hey guys,

only 2,5 more weeks to go ... i'm counting the days :)

so last thursday i arrived in Bariloche (official name: San Carlos de Bariloche) ... really a nice city in the northern part of patagonia, stayed in an awesome hostel ... was situated in the 10th floor of the highest building in bariloche and therefore had a stunning view over the city and the lake district ... was really breathtaking, i mean it's a hostel not a 5star hotel :) ... argentina is much cheaper than chile, e.g. had a real good big steak with salad and a beer for less than 10 us dollars ... bariloche is a famous skiing area, much bigger than pucon in chile but i didn't go skiing there ... the first night we had a wine tasting party with chocolate and cheese buffet in our hostel ... was really funny, and argentinean wine is good and very cheap ... bariloche is also famous for the best chocolate in argentina, there are many chocolate shops around the city ... you even get Milka chocolate on every corner ... so all in all you really can feel like home here :) ... the lake district here is wonderful, but unfortunatelly in winter most of the tracks are closed due to too much snow here ... so i only walked a bit into the national park, went to cerro (means hill/mountain in spanish) campanairo and enjoyed the great view over the lake district ... jesus, it was fu**ing cold there ... i envy you guys for that hot summer now in austria :)

so after 4 days bariloche which i really enjoyed i took a 20 hours bus ride to buenos aires ... going by bus is really cheap and comfy here, i paid a bit under 50 euros for the best bus i have ever been ... first row, upper deck, sleeping chair, very much leg room, tv with english movies (the new mr. bean was also showns *g*), and board service (means dinner and breakfast) ... and at about midnight, the steward asked us if we want champagner or vodka or something else :) ... surprisingly for the most of you, i denied alcohol this time :) ... so after this long and comfy bus ride i arrived on tuesday in buenos aires ...

finally there ... buenos aires ... many of the travellers i met really enjoyed this big and hustling city ... first prob (after organizing a hostel): where is the subte (subterranaeo ... means metro) ... after asking about 3 porteños (people living in BA call themselves like this) in my broken spanish i finally found the metro station ... for 70 centavos (=under 20 eurocents) you can go by metro which is quite old and most of the time full of people (in BA there live about 10-11 million people) ... so i got to my hostel but spent the first night in a hotel as my hostel was full ... the hotel was one of the worst places i stayed the last 5 months ... was happy, that i only had to be there for one night ...

so the next day i changed my accommodation and met with Hernan, an argentinean guy who i met in auckland ... he showed me some interesting places of buenos aires and we had an "all you can eat" meat lunch ... i've never seen such a big grill and so much meat grilled ... 2 big guys with a big big knife each cut down slices of rips, steaks etc in front of you .. and the argentinean people eat every part of the cow, pig etc. ... i even tried tounge-cow ... so this big big buffet, with a jug of beer and a delicious dessert was only about 11 us dollars ... couldn't believe that ... after this heavy lunch we walked about 4 hours through BA ... went to a strange cemetary ... is a big tourist attraction here, as this cemetary is like a own town in the town ... every guy (or family) has an own mausoleum (some of them really big) and evita peron de duarte is also buried there (the most important woman in argentineans history) ... in the evening i had an other all you can eat pizza dinner ... for only 7 us dollars incl. 1 beer :) it will be hard to get used to austrian prices in august :)

thursday i went to the austrian embassy, as i wanted to ask about malaria in iguazu falls ... i was so happy, when i left this building as they guy behind the desk was so lazy, unfriendly and slow ... a typical austrain magistrate ... he couldn't give me a proper information and finally needed at least 10 minutes to write down an adresse of a german speaking doctor here ... but he couldn't tell me how to get there ... and the office hours of the austrian embassy: monday to thursday 9-12 o clock ... i wanna work there!!! :)) moreover they don't know stress or much work i suppose, as i was the only client there ...

friday i did a guided tour to both big football stadiums ... River Plate and Boca Juniors (where Maradona played) ... RIver Plate stadium is real big, but the tour was quite boring and so our group left soon to go to La Bombonerra (which means: box of chocolate, as the stadium is built very steep and tight) ... this tour was much more interesting, they also have a big museum here and Maradona is everywhere :) (although he only played 2 seasons there) ... La Bombonnera is a only football stadium, even for the corner kick the players don't have much space to kick (close like in english stadiums) ... i could talk hours about the stadium but i don't want to bore you ...

yesterday i went to Tigre, a small town about 1 hour per train from buenos aires (train costs 50 eurocents for a return ticket!!!) ... in tigre you can visit the river delta, where a lot of islands are and you can visit them ... there is like a public transport, but of course instead of buses or metros, there are boats :) ... the tourist info told me, that there is a german restaurant on one of the islands, so i decided to go there to have lunch ... but when i arrived there, it emerged, that in fact this restaurant was run by a austrian-german couple ... the woman was born in vienna but left with the family when she was 3 years old ... but she could speak proper german so we talked a lot ... i was the only guest there (in summer, they are full and they have even some bungalows to stay a couple of days on the island) and had after several months frankfurter with sauerkraut, which was delicious ... the only thing to mention is, that they have only german beer and no austrian .. the name of the restaurant was Alpenhaus and it looked like this ... because of talking so long, i nearly missed the last boat to get back to the mainland ... the funny thing is, one of her sons is living in austria, in poertschach and has a little ice salon, so maybe the next time i will visit poertschach i will go there :)

the only thing i didn't do in BA was going out at night ... first, it's sometimes dangerous (but only in some few places at night, during the day it's save!), second in my hostel there were no one who were going out and going alone in a city where you cannot speak the native language is difficult, third and most important: the nightlife starts here at only 2-3 in the morning ... i mean there are some pubs which are open before, but it can happen that you will be quite alone there :) ... and i'm too old for going out at 2am in the morning, stay till 7 or 8 ... then i will loose 2 days because of recovering time ... and last but not least, i saved some money :)

so that's it for today, tonight i will take an other overnight bus to Cordoba, stay there a couple of days and then want to go to iguazu falls, the wolrd's biggest waterfalls ...

and for all football fans among you: i will go to a football match in rio de janeiro on sunday, 5th august in the world famous maracana stadium :) ... this will be my last highlight of this world trip

so, cu you in a couple of days, christoph