New beginnings, new continents

Day 57, 26 March 2011

What a long way we’ve come.

After an hour long wait in the plane in Sau Paulo (Brazil) and another two hour flight we made it to Buenos Aries. I think our bags were about the last off, then we jumped the customs queue and found the transfer driver. It took 25 mins to get out of the airport before zooming into town to the hotel.

Meeting Anne was great. It’s so nice to have someone familiar to see, who also knows what is going on and what to do (C- and Anne brought the essentials, tim tams, newspapers and news from home). We cleaned up a bit then headed out into the sunshine. It was a beautiful day, nice and warm. Anne told us that she’d been told that the way of life here is self enjoyment rather than responsibility. Judging from today, we can understand why. We had a lovely lunch outside in the sunshine – our first taste of Argentinean steak, and caught up on all home related matters (C- the meat , the lack of responsibility, I’m moving to BA!).

After lunch we wandered through the ‘Recolletta Cemetery’ which is a maze of mausoleums. Apparently the wealthy Buenos Arians pay fifty USdollars a month to maintain their family plot. Some are immaculate shrines, but others have fallen into disrepair. We found Eva Peron’s family site, (C- they still leave flowers, notes and many make the pilgrimage just to see it).

We then wandered through Recolleta, stopping at a few leather shops (BA is known for having great leather goods) and marveling at the architecture. I can understand why people fall in love with this city.

After a few coffee and wine stops we made our way to Florida Avenue which is the really touristy part of town. It was buzzing. We avoided the tango show touts, and inspected a few more leather places before going into a big shopping centre. It is much the same as home, with lots of clothes shops, but that much more opulent.

By about eight thirty, C and I were dragging our feet a bit, but we found a lovely restaurant and had more good meals (C- the meat is incredible). It was great to hear news of home, and we enjoyed sharing some of our adventures with Anne.

I think we fell into bed around ten.

Day 58, 27 March 2011

We slept in! The bed is amazing (C, anything after the tents is amazing, but the bed is very comfy). Things don’t open around here until 10 am so we enjoyed a lazy start to the day with breaky at 8:30.

After breaky we headed off toward San Telermo to find the markets. It was a long walk – but a nice flat one, along the longer boulevards, past some of the monuments. Along the way we ran into a protest againinst some action in Libia, I'm not sure if it is a protest or a party.

The markets were huge! Similar to the Notting Hill markets – it was kilometers of stalls, with all different kinds of knick knacks. We indulged in a few things for ourselves and also got some presents. But mainly we enjoyed not having to be anywhere – just meandering along looking at things.

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By about three o’clock our legs were a bit tired so we jumped a cab back to the hotel to re-charge. We had a hot chocolate and coffee, then spent a few hours doing admin jobs. It’s hard to balance the time we have to look at stuff with a bit of down time, but we also need to plan the next part of our trip.

We were to be picked up for a tango show, but a mix up with dates meant that we went back to the same place as the night before and had lovely meals.

The way of life here means that you don’t actually go out for dinner until 8-9 pm. So at 9pm on a Sunday night we went to a restaurant which was quite busy and getting busier. It is amazing. Apparently people eat late, go to coffee then go dancing – and then don’t get too work until 10am – love it!

Day 58, 28 March 2011

Today the morning was spent catching up on emails. It seems that we’re going to have trouble getting past Ushuaia after the boat trip we’ve recently booked. We’ll have to come back to Buenos Aries before going on to Santiago or Bolivia (there are no direct flights) which will cost about $500 each. It’s a bugger that we hadn’t planned this part, but when we left we were concerned that we’d planned too much. The joys of traveling...

We headed out about 11am and hiked miles to get to the evita museum- unfortunately to find that it is closed on Mondays….

We found a nice little café to have lunch then walked through the back streets to Recolletta where we found the shop in which Anne was eyeing off a leather jacket. After much consternation, a cup of coffee and a good sales job the purchase was made (I only whish I was the same size so I could borrow it!). We then made our way back to the hotel, checked emails and freshened up.

I’d been told about an all you can eat restaurant called, Siga La Varka – ie ‘follow the cow’. C checked it out online and determined that it was something that we had to experience for ourselves. So we bundled into a cab and said in terrible Spanish – siga la varka, the cab driver thought it was hilarious but totally didn’t know what we were saying or where it was so C had to show him.

It was in an area along the water that looked pretty ritzy, but this place was very reasonably priced- for as much as you can eat meat, salad and 1ltr of wine, soft drink, or beer could be… after eating just enough (maybe too much) (C- So much meat, so little stomach space!) we got a souvenir and headed back.

After sorting out our stuff to give to Anne we packed our bags and fell into bed.