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Published: February 25th 2013
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From Puerto Igauzu, we took a Crucero del Norte bus to Rosario. Not only did they feed us like they do on all the long distance buses in Argentina, but they also gave us sparkling wine! Two glasses! On top of the regular wine they gave us with our meals. And the seats are pretty comfy - if you pay for the cama or semi-cama, the seats recline back and you are given blankets and pillows so you can get a good nights rest.
We arrived in Rosario around 10am and took a city bus from the station to near our hotel, Plaza del Sol, not too far away from Plaza 25 de Mayo. To get on the bus, one must buy a ticket from a machine just behind the bus driver that accepts change only. At $3.75 a ride, that's a lot of coins considering they are rarely given as change at most stores in Argentina. We didn't have enough for both of us, so a very kind woman paid for me using her pass and wouldn't accept any of the bills I tried to give her in return.
When we got to our hotel, the room wasn't
ready yet. We were told to come back at 2pm so we left our bags and walked around a bit. We took a few pictures of the building where Che Guevara first lived in an apartment with his family as a baby (casa natal). The building now houses an insurance company and is not open to the public. Close by is the Espacio Cultural Che Guevara with a mural of Che in the Plaza del Cooperacion. I found it a little odd there was also a tiled image of Mother Mary (or some sort of religious icon that bears her resemblance) in the plaza. Do people here really have to worship "the mother of Jesus" so much they have to put her image in the same plaza commemorating Che? Somehow I doubt he would approve. There is also a Che Monument statue in Rosario, but it was too far away from where we were staying, and we didn't have any change to take another bus. Instead we walked along the riverfront to Parque Nacional a la Bandera, and perhaps the most impressive monument I have ever seen, which commemorates the Argentian flag. The man who designed the flag rests in
a crypt beneath the monument.
We went into a Tourist Information office for a map of the city and overheard the staff telling some other tourists that tonight was very special; there would be a caravan of boats on the water at 7pm and fireworks at 9pm. Whatever the occassion was, we were very pleased by our timing and planned to return to the Parque Nacional a la Bandera for the festivities later that evening.
After having lunch we returned to the hotel. A room with a queen bed still wasn't available so they put us in a room with two double beds instead. No big deal, we just wanted to shower and have a nap.
When we returned to the waterfront, we realized the festival was called Caravana de los Deseos, and it transformed what had been a very quiet, empty Parque Nacional a la Bandera earlier in the day into a very crowded place indeed. There were lots of boats, a few with cardboard camels and people dressed up like the three wise men. Other people on boats waved various flags and wore colourful wigs. One guy in a bright green wig was water skiing
and entertained us all with multiple flips.
We got ripped off for some choripan ($20 pesos for a choripan! We should have kept walking, I don't know why we fell for it), that wasn't nearly as good as the choripan we had in Buenos Aires. We bought a few Quilmes beers and waited for the fireworks - they were awesome. I thought they were even better than the New Years fireworks in Buenos Aires - a lot more professional anyway. There was a guy making a killing selling these cute little ostrich marinet puppets for $10. It seemed every kid had to have one. After the fireworks, the streets became packed with people trying to get home. A huge contrast to earlier in the heat of the Sunday afternoon, when nothing was open and the streets were empty. We ended our evening with a lovely jet bath in the hotel, which partly made up for not having enough time to check out the pool and view on the top floor.
The next morning after breakfast, we again left our bags with the front desk and caught the 10:30 ferry across the Rio Parana to the southern balnearios (beaches)
along Costa Esperanza. I think the beaches to the north of the city along Rambla Cataluña, such as Balenario La Florida, are probably better; there are also ferries to the north that take people to Isla Invernada where I hear there are more good beaches, but it was so much easier (and faster, and cheaper) for us to just walk to the Estacion Fluvial rather than take a cab or bus to the north end of town. The ferry took about 20 minutes to cross the Rio Parana, and went past an old industrial part of the coastline where a railroad had collapsed into the river and the old wooden docks were rotting away.
The beach we went to was nice and sandy, and there weren't too many people being a Monday. The water was pretty brown and we wondered how clean and safe it was to swim in. Since others seemed to be swimming without concern, and it was so hot, we decided to go for it - even with a dubious name like Rio Parana! There was a lot of garbage on the beach, I thought perhaps because city workers hadn't had a chance to clean up
from the weekend. Most of it had probably been blown by the wind from the overflowing garbage cans. There were lots of trees and shade up from the beach, so we tried in vain to see if we could find a path to the other side of the island. All we found was a trail leading to a huge garbage heap. This made me think maybe the garbage can't solely be blamed on the festivities of the day before. If you walked further along the beach, there were some structures and a sign that read something like "People from Rosario, turn around" so I think there's people who live here and don't want to be disturbed by city folk. We abided and turned around and had some beer and a picada of salami, cheese and olives at one of the beachside restaurants. We went for another swim before returning on the 3:30 ferry.
Once back in the city, we had lunch and walked around some of the pedestrian streets - empty the day before when everything was closed, and now busy with people on a workday. I really liked the mix of cobbled pedestrian and one-way streets in Rosario,
even though what appear to be four way stops are confusing to navigate. The cars never really stop, and just keep passing through until other cars edge up enough to take their turn. It's hard to know when pedestrians are supposed to cross without the street lights telling you. Two people on a motorcycle came pretty close to hitting us as we crossed one of these four-way intersections on our way back to the bus station after picking up our bags from the hotel.
Eating in Rosario made me start to realize just how bland Argentian food can be once your outside Buenos Aires with all its fancy variety of restaurants. At the places we ate in Rosario, the choices seemed to amount to some type of meat with a side of salad, fries or rice, none of which had much flavour. They never put pepper out on the tables, only salt. It was so hot I didn't really have much of an appetite anyway, and was never really in the mood to try what Argentinians claim is the most delicious beef in the world.
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