Buenos Aires

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After a very long 30 hour plane journey from Bangkok to Doha, then a stopover in Sao Paolo we finally arrived in a very cold Buenos Aires! It was actually really shockingly cold and we were definatly not prepared for it!lol! TIP- A South East Asia wardrobe is not suitable for Argentinan winters!!!!!!!who knew!!!!haha!

We booked into The Clan hostel in the Florida neighbourhood and soon realised that the hostel was no warmer than outside!This upset me tremenduouslly!!!!! I was really excited though as Caroline was waiting for us at the hostel and i was really happy to see her! We arrived in the evening so we spent the rest of the night catching up and then trying to fall asleep in the freezing hostel bedroom, which was fun! We literally had every piece of clothing we owned on and about 3 blankets each so it was amusing trying to struggle our way out of bed in the morning under all the weight!

Our first day there we decided to do the City open air bus tour. This was amazing as we got to see the whole of Buenos Aires, which is massive!!!!The tour allowed us to jump on and off so we could explore the areas we were interested in! We got off at La Boca, which is the slum area and it was amazing, so brightly coloured and vibrant. There were loads of people on the street and street performers dancing the Tango which was pretty amazing! We also got off at Recolletta, which is the area with Evita´s graveyard and the markets. We stumbled across these guys doing tricks on these bouncy ropes attached to three trees. We chatted to them for a while and Lisa and Caroline got a chance to have a go, which was definatly harder than it looked!lol! We literally fell in LOVE with the Argentinian bakery´s and i have a new found love for empanadas and custard croissants which i never reralised were so popular in Argentina!!!!The next night we went out to a local club, which was so much fun but rammed full of people. We soon realised that some of the guys had a caveman attitude where they felt that the word ´no´ actually meant ´yes´ and proceeded to try to kiss or pull you into a dark corner at any given moment. We clocked on that we were definatly safer in numbers when at a club.

The next day we visited the Evita musuem which i was really excited about as i love the film and it was really good. I loved how they had video clips, pictures, written information and some of her belongings and we really got a sense of her story. We then went to the graveyard where she (along with other notable Argentians) are buried. This was really eery but it was beautiful as some of the graves were immaculate and so grand! That evening we got to eat at arguably ´The best steak restaurant in Argentina´ called La Cabrera. Now i do not like red meat but i thought (and was told on a number of occasions) that it would be a CRIME not to try a steak in Argentina. So i decided to give it a go and i will admit that it wasnt terrible however i wouldnt order it again as i really could take it or leave it! I ordered chicken in the end at La Cabrera and it was actually the best meal of my life, now i have eaten a lot of chicken in my time but this was huge for one and beautifully cooked! We were disgustingly stuffed when we left and i had to go to bed immediatly to get over my food coma!lol!

On the thursday we went to Plaza Italia which was meant to be like a Little Italy of Buenos Aires. It was really nice around there with lots of deli´s and cute shops. In the evening we went to a magic show which one of the guys at the hostel recommended. The show was suprisingly really good considering it was all in spanish and we couldnt really understand what they were saying. The magic was amazing and i still cant work out how they transferred a bunch of goldfish into a glass!!! After the show we went on to Club 69 which was AMAZING! We had been recommended by loads of our friends as its a club with a caberet show including break dancing transvestites!!!!! The club was insane, it was all sequins, and nudity and drinking and dancing and sweating! CRAZY!!!!We had such a good night! Now in my drunkeness i somehow managed to wangle my way backstage into the dressing room with the cast and proceeded to spend the rest of the night/morning drinking with the cast till 7am! It was amazing!

I woke up at about 5pm the next day feeling very fragile and we joined the rest of the hostel on the roof terrace for a bbq which helped a lot! By around 7pm i was feeling much better so we decided it was acceptable to go out again!lol! We pre drank at the hostel with a group of people we had met and went on to a club called Crobar! The club was so cool, they played really good house music with south american beats! I was having the time of my life salsa-ing by myself for a few hours! Again we didnt get back until the early hours and the next day i was hanging pretty badly! We went to the markets during the day but i had to admit defeat in the evening as i felt damaged!!!!! We left the next day to go on to Iguyazu Falls. As much as i loved Buenos Aires i was really looking forward to being warm as i literally was freezing the whole time we were there! Id definatly go back during the spring or summer as its so huge i feel like i only experienced about a third of its amazingness!

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