By the beginning of October we were reaching the pointy end of our trip and our funds were running precariously low. So we decided to check out Workaway for volunteer opportunities in Argentina. We came across Susan and Dave’s post on the website and it sounded perfect. A few quick emails and then it was confirmed that we would spend a bit under 2 weeks with them on their property.
We caught an overnight bus from Buenos Aires to San Rafael, which is a few hours south of Mendoza. We were picked up by Susan and Dave at the bus station and were taken straight to a party – my kind of people! Dave and Susan meet up with their expat friends each Sunday for an afternoon of food, wine and bocce, and luckily we were invited too.
Dave and Susan’s property is located 30 minutes or so out of San Rafael. We were given our own two bedroom house and food for breakfast each day in exchange for four hours of work each morning Monday to Friday. A very fair deal we thought! While on the finca we built a bridge, fixed chairs and helped clean up the property. Dave and Susan’s daughter, Tiv, was on holiday in Miami (lucky thing!) for most of the time we were there, but we did get to spend a bit of time with her during our final days too.
We had such a good time in San Rafael! Lots of amazing meals (steak cooked to medium rare on the asado instead of well done in the restaurants), some intense games of Spades, fun afternoons of poker games with the expat crew and lots of laughter over 4.6 flagons of malbec. Ryan managed to catch catfish out of the river at the back of the property and taught Tiv the techniques for a set-line. One of the other great things about living on the finca was having pets again! Catorce and Rex are amazing dogs, and the cats are pretty cool too.
We highly recommend doing Workaway with Susan, Dave and Tiv if you ever make it down to San Rafael! We couldn’t have asked for more generous and welcoming hosts. Thanks guys!
Chasing the Cheese 