Thursday, March 08, 2007
We only spent one night at the Brazilian side of Iguassu Falls. First thing the next morning we grabbed a taxi over the border to the Argentinian side. While the falls were impressive the day before, they are far more so from the Argentinian side. There are a couple of little one and two hour trails that lead through the rainforest with natural spots along the way for viewing the many individual waterfalls that make up Iguazu falls. There is also an iron walkway that leads out into the river to the very edge of the largest fall – the Devil’s throat. At the end of this walkway the view down over the edge of the falls is incredible. Also the splashback from the waterfall gives a refreshing respite from the vicious heat. Once wed walked all the trails we headed back to the bus station to wait for our overnight bus to Buenos Aires!
After the madness of Rio de Janeiro, we came to Buenos Aires with the intention of relaxing a bit. Forget it! Buenos Aires is as mental as Rio but in its own more chilled out kind of way. Everything really does happen later here. People wake up at 2pm, eat at midnight and don’t go out until 2am! We arrived about mid morning giving us time to see some of the city. We walked around downtown all day and headed back to our hostel to freshen up in anticipation of our first Argentinian steak. We decided to hit San Telmo that night as it seemed to have a good few cool bars there. It did! After a delicious steak in a small restaurant that the locals seem to use we hit the square where we sat listening to live jazz and drinking delicious red wine. We spent the rest of the night barhopping and having some epic chats where many of the world’s issues were discussed. Great first night in BA!
The next day we woke up at 2pmish which is pretty standard for the city. We decided to hit Recoleta and walk around the cool cemetery. Resting in the cemetery of Recoleta are some of Buenos Aires’ more affluent members of society. Some of the gravestones were impressive while others were just downright pretentious. Some of them were practically 2 storey houses! Amongst the people laid to rest there was Evita so we had the obligatory look at her grave. After this we went to see a kind of modern art museum nearby but headed back soon after for a nap before another night ahead. I can’t remember how it happened but we ended up back in San Telmo again! We had cooked dinner for ourselves so forwent the steak this time. But again we hopped from bar to bar until the end of the night.
Despite our late night we woke up pretty early the next morning. This was because we wanted to catch the craic in San Telmo square – yep. We went to San Telmo again! But this time not for the bars but the street entertainment and market. There was much fun going on with musicians, tango dancers and those guys who stand still and only move when you put money in their bucket. After wandering around the streets for a while we headed for Boca to see Caminito. This is a street with an assortment of brightly painted low houses made of wood and metal that burst upon the eyes in a scene that could almost be from somewhere in Scandinavia Also Boca Juniors had a big football match on that day and we went to see if there was any atmosphere around the town. Sure enough there was and we ended up getting caught in the crowds and being dragged towards the stadium. It was once we were there that we first considered actually going to the match. One thing led to another and after a lot of faffing around with dodgy ticket touts we found ourselves standing at the back of the terrace in the stadium about 20 minutes before kick off. Boca Juniors are the best team in Argentina – or so we had been told! At half time they were 1-0 down and really not playing the best. Soon into the second half San Lorenzo had scored another and the tension in the crowd was really heating up. Since we were in the cheapest area of the stadium where all the hooligans go for, we decided we would leave the match 10 mins early to avoid the crowds and getting caught up in any potential riots. However about 15 mins from the end, Boca conceded another goal. We ran! The second the goal went in we felt the tension go from bad to worse and we weren’t going to wait around and see how the fans would deal with the loss! Back at the hostel we abandoned our plans to cook for ourselves again. We could barely speak we were so fatigued so cooking was not something that we were going to do. We headed for San Telmo again for another steak. Since we were so wrecked we planned on just eating and hitting the sack. But once we felt the pull of San Telmo we couldn’t just go so once again, for the 3rd night in a row we found ourselves bar hopping around San Telmo. However we didn’t stay as late as other nights and had a reasonably early night for Buenos Aires.
Plans to go to Colonia Del Sacramento in Uruguay the next day were abandoned. The sheer lack of sleep in the last few days had exhausted my body and I just couldn’t do it. So for once I actually had a decent nights sleep. Instead we spent the day shopping. Fi and I went our separate ways for the day and I ran some errands I’d been planning on doing for a good while. We also changed hostels for boring reasons that I won’t go into. When we met up back at the gaff we bumped into a guy we had met in the other hostel and we went to see some percussion workshop/performance thingy that was on. Unfortunately we missed it by a week and it wasn’t on. So what did we do? Went to San Telmo for steaks! As Fi and Will had met a pair of Argentinians and were blabbering away in Spanish I decided to leave and find my own craic. I knew there was a party going on back at the hostel but it was crap. So I headed for a random bar where I met a few people and had the chat for a few hours before hitting the sack.
The next day we went to walk around Palermo which is an area of BA full of parks and green areas “perfect for smooching your honey” according to the lonely planet. After walking around these and the Japanese gardens, we also visited Evita’s museum. Back at the hostel we met a couple who were staying in our dorm. We had tickets for a tango show in café Tortoni but arranged to meet them in San Telmo afterwards. After Fi cooked up a delicious pasta and veg dinner we went to the tango show. It was amazing! Unfortunately flash photography wasn’t allowed and the non flash photos didn’t really come out. The first half of the show was kind of like a musical. The band consisted of double bass, piano and accordion. The music reminded me a bit of Jacques Brel. Three male and 3 female dancers danced the tango while acting out a scene at a brothel while a guy dressed as a waiter sang. We were suitably impressed at half time but had no idea the best was to come.
Just after half time we were treated to a couple of percussionists who gave a performance that I couldn’t even begin to describe. The rest of the show was a mixture of tango dances and singing. On a high from the tango we grabbed a cab to the bar in San Telmo where we met Graham and Jen. This was our wildest night and I think we arrived back at around 6am for a few games of pool at the hostel. The next day was a write off and we spent it in the cinema which was great for us since we hadn’t been in 2 months. That evening we had the obligatory pints in San Telmo again but this time we went to a bar down at the docks first to catch some of the atmos down there. Today it is lashing rain but really hot so I’m drenched in a mixture of sweat and rain. This evening we fly to Ushuaia where its apparently snowing and 0 degrees. Thank Christ! I’m beginning to get a bit sick of constant hot weather and sweating from morning to night. A bit of cold will do me good. Sadly though BA is probably the last of the really good weather we’ll get on the whole trip. With the possible exception of Cairns, any other hot places we’ll be in will be very overcast so we won’t get a whole lot of sun. Oh well! I guess I can’t keep this tan forever.
After the madness of Rio de Janeiro, we came to Buenos Aires with the intention of relaxing a bit. Forget it! Buenos Aires is as mental as Rio but in its own more chilled out kind of way. Everything really does happen later here. People wake up at 2pm, eat at midnight and don’t go out until 2am! We arrived about mid morning giving us time to see some of the city. We walked around downtown all day and headed back to our hostel to freshen up in anticipation of our first Argentinian steak. We decided to hit San Telmo that night as it seemed to have a good few cool bars there. It did! After a delicious steak in a small restaurant that the locals seem to use we hit the square where we sat listening to live jazz and drinking delicious red wine. We spent the rest of the night barhopping and having some epic chats where many of the world’s issues were discussed. Great first night in BA!
The next day we woke up at 2pmish which is pretty standard for the city. We decided to hit Recoleta and walk around the cool cemetery. Resting in the cemetery of Recoleta are some of Buenos Aires’ more affluent members of society. Some of the gravestones were impressive while others were just downright pretentious. Some of them were practically 2 storey houses! Amongst the people laid to rest there was Evita so we had the obligatory look at her grave. After this we went to see a kind of modern art museum nearby but headed back soon after for a nap before another night ahead. I can’t remember how it happened but we ended up back in San Telmo again! We had cooked dinner for ourselves so forwent the steak this time. But again we hopped from bar to bar until the end of the night.
Despite our late night we woke up pretty early the next morning. This was because we wanted to catch the craic in San Telmo square – yep. We went to San Telmo again! But this time not for the bars but the street entertainment and market. There was much fun going on with musicians, tango dancers and those guys who stand still and only move when you put money in their bucket. After wandering around the streets for a while we headed for Boca to see Caminito. This is a street with an assortment of brightly painted low houses made of wood and metal that burst upon the eyes in a scene that could almost be from somewhere in Scandinavia Also Boca Juniors had a big football match on that day and we went to see if there was any atmosphere around the town. Sure enough there was and we ended up getting caught in the crowds and being dragged towards the stadium. It was once we were there that we first considered actually going to the match. One thing led to another and after a lot of faffing around with dodgy ticket touts we found ourselves standing at the back of the terrace in the stadium about 20 minutes before kick off. Boca Juniors are the best team in Argentina – or so we had been told! At half time they were 1-0 down and really not playing the best. Soon into the second half San Lorenzo had scored another and the tension in the crowd was really heating up. Since we were in the cheapest area of the stadium where all the hooligans go for, we decided we would leave the match 10 mins early to avoid the crowds and getting caught up in any potential riots. However about 15 mins from the end, Boca conceded another goal. We ran! The second the goal went in we felt the tension go from bad to worse and we weren’t going to wait around and see how the fans would deal with the loss! Back at the hostel we abandoned our plans to cook for ourselves again. We could barely speak we were so fatigued so cooking was not something that we were going to do. We headed for San Telmo again for another steak. Since we were so wrecked we planned on just eating and hitting the sack. But once we felt the pull of San Telmo we couldn’t just go so once again, for the 3rd night in a row we found ourselves bar hopping around San Telmo. However we didn’t stay as late as other nights and had a reasonably early night for Buenos Aires.
Plans to go to Colonia Del Sacramento in Uruguay the next day were abandoned. The sheer lack of sleep in the last few days had exhausted my body and I just couldn’t do it. So for once I actually had a decent nights sleep. Instead we spent the day shopping. Fi and I went our separate ways for the day and I ran some errands I’d been planning on doing for a good while. We also changed hostels for boring reasons that I won’t go into. When we met up back at the gaff we bumped into a guy we had met in the other hostel and we went to see some percussion workshop/performance thingy that was on. Unfortunately we missed it by a week and it wasn’t on. So what did we do? Went to San Telmo for steaks! As Fi and Will had met a pair of Argentinians and were blabbering away in Spanish I decided to leave and find my own craic. I knew there was a party going on back at the hostel but it was crap. So I headed for a random bar where I met a few people and had the chat for a few hours before hitting the sack.
The next day we went to walk around Palermo which is an area of BA full of parks and green areas “perfect for smooching your honey” according to the lonely planet. After walking around these and the Japanese gardens, we also visited Evita’s museum. Back at the hostel we met a couple who were staying in our dorm. We had tickets for a tango show in café Tortoni but arranged to meet them in San Telmo afterwards. After Fi cooked up a delicious pasta and veg dinner we went to the tango show. It was amazing! Unfortunately flash photography wasn’t allowed and the non flash photos didn’t really come out. The first half of the show was kind of like a musical. The band consisted of double bass, piano and accordion. The music reminded me a bit of Jacques Brel. Three male and 3 female dancers danced the tango while acting out a scene at a brothel while a guy dressed as a waiter sang. We were suitably impressed at half time but had no idea the best was to come.
Just after half time we were treated to a couple of percussionists who gave a performance that I couldn’t even begin to describe. The rest of the show was a mixture of tango dances and singing. On a high from the tango we grabbed a cab to the bar in San Telmo where we met Graham and Jen. This was our wildest night and I think we arrived back at around 6am for a few games of pool at the hostel. The next day was a write off and we spent it in the cinema which was great for us since we hadn’t been in 2 months. That evening we had the obligatory pints in San Telmo again but this time we went to a bar down at the docks first to catch some of the atmos down there. Today it is lashing rain but really hot so I’m drenched in a mixture of sweat and rain. This evening we fly to Ushuaia where its apparently snowing and 0 degrees. Thank Christ! I’m beginning to get a bit sick of constant hot weather and sweating from morning to night. A bit of cold will do me good. Sadly though BA is probably the last of the really good weather we’ll get on the whole trip. With the possible exception of Cairns, any other hot places we’ll be in will be very overcast so we won’t get a whole lot of sun. Oh well! I guess I can’t keep this tan forever.
# posted by Grum @ 8:06 AM 
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