Our bus to Buenos Aires was nearly an hour late, so we sat baking in the bus station chatting to another equally hot and bothered couple waiting for the same bus, discussing the seemingly wrong rumour that the buses in Argentina are the best in South America!
Eventually it turned up and we were pleasantly surprised to find that we were the only four passengers on the journey for a good few hours! We were even served dinner and had an English film too!
Slight annoyance came though when the bus broke down at 8am the next morning and we waited an hour by the roadside for them to change the fanbelt! However, since speaking to others, it seems an hour isn`t a bad wait, some people had been delayed 12 hours!
After checking into our hotel, we bumped into a guy that had been at our very first hostel in Rio (like I said before, its amazing how you bump into the same people all over the place!).
This was our first proper hostel, sharing in a room with ten others... all boys apart from me! It smelt a bit!
We went straight out to find Evita`s balcony, which disapointingly was covered in scafolding! In fact the whole of BA seems to be under massive reconstruction as there are roadworks and scafolding everywhere! Other than that, Buenos Aires is very cosmo and European looking, you could almost be in Milan or Madrid. It also feels ten times safer that Rio and Sao Paulo, you can just tell by the way the locals act... people actually carry bags!
We saw a huge protest begin outside one of the public buildings and all these riot police turned up with sheilds and guns. We got out of the way pretty quick as the guide book said they often get pretty violent and it`s best to avoid them. Also we didn`t know what they were actually protesting about or if it was a worthy enough cause!
After we just kind of wandered round getting our bearings. Puerto Madero is quite a posh area so we wandered down there by the port, stopping in Hooters for a beer!! We also spotted a restaurant that was posh, but cheap enough to treat ourselves! We`d been hearing so much about the Argentinian steak, we previously decided we`d sod the budget once we got to BA!
As it turned out later when we came back for dinner (and happy hour!), we'd miscalculated and it was still unbelieveably cheap. You can still eat like a King on a budget in Argentina! The steak we had that night has changed me forever! It was soooooooooo good, I`m still recovering! Nick was a bit jealous as his just didn`t quite match mine, its just wasn't quite as fat!!
Saturday 10th we spent a nightmare morning trying to change money up. Advice to travellers: don't for a second think that a Beuro de Change in Argentina will actually change money or travellers cheques for you, especially on a Saturday! It seems they would change absolutely anything into Peso's, but wouldn't give you any other currency, even US$'s, and we needed Peru Soles... quite out of the question! Even in the airport. So after a good few hours wandering round banks, we decided to give up and prey that our ATM cards worked in the airport!
Later on, to lift the mood, we went to visit Evita's tomb! It was pretty special as they lay loads of fresh flowers round it still. The graveyard itself was pretty spooky cos all the other tombs were enormous, and you could actually see some of the coffins through glass doors. I just kept expecting the doors of each one to fling open and some zombie pop out! Nick thought that this would actually be quite a funny thing to have on your grave as a joke!
Again we bumped into more people we'd met at a previous hostel!
After we went to Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, a free gallery outside the cemetery. They had work by really famous artists such as Picasso and Monet, but most impressive was Rodin's 'The Kiss' sculpure. I hadn't realised there would be anything that famous in there so that made it all the better!
We had planned that evening to try and save some cash by cooking for ourselves, but, still reeling from the steak the night before, we changed our minds at the last minute, but compromised with a cheaper restaurant! Nick won that night, his steak was the size of a foot, and about 4cm thick (for 4 pounds)!! Luckily, he couldn't eat it all and, being the supportive girlfriend, I helped out! Not quite as good as the night before, but still a near-life changing experience!
Our last morning in Buenos Aires (and Argentina) was spent in San Telmo flee market and Plaza Dorrego (Square). Here they have all sorts of stalls selling antiques to water colour paintings. You can by pretty much anything. They also have street performers, the best being the tango dancers swaying for the cameras!
We had to get back to the hostel after that as we had a 2 hour bus ride to the airport. Then another 3 hour wait as we were quite early!
Our flight itself was delayed another hour due to the stupid people swanning around duty free! One hour after we'd boarded, people were still turning up in their own sweet time. I can't believe the plane was actually waiting for them!
Anyway, thats country number 2 finished with! We both thought that we could have explored Argentina more. From what we've heard it seems to be a bit overlooked by travellers, but is a gem in terms of beauty and cheapness! Still, on to Peru...
P.S. Nick wants me to add that I got told off in the airport for staring at a womans boobs! (they were huge though!!).
Private Notes
BA Stop Hostel