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Published: September 28th 2006
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Fishermen in Mar del Plata
It seems that wherever you find water, you'll find men trying to catch fish. It's definetly universal. After nearly a month in Buenos Aires, with no sight of the ocean, it was great to arrive in Mar del Plata. A resort town located about 5 hours south of Buenos Aires, this place is where the porteños (Locals from Bs.As.) come to play. The town is full of fancy restaurants and bars, nightclubs and many hotels. Tourists and Argentineans alike come for one thing... the sun and the sand. The beach in Mar del Plata is pretty sweet, stretching for a couple of kilometres and winding its way around many points and bays. The sand is nice and the waves are hypnotizing, what a great place to spend my 25th birthday. Wow, 25 years and I find myself in Mar del Plata, Argentina. Not bad. Laurence suggested that we go somewhere before she started school and so that we could celebrate my birthday somewhere other than Bs.As. It was a great idea and a great little adventure. After, arriving in town we shared our first hotel search. For those who know me, and for those that have travelled with me before, you’ll know that I am hound for deals, especially when it comes to lodging. By the end of
this search, we had found a run-down but clean one star hotel, oh the romance. After leaving our bags in the spartan room, we headed out for a coffee, and some tourist information so that we could start to figure out what we would like to do in this town. We ended the evening with a well-deserved meal of pizza and beer, ending a wonderful birthday day.
The next day we awoke to beautiful sunshine and were focused on walking along the beachside promenade and making our way to the Lomos del Mar or Sea Lion colony that existed near the port. You should have seen how excited Laurence was to go and see these animals, she nearly ran to the colony once their fishy smell filled our nostrils. It was great to walk along the ocean, grabbing a coffee and croissant whenever we liked, or taking the odd empanada here and there. It was just great to be out of the city and enjoying some time with each other. We finally arrived at the port and made our way to the small sea lion colony.
What a smell and sight. These animals were perched on the rocks,
the beaches, and even on the docks and didn’t seem to care that people were working round them. I will say, that it always pretty cool to see animals up close, even if the portside colony reminded me of a bad zoo, these guys were wild and free. We watched them for an hour or so and enjoyed the way the port’s resident mangy dogs harassed the sea lions. It was pretty fun to watch. We returned to our hotel and had a siesta before heading out to find a nice restaurant to enjoy and well deserved meal. We ended up finding a great one that had a wonderful view of ocean, delineated by the coast’s streetlights twinkling in the cold winter evening.
Laurence chose to have a great rabbit dish and I ended up taking a beautiful tenderloin wrapped in bacon with scalloped potatoes (sorry Scott), we washed this down with a beautiful bottle of Malbec and finished the night with a piece of apple pie, something Laurence insisted we have. It was a great meal, a super day and a wonderful holiday away from Bs.As.
The next day, we had planned on going horseback riding but unfortunately the weather would not cooperate and we abandoned those plans. The horseback adventure would have to wait until another day, but I am sure that it will happen sooner than later. Seeing that the rain was not going to let up, Laurence decided to return to Bs.As. on an afternoon luxury bus, while I decided to continue south, until I could find and spot the elusive... El Penguin. All in all, it was a great holiday and a great way of spending my birthday and will no doubt stay in my memory for years to come.
After saying goodbye to Lo, I waited in the bus station for 6 hours for my semi-cama (translate - regular) bus was scheduled to arrive. Wow, I was instantly transported into the realities of travelling and patiently waiting for shitty buses, ohh the joy. With all that said, I was exited to be travelling in Argentina and couldn’t wait to see Patagonia.
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Vince
non-member comment
lucky man
Jason, you sexy bitch. You kill me with these stories whuile I sweat over RFPs and powerpoints along with kids waking me up at night with snotty noses, god love the buggers. Keep enjoying the travel and life with Lo, don't get pregnant and keep the dispatches coming. Cheers, Vince