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The maxim "You snooze, you lose" should be emblazoned in bold, front and centre on Mendoza bus station. By all rights there should be ravingly decrepit man screaming at passers-by, "Get out," he would say. "Get out…GET OUT!"

This isn't addressed to people with all their worldly belongings on their back, blissfully oblivious to weather warnings, able to hop-tail it out when the going gets rough. This is directed at those poor souls who, for no apparent reason, think winter season is a good time for a quick weekend getaway to Mendoza, Argentina.

Give or take an Ande or two, this city is a sprightly three or four hours out of Santiago. Hell, you think, I'm going to do some shopping. Get some boots. Relax. You know, get away from it all.

Sadly, you could not have been more wrong. Every silver lining has foreboding, polluted cloud attached to it. Forget relaxing, forget getting away, because there's no getting away from anything once the pass has closed. The snow has fallen, and the border's shut. And you, my friend, are screwed.

Mendoza is not so much a city as a stinking hole of square plastic commercialism. This realization is made in the first couple of hours, but, or course, you think you'll be able to leave just as happily as you arrived.

Alas, in truth, you'll be running, screaming, sweating balls and wishing you'd never heard the sentence "Oh come on, it's only a couple of days."

An early 20th Century earthquake robbed the town of any sort of interesting appearance. To look at Mendoza these days is to suspect some grey breeze-block loving Stalinist decided hey, capitalism is a good thing, and we're going to goose-step unbelievers to the nearest 5 city blocks of shoe stores, stuff their face with Argentine steak and laugh as they cry about how they only wanted cheap boots.

The ironic thing about Mendoza in late July, a time when one is most likely to find themselves stuck, is that pretty much most of the time, everywhere is closed. It's forever siesta, a national holiday, or perhaps proprietors are just creeping in the back, peering through the woven steel fence they've dropped over the front entrance, and smirking at the tourists wondering at the irony of it all. This is the place everyone says is the place to shop… we came for a weekend with no change of clothes… we're goddamn stuck here…and nothing is open.

There's no two ways about it: Mendoza blows. I've been in conversation with people, far from the time and the crime, who've mentioned how they were in Mendoza, and well, yeah, it wasn't that bad…we quite enjoyed it.

For the ever growing fraternity of travellers who've found themselves trapped here, this kind of casual lack of understanding is akin to some loser complaining that Zidane's head butt in the dying moments of the 2006 World Cup was unwarranted, unprofessional, and disappointing. That's not the fucking point. He was playing his last game, at the end of final extra time, in the biggest match for four years, with over a billion people watching. Talk about going out with a BANG. To whinge, complain, or to say anything negative about this balls-to-the-wall split second reaction is to complain about the beauty of human spontaneity.

As such, in a similar way, for someone to wax indifference about getting trapped in a place such as Mendoza is…well…just plain wrong. So perhaps those two thoughts don't link as well they should. But they feel right. And either way, both situations sure make you want to head butt something; be it some poncy Italian racist, or the nearest fat teenager outside Mendoza bus station smugly asking you if want a place to stay after an official had just told you, yep….the pass is still closed, for a few days, perhaps a week, maybe two….

The economy of this town is fuelled by bitter visitors in the winter season. It's full of people who just don't want to be there, who don't have the money for an airfare, can't face a 50 hours bus south, and have lost hope of ever seeing the reassuring smog fog of Santiago, which, after this kind of mind-numbingly boring hell, sounds like heaven.

Me? I weighed up the options, and chose the ever growing pile of dept to build upon. I flew. It was glorious. The fare was a small price for the elation I felt, leaving behind the suckers who didn't get out when they could. You snooze, you lose. Just don't wait around in Mendoza. Or better still, don't ever go. Stay in Santiago, fast for a couple of days, then buy some slightly more expensive boots. You won't regret it.