Buenos aires

​November 11, 2022
             What a whirlwind it was trying to get here! Our tightest layover was our very first leg of the trip to Houston then on to Buenos Aires. Before we even left our house, Robin received an alert from United Airlines that the first plane was going to be an hour behind. That left us with 30 minutes to make our connection in Houston. I called United customer service to try to change our tickets, but thankfully we did not because we actually made it. We landed at 8:01 PM and our flight to South America was leaving at 8:20 PM. While it doesn't seem like it would be too difficult to make… it was like 2 miles away. We were running and running, I was ready to keel over when we finally received a ride on one of the buggies to our gate. What was funny about that was that some of the people were walking faster than the buggy. However, I was grateful to not be running anymore! The woman driving the buggy informed us that they were definitely holding the plane for us at the gate. They also were waiting for a few others including someone in a wheelchair. They had to check our bags because there was no more overhead bin space. The flight was about nine and a half hours long and I slept for maybe 25 minutes. When we landed in Argentina, we could instantly feel that it was hot and humid just walking down the jetway.

We waited in the very hot and steamy immigration line for nearly two hours to get through immigration. I still had thick jeans on, compression socks and a long sleeve shirt. At one point, I thought I would pass out. It's hard being up for 25 straight hours only to wait in line for two!

Since it was so early, our room wasn't ready. We had breakfast in the beautiful Palacio Barolo building while we waited.

Our hotel ended up being in an excellent location. On points... of course!

We were looking forward to having dinner in San Telmo market. So many choices! But it was excruciatingly hot inside!

Before you get to the food stalls, you have to pass the creepy doll store.

We saw on a YouTube video that we must have the empanadas at this restaurant.

They were excellent... except we had to eat outside to find a breeze. We ended up on the steps of an apartment building. Only five bucks total for two!

The first of MANY desserts on this trip.

Crossing Avenida de Julio. It's 16 lanes wide and takes 2-3 walk signs to get across. The woman's outline in the blue building is Eva Peron (Evita).

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November 12, 2022

As usual, we were the first and only guests at the 7am start breakfast time.

We decided to walk to La Boca for our 11am tour even though it was almost 4 miles away.

Everyone said it was a bad area but we didn't find it to be any worse that other places we'd walked (especially at 9am).

Argentina is having many issues right now. In addition to 100% inflation (yes - 100%!!), they have a lack of public services. Many streets looks like this. With it being so hot out, it certainly was stinky.

Interesting street art.

Like every South American country we've ever been in... loose dogs everywhere.

We walked past the famous futbol stadium where the Boca Juniors play. From a distance, we thought it was an Ikea store!

We arrived long before any of the crowds and so we both got some great photos of this extremely colorful neighborhood with very few people in them.

This is the oldest neighborhood in Buenos Aires. Argentina (like Brazil and the United States) appealed to immigrants - mostly white - to move from Europe during the 1800s. People came from all over, but mostly from Italy and Spain.

In this neighborhood, as many as 150 immigrants would live in one house. It would have only one bathroom (basically, a hole in the ground) and no running water as well as only one kitchen. They were from many different countries speaking different languages... often unable to communicate with each other.

La Boca is known as being one of the origins of the tango (except we ended up hearing other countries say it originated there). The tango is similar to country western music and that it's often about being heartbroken, poor, and down on your luck. Exactly the way the people felt in La Boca. The woman in the photo is a tango dancer. We waited for a while for them to dance, but I think they needed to collect money first.

While the neighborhood had always been multicolored, one person back in the 1950’s (can't remember his name) was responsible for making it the way it looks today. It is definitely a MAJOR tourist attraction in Buenos Aires!

After leaving the festive neighborhood and the thousands of tourists that had descended upon it, we went over to the river. Our guide said she remembered being a young girl when her parents brought her down and told her to look at the river and she thought, “what river?” It was so contaminated and polluted that you could not even see the water.

While it has improved, it's still very contaminated due to the industry that had once been in the area. This particular boat with a giant paddle wheel drives around all day aerating the water. The floating vegetation in the background also helps aerate the water.

We enjoyed watching the kids play soccer on this cement court. They were really quite good!

The dog walker was at the door of this residence to pick up dog number 13. I also have video of it and he made it look really easy.

Our guide said that Argentina (like many places in the world) is very polarized right now. Half of the people worship Eva Peron while the other half despises her. Half of the people love Pope Francis (he is Argentinian), while the other half hate him. But all Argentinians agree on Diego Maradonna and that he was a god to them. That's why you see him before you see Pope Francis.

We finished the tour looking at the murals of the revolutionists who were against the right-wing military junta that executed a coup against the left-wing president in the late 1970s. Once the military was in power, thousands of people disappeared. Around 30,000 people were part of what was known as “the disappeareds”. Most were between the ages of 16 and 35 years old. They were suspected of being communist or left wing and were placed in detention centers and were tortured and killed. The mothers of these people banded together and wore diapers on their heads and were called “The Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo”. They always wore their white scarves. This mural shows a white scarf mother trying to find out what happened to her child.

After the tour ended, we needed to catch an Uber. The first Uber driver pulled up and when he found out we were paying through the app instead of cash, he drove off. We saw this on a YouTube video, that if for some reason they don't like you or don't want to take you they'll just drive away. The second Uber driver had a nicer car with air conditioning, and it seemed so much better. We were going to Peron Peron for lunch in Palermo that was a 35-minute drive. Well… after nearly an hour in traffic that was not moving due to a marathon, I used Google translate to let the guy know we were jumping out of the car because we were getting nowhere. We walked about 10 blocks away from the marathon and caught another Uber in an old beat-up Ford Fiesta that had a smashed front end. This guy didn't even have seatbelts in the backseat because he had removed them. He was one crazy driver, but we did get there fast!

We were going to Peron Peron for lunch because it was featured on a show on Netflix called "Somebody Feed Phil".

Although the restaurant was probably an icon for decades, I think that it had lost its spark. It wasn't bad but wasn't that great either.

Later, we ended up walking near the waterfront so we could purchase our next-day tickets for the ferry to Uruguay. The waterfront is very modern and upscale compared to other places we'd been. At the ferry terminal, no one spoke English and we somehow ended up paying way more than expected. Argentina's currency is nearly worthless and there are two rates. One is called the "blue dollar rate" and is a parallel rate of USD in Argentina. The official government exchange rate for a US dollar is far less than the blue dollar rate. So, it's very confusing when using a credit card. We believed we were paying $202 for two tickets, but when I checked my card I was charged $351! Our research before we left showed that a ferry ticket was supposed to only be $58. (I ended up disputing the charge with Chase Bank and they removed $149).

November 13, 2022

Today was our long 8-hour private tour with Leo. The highlight of our day was Recoleta Cemetery - one of the most beautiful cemeteries in the world.

It’s mostly famous because it’s where Eva Peron is entombed. However, her mausoleum is quite small with a crowd of people gathering in front of it, and there were far more interesting tombs to see.

In 1902, Rufina Cambacérès was nineteen and a Buenos Aires socialite. While getting ready to attend a show, Rufina suddenly and without warning collapsed onto the floor. Doctors were called in, and supposedly all three doctors pronounced the young Rufina dead of a heart attack. Rufina was put in a coffin and sealed in her mausoleum, and a funeral was held. Days later, a cemetery worker found the lid cracked and suspected grave robbers. When he checked, he found that the inside of the lid has scratch marks and that Rufina had been buried alive. Or so the legends goes…

In this vault lies 26-year-old Liliana Crociati de Szaszak. She was killed in 1970 during her honeymoon in Innsbruck, Austria, when her hotel was struck by an avalanche. This is a life-size bronze statue of Liliana in her wedding dress. Following the death of her dog Sabú, a statue of the dog was added by the same sculptor. Touching the dog’s nose supposedly brings good luck.

This one was particularly interesting. The wealthy husband was known as a difficult man. The wife liked to spend money and he refused to pay for her debts. So they spent 20 years not talking to each other. He died first and so she set it up so they didn’t have to look at each other for the rest of eternity.

Since many of the mausoleums are quite old, there is no family left to maintain them. Many vaults have fallen into disrepair with cracked facades and broken windows. When we peered into the window of this one...

... bones!

We stopped at a memorial park for a terrorist attack that I knew nothing about. Hezbollah attacked the Israeli Embassy in 1992, killing 22 people and causing 242 injuries. This is a memorial for the 22 people who died with each having a tree to honor them.

We walked by various government buildings on tree-lined streets.

One of the interesting things about Buenos Aires is that you can walk several blocks and be in a completely different type neighborhood.

While this may look like a cushy bench, it's actually made of concrete.

We spent most of the rest of the day walking through parks and rose gardens talking politics. Our guide thinks like we do. He said 90% of his clientele is from the US. So far, he’s never had a Trump supporter and only one Bolsonaro supporter. Again, people who travel…

After 8 hours and 32,000 steps, we said goodbye to Leo. We ate dinner at a very busy restaurant in Palermo. After we were finished, a street person walked past and pointed to our leftover pizza on our table to see if he could have it. We nodded yes and he was happy to grab it. There are many people living on the streets, but not near as many as we see in Portland. However, many of the homeless here have little kids and it makes me very sad. Notice that I was photobombed by two creatures in this shot!

On to Uruguay!!