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Friday 7th September
Today we depart Foz to head to Buenos Aires. After finding out that the coach journey would take 17 hours to get to Buenos Aires we decided to blow the budget and book internal flights instead. Ana Marie picked up myself, Lisa and our new tag along friend (Nikki) from the hostel at 8.30 giving us plenty of time to get our 10.15am flight. However after arriving at the airport in Foz to catch our flight to Buenos Aires it turned out that we were in fact at the wrong airport. We should instead have been flying from Puerto Iguasa which was on the Argentinian side of the border. So off Ana Marie sped in her 1.4 Ford Fiesta to get across the border and through passport control to get us to the airport in time. However we never nearly made it to the airport as Ana decided it would be fun to keep swerving off the road. (no joke)!! We finally arrived at the airport 3 mins to spare only to find out that the flight had already been cancelled and we were on the next flight out at 12.15, but didn´t actually leave till 1.15!!! (apparently this is common practise to change and cancel flights at the last minute) Luckily I had Nikki´s PSP to keep me occupied. Lisa and Nikki had a nice long girly chat!
After a very bumpy flight we safely arrived at Buenos Aires and managed to get ourselves a taxi to the hostel we had booked the night before. When we arrived at the hostel we encountered our first hurdle, the online reservation had not worked and there were no private rooms at the Inn. They had dorm rooms for us but we declined this as by this point we decided we wanted to be poncy travellers The very nice hostel man did let us use the premises to use Nikki´s laptop (I knew we bought her along for a reason) to search other hostels in the area with a private room. After trekking the busy streets of Buenos Aires with a new kind of hatred for our backpacks we EVENTUALLY found the hostel we were looking for. Our private room was available for all but the first night of our stay, so we had to lower our standards and share a dorm room with a crazy Mexican guy Juan Carlos aka John Charlie!! By now it was early evening and we were all very hungry (Including Lisa) so we headed to the best steak house in town (Laz Nazaramas) to stuff our faces. The steaks were out of this world (or as Nikki would say AWESOME) and we all had big smiles on our faces heading back to our slum room for the night!
Saturday 8th September
We woke fairly early saturday morning, well earlier than juan carlos who was sprawled across his bunk bed in his pants which was a really gross sight, but maybe slightly better than his face! After sampling the breakfast of dry toast and cheese spread we moved to our classy private quarters, which we even had our own private staircase too, safe now from John Charlie!!! Safely in our new rooms and not having to share a bathroom, we planned our day ahead. The weather was lovely as we headed to Avenue Mayo (by now I had studied the map and new my way round like a local, well almost!!) and made our first discovery. The map had suggested we visit Cafe Tortoni, which we later discovered was the first cafe in BA back in the 1850's. From the outside it looked old and dirty, not very appealing. The doors opened and we were gobsmacked, the place was amazing, it was like stepping back in time. We sat down and spent the first 10 mins looking around and taking pictures, but i'm sure the waiters must be used to that (although i'm sure the really old waiter didnt expect us to ask if we could take a picture of him!!!!). We had coffee, hot chocolate and pastries and left very happy. Our next stop was the pink palace (as we call it, our spanish is not very good yet!). This is the palace were Evita sang to the crowds (well she did in the film that i watched last week!). Discovering museums etc were not open on saturdays we looked at a few more historic monuments and headed to Puerto Madera, which is the wealthy converted dock area. We walked along the docks admiring all the posh restuarants, walked around an old ship, then carefully chose somewhere to have a drink...... HOOTERS!!!! well, Tom was a Hooters virgin!!! (and just so Tom could get to see the hooters girls again i non accidently left my bag there so we'd have to go back 1/2 hour later, how nice am i!!!!!). We also saw a mini sydney opera house, the capital bulding (washington) and big ben on our travels, i didnt realise we'd walked quite so far! exhausted we headed back to our private room were we decided we'd eat that evening in one of the expensive italian restuarants on the docks (see we really are the best poncy travellers!).
Sunday 9th September
Today Lisa and Nikki decided that they would gang up on me and wake me up at 7.00am to take me to an Antiques market in San Telmo. (Im not sure bringing Nikki along for her PSP was worth it, especially as she left Pro Evolution soccor at home and I had to play Harry Potter!!) The antiques market itself was pretty much what we expected. Each stool sold old knives and forks, rusty looking candle holders, old toy cars and the occasional odd looking porcelain doll. Luckily on the way to the antiques market itself we stumbled upon a second market which I hate to admit was pretty cool. All the items on each of the stalls were hand crafted by the local folk, like hand made flutes and pan pipes, mobile phone holders, notebooks, jewellery etc etc. I forgot to add that on the way to the market we ended up in the middle of a mass stampede which turned out to be the Buenos Aires half marathon. It was like the part of Lion King where Mufasa tries to save Simba from the wilderbeast. Luckily Nikki (Mufasa) didn´t die!!! My plan was folied!!!! Nikki is very much into her running so we ventured over to the finish line to watch all the old men fall over or faint at the finish line!! After an eventful morning we rushed back to our hostel in time to go to the Riverplate Vs Velez footy match.
As we are all die hard Riverplate fans we all wore our new footy shirts to the match, and looked very silly when we got on the coach and saw that everyone else on the mini bus was dressed in casual wear. I think we looked way cool though! After a long delay waiting for 6 idiots to show (that never did) we rushed off to the stadium in time for kick off. However on the way our CRAZY CRAZY mini bus driver decided he wanted to start a fight with an old man driving a taxi for apparently cutting him up. He even swerved round lots of cars and sped to catch him up to moan some more. I assume thats all included in the price of the tour. The Riverplate Stadium holds around 80,000 fans and is the biggest stadium in Buenos Aires. We were seated in the upper part of the stadium and had an amazing view. As games in Argentina are very dangerous we were seated in the VIP area as it is safe to take photo´s here and also and most importantly not to be klilled! Before the game our tour guide informed us that there are normally around 150 wanted hooligans known to the police that go to these games to cause trouble. Due to a bad stabbing the week previous to our game they had arrested 100 of these fans at our game. The game itself started very slow but after about 20 minutes it became the best game I have ever watched. The players are very skillfull, always doing trick after trick and made the game great to watch. The fans themselves are crazy but create such an amazing atmosphere. Riverplate won 5-0 scoring four of the best goals I have seen in a long time. The first goal was boring, the second goal was a great individual run by a solo player taking it past 3 players and shooting 25 yards out, the ball hit the cross bar, the post and then went in. The third goal was cut back from the corner flag for the receiving player to scissor kick the ball home off the cross bar again. The forth goal was a cracking power drive of a shot from about 35 yards out straight into the top corner. The fifth goal for me was the best as it required the most amount of skill. It was a short corner to a player who dinked it past one player....... paused........ then decided very cooly from 25 yards out to lob the keeper into the top right corner. FANTASTIC!!! Apparently it was one of Rivers biggest wins for a long time and made front page of the newspapers. I think it was because we all wore our shirts The funniest and probably scariest part also of the game was the away fans. They had one tiny corner of the stadium (about 5 thousand fans) and they didn´t take the defeat too well. Instead of walking out the stadium with grace they decided to rip the bottoms of there seats off and throw them onto the home fans below. Very amusing for us as we were seated a little way away from this. When the game was over we had to wait 30 mins for the away fans to get far enough away from the stadium before they allowed the River fans to leave the stadium. On the journey home the CRAZY CRAZY driver hadn´t finished with his antics just yet. He decided to pull along side a crowded bus and attempt to chat up the quite fit lady driver. His attempt involved a lot of kiss blowing, little winks and funny noises coming from his mouth! I have also never seen a driver use his horn and flashes lights so much. Everytime he moved or stopped or in fact breathed he had to toot the horn 50 times and flash his lights another 20. Very strange man!!! For dinner we chose a very nice local restaurant, drank lots of Rose wine and to be different to every other meal ate steak. Just so you all know the steak is seriously the nicest I have ever tasted and feels like a crime if you do not have it every night. Then we went home to sleep. lol
Monday 10th September
After the early morning on sunday we decided to award ourselves with a lay in, so woke around 11am and had croissants in the hostel. The sun was shining in the morning, but typical that the moment we stepped outside it started to rain. But that was ok, cos we were heading to Teatro colon, which is the main theatre in buenos aires. The pictures we had seen so far were amazing, 2500 seats, the architecture laced in gold, plus red seats and chandeliers draped all over the ceilings. There are daily tours in english which is an exciting prospect in South America, as few people speak english, which is somewhat isolating! The theatre was just over the road, well i say a road, its the biggest avenue in the world, and with 16 lanes we certainly agree! We arrived at the theatre only to be told it was closed, for a year, for renovations.... well thats just charming!!! So that put a stop to our early afternoon plans, we had to rearrange the schedule.. We had wanted to see an opera or show in BA, so we started on a mission to find one, we knew we were in the theatre district, but we didnt seem to find any. I dont think September is there busy season for shows. Not having much luck and feeling like the day was not much of a success we jumped in a taxi and headed to La Boca. Now La Boca was much more of a success, although as we first arrived the loudest clap of thunder sent me running to the nearest cafe for safety! After the storm had passed, and finding out me and nikki had the same crazy mentallity (conversations about not wanting to be an ethopian!!!) we headed down the famous street of brightly coloured metal houses. It definately lived up to all expectations. The houses are so cool, painted yellows, blues, pinks, reds etc. There is a lot of whacky art and statues around as well. We also watched a tango display with a couple who were quite good, had some funky tricky moves and lifts. Although a smaller area than i had expected, its definately worth the visit, and theres a cool bakers on the corner which we brought nice danishes from! We headed north towards the boca stadium, but didnt head any further north, as the streets gave way to shacks and shanty towns and teenagers hanging around with nothing to do. By the docks there was a massive closed down factory, but along one side of the building there were murials made of newspaper, one was of ronaldinho and we assumed the rest were famous football players in argentina! Pleased with touristy adventures and with the sun fading we headed back home in a taxi. That evening we decided to head down to the posh docks area and eat in.... TGI Friday! ha ha, but we never actually made it there as Tom saw an argentinian restuarant with the huge bbq's cooking enormous slabs of meat, so we let him get his own way that night and we ate there. We waited an eternity for our meal and was constantly ignored by the waitress, by the time Toms Lamb ribs arrived he understandably wasnt in the mood to disect the huge rack of ribs and try and find the meat in amongst the huge lumps of fat. We might not have minded if it was a cheap restuarant, but it was the most expensive we'd been in to date! I had a lovely meal of salmon and baked potato though!!!!! We decided to boycott the restuarant and buy dessert elsewhere. The rain was really coming down on the way home, and we had no money for a taxi or ice cream, so we brought chocolate, leg wax and vicks rub in the pharmacy and headed home. I think the locals thought we were drunk, but we were just high on life. Nikki gave Tom a piggy back down the docks, before tripping and falling in the road. You had to be there really, but it was hysterical!!!!
Tuesday 11th September
I had been woken early by the sound of thunder, and that about summed up the weather for today. So we decided today would be a good day to take a tour of the shopping malls!!! And of course the famous cemetry in recolleta, just so we had done something cultual that day. We headed off in a taxi to the first mall on our list, the Design mall, which turned out to be a mall for homeware. Very nice of course, but wasnt gonna help me purchase a pair of high heels! Next to the design mall was the cementry and as the rain had eased up we decided to head there. It was such a bizarre place, but really cool, which i never thought i'd hear myself say as i hate graveyards! Our mission, as was everyone elses was to find Evitas grave (tomb house thing!). The weirdest thing about this place by far was the amount of fat wild cats roaming around, sitting on tombs. The second weirdest thing was being able to look through the doors of these tomb house things and see the old coffins. One of the funniest things was when nikki run down a path in between tomb houses, and hadnt noticed a guy had entered one of the tombs behind her. She jumped out of her skin when the guy then walked out of the tomb house as she was walking back!!! ha ha ha.. After finding evita's tomb house we decided we'd done enough cultural stuff for the day and headed to our next shopping mall. After making a few small purchases (jeans, tops ectc!) we decided to walk to the next mall, some 20 mins away. After looking in 2 shops we got bored and headed back to the hostel to get ready for dinner and the tango show we'd booked that night. As usual we headed to the docks and went to our favourite restaurant again, this time getting slightly tipsy on red wine!
We got a coach to Senor Tango show, arriving just before the show was to start, where we had great seats. The wine sucked but the dancing was amazing. I watched the routines with much fascination at the intricate steps and lifts etc. Tom watched the dancers with much fascination as the costumes got more and more revealing. By the end they were wearing thongs, stockings and suspenders! In between the dances was a native looking pan pipe player, who was cool, and a slightly over weight old singer who was good at singing but loved his voice far far far too much. I assume he was Senor Tango as the show seemed to evolve around him. As we reached new levels of boredom listening to him we decided that maybe opera wasnt for us! But the dancing had wetted Tom and Nikki's appetite to have a tango class with me! We left after midnight and got a minibus home, where tom was told off for not sitting still like a good boy!!!! To be fair, he was told to sit down, when he was in fact sitting down, he was just fighting with me at the same time!!!
Wednesday 12th September
Today we had a trip booked to Tigre, which is a posh area in the north of Buenos Aires. We travlled by coach to Tigre and was pleasantly surprised at how nice it was, like a mini cambridge with lots of little rivers and boat clubs. It was very cold by the time we arrived so we were pleased that the boat we were now going on had the seating inside. We headed around some islands which are in the middle of the river deltas. The islands are inhabited around the edges only, with many different houses sitting along the shores, some very close! The river waters were very high due to the recent storms, which were just about to hit Buenos aires (literally within an hour!). As the boat sped around some areas the waves flooded into peoples front gardens. Many of the homes are not habited in the winter. We arrived back at the pier we'd started at and then headed off on a train for 30 mins up the coast to a small village whose name escapes me, to look at the craft markets. However as we got there the heavens opened, seriously opened and it teamed down with rain so hard it flooded the roads. So instead of shopping we headed to the nearest burger joint and spent a very stressful 10 mins trying to order 3 burgers and chips! On the way home we spent most of the journey wondering whether the Boca game we were going to tonight would still be on, and if so how we'd dress to sit in the rain for 2 hours!!! I'll hand over to Tom now as apparently i'm not experienced enough in the art of football to commentate on the game!
When you first arrive at the Boca stadium you can see how small it is compared to the Riverplate stadium. River holds 80 thousand and Boca only 45 thousand! Boca and River are the two biggest rivals in Argentinian footy and apparently the clash between the two is known as one of the most dangerous in the world. Clearly no they haven`t been to a Millwall or West Ham game :o) The weather was cold and rainy but the atmosphere in the stadium is like no other I have ever experienced. In the part of the stadium where all the hardcore fans sit they have no seats, just concrete stairs and metal railings. The fans stand anywhere and everywhere no matter how dangerous. Men wave there babies in the air in time to the chant! its truely crazy!!!! The most amazing thing is the fans chant with the aid of their live band from kick off to full time. I have never seen or heard such dedicated fans. Boca won 2-0 against Olympia. The second was a penalty which resulted in a Olpympia player getting sent off. The player needed two armed guards with protective shields to usher him off the field. Even then the player was fighting against the armed guards! The game itself was not as good as the River game we saw but the atmosphere was much better then River and well worth every penny. AFter the footy we made our way back to the hostel, ordered Burritos and sprite as we were to tired and hungry and wet to be arsed to go out for dinner. The girls watched Finding Nemo and I went to sleep.
Thursday 13th September
This day was known as ADMIN day, as we had now accumulated a huge list of things that needed to be done. Most of which included the post office, which took us a very long time to find! After a hard morning we rewarded ourselves which lunch at Tortonis as we really liked this place. Tom stuffed his face with 2 lunches and dessert. This is Tom here and to be fair my first course was the smallest ham and cheese croissant. By this time it was about 3pm and we had had nothing to eat all day. I then ordered a pizza that was again very small but very filling. My so called desert was two wafers off of Nikki`s plate that were again very very small. So ner ner ner ner ner Lisa :oP Anyway, after more admin we found a nice tango shoe shop which made the shoes in the back, and also gave tango classes, so we had our first lesson here. We learnt the 8 basics steps and a forward and backward figure of 8 step. It was great fun, apart from when Tom stood on my bare toes! Nikki and Tom decided they were going to become Tango dancers, but thankfully that novelty has since worn off!
As i got very ill in the evening (will not explain) we decided to head somewhere more local for dinner, so headed to Avenue Lavalle. We ate in a nice italian which also sold amazing cakes and chocolates. However i think we will remember this place more for the best ever home made Sangria which the waiter made on our table! Unfortunately as i was ill and had taken antibiotics, i was limited to only one glass, on the condition i drank 2 glasses of water. For anyone who knows me that was a hard task. Our night out clubbing therefore did not happen, but the sangria was great!!!
Friday 14th September
Today we got rid of Nikki cos she was getting on our nerves.... just kidding! She had a problem with the package her parents had sent her via DHL and it was stuck in customs so off she headed on her own like a brave girl on a mission to the airport (40 minutes away) to sort them out!!! me and Lisa headed over to Palmero were our first port of call was the botanical gardens. I wont write much as it was rubbish. It was an overgrown park with more cats in it then the famous cemetary. After this we headed over to the zoo which was actually very good. We saw giant tortoises, beavers roaming freely, giant giant snakes, some amazing dragon art work in the reptile enclosure, a peacock fighting with a swan thingy and then the general animals you see in all zoos. However this zoo can boast about housing a monkey with the biggest willy in the whole world! It had now began to rain as we headed over to the Japanese botanical gardens, and I have to say these were fantastic. The first botanical gardens we went to could learn a lot from these people. Everything was perfect. The gardens were set out around a giant lake that had very ornate bridges weaving in and out of the lake and was full to the brim with giant Koi carp. We then headed over to a modern art museum. Most of the work was not my cup of tea (or Lisa`s) as it was very out there. Some might say the art was basic, childish and pretty crap! However we were very impressed with two things. First was a set of giant screens (each in its own room) that projected short clips of odd things. The first was of a Elephant in a room with a camera rotating around him. Doesn`t sound good I know but it was thought provoking (Lisa told me to write that). The next screen was of a mans hands simulating sex acts. I wont go into too much detail but it was actually very clever. They also projected a 1cm square image that when you looked closely was a fly on its back just wiggling his legs. The forth and final projection was of a car parking or moving in very slow and stuttering kinda motion! It was odd but interesting. The best thing we saw was by a man called Douglas Gordon. What he had done was overlap two films (The original Exorcist movie and some old Judie Garland movie) so that they played simultaniously on the same screen. However he cleverly faded the audio and visual of both films at different times which really does captivate the audience as you can tell he had maticulously planned when to do this to effect your consious awareness (we later found out when we read the back of his book). We then went back to the hostel to a very annoyed and upset Nikki who had a bad day at the cargo terminal of the airport. SHe was even more distraught (as was Lisa) that after waiting a year for the package and going through so much hassle that her mum had forgotten to put her hair straightners in the package. This mildly amused me though. lol We decided to eat at a restaurant recommended in the lonely planet book so took a taxi there. The taxi driver was a complete tit and couldnt find it ater 20 mins of driving so we got out (very annoyed and hungry) and walked to our favourite restaurant in puerto Madero for our last night in Beunos Aires. Our old man waitor that recognised us from a previous night had called us Amigos and gave us a glass of champagne each on the house.
Whilst staying at the hostel we met a very friendly Engligh girl who We (Tom) named pretty girl. (She really was stunning) She was staying in Buenos Aires for a year and working in a local Irish Bar. She invited us out on numerous occasions to go drinking with her but we were far too tired to stay up past 9pm :o) Luckily She be-freinded John Charly (our Mexican buddy) so thankfully we didnt see much of him after that!!
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