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Published: August 6th 2007
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Casa Historica
Two smart guards watch carefully over the entrance Last weekend we travelled 4 hours on a bus to the city of San Miguel de Tucuman, capital of the Tucuman province and generally known simply as Tucuman! It's a city of great historic importance as this is where the country of Argentina was founded back in 1816.
The casa historica is, without a doubt, the must see thing in Tucuman as this is where all the history was made. Outside there are guards smartly dressed in uniform to welcome you through the doors in the whitewashed wall. inside are several courtyards and a good museum. It was rather lacking a timeline which would have made things easier to understand but we got the gist of Argentine history from it.
On Friday night we went to the luz y sonido show at the casa historica. We had expected a music and lights show, but it was almost entirely a narrative of the historic events leading up to the declaration of Argentina's independence from Spain. It was interesting but we were pleased to already have some knowledge of the history and a reasonable grasp of the language. There was one very funny moment during the show. All around the grass
Casa Historica
The whitewashed facade areas of the courtyards are chains to stop you walking across. Normally it would be the kids who misbehave so we found it rather amusing to see a couple of old dears fall over and get their best clothes muddy!!
The city itself has some nice buildings but it isn't going to make you fall in love with its aesthetic beauty and come rushing back. The enormous city park (Parque 9 de Julio) was nice to wander around. The big disappointment was that the sugar museum which we really wanted to see was closed for restoration. It actually seems to be being knocked down and rebuilt from scratch!
We would have liked to get out into the countryside to see Tafi Del Valle but that will have to wait for another time. It's a bit further out than we had time for but maybe next time. We did make it up to Yerba Buena to see the new shopping centre though! It was ok but Jumbo didn't have the foreign food section that the Buenos Aires branch has, so Russ didn't buy much.
We also went to Tucuman to see Moriah and Jake, two Americans from Vermont(mental
Independence
A plaque replicates the declaration of independence. The names of the signatories reads like an A-Z of the streets of Buenos Aires! note - must google to see where that is again!) we met in Cafayate. It was great to see them again and have English conversations with people who actually speak the language! No offence to our students, but it is the thing that we miss most. We met in Waldo, a bar with crazy painting on the walls, then went to a terrific restaurant called
Plaza de Almas. It was a fabulous night, thanks guys.
As usual we did a lot of wandering around. Away from the centre we found a nice plaza fronted by a railway station. This came as a bit of a surprise to us, and even more so to discover there are 2 trains a week to and from Buenos Aires. We made enquiries, 200 pesos between us for a cabin, which sounds good but we're not sure we could survive 26 hours on a train!!!
So, Tucuman was fine, and we will definitely be back so that we can explore a bit of the area around there.
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Natalie
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Tafi!!
Glad to see you paid homage to Luis' hometown! You must go back to Tucuman, maybe not so much for the sugar museum but definitely to spend some time in Tafi del Valle. It's gorgeous and perfect for ambling and wandering on a blue-sky day. The mountains look like they're covered in velvet and the views are worth a hike to see. On foot or on horseback, and the town is quite user-friendly, too! By the way, Vermont is a smallish state in the very northeast, part of New England, touching the Canadian border. :)