Day 31 – The Last Night

Before

After

El Obelisco

Monumento a General Juan Lavalle

Palacio de Justicia

Teatro Colon and Monumento a General Juan Lavalle

We’re about to go get our last dinner in Buenos Aires – trying a place called Gran Bar Danzon which is renowned as one of the best bars in the world and also has high quality food (lets hope so).  We spent most of today outside, walking around three of the barrios and enjoying the powerful smell of exhaust one last time.  (Side note, it just came out that Buenos Aires is the fourth loudest city in the world and that one of the loudest parts of the city is one block from our apartment).  We had what might be the best pizza in the world today and are hoping this last meal is half as good.  See you all soon.

Day 30 – Uruguay (and we still have two more days!)

Waves crashing in Colonia

Lighthouse in Colonia

Entrance to Barrio Historico

Angela in Colonia

It is windy

Lighthouse in Colonia

Today is our 30th day in Buenos Aires, but contrary to the name of this blog, we actually have two more days left after today.We finally made it to Uruguay after bagging the 8:30AM ferry and settling for the 12:00PM ride over.

We arrived to the Buquebus terminal at around 11:00 and we’re happy we showed up early.  Although the building is very modern in its architecture and technology, the processes of the company were a bit flawed.  We waited in one line to reserve our ticket, then went about 15 yards to the right to pay for the ticket.  Finally, we were sent to the left of the original line to get stamped before going upstairs to the ferry.  The process took as almost an hour and didn’t leave us much time to spare.

The ride over was smooth and seamless.  The ferry made us feel like we were in a cruise ship or a casino (sans the slot machines).  We purchased food and checked out the duty free store during the one hour trip from Argentina to Colonia Del Sacramento, Uruguay (referred to as Colonia).  As we were exited the ship, we met a couple from Ottawa, Ontario and spent our day in Colonia with them.

Our first stop was to get some food in our bellies.  All we’ve heard about the cuisine in Colonia is that there’s really only one choice for a first time visiter – El Drugstore.  The decor in this restaurant is kitschy and eclectic.  The kitchen is fully exposed so you can watch the chef cook any of the what seems like 100 meals on the menu.  The menu itself was an adventure as each page is constructed with a different drawing that would make Andy Warhol jealous.  It didn’t take long for us to assume that the reason the restaurant is named El Drugstore is because if you were high on drugs, the restaurant experience would be quite the trip.  Either way, the food was very good and we had a fun time getting to know our new Canuck friends.

After lunch we started to explore this small colonial town.  The town itself is small, population only 20,000.  It was founded in 1860 by the Portuguese, making it the oldest city in Uruguay.  For years, the Portuguese and Spanish fought over it until Uruguay finally won it over.  The Barrio Historico, which is the main area of Colonia, is recognized as a World Heritage Site.

The barrio is filled with little shops, bars, restaurants and museums that made for some great site-seeing.  In addition, even though the coast is pretty much non-existent in Buenos Aires, it is everywhere in Colonia.  This was not a day, however, that we were going to be able to lay out and get some sun.

When we arrived in Colonia, the temperature was in the high 50′s and it was sprinkling rain.  Two hours later, the winds had picked up to what we would estimate at 60 miles per hour, the rain picked up and the temperature dropped dramatically.  It felt like a hurricane.  It was about this time that we decided we would try to get on the 5:00 ferry rather than wait until the 8:30 that we had intended on.  If it were a nice day we would have had plenty to keep us busy, but the inclement weather took away some of our options.  We raced to the ferry station and made it on with about one minute to spare.

It didn’t take long for us to question if we should have just waited for the 8:30 ferry.  About ten minutes into our trip back to Buenos Aires, the choppy waters started to rock the boat back and forth so hard we thought for sure we would capsize.  Three indications that things were hairy – dishes twice falling from the cupboards and shattering in the kitchen, at least one person putting on their life jacket, and the ferry attendants coming around with barf bags for everybody.  The mood in the ferry changed quickly.  While many people started the trip off sleeping, everybody was now alert and talking to each other, but even though many were speaking a different language we could tell it was the nervous chatter to keep their mind off what was happening.

Fortunately, the waters calmed about 20 minutes later and put everybody at ease.  We got back to Buenos Aires at 6:00 as expected and returned home to relax before dinner.  Around 9:30, we arrived at Campo Bravo in the Las Canitas barrio for dinner.

Las Canitas is an area we probably should have spent more time in.  It is extremely clean with a lot of restaurants, bars and shops.  The story has it that mean local celebrities – actors, musicians, athletes – live and hang out in this area.

Campo Bravo was great.  Fifteen minutes after we arrived, we took a look around and noticed the place was jam packed even though it was a Tuesday.  The restaurant hours are until 4:00AM every night of the week and legend has it that it goes past this time most nights.  The food, service and ambience were all top notch.  We started with the customary provoleta, likely getting our last taste of this cheesy delight.  Angela ordered bife de lomo kabobs and I had the bife de chorizo.  We shared some papa fritas, dulce de leche and two bottles of Trapiche Malbec before cashing out around midnight.

Day 29 – Corrientes and Carlos Gardel

Our first stop today was the Palacio de las Aguas Corrientes building on Corrientes and Riobamba.  This is a building that we’ve seen time and time again since we’ve been here, so with our departure looming we felt we had to make a visit.  Work on the building began in 1887 to address the health needs of the city that at the time was overtaken by epidemics.  Since 1987 this building has been a national historical monument, and we certainly recognize it as one of the most beautiful in the entire city.

From there, we headed west about 10 blocks to the Abasto barrio and the Museo Casa Carlos Gardel.  If the name Carlos Gardel doesn’t jump out at you, don’t worry – it didn’t to us either.  It didn’t take long, however, for us to realize how this man was not only a national hero to the Argentine’s but also very well respected world wide.  He is best known for being the most important figure in the history of tango.  Although the dance existed far before he became popular, Gardel was instrumental for matching a music to the dance.  His popularity has been compared to that of Elvis, and he even starred in American movies before his tragic death in an airplane crash in 1935.  As interesting as the museum that celebrates his life is, you can’t help but feel he deserves something grander when you compare it to the likes of Graceland.

The Gardel museum was our gateway to Abasto.  Up to this point in our trip, we had avoided this barrio for one reason or another.  We can’t tell you about the neighborhood as a whole, but the few blocks that line the museum make for excellent site seeing.  Many of the buildings are marked with murals of Gardel and lyrics to his songs are painted on the sidewalks.  For someone we didn’t know much about before our trip, Carlos Gardel lived a life we are excited to learn more about.

After touring Abasto, we grabbed a late lunch and coffee at Cafe Martinez before heading back to the apartment.  We downloaded and sampled the new Pearl Jam album, tooled around on the internet and relaxed before getting ready for dinner.

We arrived to 647 Dinner Club in San Telmo around 9:30.  Being a Monday night, we expected a sparse crowd. We pretty much had the place to ourselves when we arrived.  The decor of this French restaurant was gorgeous – from the chandeliers to the high ceilings.  We grabbed a seat in an oversized, round booth and took a look at the menu.  For our entrada, we went with a veal carpaccio, which was extremely tasty.  To accompany our appetizer, Angela ordered a Rhum Forrest, Rhum (get it?), a rum based cocktail, and I had a Mint Jagger (get it?), which is basically a mojito made with jager.  Both were excellent.  Our entrees were equally as satisfying; Angela had a pumpkin based pasta dish and I had quail with blue cheese stuffed pear.  Even though the place was fairly empty which likely took away from some of the ambience, this place easily climbed to the top of our top restaurants in Buenos Aires.

Although the San Telmo barrio is becoming more and more safe with the high quality restaurants and bars going up, we still had the bartender call a cab for us.  Only a few minutes later, we were on our way back to the apartment.  After getting home around midnight we decided to put on Munich and call it a night.  Even though we have said this before, we are planning on going to Uruguay tomorrow.  There aren’t many days left on our trip, so we’re confident it’s finally going to happen.

Day 28 – Sunday is for Football

Casa Bar

At Cumana Restaurant

Deep in Conversation

Today was supposed to be the day we finally got to see an Argentine futbol game live.  We had planned on seeing a game at the famed La Bombonera stadium featuring the Boca Juniors club and had pegged September 20th as the best opportunity to do so.  I had emailed a company called GoFootball about going to this game, and even though their communication was poor they finally responded to say they could accommodate us.  Today, the day of the game, however, the communication disappeared.  I responded to an email at 10:00AM giving them our exact address for pickup.  A few hours later, we hadn’t heard back so I emailed again making sure we were still on.  Nothing.  By 4:30, we gave up on it, considering the pickup was to be between 3:30-4:00.  Still to this point, we haven’t heard back.  Its unfortunate we’ll be leaving Argentina going 0-2 on soccer game experiences, but it is all the more reason to try to get to Johannesburg next July.

Luckily, we had a backup plan.  Being a Sunday, we knew could count on Casa Bar playing the NFL games on their flat screens.  We also had a pretty good idea that we would run into Michael and Sabrina and sure enough, they were posted up in the same exact seats as the week before.  After suffering through the pathetic Seahawks game, we headed across the street to Cumana, a restaurant we had been to earlier in our trip.

The four of us spent a fantastic 3.5 hours at Cumana, sharing three bottles of wine, empanadas and some great conversation.  Angela got her first experience with locro, the popular Argentine stew that rivals chili in the “I can eat you for two weeks straight and not get bored of you category.”  This meal, with the three bottles of wine, ran Michael and me about $25 each.  At around 12:30, we parted ways with Michael and Sabrina and headed home for the night.

Day 27 – La Boca and Live Music

La Boca

La Boca

Lunch in La Boca

La Boca

La Boca graffiti art

La Boca graffiti art

Iglesia Orthodoxa Rusa

Staring down the barrel of a cannon

Lily Allen

Today started with us sleeping until our body clocks naturally woke us up.  We headed straight to La Boca since we hadn’t spent much time in the area that founded tango and was once the main port in Buenos Aires. Our first stop was Calle Museo Caminito, a pedestrian street built in 1959 specifically geared towards tourists.

Up to this point in our trip, we’d done a great job avoiding the tourist traps, but we welcomed this exception.  Caminito makes no apologies to being more commercial than cultural and it needn’t have to.  We stopped first at a restaurant called La Rueda after being lured in by one of many street hawkers.  The food was average at best (Angela claimed her gnocci to be the worst she’s ever had) and the service was worse.  Fortunately, this was to be expected and we knew the atmosphere would be the real draw.  The restaurant put on the three separate tango shows, one of which displayed what we graded the best dancers we’ve seen on our trip.

After lunch, we took to the streets and snapped about 200 pictures of the multi-colored houses (originally painted this way because of paint leftover from the shipyards), sculptures and graffiti that fill the barrio.  Buenos Aires is a city filled with beautiful art — from museums to its public statues – but the graffiti that covers its walls and buildings is some of the best work in the city. After our fill of Caminito, we grabbed a cab to the nearby San Telmo barrio.

Our first stop was Iglesia Orthodoxa Rusa, a Russian Orthodox Church built in 1901 that confirmed the melting pot that was and is San Telmo.  It is a replica of many Orthodox Churchs’ in Russia.  From there we continued west to the Parque Lezama and the Museo Historical Nacional that sits inside its perimeter.  This museum recounts Argentina’s history from pre-Columbian times to the 20th century and includes the founding of Buenos Aires.  From there we headed home to relax before the Lily Allen concert.

The concert was at a venue called Luna Park.  From what we understand this is the most popular place for big artists to play when in Buenos Aires.  We didn’t really know what to expect from a crowd standpoint, because while we like Lily Allen and know a lot of other people that do, she doesn’t play huge venues in the states.  Luna Park, however, holds 8,000 people and the place was close to packed.  She was much more lively than we anticipated and seemed to really play off the energy of the crowd – evident by the five or six cigarettes she smoked on stage (Argentine’s love to smoke).  Her band really complimented her well and some of the slower songs were sped up to make for a better live effect.  It’s amazing to think that in this day and age, a person can put their music on a website like myspace (which Lily Allen did), promote yourself on your own, and only a few years later have thousands of people across the world that speak a different language singing your songs.

The concert also provided another example of the national pride we’ve witnessed several times while we’ve been here.  The Argentine’s have gone nuts over their soccer teams and thrown parades in multiple cities for Juan Martin Del Potro, the tennis player who just won the U.S. Open.  This one was a bit strange, however.  Lily Allen made the comment that she just played two shows in Brazil, and everyone says Brazilians are the most beautiful people in the world.  As the crowd began to get uneasy, she then responded by saying Argentina has way more beautiful people than Brazil.  This sent off a huge roar, which was followed by the Argentine National Anthem before she started her next song.  This is a country that has had many ups and downs, but in the short time we’ve been here we’ve seen more displays of national pride than we can ever remember in the states.

After the show we headed about 6 blocks to La Cigale bar, where we had been a few weeks ago.  We were a bit surprised to arrive to a cover charge, but were happy to pay after realizing it would come with a live band.  We each ordered a drink and pizza and grabbed our seat for the show.  The band that came on, Motorama, was a local act that had an early 90′s punk sound.  Most of their tunes were catchy even though we couldn’t understand the language, and we really enjoyed watching our second live act of the night.  After about 10 songs and a brief power outage, we hailed a cab and headed home for the night.

Day 25 and 26- The Weather Outside is Weather

Angela and a Statue

Avenida Santa Fe

Brasserie Petanque Restaurant

San Telmo

Brasserie Petanque Restaurant

Steak tartare at Brasserie Petanque Restaurant

Gibraltar Bar in San Telmo

After another lazy start to the day, we made our way up to Recoleta for lunch at a place we’d seen a lot of people eating at in days prior, Scuzi.  The walk to Scuzi was fairly miserable as the rain was accompanied by cooler temperatures and a menacing breeze.  We also both stepped in a few puddles along the way to give our feet that comfortable “My feet feel like they are going to fall off” sensation.  After arriving at Scuzi, we had both worked up a bit of sweat from battling the conditions, but we were happy to at least by inside and sitting down.

We had walked by Scuzi twice earlier during our trip and, as mentioned above, it had been busy both times.  It is a more modern looking cafe with plasma tv’s on the wall and patrons working on their laptops or reading the paper.  We ordered a margarita pizza to share which ended up being one of the better pizza’s we’ve had on the trip.  After a coffee for dessert, we were on our way.

From Scuzi, we headed back to the bookstore; one to get out of the rain, two because we are looking for one more book to bring home with us.  We spent about an hour perusing the store and found a few coffee-table candidates, but decided against buying anything.  We spent the next hour or so walking back to the apartment on Santa Fe, ducking into shops and staying under the awning to protect against the rain whenever possible.

The next few hours we mainly laid around, figuring we would probably stay in for the evening and out of the rain.  Around 9:00, however, we cracked open a bottle of wine and decided we would at least go out for dinner, as today marked the “one week left” point of our trip (turns out we’re actually here for longer than 30 days).  We realized we haven’t spent nearly enough time in the popular San Telmo barrio, so we picked the Brasserie Petanque restaurant upon a few online recommendations.

Upon entering the restaurant, we knew we would love it.  The decor was decidedly French, with a very open but not overly large layout.  The restaurant gave off a ton of energy from its customers whose chatter produced a loud but comfortable noise bouncing off the walls.  Even without reservation, we were seated right away at a great location that allowed us to peer at the popular Avenida Defensa.  We were immediately given a complementary pre-dinner sweet wine drink as we sat down and looked over the menu.  For our appetizer we decided on a shrimp dish, which was served over some sort of crispy pastry and dipping sauce.  For our entree, we both went with the same thing, steak tartare.  The tartare is what initially drew us to this restaurant.  Its not something that is extremely common so when we have the opportunity to get it at an upscale restaurant we typically tend to order it.  It lived up to the hype.  It was served with dijon mustard and a raw egg, which we both smeared into the meat to give it a spicy and creamy complexion.  It ranks up there with Bing Crosby’s in Palm Springs for Angela, Nick and Sam’s in Dallas for me, and Del Frisco’s in New York for both of us as the top steak tartare we’ve tried.  For dessert we had a chocolate lava cake while we finished our bottle of Malbec and wrapped up an excellent dinner.  Petanque is another one of those restaurants that just gets it and does the little things right – the decor, the vibe from its customers, wait stuff and of course the food were all excellent.  We’ll be ranking – top to bottom – all the restaurants we ate at while in Buenos Aires, and Petanque will surely be near the top.

After Petanque, we headed to an English bar called Gibraltar.  Apparently, this bar started as more of an expat bar frequented by British and Americans but has recently become a popular hot spot with the locals.  Not surprisingly, the bar looked like something straight out of England, right down to the upstairs library decorated with British literature and wall art.  Radiohead was even playing when we walked in.  Angela decided to go American with her drink order, a Bud heavy, while I had a Cuba Libre, which is really just a rum and coke.  We enjoyed people watching and checking out the decor of the bar as we sipped our drinks, but decided to end the night with just one and head back home.

That was Thursday and we’re writing this on Friday.  Considering we don’t have a whole lot to post for today, we’re going to combine this into one post.  We went back to Lobby in Palermo for lunch (we had gone for a few drinks and wine purchases previously but not lunch).  We showed up around 1:30 and the smallish interior was jam packed for lunch.  We were lucky to find the one remaining table in the joint.  Angela had a tuna salad and I had the popular chicken and cheddar sandwich.  We were both pleased with our choices.  We wanted to buy a few more bottles of wine at their wine market, but with the restaurant so crowded, we took to the streets for a bit before coming back.  About an hour and a half later when we reappeared, the restaurant was nearly empty, so we were able to not only have more access to the wine wall, but also have access to the owner, Nacho, to get his opinions.  We bought several more bottles and Nacho was kind enough to box them all up so they should make it home with breaking.  We’ve now been to Lobby twice and both times Nacho has been awesome.  We are planning on going back there one more time before our trip is over for a few drinks but this is a bar we will definitely miss.

After heading back to the apartment to drop off the wine, we had two more stops.  We are going to the Lily Allen concert tomorrow and had to pick up our tickets at the ticket hub.  From there, we checked out the posh Palermo Alto mall about 8 blocks from our place.  Great, modern mall but we actually didn’t even do much looking.  We decided to head back to the apartment to cook dinner at home, as our next few days are going to be pretty action packed.  We’re definitely in for the night, as we got hooked on a foreign short-film marathon on one of the channels.  The verdict so far…pretty weird.  If you want to know what we’re talking about, check out the claymation film Fright Ride.

Day 24 – The Day After the Club is Hard

Sorry to disappoint, but this will be by far the lamest post since we’ve been here. We discovered we’re too old to be out until 6 in the morning (even though we’ll probably try again in a few days).  We slept in until about 2:30PM then proceeded to be lazy and just lay around for the next few hours.  I cooked up some steak slices for “breakfast” which stunk up the apartment for the next several hours and almost sent off the building’s fire alarm. We were able to catch up on some email and other to-do items online while sharing some wine before finally make our way out of the apartment for an early dinner at Duero.  We had a huge calamari dish for our appetizer that came with fries and lettuce.  It might as well have been a full meal.  For the entree, Angela went with a smoked salmon salad with brie and capers and I had gnocci.  We shared a bottle of Catena Zapata Malbec and headed home.

And that was about it for the night.  We brought three movies with us we haven’t seen – Blood Diamond, Munich and Aviator – and decided to give Blood Diamond a go, mainly because it was the shortest of the three.  Pretty good flick.  Hopefully we’ll be back with a more exciting post (and some pictures) of day 25.

Day 23 – We Went to a Club

Our whole plan for today was to do whatever necessary to put ourselves in a position to actually make it to a club tonight.  All trip we’ve talked about going to an extremely late dinner, followed by a trip to a bar before the grand finale of a Buenos Aires club.  So today, we set our day around doing it.

Originally we were going to spend the day in Uruguay, get back around 6:00 and nap until it was time to get ready for dinner, which we had planned with my cousin Michael and his girlfriend Sabrina.  When the alarm went off at 7:15, we instantly knew Uruguay was going to have to be postponed once again (we’ve since decided maybe we should just take the later ferry and spend the night in Uruguay so we don’t have to deal with the early alarm).

Instead, we started the day around 10:30 by walking around the corner to Cafe Martinez.  We had seen this cafe a few times from taxi’s on our way back to the apartment, but this was our first time making it inside.  Cafe Martinez is the exact opposite of most of the cafes we’ve been to in Buenos Aires.  Whereas most of the cafes are essentially historical landmarks, Cafe Martinez has a very modern feel that would remind you more of Starbucks than Cafe Tortoni. After each having a coffee and jamon y queso medialuna, we decided on taking advantage of another nice day and walked to Palermo.  Just like yesterday we strolled Santa Fe, but went west rather than east like we did the previous day to El Centro.

Our first stop when we got to Palermo was Mama Racha, which we had gone to earlier in our trip.  We each had a caprese salad, a few waters and some espresso.  We spent most of our time there surfing the web and working on yesterday’s blog post.  After almost two hours, we settled our tab and wandered around the cobble-stone streets enjoying the nice day.  After mostly window shopping at the outlets that line Avenida Cordoba, we found our way back to our apartment around 4:00.

The rest of the day, as mentioned earlier, was devoted solely to preparing ourselves for a late night.  We relaxed for about an hour, detoxed with some water, took a nap and got ourselves started with yerba mate.  Around 10:00, we grabbed a bottle of our wine and hailed a cab to Michael’s hostel.  Upon arriving, we headed up to the terrace and shared about 1.5 bottles of Malbec. Approaching midnight, we decided it was about time for dinner.

Green Bamboo is a restaurant that has been near the top of our list to visit since we’ve been here and we were happy to finally have this opportunity.  It is a Vietnamese restaurant known not only for its great cuisine but also their drinks and wine list.  Angela, Michael and I all went with the Pho.  Like always it didn’t disappoint.  We were a bit worried that, being in Argentina, it would be filled with all kinds of crazy animal parts, but they kept it basic and it was delicious.  We also had a bottle of Ruca Malen Malbec, which is from a winery we visited in Mendoza.

We wrapped up dinner close to 2:00AM.  Still, it was a bit to early to head directly to a club.  Instead, we grabbed a cab to Mundo Bizarro (Bizarre World) bar to have a few drinks before the clubs really got going.  The bar was fairly empty, and other than the rum and cokes we consumed, the most memorable thing from this bar is their unusual contrast of stuffed deer heads and Betty Page posters scattered all over the walls.

We headed to the club around 3:30.  Being a Tuesday, even in Buenos Aires, we had to get a bit crafty on where to go to ensure a crowd.  Unfortunately, our first top was a bust.  Even though we heard they had great parties on Tuesday nights, it was closed.  The second stop – no luck either.  We checked their website to make sure they were open on Tuesdays, which they were supposed to be, but the were also closed.  Unwilling to give up, we instructed our cab driver to start radioing other cabbies in the area to see where people were going.  Finally, around 4AM, we arrived at a club that was open.  The club experience itself wasn’t anything you wouldn’t see in the states (although you could probably argue there aren’t many places open at 4AM on a Tuesday).  There were probably about 150 people dancing to the electronic music being spun by three DJs.  We had a great time dancing the night away, but are certainly looking forward to trying it out again this weekend when there are sure to be crowds in the thousands.

Day 22 – Puerto Madero and Leather Boots

Puente de la Mujer

One of the many skylines

Barrio under construction

Puerto Madero

They love the Beatles

Tango

Today started like most days of our trip, with us sleeping in until we naturally woke ourselves.  Mondays have been an interesting feeling since we’ve been here; we awake with the anxiety of the work week before realizing that we have absolutely nothing to be stressed about.  That’s a nice feeling.

The weather was picture perfect today.  High 60′s with a slight breeze to keep us cool when the sun was pestering – ideal to walk the long strip on Avenida Santa Fe from our apartment to El Centro, where we were to have lunch.

The walk along Santa Fe from our apartment to Avenida de Julio is about thirty minutes and lined with shopping the entire way. Angela mostly window shopped, which only fueled her fire to find the perfect pair of leather boots.  You see, she has been on a leather mission since we’ve been here.  She found a jacket early in the trip, but even though we’ve looked at boots what seems like every day, she hadn’t found the exact pair that she has created in her mind.  That didn’t change on Santa Fe.

We arrived to El Centro and found our lunch destination, California Burrito Company (CBC), which came highly recommended from both locals and tourists.  CBC is owned by a couple of guys from California, and is pretty much a duplicate of Chipotle.  We both had a chicken burrito with a coca cola light and headed out to our ultimate destination for the day, Puerto Madero.

Puerto Madero is the newest area of Buenos Aires, only gaining its own “barrio” recognition in 2007.  Until then, it was mostly old warehouses and the forgotten part of downtown.  Now, everywhere you look you see a brand new building or one that is under construction.  Many 5-star hotels and restaurants have recently gone up in this area and it is home to the most expense real estate in Buenos Aires.  Until today, we hadn’t ventured this far to the east (Puerto Madero is the most northeast area in Buenos Aires).

When you get to Puerto Madero, the first thing you need to do is cross the small canal that leads to the river and separates downtown from Puerto Madero.  There are four main opportunities to cross, and we chose the most interesting, the Puente de la Mujer bridge.  The architect was inspired by tango dancers and the most visible part of the bridge – a 128 foot “arm” – represents the man of a couple in mid-tango (although I don’t really see it).  Either way, in a city where most of the aesthetically pleasing pieces of architecture are over 100 years old, this is a beautiful bridge that brings Buenos Aires into the modern era.

After snapping some pictures of the bridge and other picture-worthy objects along the boardwalk, we found the Reserva Ecologica, a 865 acre piece of land filled with more than 500 species of bird and a variety of flora and fauna.  Or so we hear. The park is closed on Monday so we’re just going to have to trust the guide books on that one.  Incidentally, that left a small gap in the day which Angela immediately declared should be spent shopping.  And by shopping she meant finding her boots.  This time, it didn’t take long.  As we strolled the boardwalk in Puerto Madero looking for a cafe to sit down at, she finally saw the boots that she had designed in her head.  Camel-colored, to the knee, low heal.  Even though I gave my best attempt to talk her out of them (for no reason but to keep my negotiation skills sharp), I was no match and she finally had the boots she’d been looking for all trip. Whew, what a relief.

After grabbing an ice cream at the extremely popular Freddo, we headed by foot south to San Telmo.  This is an area we need to make sure to spend more time in before we leave.  Up to this point, we’d only been in San Telmo once for the street fair that everybody else in town (at least every tourist) was also at.  San Telmo is one of the original barrios of Buenos Aires, and although it is getting a makeover, it is filled with history and culture.  We stopped at the Dorrego Plaza for a beer where we were entertained with a tango show.

After hanging out in San Telmo for a while and soaking in the beautiful afternoon, we headed back to our apartment and ended the evening with a trip to the grocery store for some essentials.  We’re going to try to take another run at Uruguay in the morning, but that 8:30 departure time of the ferry is just a bear.

Day 21 – Football and Family

With cousin Michael and his girlfriend

Cousin Michael

Angela and Sabrina

We got into Buenos Aires this morning at about 8:30AM after taking the overnight bus back from Mendoza.  Although we had a decent sleep in the 180 degree reclining chairs, we still decided to start the day off with a quick nap before we got moving.  We woke up around 11:00 and, after being gone four days, cleaned the apartment and took our time getting ready.  Being the opening Sunday for the NFL, we decided to find an American expat bar we’d heard of, Casa Bar (owned by a guy from Malibu), to spend the day watching American football.

About 10 blocks from our apartment we walked into Casa and had a seat between two 42 inch plasmas playing the Colts-Jags and Vikings-Browns.  After Angela and I each ordered a Quilmes beer and nachos, I looked up to find my cousin Michael sitting at the bar with his girlfriend.  Neither Michael nor I had any idea the other was in South America, let alone Buenos Aires or Casa Bar. Angela and I moved seats to sit next to them and had a great time catching up. We shared many more beers, fernet (the local spirit many locals drink with Coca Cola) and more food, staying at the bar all the way through the Seahawks game and Bears-Packers game that the bar had to stream through a laptop up to the plasma.

After contemplating staying up and hitting a club as a foursome, Angela and I instead decided to go home and save the club for Tuesday, when were going to get back together with them for a long night of fun.