Advertisement
Published: March 3rd 2010
Flying over Sydney
if you look closley you can see the Sydney Harbour Bridge and the Opera House We set off from our motel at 4am to get to Cairns airport. We had a 3 hour flight to Sydney followed by a 13 hour flight to Buenos Aires with a 1 hour delay!! We crossed the date line and ended up arriving at BA at 10.30am on the 15th - half a hour earlier than we had set off in Sydney!! How weird!! When we arrived we went through a really slow customs but luckily we didn’t have to pay anything, unlike the Aussies and the Yanks. Got a taxi and drove to the San Telmo district of Buenos Aires, BA. We turned up at the Circus Hostel but couldn’t check in until 3pm!! We took a walk around San Telmo. It is very much like France and has a nice square which is surrounded by small bars and cafes. The buildings are all aging mansions and it is full of cobbled streets. It has a really nice feel about it and we took a wander and had a couple of drinks in the square watching the world go by. We got back to the hostel about 3pm and Zo had picked up a cold
on the plane. We had been up for over 24 hours and did the worst thing possible for Jet Lag, we had a sleep. So long in fact we didn’t wake up until 5.30am the next day!!
We had to check out of our hostel and into another one just around the corner. They had a room available which left us with the rest of the day free. We walked to Av de Mayo, which is the road that leads from the Pink house to the Congress. The main political road. Everyday it has to be shut about 3 times for demonstrations as the government aren’t very popular. We took a walk to the Pink House, Casa Rosada, but didn’t know much about it so walked the full length of Av. De Mayo to the congress building, Placio del Congreso. This walk crosses Av. 9 de Julio which is the widest avenue in the world, or that is what the Argentineans tell you. The widest is actually in Brasillia but they don’t tell you that!! When we got to Congress we saw a free walking tour just by Monumento a los Dos Congresos, which took you around BA and
luckily it was just starting. We had a nice guide called Macarena, like the song and she was very informative about the buildings and their history. Our tour started off at the Congress building, where she gave us some history about it and how the government don’t do a lot of work. From there we walked back down the Av. De Mayo and past some fantastic buildings. By the time we got back to the Pink House we had done the 10 blocks twice. We got the history of the building and the 2 dates that are important in their history. Legend has it that the reason why it is painted Pink is for 2 reasons. The first being that they didnt have any waterproof paint, so they mixed white paint in with cow's blood and fat. The second being that one of the parties colours were red and the others were white so they compromised on pink - i prefer the first one!! There is a statue in front of the Pink house to commemorate their independence in May 1816. They have had a lot of tragic history and we were told about how the mothers parade around this
Early morning
in Buenos Aires, the view from our room monument every week in memory of the children who got taken away. We then walked up another street past the neoclassical cathedral, Catedral Metropolitana, and up to Av. 9 de Julio. We stopped to look at the Obelisco, which is like the Washington memorial. The guide told us that it is their Big Ben or Eiffel Tower. It is very phallic and a AIDs charity famously put a huge condom on it to build awareness. We also got to see the only house in BA centre, which is located on the roof of an apartment block. Put there by the owner of the block so he could have an afternoon nap. What a great sight!! That was a really good tour, especially as it was free, but we did tip her quite generously. We went to grab some lunch before heading back for an afternoon nap. Headed out late to Plaza Dorrego, San Telmo, to grab some dinner. Our first taste or Argentinean steak and it was awesome, followed by classic deserts of pancakes and flan with dulce leche - delicious!! We also got to see a free tango show so everything Argentina has to offer in one night!!
Up early due to jet lag. We took a walk back to the centre of town and walked down Av. Florida. This is the main tourist shopping street and is full of people trying to sell you stuff you don’t want. It crosses about 10 blocks and take quite a while to walk. On our way we went into Galerias Pacifico, which is a huge expensive shopping mall. It has a dome roof and on the inside it is painted like the Sistine chapel. Bit too pricy for us so we carried on our walk. When we reached the end of Av. Florida we had a rest in a park before continuing our walk to the posh area of Recoleta. We saw lots of paseaperros, professional dog walkers, and the surrounding buildings were very impressive and expensive. We arrived at the Palza Intendente Alvear and from there walked into a lovely church with amazing stained glass windows. We then grabbed a drink in the sun at a nearby café before going to the Cementerio de la Recoleta, the cemetery!!! We don’t make a habit of going to cemeteries but it is where Eva Peron is buried. It was an
amazing place full to brim with over the top mausoleums‘. We followed the crowd and managed to find the mausoleum of the Duarte family (Eva’s maiden name). It was very much like the rest but had more flowers and more people around. From there we went and grabbed some lunch and a few drinks at Hard Rock café. Back to the hostel of an early night as we keep getting up so early!!
Up and out into town to book our bus to the Iguazu Falls for the next evening. Took a walk to café Tortoni, the oldest café in BA and managed to get in before the lunch time and afternoon rush where people queue up especially. Had a coffee and a cake and took in the old atmosphere. We also book in for that evenings tango show. Walked back down to the cathedral and to take more pictures as it was a beautiful day. We were going to go into the cathedral but I had shorts on and wasn’t allowed in. Grabbed some lunch and a few beers before going back to chill before the Tango show. The show started at 8.30pm and was downstairs in Café
Tortoni. It was really good and had a smoky old jazz club feel. They did a full show which was quite funny, even though the speaking was in Spanish. Zo said the dancers were a bit out of sync, but for a novice like myself I thought it was pretty good. The highlight was a percussion duo who were amazing.
Next morning we had to check out and weren’t getting the bus until the evening. We walked around all day taking in this vibrant city before having a few drinks in this nice bar by Av. De Florida. Very cheap and the glass of wine Zo had was huge!! Back to hostel to get our gear and go to the bus station. The bus station is huge and it took us a while to work out where our bus was going from. The information on the screen wasn’t what we had been told to look for and we just made it. What can I say about the buses apart from luxury!! We paid for the best quality bus and it was like being in first class on a plane. We had a 4 course meal with wine, individual TV
and a fully reclining seat. It was amazing and made the 17 hour journey very comfortable and not bad for £50!! On the way out of BA we saw a lovely sunset.
Iguazu Falls Arrived at about midday very relaxed after a good night sleep on a bus - never thought I’d be saying that!! Got a cab to the Hostel Inn, sweating through the humidity and checked in. The hostel used to be a casino and was great. It had a huge pool which we took advantage of and £1 big bottles of Quillemes beer. We relaxed for the rest of the day and booked our bus to the Argentinean side of the fall and the Brazilian side.
Up to get our bus to the Argentinean side of the falls, only 20mins down the road. We paid for our entry to the park and then went on our first excursion. We had paid a bit extra to do a jungle safari and a boat trip up to the falls. We got on our lorry/open top bus and off we went on bumpy roads into the jungle. We had a guide who gave us some information but
in general it was like any other forest we had been in. When we arrived at the boat terminal we put on our undersized life jacket and sat down in our places. The French guy next to us took off his top and shorts, all the way down to his Speedos, not a pretty sight!!! A lot of people were taking off their tops and getting down to their shorts, but as the guides and driver was dressed normally we thought nothing of it. Off we went up the river and then the falls came into sight and what an amazing sight it was, and this was only a tiny section of them. Guarani legend says that the falls originated when a jealous forest god, enraged by a warrior escaping downriver by canoe with a young girl, caused the river bed to collapse in front of the lovers, producing the giant falls over which the girl fell and, at their base, turned into a rock. The warrior survived as a tree looking over that rock!! I believe that it may be the geology and that the top is Basalt and then it changes into a more easily eroding rock, but
The Queue
for the oldest cafe in Buenos Aires who am I to judge a Guarani legend!! We drove around the falls taking in the shear size of them and the deafening sound they produce, taking photos and trying to shut our mouth from the amazement and then something funny happened. All the guides started putting waterproofs on and we were told to put our cameras into our dry bags. Then off we set into the base of the waterfall!! It took a
us just over 3 seconds to be soaked through to the bone but well worth it. The speed of the water was crazy and you couldn’t see. We did this again on the other side and it was a great experience. These were just the baby falls as well. We parked up our boat and off we got to buy a dvd, which one of the guides had been taking. We then got to walk around on 2 tracks to see the waterfall from the bottoms and from the top. It was very busy with people but that couldn’t take away just how impressive the falls are. They are the largest waterfalls in the world and they go in for miles!! After doing the 2 tracks
you take a train out to the ‘testicular de los perros’ of the park. You get off the train and have to walk 2km on a walkway out to these falls and when you get there you are on top of the Garganta del Diablo, the Devils Throat. The speed of the water going over the edge, which you are standing on, is phenomenal. Nothing can describe this place and pictures cant do it justice, you just have to visit it for yourself. We got the train back and had a nice all you can eat lunch with a huge BBQ before getting the bus back to our hostel. Zo got stung by a wasp on the way out. What a day and there is more of it tomorrow.
We were up earlier to get our bus to the Brazilian side today. We drove the short distance to the border where we got stamped out of Argentina and into Brazil. Off to the falls and had to queue up to get our tickets. We were only there a half day as 85% of the falls are on the Argentina side. When we got off the bus to take us
Galerias Pacifico
The local shopping centre, lakeside eat your heart out. to the viewing area we took a short walk before we got to see the falls from the other side. What a view and you get to see them in their entirety. We then walked further along and down so we were underneath the falls and the devils throat. We got to walk out on a platform and take in the magnitude of this section, whilst getting wet from the spray! Up in a lift in a tower to get a good view of it all. We really recommend doing both sides as it tops it off!! Back on the bus, stamped out of Brazil and back in Argentina and back to the hostel. This is the most impressive and powerful thing we have ever seen and it is so hard to take it all in, luckily Zo took more photos than gallons on water in the falls so we’ll never forget it. Had a few beers and a crap buffet before going to bed.
We had to wait around all until 3pm for our bus back to BA and it was hot and humid. We spent some time in the pool before getting back on our luxury bus
to BA. We got stopped about 3 times on the way back by the National Guard to check our passports and they were giving the guy next to us a lot of grief. We think he may have been someone a bit naughty because they kept searching all his stuff.
Buenos Aires We arrived late due to our hold ups and dropped our gear off at another hostel in San Telmo before walking into town to book our next bus to Mendoza and then to Chile. We had a wander as we had seen most of it and went for some lunch and some drinks. We walked down Av. De Florida to get some new sunglasses, 11th pair for me!! Had a few drinks before going back and chilling for the eve.
Our bus wasn’t until the evening so we packed up out stuff and got a cab to La Boca. La Boca is a poor working class neighbourhood, where Carlos Tevez is originally from. We had to get a cab there because there is only one street which is safe for tourists to go. The lady in our hostel put a big cross on
our map through the other sections, saying they were too dangerous. On the cab journey in you could see that it was very run down and that there seemed to be a big police presence. We got to the Caminito, the tourist street and had a walk around. It is a lovely place with multicoloured corrugated iron buildings‘. A lot of it has been set up for tourists now with bars and tango shows everywhere but the buildings’ were good to see. We had a walk around into some shops and then for a couple of drinks before going back to town and getting our 13 hour overnight bus to Mendoza.
Mendoza This was the second bus company we had used and the only difference was that we got to play bingo, in Spanish, which was good for learning numbers and we got more wine and champagne. Cant complain about that. When we arrived we got a cab to our hostel where we couldn’t check in so headed into town. Mendoza is famous as the wine producing area of Argentina and is right next to the Andes on the border with Chile. They have a average of
2.5cm of rain per year, so it doesn’t rain much and they water the vines by flooding them with the water from Andes melted snow, - cant get much purer than that. We checked in and had to take some washing to the launderette, which is fun explaining in Spanish, before going for some lunch in the centre of town. At the end of Feb beginning of March they have a festival in Mendoza to celebrate the start of the harvest season, Fiesta Nacional de la Vendimia, and we were there just in time for that. After a late lunch we went to the park where they were building a huge stage before going back to get the washing and back to the hostel.
We met up with our tour group to go on our bike tour out to the wineries. We drove about 40mins outside of town to the first winery where we were given a huge glass of rose to enjoy on their roof top terrace in the sun - it was 10.15am!!! We then got on our bike and off to the next winery. We had a very good guide here who took us for a
tasting of 3 different malbecs, a desert wine and took us on a tour of the winery. The grapes are still picked by hand by workers from the north and they look after their grapes very well. This is why the wine was so good!! Back on the bikes and off to a olive oil factory which we got to take a tour of and taste some oil. Also got to learn about the process which was interesting. Back on the bikes to our last winery, where we had a lovely beef lunch, with wine of course, under some trees in a beautiful location - followed by a tour and tasting from a very good guide, who spoke beautiful English. We walked to the cellar where she showed us how thick the walls were because they sometime have earthquakes in Mendoza, little did we know what would happen next! Back on the bus this time and off a bit further to a Chocolate and Liquor shop where again we got to taste. Back on the bus and back to the hostel. We went out to see how the festival was going as they were having a beauty competition, but it
was heaving with people, so we went for dinner instead. Out here they don’t eat until 10pm at the earliest, which takes a while to get used to. It’s like being in Hastings!!!!
It was the High Andes tour today. There was a lot of banging in the night and we were up an hour early, by mistake, as I must have changed my watch when looking for the time. When we walked out to reception at 5.50am instead of 6.50am, they guy asked us if we had felt the earthquake in the night. We said ‘No’ and he said it was quite violent, about a 6.0 magnitude in Mendoza. Luckily our room was in the basement area and very well protected. They had a huge earthquake some years back in Mendoza which flattened it, and rebuilt all the buildings to withstand. All he told us was that it was in Chile and about a 9.0 magnitude there. We went back to bed, tried to use the internet to let people know we were alright but everything was down. Back up for our 7am departure and everyone was talking about the quake but nobody knew any specifics. It took
about an hour until we saw the first mountains and then they never stopped. What an impressive mountain range the Andes are. We had a few stops on the way for food and photos, but Zo and I were going to do the same route the next day on our bus to Chile - or so we thought! We stopped at an old Inca bridge that had a thermal spring near by and some Americans had built a hotel, church and thermal baths in the 1950s. Unfortunately the hotel got wiped out by an avalanche but the church survived!! We stopped off at a ski resort and Zo and I went up in the ski lift to get a better view, and it was well worth it. No snow though!! Our last stop was a walk to see Aconcagua, the largest mountain outside of the Himalayas‘. - nearly 7000metres. Unfortunately it was cloudy and we couldn’t see the summit. At this point we walked around to see a lake, which stood at nearly 3000m. Back on the bus, a stop for lunch (didn’t have to eat each other like in Alive) and our crazy bus driver took us back to
town. It was only when we got back and looked on bbc news that we realised how bad the earthquake was. We spoke to the family as they were understandably worried for our safety as the internet was now back up and running. Turned out they had shut the tunnel to Chile and there was a lot of damage in Santiago. We decided not to go for fear of aftershocks and the buses weren’t running anyway. We were going to go to Salta, Northern Argentina, instead and work our way to Bolivia from there, but then we found out they had been hit with a 6.9 aftershock. This made us realise that we should get out of the earthquake zone, so we headed to the bus station a nd booked a bus back to BA. Went out that night for steak dinner and to decide on our next plans.
We were supposed to be leaving for Chile today, how different it could have been if we had left a few days earlier, which was our original plan. We had to check out of our room and wait around to check in another room, at the same hostel!! What a joke!!
We had seen everything we wanted to in Mendoza so sat down a reworked a route. Our new route isn’t a very logical route and requires going back on ourselves a couple of times, due to flights, but cant complain as it could have been so different. We will be home earlier now as Chile was a major chunk, but we’ll have to come back another time. We went and had a late lunch with some beers and came back to our room to look through all our photos. You forget how much we have actually seen and done.
We paid for a late check out at 2pm, went for some lunch and got on the bus to BA at 7pm. Nice comfortable journey again with a film to keep us entertained.
BA Again!!! Got into BA, again, at 8am and couldn’t check into our hotel. We got a cab into town, had some breakfast and then booked our boat to Uruguay - our new destination!! The woman in the travel agency was surprised to see us as she had booked our bus to Santiago!! Went to the newsagent to call Qantas to change our flights. We
thought we’d be on the phone for hours, like last time, but they were brilliant. Now they manage our ticket, they changed 4 flights in about 20 mins and the call only cost £2!! Better than Cathay Pacific. We went back to Palermo, where we were staying and went to get some lunch. Palermo is the rich area of BA, with little boutique shops and big houses on tree lined cobbled streets. A lovely place and the lunch and drinks were a bit more expensive, still cheap though! Had a nice lunch before going back to hostel, with massive room and chilling for the afternoon. Catching up on blog etc.
We had to get the boat to Montevideo at 2pm we we had a quiet morning, walked down to the park before getting a cab to the port.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.298s; Tpl: 0.034s; cc: 10; qc: 44; dbt: 0.0542s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.2mb
Fuff
non-member comment
Hi Tom and Zoe Thank God you changed your plans and you are safe and well!! It has been terrible watching the news. It has been really wonderful following your journey and getting a taste of your fab experiences. Guess it won't be too long before you are back home -Croydon has a lot to live up to!!!! Stay safe and happy. Luv Fuff xx