Where did all the mountains go?

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Buenos Aires was a huge culture shock for me at first. All of a sudden, in the space of a 4 hour flight, I went from the depths of Patagonia to a huge, hot, bustling city. I was amazed by the size of some of the streets here, I all but needed a pair of binoculars to see to the other side of Avenida Libertador! I was very thankful that for the first few days there I was able to stay with Sandy, step-brother of a friend of my parents. As he lives just outside the city centre, it gave me a calm place while I tried to get used to the new pace of life.

One of the things I had been told about Buenos Aires, was that it is a city with two passions. Tango and football. Being as I really don't like one of those things, but am quite keen on the other, I decided to make up for not doing both, by giving myself extra portions of the other. So... let me tell you how my 2 week long Tango lessons went.

Hah! You didn't believe that for a minute did you? Nope, apart from a brief 5 minutes watching a couple having a bit of a prance in the main square in San Telmo, I steered well clear of the followers of Carlos Gardel. Instead, I visited the Bombonera and the Monumental for a bit of a look around, went to see River Plate play against San Martin de Tucuman, and rounded off my time in BA by seeing Argentina destroy Venezuela. But we'll get back to football in a bit.

My first full day in Buenos Aires, I actually had a tour guide, as the nephew of a friend of Sandy's was kicking around with nothing to do, and with a bit of persuasion from his aunt, agreed to show me round the centre. By this time, it was already mid-afternoon, so what better way to kick off my time in BA than a lunchtime all you can eat steakathon! After waddling out, I was shown the Plaza de Mayo, where lies the Casa Rosada, where Madonna... I mean Eva Peron gave a rather famous speech back in the day. And may or may not have sung Don't Cry for me Argentina. Depends how much you want to believe in what cinematography tells you. After this, we wandered down along the Rio Plata at Puerto Madero, the old dock, which is now filled with fancy bars and restaurants. It reminded me a bit of the Waterfront in Bristol, apart from here there was an old frigate, with real life (de-activated) cannons.

My first few days in BA continued in this theme, albeit without my guide, as I generally picked an area to go to, and spent the day wandering round. One of these days took me towards the Recoleta Cemetery, which has become a big tourist attraction. Like in Punta Arenas, the tombs are all rather impressive, but the one everyone comes here for is Eva Peron. I followed the flock, and was quite surprised to find she's tucked away down a narrow alley... definitely not prime real estate. Which meant I entered into the strange situation of queuing to see a grave. And saw the even stranger sight of people standing next to the tomb, giving cheesy smiles and the thumbs up to the camera. Hmm.

Buenos Aires has a very efficient undergound system - I have to say I particularly enjoyed Line A, where the carriages were like sitting in a Victorian living room. After moving from Sandy's into a hostel in Palermo, this was how I got about most of the time, one day taking one into San Telmo, which was possibly my favourite area of the city. While most of BA feels very modern, San Telmo is like an area that time passed by, with its cobbled streets and old colonial buildings. Just up from San Telmo is La Boca, which I mainly went to to visit La Bombenera, but also had a bit of a wander up Caminito, the street famous for its coloured houses. Can't say it was overly impressive, and the hoardes of touts were a pain in the neck.

As well as the centre of BA, I also spent a day out in the nearby town of Tigre. It's a pleasant town, with the main feature being that it is at the delta of the Rio de la Plata. Therefore, I decided it would be fun to take a boat trip around the delta, which was OK, although it did get a bit boring after a while. The town seemed very quiet while I was there, but apparently at weekends it gets filled up with people from BA coming out for a break from the city. The huge casino and theme park definitely suggest this could be the case.

Oh, and I suppose I should mention that while I was in Buenos Aires, a little known band called Radiohead came to town. I'd been weighing up whether to go for a while, and had come to the decision that being as I'd seen them before, it wasn't worth it. Obviously, the day of the gig I changed my mind, and went down to try and get a ticket from the gate or a tout. This didn't happen, but there were loads of folk just sitting outside as it was an open air gig, so instead of forking out 60 quid, I enjoyed it from outside with a few Argentinian folk. I had to feel sorry for one guy though, who'd got a bus there from Salta (20 hours) bought a ticket and found it was a fake. Gutted.

Now, I promised you more football, but tell you what, I've had a change of mind. I think I'll create a new blog entry just for that, as this one is already getting a bit lengthy. So you'll just have to click a few buttons to see that one (unless you read the football one first, in which case you're a cheat).

Chao for now,

Stewart

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Photos

Puente de la Mujer
and Puerto Madero

Strange bears
There's some sort of exhibition where every country donates a bear to this display. The UK's entry looks a bit like Biggles.