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Published: February 10th 2006
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Tango in Buenos Aires
It´s difficult to take pictures in the dark, but this one turned out pretty well. After a long flight from Houston, we arrived in Buenos Aires, surprisingly, ready to see the sights. Unfortunately, they were not ready for us to see them. Three museums attempted, and three museums closed. January, it seems, is a poor time to visit for tourists as all the locals are on holiday, closing many of the attractions. Our hostel in San Telmo, the Telmotango, was very nice. Clean and neat, we had a two story room with two single beds on the upper floor and a double on the lower floor for Sara and me. Cabinets were present in the room for locking up our 100lbs of gear, and we decided the staff was trustworthy. After finding that so much of the town was shut down, and feeling that our lungs were quickly clogging with diesel fumes, we decided that two nights in Buenos Aires would be enough, which required that we speed up our sightseeing.
We booked a Tango show for the second night, the 26th, and headed out to see the San Telmo district and Plaza de Mayo. The Plaza was busy as every Wednesday there is a rally for the Disappeared from past regimes. They must
Strange Object
I´m not sure what this is, but it looked different. spend all week preparing for the next as there was a great deal of crowd control present. The Presidential Palace, the Casa Rosada, was also right off the square. The palace is quite large and as the name implies, quite pink. After walking though San Telmo, a bohemian neighborhood know for its street performers (which we did not see) and antique shops (which we did, window shopping only), a nap seemed in order. We found a nice vegetarian restaurant for dinner, and tried to decifer the menu. We ended up with a nice meal, fully vegetarian, and full bellies. By this point, it was 11pm (dinner is very late, and we a quite jetlagged), so off to bed.
The next day, it was off to the Palermo district to see gardens, the zoo, and art galleries. The gardens were disappointing but nice, with many birds and cats. I did not know they went together well, but maybe everything is opposite in the Southern Hemisphere. The zoo was skipped, as Sara shot that idea down due to the rather dismal condition a seal seen through the gates. The art museums, however, were extremely nice. The first was the MALBA, which
Tomb of Eva Peron
Probably not the most representative picture of the cemetary, but the most famous. contained Latin American art, mostly modern. The paintings, from artists such as Frida and Diego Rivera (admittedly, only one a piece) were nice, but the key attraction was the interactive art. They had four rooms that required the removal of shoes (which with my nonexistant Spanish got me in trouble), with slide shows of cocaine design art and background music. While the art was forgettable, three of the rooms had, respectively, beds, hammocks, and a foam cushion floor. It took an hour to get though those, though only one, with Jimi Hendrix playing, had good music. After lunch at the Art Museum restaurant (very nice, and only 68 pesos or $23 for the three of us), we headed to the Fine Art Museum, or the Museo Nacional de Arte, a very impressive gallery covering art from around the world (Degas, Monet, Renoir, Picasso, Pollack, Goya, etc) as well as local artists and relics from long ago. A nap followed, to prepare for a night of Tango. The show began a 9pm with a mediocre but edible dinner, followed by three sets brilliant dancers (Australian for good, as our fellows travelers were from there), a four piece orchestra with an amazing
City at Night
A picture from our hostel balcony. By request of Sara. accordian player, and three singers, one of whom was quite good. The arrangements, included transportation, were made at Telmotango and it cost 115 pesos per person, which was reasonable. We all had a good time but were ready for bed by 1am.
Today has been mostly occupied with preparing for our flight to Iguazu and booking bus tickets for Puerto Madryn. We decided to travel light to Iguazu so we only have carry on bags for the flight. The remaining 150lbs (Jill has 50lbs as well) will be stored at the hostel. We took off with our bags for the train stations, taking the subway most of the way and then attempting, quite successfully, to determine which bus stations had buses to our destination. After talking with a few companies, one seemed to fit the bill to get us out the night of our return flight (a 20 hour bus ride) and the person behind the desk was very helpful. I would tell the company name, but is has slipped my mind so I will save it for after our actual journey. A short walk later, and here we are, at a very nice, fast, and cheap internet cafe (70 cents per hour).
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Bernadette Thomasy
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Fabulous photos
Thanks so much for adding the beautiful pictures. We can really travel along with you now. I love the strange object.