The end.

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After a horrid Argie breakfast with the normal sweet croissant and some other cake, sweet as well, the piece de resistance was coffe made with a coffee bag, it tasted like brown water, how deep will the Argies fall before they realise that breakfast has to be more than sugar and wannabe coffee? In Chile you'd at least get instant coffee and eggs, still it was nice to be back in Argie, home away from home maybe?

After another long days trek we finally arrive in Baires, I leave my little baby at her grannies flat and set of to my lodgings, chez Marisa and Jorge total hospitality and friendship to go, definitively a home away from home.

I schlep my bag up to my room and go down to deliver an account of our ins and outs of northern Argie and Chile to my expectant hosts.

When I arrived at my first supper, a barbie, I put my foot where my mouth was by stating that Chivas Regal was only fit for washing my feet in, to prove this I bought a bottle of single malt that we never got around to tasting.

Now was a good moment to do it, aq good thing with single malt is that it's always smooth especially if it's not so smokey.

To keep my hosts happy I told about Chile and how terrible it was and how happy we were to have left. NOT.

There a bit of rivalry between Argie and Chile hence the above.

The remainder of the days were to be spent in Baires going here and there to see some more of the metropolis.

It's huge, 11 milion, is lot of people and cars and buses and houses and an astonishing amount of pretty girls.

We went here there and N had promised that I would cook supper for friends and family.

As I can't cook Swedish worth a sh.t it had to be either Indian or Thai ( wannabe anyway).

So we went to Chinatown, 4 blocks of chinese shops selling some whatever the Chinese want and some spices as well, the Argie kitchen is not exactly filled to the brim with exotic spices and I do need something to make a curry.

Buying some here and there and in a shop around thte corner gave us something to take home and an idea of what was missing, being a good dad I even went with N to her poofy hairdressers.

Compensation for this was to go and have a , yes you guessed right on the first try, beer and watch people in Palermo one of the hip places in Baires.

Begging children and HIV positive want my money, I'll give food to a kid but no cash, they hardly ever want the food and their parents won't get any money out of me.

Back home for pizza and plonk, nice pizz and Jorge has a selection of very nice plonk that he parts with readily.

El Tigre is our goal the next day and we also are supposed to take the Chariot back,i want to take it back like they gave it to me, with and empty tank according to my calculations we will not have to fill up, hopefully any way , we get there alright.

Tigre (Tiger) is a town in the Buenos Aires Province, Argentina, situated in the north of Greater Buenos Aires, 28 km (17 mi) north of Buenos Aires city. Tigre lies on the Paraná Delta and is an important tourist and weekend attraction, easily reached by bus and train services, including the scenic Tren de la Costa. It is the principal town of the Tigre Partido.



The town sits on an island created by several small streams and rivers and was founded in 1820, after floods had destroyed other settlements in the area, then known as the Partido de las Conchas.



The area's name derives from the “tigres” or jaguars that were hunted there, on occasions, in its early years. The area was first settled by Europeans who came to farm the land, and the port developed to serve the Delta and to bring fruit and wood from the Delta and ports upstream on the Paraná river. Tigre is still an important timber processing port. The “Puerto de Frutos” (fruit port) is now a crafts fair located in the old fruit market by the riverside. The Naval Museum is also nearby. Antiques shops, riverside restaurants and pubs, the casino and Parque de la Costa, an amusement park and its renowned natural beauty make Tigre a popular tourist destination throughout the year.



Tigre is also the starting point for a visit to the Paraná Delta. For locals and tourists alike, vintage mahogany commuter launches and motorboats are the favourite way to travel through its web of inter-connecting rivers and streams. English-style rowing clubs, countless marinas, humble dwellings and elegant mansions from the “Belle Époque”, such as the Tigre Club, are to be seen, as well as small pensions and upscale lodges, restaurants, teahouses and simple picnic sites.

Tigre has, in recent years, seen an influx of people relocating to the city from other parts of Greater Buenos Aires. In recent years it has seen a rise in upmarket tourism, spawning new spa developments and clientele such as the pop star, Madonna.

We walk around and have some absolutely amazing peaches, the ones that are so juicy that the juice runs down to your elbow.

The old fruit port is converted into a big tourist trap but at least the sun is shining.

We go on a boat trip around the delta with the most boring guide ever she even makes Carol seem like a nice and charming lass

what a cow, or maybe she's part of an international "Carol wannabe" contest.

Lunch and then it's time to take the Chariot back, the petrol gauge is on zero but the warning lamp is not yet lit, a sensible person would figure out how much to put in just to be on the safe side.

I ask N if she's got good nerves, she smiles an affirmative so it's a go and then the lamp lights up.

Still on, I ask and get a nod back and as you all know a nod's as good as a wink to a blind bat so we go on.

We whizz past petrol stations and I'd like to put a litre or two in and then again not, pigheaded and vindictive are my middle names.

I got the Chariot with fumes only in the tank and they'll get it with less, had I had a hose I would have siphoned out the last drops.

The total kilometerage ended up as 9227 km, my carbondioxide footprint is huge.

We take the grotty Baires' metro back home, some stations are ok and some look as if stolen from London.

N has bits and bobs to do and my hosts are off so I'm left to my own devices and a solitary dinner and not a nice one at that either, grumph!

The driest Ciabatta that side of the equator and matching chicken with it, the beeers nice and cold though.

I spend some time thinking about work and then leave and go home to my digs.



Belgrano a part of Baires where I am staying is a nice area to walk around in, most streets follow a grid pattern so it's easy to find your way.

Unless you've got the attention span of a sea gull you will have noticed the word "most"

which in this case means that not all the streets are in a grid pattern.A street that I thought was perpendicular to the one I'd just walked was not.

So my little morning stroll turned into quite a walkabout, not so bad when you don't have a date but a bit frustrating when you have.

Still no major harm was done, my gammy knee was whining a bit at the end though but the head was happy enough and that's still the part that makes most decisions.

There's a reptile brain(?) that makes other decisions, but was not involved here.

The next day we go to San Telmo and Puerto Madero, one is an olde quarter in Baires and the other is the equivalent of Docklands in Britain. Baires grows on you I don't like big cities but as big cities go this is quite good lots of green stuff parks and trees.

Some areas with very nice old houses some of which are dwarfed by the high rises next to them and probably only see the sun at noon .

According to the experts there is quite a lot of transvestites that hang around in some park or other, and being curious we decide to go and have a looksee if if they are more to be pitied than not.

They come out when night falls so we go around a bit more and check out some sights.

Some park or other with a gum tree from the year 1800 or so, it's huge the crown is about 40 m across, the branches are incredible long, the ones closes to the ground have supports to keep them of the ground.

In Sweden the liver indoors in pots!

There's a racing, as in car, bar/restaurant, looks quite posh, but what the heck a few more pesos more for a beer in a nice place with a beautiful girl by side, is money well spent.

Normally I stay clear of restaurants that has waiters with bow ties and aprons = expensive.

ET phones home, no sorry 'bout that, N phones Jorge who's a fountain of wisdom about places in Baires to find out where the t-people are, we go there only to find out that there was not even one there.

After a while we just go home and after having be queried by my hosts about our adventures it turns out that somehow N misinterpreted the directions given by Jorge so we get to see some adults playing, not with themselves but with model boats in a pond and loads of people jogging about.

Enough sigth seeing is enough so without having seen the ladies,

.



Tomorrow was another day and today is that day, cooking.
Cooking in your own kitchen is easy because then everything is more or less where you left it the last time you cooked.
My home way from home's, Chez Marisa and Jorge, was unchartered territory, where was everything and some more shopping neede to be done as well, or rather most of it.


So we trotted back to Chinatown and got all the exotic stuff, all of which I always have at home and I take it for granted that it's there, I need six cloves and had to buy a hundred and cardamom pods instead of seeds.
I you want to make kashmiri chicken, dry beef curry, dhal,sour chickpeas, bhajees,and raita and have nothing you need to do some serious shopping.
The day was hot and time went quickly so we got a bit thirsty and sat down to have a quick one, they were out of crisps and peanuts so N asked for a minipizza , the witress said that for the pizza we had to pay cover charge as that was eating, not only a drink.
Ok we said and then she comes back and said that the boss was a bit ashamed for not having any snacks so no cover charge, very good indeed.


We get our nice cold Quilmes,Argie beeer, and our pizza and then what must be the owner comes by with a bowl of peanuts and an apologetic smile.
What a difference it makes when you get treated that way, it puts a big smile on your face and happiness in your heart, it was very easy to leave a tip.
Thus fortified we walk back to the locals supermarket to get the rest, a million plastic bags later we're done, now we just have to cook it.
N's friend Valeria is a real chef and she's curious and wants to help out and maybe pick up an idea or two, she's got her own catering company.
She makes the best chocolate cakes ever, one of the cakes she made for Nathalie's exam party was so good that it makes me drool just thinking of it.
Indian food involves a lot of chopped onions, a job best left to my slaves and I walk around trying very hard to look as if I know what I'm doing, haha!
Cooking on gas is also a new thing for me, but with the help of the girls i make do.
I use 20 percent of the ,for me,normal quantity of chillies, the Argie palate, not used to foreign food, is sensitive.
In Argie you dine at 9 pm at the earliest and with SA punctuality we decide to put the chicken in the oven when the guests arrive, my fame has spread, there will be 12 of us around the table.
A few butterflies exercise their wings in my stomach, what if they don't like it or if I make a mess of it?
Well as I pointed out earlier to Jorge, when he took me out to buy wine, to take home with me, the culinary Antichrist, the golden sea gull, is just up the street if my cooking turns out to be a cluster fu.k
We sit down at 10 or so and I explain what is what and servings are handed out and when the first mouthfulls are being masticated the sound level around the table drops to a murmur,the only thing to be heard are voices asking for more and pass me this and that.
The butterflies fly away as the pots and plates are left empty, Maite(?) who was fearing being poisoned by strange food made by the houseguest eats to her heart's content.
Jorge has opened a couple of bottles of his good supply of wine, the company is excellent and time flies.
Valeria has made desert, one of her lovely chocolate cake that rounds of dinner in a nice way.
Second best is that I don't have to do the dishes , thank you girls!!!
The evening ends much to quickly and in a few hours it's flying home time 😞+😊 ie I'll be sad to leave and it wil lbe nice to get home and meet Maria again.
All flights should leave early in the morning, the waiting is boring as hell. I go for a last walkabout with N, a quick lunch, and it's time to go.
Saying goodbye to people that you like is no fun, so we do it quickly and part ways.
Twentythree hours of utter boredom and discomfort later sees me in Sweden, a 40 degree C temperature difference is compensated by meeting Maria again. Thus endeth the voyage.

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Photos

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El tigre

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El Tigre

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El Tigre

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El Tigre

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El Tigre and the next ones with water as well