A Year In Motion

Buenos Aires was one of the most anticipated destinations on our South American leg of our year in motion. We were to spend around ten days there in all, and visited the city on three separate occasions during our time in and around Argentina. So did it live up to expectations? Well, there’s a story that says that Argentinians have the most psychologists per person in the whole continent, and with a city as large and diverse as Buenos Aires, the answer to our own question becomes a little complicated.

Our first visit to Buenos Aires came after an overnight bus trip in Royal Class and brought us to the bohemian heart of the city, San Telmo, where Ninfa’s brother Salva studies, and where Martin, an old friend of Ninfa’s from Honduras, lives and owns a small Middle-Eastern restaurant. Our first impressions of Buenos Aires were not therefore distinctly Argentinian, but distinctly positive with a free dinner of Ninfa’s favourite cuisine, plenty of red wine, and good company. We would get to know San Telmo very well in the next three days that we stayed in the area as we spent the time helping Salva look for an apartment in the area, and just aimlessly wandering the cobblestoned streets and atmospheric cafes of a bygone Buenos Aires. Sunday is the day in San Telmo when the market comes to town, and all sorts of antique bric a brac are on display, an authentic milonga takes place in the main San Telmo square and hot empanadas are never more than a few steps away (almost as common as dogpoo on the ground – watch your step in San Telmo).

Tango was invented in Buenos Aires, and San Telmo is the bastion of tango in the city. A milonga is basically a time and a place where people come together to dance tango, and there is no shortage in San Telmo. We attended one on a Saturday evening on the second floor of a terraced block which reputedly belonged to Che Guevara’s grandmother (not verified) and it was a little like a scene from a David Lynch film. We watched from the dim lamplight of our small table on the edge of the dancefloor as the small group of smartly dressed elderly patrons skilfully performed steps which were so rehearsed as to appear effortlessly natural. On the far side of the large, almost empty ballroom, single ladies were were in turn invited to dance by the resident “taxi dancer”, a pot-bellied Casanova dressed head to toe in black, shirt open almost to his waist, his receding hair sleaked back in a ponytail. Casanova turned out to be a surprisingly affable man and indulged us in a little of the history of tango and failed to convince us to embarrass ourselves in front of the assembled regulars.

During our first few days in San Telmo, we stayed in nearby Puerto Madero, the former docklands area of the city which has been stylishly redeveloped into a modern shiny waterfront district retaining some tasteful touches of its former purpose. Nearby is a nature reserve on the banks of the Rio Plata, and what I really liked was seeing the brightly coloured chirping parakeets from the park sitting in the cranes of the urban-industrial setting of Puerto Madero. We dined on two occasions in Puerto Madero, each time in one of Argentina’s famous “Tenedor Libre” restaurants. Tenedor Libre literally means “free fork”, but is better interpreted as “all you can eat … meat”. We tried the hugely popular Siga La Vaca, and the more locally popular “La Bistecca”. Of the two, we both preferred the latter, which offered a better quality of meat, lower prices and the option of pastas, pizzas and salads. In fact, we ate so much in La Bistecca that we had to go straight back to the hotel afterwards and take a long siesta, even after my two espressos!

To call Buenos Aires a huge city doesn’t even begin to convey the size of this South American urban sprawl. So together with a copy of Time Out Buenos Aires, and armed with a map and very informative advice from the Buenos Aires tourist office in Puerto Madero, we set off to explore some of the other parts of the city. First stop was Boca. The tourist officer had marked a big X, no-go area on our map, and we had found a highly recommended restaurant right in the middle of it. The restaurant, El Obrero (The Worker), is in the heart of downtrodden Boca, the non-redeveloped working class port area and home to Argentina’s most famous football club, Boca Juniors. The homage paid to Boca Juniors is by no means subtle and the walls are decked with scarves, photos, and flags of the glory years of Boca, and their most famous son, Diego Maradona. El Obrero does a great homage to Argentina’s parrilla (grill) tradition too, and after a hearty lunch we made our way the short distance (by taxi) to the Bombonera, Boca’s stadium, which literally translates as the Sweet Factory. The surrounding streets on the walk to El Caminito are almost entirely blue and yellow, with murals of Diego and his famous Hand of God goal taking pride of place. The Caminito itself boasts every colour under the rainbow but is very touristy, although the tango dancing could probably even teach a taxi dancer a thing or two.

I’ve often heard of Buenos Aires referred to as the Paris of South America, but to find Paris, you have to leave Boca and San Telmo and find instead the wide boulevards of Centro, Recoleta and Palermo. And there’s no boulevard wider than the Avenida 9 de Julio, the world’s widest with over 20 lanes of traffic at some points, and crowned in its centre by the towering Obelisco. The Centro district is full of monumental buildings, avenues and squares, none less so than the National Congress building with its dome, fountains and statues. We took the subway the length of the Avenida de Mayo from here to the Presidential Palace, the Casa Rosada, at the opposite end. This metro line, Line A, is Buenos Aires’ oldest, which still carries the original wagons with old lamp lighting and wooden seats which was a real journey back in time. The Casa Rosada is another journey back in time. Christina Kirchner is the current president of Argentina and our tour of the Casa brought us for a brief glimpse at her office, and it was interesting to see the personal photographs against the backdrop of the grand formality of the presidential office. The Casa Rosada is most famous perhaps for the address of Eva (Evita) Peron to the working classes from the balcony facing the Plaza de Mayo. We got to step out onto the balcony on our tour and I couldn’t resist singing a few lines of Don’t Cry For Me Argentina to honour the occasion.

Another day of our extensive roaming in the Argentine capital brought us to Evita’s final resting place in the Cemetery of Recoleta. The cemetery is well worth a visit, and is more like a museum of the Buenos Aires’ past, with its classical sculptures and stories of former prestigious residents. Some people, it seems, didn’t even find peace in death, such as the couple who were buried together but had their statues sculpted with their backs to each other. I was quite proud on the other hand to find a few Irish names among the ghosts of the noble classes, and even found a mausoleum to the Byrne family of Buenos Aires.

In close proximity (in Buenos Aires terms) to Recoleta is the fancy neighbourhood of Palermo which is where we stayed on our final trip to BA with Doug, a friend we made on our Antarctican cruise. I took a few jogs through the statued parks around Avenida del Libertador and got a taste of what urban living can be like in BA for the well off – it’s nice! To get a better and more relaxing taste, we made a trip by bus out to the Calle Honduras, which much to the satisfaction of Ninfa, turns out to be one of Buenos Aires’ hippest areas with all the flashy boutiques, classy cafes and fashionable people, and a trip here on a weekend seems to be a must for the in-crowd in BA. After the grimy and gritty introduction we got to Buenos Aires in San Telmo, we had finally found the glitz and the glam.

Buenos Aires by day is one thing – generally that one thing is hot! – but by night it’s another. Although we lacked the energy to rival the partygoers who last until dawn (we generally saw them coming home when we were going to airports for morning flights), we did pack in a pretty impressive porteno nightlife. An evening game at one of Buenos Aires numerous football clubs was a must on my to-do list, and although Boca weren’t in town, we did get to a game at River Plate. No goals, pricey tickets, sitting on the steps because all the seats were full are the price to pay to witness an amazing atmosphere that even made the nil nil draw against Argentina Juniors an exciting experience, although a comfier seat might have been nice. We also coincided our trip with a Shakira concert. In Latin America, there is no bigger star and she really knows how to put on a show. And finally, a blast from Ninfa’s past, her high school favourite band, local band Vilma Palma had reformed for their 25th birthday and were giving a one-night concert in Buenos Aires. The place was rocking and Ninfa transported herself back to that age of screaming adoring public as Vilma strutted his stuff and belted out his hits.

Alas, it’s the end of Buenos Aires, so what’s the verdict. We did have a great time but it didn’t really live up to our expectations. In general, the people had us questioning if we were still in Latin America as they were not as friendly as we hoped, although there were some notable exceptions including Mariella (thanks for all the great tips!) and some others like friendly old people and taxi drivers who offer cigarettes to their passengers. BA has just about everything a big city should have but the place is so big that it can be exhausting, and we found it quite dirty, well until we got to Palermo. Verdict then, Buenos Aires has a lot to be admired, but also leaves a lot to be desired. Next stop is guaranteed to be something different – the white continent of Antarctica!

More photos below and in our Argentina album here.

One of the great attractions of visiting a Latin American country is a rich legacy of beautiful colonial architecture, and Colonia del Sacramento on the banks of the Rio Plata in Uruguay is one of South America’s finest examples. Colonia del Sacramento is a small port town just an hour’s boat ride across the wide Rio Plata from Buenos Aires. It was this proximity that made it a bustling port in Portuguese controlled Uruguay during colonial times ideally located for smuggling goods in and out of Spanish-controlled Buenos Aires. What’s left today is an almost perfectly preserved old colonial town which is well worth a visit even if there are no longer any great savings on goods to be made.

In Ninfa’s old apartment, there were a couple of photos of Colonia and they looked so beautiful that we were really looking forward to visiting the place, and we put aside a day and half to do so. We arrived on a sunny and very hot afternoon by bus from Montevideo and made straight for the hotel where we spent the majority of the afternoon enjoying some sun and watching the locals cooling off in the very wide Rio Plata which separates Colonia and Buenos Aires. We’re not big on swimming in freshwater rivers, and the colour of the Rio Plata wasn’t going to do anything to change that, so we opted for a couple of cool showers before heading into the old town to see if Colonia was going to live up to expectations.

As we strolled through the old cobbled streets and down to the waterfront, we were possibly most surprised at how quickly we had done that. First impressions were that Colonia is small! But usually great things come in small packages. The atmosphere in the old part of town is very laid back, with restaurants spreading their dining rooms onto the plazas and narrow streets. It seems that every corner we passed, we were greeted by either another beautiful, perfectly preserved street, or another beautiful, perfectly preserved vintage car. The highlight of Colonia del Sacramento is the Calle de los Suspiros, a short street of faded picturesque bungalows and the poorest laid cobble street in the world – watch your step! And if you’re lucky you’ll even be able to make out a line of matchstick figures on the horizon which are the only sign of Buenos Aires in this town, which aside from distance, feels miles away from Colonia del Sacramento. We enjoyed a beautiful sunset down by the waterfront watching the locals fishing with some success on the rocks below us. Strange then that as we perused the menus of the various restaurants which clutter on the plaza that we couldn’t find any local fish anywhere. Unfortunately, no doubt owing to its popular tourist success, it’s difficult to get anything good other than a great setting in the restaurants in the old town. In fact we found one of the oddest waiters from our whole trip around the world who contended that the price we had to pay for being able to enjoy dinner on the street without being mugged was slow service. Odd logic – we didn’t tip!

Colonia’s old town also attracts its fair share of locals too, so we encountered plenty of Uruguayans “mateando” with their friends, but this time we decided not to join in. Too much mate would be spoiling oneself after all. We were also really lucky to coincide our visit with the onset of Autumn and the trees lining the streets were now adding a crispy crunch to our footsteps as we meandered our way aimlessly and at leisure through the alleys and byways of the old smuggler’s gateway to the colonies. We’ve had so many lucky coincidences on our travels, but we like to think of the old saying that “coincidences take great planning”.

Colonia del Sacramento can easily be covered in one evening, never mind one day, but it was nice for us to take some time out to relax and we didn’t regret spending two days there. In the hot summer heat of Uruguay, it was nice to relax in the daytimes and enjoy the old town in the soft light of a sunset that really brings the beauty of the town to life. Next stop for us is Buenos Aires again for a couple of days more before we head south, south, south to the end of the world and beyond. No kidding, we’re not stopping until we hit Antarctica!

All our photos of picturesque Colonia del Sacramento can be found here or just scroll down a little further for some of our favourites.

Travel Tips

For last minute ferry tickets, be sure to check SeaCat online. If they have seats left, they will sell the remaining seats at big discounts up to a week in advance. We saved over $100 each on ferry prices by using SeaCat instead of BuqueBus. On our outbound journey we travelled on a BuqueBus boat, so no difference in quality.

The COT buses in Uruguay frequently have wifi on board – bus of choice for travel bloggers.

During our extended time in Buenos Aires (BA), we took a four day break to visit Colonia and Montevideo in Uruguay. On the fast ferry Colonia is just an hour away from BA, and once in Colonia, it’s an easy 2.5 hour bus to Montevideo from the Colonia port. We were looking to get away from the hectic life and high prices of BA. Certainly the pace of life in Montevideo was slow compared to BA, like the turtle to the hare. But boy were we wrong about the second thing, prices were different in Montevideo, and to the wrong end of the scale; much higher than in Buenos Aires, even higher than in Chile. How the locals deal with that is beyond our comprehension as they assured us that their salaries are low. In Uruguay we saw a bigger racial mix: white European looking, dark Brasilian types, and the in between mix; as Uruguay is sandwiched in between Argentina and Brasil.

After being in BA, Montevideo does not seem to have many attractions, but we really enjoyed being there. Not only was it quieter and cleaner than BA, but it seemed to me that there was a higher joie de vivre there. People were really relaxed, friendly and easy to talk to. We walked through the old town taking in the old historical buildings and many monuments to the greatest national hero, Jose Gervasio Artigas. There was a particular building in the Plaza de Independencia, the Palacio Salvo, which Tony fell in love with. It has to be the most magnificent building in South America. The construction was made by an Italian architect and completed in 1928 intending to become a high class luxurious hotel, but it never served as a hotel. Palacio Salvo is a national icon of pride. The construction is so spectacular that it really clashes with the 70′s and 80′s buildings around. We have not done any further research on the subject, but our first impression of Montevideo is that it was a rich city with former glory, but somehow collapsed and declined. Now it’s mainly full of 70′s and 80′s buildings, in my opinion, architecture’s darkest period, as evidently the biggest decor on these buildings are external AC units. Montevideo reminded me both of La Habana in Cuba and Bucharest in Romania.

I contacted a local to have an insight on the city, my Uruguayan friend and former colleague in Brussels, Cristina. She gave us wonderful tips on how to enjoy Montevideo as a local. And we sure did! We had lunch at the famous and full of ambience Port Market (Mercado del Puerto). Ironically, their specialty is meat, not fish. It’s an old-style aluminum warehouse with plenty of character with about a dozen restaurants serving the big Parrillada (all sort of meat products on a grill). They all have the same steep price, but it’s quite an experience full of charm to have lunch there, sitting on a bar stool watching the grill, while Gauchos (cowboys) come and serenade you with their guitars. Cristina said we had to order a cup of Medio y Medio (Half and Half), a famous local drink consisting of half sparkling sweet wine and half white dry wine. Not bad! In fact so good, that we later had a full bottle of it at a local bar. We also tried the local specialty “Chivito” a big sandwich with meat, bacon, and egg. The rest of the food is very similar to the Argentinian diet: various grilled meats and their own style pastas and pizzas. Oh and how can I forget their obsession with “completos”, plain hot dogs, which we skipped as Tony had sufficiently indulged in them in Santiago. Uruguayan wine is not as famed as the Argentinian, but lately they have been developing quite well the Tannat grape which is a red grape that has become the signature Uruguayan grape.

We walked through the market area, the old town and just as we were making our way to the port to take pictures of the fishermen, a policeman stopped us. He said we shouldn’t go any further, or we would come back without camera. It didn’t seem dangerous at all to us but we obeyed. All cities have dangerous areas, and usually the port is one of them. We were pretty impressed with Montevideo and their policy of protecting tourists. There was a tourist police in every corner of the Old City, not bad at all. However during our walk, the police had to stray their attention from the tourists for a few minutes as two local teenage girls engaged in a heavy fist fight and hair pulling, and to which we must admit that we were quite amused to watch ourselves. We also rode public buses to the other side of the city and we discovered the onboard busker phenomena. In a short ride, at two different stops, two different groups of singers with guitars got on the bus and delighted the crowds with their music. We’ve seen buskers in the metro in almost all of Europe, but not in buses. While in Europe most people try to avoid them like the plague, in Montevideo people seemed to really enjoy it as they clapped and gave them plenty of change. It was so good that we also contributed to their art, a thing we never do; and Tony even chanted “otra otra” (encore) and they pleased him.

A very important recommendation from Cristina was to “Matear in the Ramblas” during sundown. Matear is to drink the mate while you go places and that’s what a lot of Uruguayans do all day. It’s a national tradition in Argentina as well, but an obsession in Uruguay. Mate is a bitter herb which is consumed in a hot water preparation and drunk by sipping a metal spoon/pipe from a dried-pumpkin cup. Since we arrived in Uruguay we noticed this tradition immediately. People all over town carry during the whole day their hot water thermos, their herb and their pumpkin cup and sip it all day long. Tony really wanted to engage in that tradition but it was served nowhere. We were told that it’s a very personal affair, not something one buys in restaurants or bars. So off we went until we found our perfect mate glass and spoon, a hot water thermos, and the herb. With all our new gear and some instructions on preparation we hit the ramblas (waterfront promenade) during sunset. Mate is quite bitter, an acquired taste, or probably an inborn trait; but it was really cool to walk down the ramblas, mate in hand, doing as the locals do.

Montevideo does not have the size or wonders of Buenos Aires, but it makes a relaxing break from the craziness of it; in our opinion well worth the visit!