bristol, and to be honest, I've found I've gone off this city to some extent since moving here, even though I always enjoyed visiting before. There are lots of issues with things like drugs and homelessness, and it also has one of the highest costs of living in the entire country. When Claudio comes over here, I'd like us to live in our own place together (which would be super expensive in Bristol), and I'd also like to us live somewhere that feels less seedy and depressing. Newport doesn't have the greatest reputation, but it's cheaper than Bristol, so I decided to go and see what it was like.

Overall, it was better than I expected. There's a nice old-fashioned arcade with shops and cafés, as well as a big market/food court, which reminded me of one I used to go to in Valletta.

The city centre also has a shopping area with a cinema and all the shops and restaurants you'd expect to find in a British city. Generally, I felt like the city centre was safer and cleaner than Bristol's.

The part of the city I liked the most was the riverside, which is where you can find Newport Castle! A castle is definitely a plus point for any city, as far as I'm concerned, and I found the riverside quite picturesque in general.

During my morning in Newport, I walked up a massive hill to get to St Woolos Cathedral. It's more of a church than a cathedral really, but it was interesting to see it, and to get more of a feel for the city.

I wanted to make a bit of a day out of my trip to Wales, so in the early afternoon, I took a very crowded train to Cardiff, followed by a very clean, comfortable and quiet train to Caerphilly (which reminded me of trains I've been on in continental Europe).

I was very excited to go to Caerphilly, as its castle is the largest in Wales, and that's saying something, considering how many castles there are in Wales!

The town of Caerphilly itself seems quite unremarkable when you come out of the train station, but once you get to the castle, you can't help but be impressed. It's so huge, and the fact that it's surrounded by a moat makes it even more spectacular.

At the moment, the castle's great hall is being reconstructed to make it look as it did at its peak in the 1320s! They're also making the site more accessible and building a café and toilets there, so in around a year's time, it's going to be an even better place for a day out than it is already. As it is now, you can go up inside some of the towers, and onto the rooftop of the main part of the castle, which is still a pretty decent amount to see, and took me a good hour or two to go round.

It was really fun to step into history and explore the interior of the castle - it was built in the 1200s and a lot of it seems to have not changed since then, particularly the steps to go up and down the towers! The place had a lot of atmosphere, and the typical Welsh weather and Halloween decorations further added to that.

Of course, one of my favourite parts of my trip to the castle was seeing some dragons - always a must when visiting Wales! You can even press a button to listen to a story about the dragon family either in Welsh or English. 

To conclude, my day trip to Wales was a nice little escape to a different country, and felt like a bit of a holiday, even if part of the trip was for practical reasons.

Actually, since I took this trip a week ago, there have been some potential new developments that have come up in terms of what Claudio and I will do and where we'll live in the near future, so I'm holding off scouting out new places to live close to Bristol until we're more certain about that. I definitely don't see myself living in this part of the world long term, but I could be here for several more months, so I'm keeping Newport as an option for now.

Well, that's all for today, but I'll be writing again sometime soon, probably with some travel adventures from around the Bristol area. And next month, Claudio and I should be spending some time abroad, which will be exciting! See you back here soon!