Well we finally did it. We crossed the water to Buenos Aires!

On Friday morning at 7am we boarded a bus to Colonia, which was about 2 and a half hours away. Once in Colonia, we cleared customs and hopped on the ferry that would bring us to Buenos Aires. The ferry was very smooth and we were served sandwiches with juice (better than airline food) during the trip.

When we finally arrived we were transported to our hotel (Zentra) where we checked out the facilities. The hotel has only been in operation since March of '06 so everything was pretty sweet. Our room had four beds and looked like an ad for Ikea. The basement of the hotel offered the dining area, projection screen for movies, work out room and internet. From there we grabbed a map and hit the road. We walked to famous sights such as the Obelisk, Avenue 9 de Julio (the widest avenue in the world), Puerto Madero, Plaze de Mayo, Casa Rosada, and the list goes on. Finally we took the A-Line (the oldest subway in South America) home and got ready for dinner ... dinner at TGIFriday's! After 2 months in South America, we were all ready for some good American food. Everything was great! We even enjoyed jumbo milkshakes (see the picture), although the food was a little too American for our stomachs . Unfortunately it limited the rest of our activities for the night.

The next morning we took a city tour by bus to learn more about the sights (what's the point of seeing them if you don't know what they are?). The tour lasted about 3hours and covered everything we wanted to see. At the conclusion we checked out some of the things we wanted to see up close and did a lot more walking! It was amazing to see some of the things that we've only heard about. After all the sight seeing, we headed to Hard Rock Cafe for more American food. It was an experience! Hard Rock is interesting in every city, and Buenos Aires was no exception. The place is awesome. You can tell it's totally a tourist attraction - the waiters seemed to be professional photographers! Still we enjoyed listening to some great music during a wonderful meal.

Sunday we planned on grabbing some souvenirs ... apparently we weren't informed that it was some sort of holiday. Nothing was open! We walked for blocks until we found a little strip near the mall with a few things. It was an interesting area, with little shops and people handing out flyers to get people into their stores (mostly leather stores). The sad part was the little kids playing toy accordions in the street. It was freezing and they were just playing away, hoping for some money.

Satisfied with our purchases, we headed back to the hotel to wait for our ride to the ferry. We arrived back in Montevideo around 7pm, with another country checked off the list.