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Published: June 23rd 2008
Our latest 16 hour coach ride from Puerto Iguazu to Buenos Aires was in luxury because we´d opted to splash out and spend an extra 80p each on a cama coach rather than semi cama. For those not aware of the difference this basically means that the seats are wider and recline nearly all the way back to make a bed (cama)… the best £1.60 we have spent so far we both thought! As well as luxury seats you are also provided with a blanket, dinner and breakfast, kind of like a flight but better as you get a lot more legroom! As an added bonus they showed 300 in the evening which is one of our favourite films so all in all a great journey for us!
On our arrival we were greeted with a protest across the city. The bus drivers had blocked most of the roads in the centre while huge crowds of people were marching through all the streets with their banners waving. It was quite surreal to see the main street through the city (an 8 lane highway) with no cars and just rubbish blowing across it.. much like a scene from 28 days later!
We were told it was a protest because the farmers are being over taxed on their products as well as the price of food and living not matching the wages of the people.. sound familiar?!
Buenos Aires is a huge city and it takes you quite a while to find your feet, this wasn´t helped by our first hostel being quite a way out of the centre which meant a long walk to get anywhere. There are many different areas here, each very different from the next so it´s quite easy to walk from high rise buildings in the financial district to old colonial buildings with cobbled streets in San Telmo to the nature reserve on the edge of the city.
Unfortunately for us the first few days here were not only cold but also pouring with rain and sightseeing in the rain is no fun for anyone. To try to get over this problem Dale booked us onto a city tour which took us past the main sights from the warmth and shelter of a coach. We made a couple of stops to have a look round the Boca Stadium area and Caminito Street with it´s pretty
coloured buildings but as we´re sure you will agree from the photos, these things would have looked so much nicer in the sunshine!
Another problem we had to overcome whilst in Buenos Aires was a minor medical emergency! Dale´s tooth fractured whilst in the UK and the cap he had over this came away whilst in Puerto Iguazu, Sophie was quite worried because it takes a lot for Dale to complain that he is in pain and he definitely was with major toothache. We received help from the hostel to find an English speaking dentist and made our way there on Thursday afternoon. The dentist was really helpful and had a lot of experience dealing with various travellers who knocked on his door. Rather than remove the tooth his advice was to save it so Dale underwent a course of root canal treatment. After 5 hours in the chair on 3 separate occasions Dale´s tooth is now fully repaired and he is no longer in any pain. We were both really pleased that it had happened when we were on our way to a major city as we weren´t sure how professional a dentist would have been in a
Dale´s steak
This was about 4¨ thick!Bolivian village!
Thankfully on Friday we woke up to some cloud and sunshine.. still cold but we can overcome that with fleeces and thermals! We decided to take a walk down to the bottom end of the city to visit Eva Peron´s grave and the other sights we had seen from the comfort of our coach tour earlier in the week. The feel of the city is completely different in this end of town, most noticeably people actually pick up their dog poo instead of it being under every step you seem to take! The buildings are much flasher and the pavements are not quite so uneven so we decided that this was the place where the rich people must hang out!
The trip to the Cementerio de la Recoleta was a highlight for Sophie because she´d seen these type of places in many horror films so to get to walk between the crypts was quite exciting if a little scary. We both agreed this is definitely not somewhere you would want to be after dark! You could actually look inside many of the crypts and see the dust and cobweb covered coffins which is quite eerie even
in bright sunshine. Everyone goes to this cemetery to see Evita´s final resting place but to be honest it´s a bit of a disappointment because it´s not on the grand scale of some of the others that surround it. We are told this is because it belongs to the family and therefore understated. The cemetery also seems to have been adopted as a home for 100´s of stray cats.. we liked to think that these were reincarnations of the people who were buried here!
As a treat in the afternoon we decided to go for tea and cake in Tortoni´s. This is a famous café that has been open for 150 years and used to be a big hang out for various artists and the like. Now it´s just a major tourist attraction for visitors to the city and one of the main places to see tango. Rather than tea & cake we opted for beer and chocolate mousse cake (yummy) and coffee and a steak sandwich! It´s a great place where the waiters take their fashion tips from the 1920´s with black waistcoats and white tea towels over their arms.
Sunday brings the antique & flea market
Maradona Shirt
This is the last one he wore when playing for Argentina to the streets of San Temlo so we ventured out to see what we could find. It´s a bit like going though an Aladdin´s cave with stalls selling all sort of antique (read tat!) wares… old telephones, jewellery, clothes, coins etc etc… as well as the antique part you also have other streets selling local hand made crafts all of which are very beautiful and somewhere you could spend a lot of money.. if you weren´t on a travellers budget that is!!
Dale had been looking forward to the evening´s event all week but we´d decided to wait until his tooth was completely better so he could really enjoy his first Argentinian steak. Not ones for just picking anywhere we visited the restaurant that is supposed to have the best steak in the whole of Argentina. The restaurant was very exclusive and we were a little worried about turning up in our backpacker boots and jeans but they were very accommodating and make us feel quite at home. It was a little expensive to have a 3 course meal so we decided to go straight for the kill and just have the meat! The steaks were delicious and well
worth the wait.
We will be quite glad to leave another big city because as exciting as they are we get a little tired of the constant buzz and are looking forward to Peru where we hope that things will be a little more laid back! We have decided while we were here that Buenos Aires is much like marmite.. you either love it or you hate it.
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