Vendimia

Dan: I think the Vendimia (wine festival) is winding down. We went to the parade on Friday night. It consisted of each queen (17 or so) being pulled on a tractor trailer bed, elaborately decorated in harvest themes. She was usually accompanied by 6 to 12 lesser royals. We got there an hour early and got a decent place to stand behind a fence. Then as the parade got started, we watched as thousands lined the road on the inside of that fence, scarcely leaving room for the trucks to come by. They needed to be close to gain better access to the loot being tossed by the floatriders. When I say loot, I should really say fruit; a lot of grapes, some apples, some pears and the royal court of the region famous for its cantaloupes threw melons into the crowd. Most of them threw like girls, so very little fruit made it to our outpost. It was no Raspberry Festival, probably because I didn’t get a sunburn, it being at night. The next morning, however, there was a repeat of the whole thing, in scorching hot sun. This time the parade went in the opposite direction and included bands and dance troupes between the queens. Once we got the gist of it, we decided that it could be enjoyed just as well on TV in our room.

I think the main deal for which people come to the Mendoza Vendimia is the big show at the park. There is a Greek amphitheater at the big Parque San Martin. For three nights they but on a big time stage show, celebrating what else, but the grape harvest. Something like 20,000 people watch in the theater and on the hill behind it. We watched on TV. It’s a pretty elaborate, allegorical, cirque de soleil without the cirque, cast of hundreds, costumed dance production with fireworks and an angel brought in on a crane. Sometime after midnight, just when we thought it was over, they dragged all the queens back onstage. We were pretty sick of hearing about these gals by this time, but still there was an American Idol-like need to see who would win. So for another half hour or so we watched as each individual vote was announced by the MCs until they finally crowned the weeping, exhausted sovereign from Guaymallen.