Arriving back in Buenos Aires was a little bittersweet, we had waved goodbye to the beautiful mountains of the Andes and the crisp mountain air, exchanging them for high rise buildings and sticky humidity; time too to say goodbye to the friends we had made in our trip around Patagonia as we all split up for different ongoing destinations. This was the start of the next part of our travels, going it alone for a few weeks.
We had yet another last night dinner, on the lovely Ash's recommendation - she didn't steer us wrong once in 2 weeks, the food and wine has been a real treat. We then moved out of the centre of the city with its noisy narrow streets and made for the suburban district of Palermo for a few days, an awesome area with wide tree lined streets, street art on every corner, and a real cafe culture. Thanks to Pete and Jo for our wedding gift of an upgraded hotel in Palermo; we found a real gem which was up there as one of the nicest hotels I have ever stayed in.
Rather than enjoying the weather and relaxing on our first day back in the city, we unfortunately spent the majority of the day trawling the streets in search of a new camera lens due to my clumsiness on the boat in the Beagle Channel. Buenos Aires has specialist shops all in similar areas, the challenge was to find 'camera street', no small feat as it turned out. We eventually found a tiny shop with hundreds of lenses, and walked out of there with the Sigma 18-250mm macro lens for a giddying multiple of the price that it would have been at home. That is a lesson I will likely not need to learn again - replacing things is possible, but we definitely take for granted how easily and cheaply we can source high end goods in the UK. All clouds have a silver lining though, the old lens is still usable for the time being, and we now have an extended zoom which I have no doubt will come in useful when we reach the Galápagos Islands in a few weeks :)
Coincidentally, two of our friends from the tour were staying just around the corner from our hotel, so we spent some more time with them over the next couple of days. This included me going out with the girls for dinner. Andy had decided not to bother that night, but changed his mind fairly rapidly when I showed him a picture of the amazing burger I had found... There was an article in the window claiming that this was one of the best burgers in the world. On seeing that when I got home, Andy went out and got himself one too... He is not known for being able to resist a burger (To the extent that he has already booked our tickets for the Burger Challenge Final in London for the day after we get home!).
We bit the bullet on the next day and boarded the hop on hop off bus to tour around the city and see the sights. Given the last time I ventured into one of these I ended up in A&E from falling down the stairs we were a little nervous of a repeat performance but I'm pleased to report that this passed without incident! The city is so big, with the areas that we wanted to visit so far apart, that the bus seemed the best option.
We went into the Recoleta Cemetery, a 14 acre site filled with a staggering 4,691 vaults, in the centre of the city. Many of the tombs are immaculate, with intricate carving and varying styles; many more have fallen into a state of disrepair, with windows smashed, or skylights broken, showering dust and debris onto the coffins inside. We saw several where the plants in the cemetery had grown through the skylights/doors, making them look desolate and forgotten. We followed the well trodden path to the Familia Duarte tomb, final resting place of Eva Peron, and took the obligatory pictures. Although this tomb is beautiful, and naturally better cared for than most others as the 'main attraction', there are others which are far grander and more imposing. Evita is still renowned in Argentine culture, she is considered an icon.
From the Recoleta the next highlight of the tour was La Boca, colourful area a little out of town, famed for its brightly coloured buildings, street tango, and La Bombonera, the home of the Boca Juniors football team. The stadium didn't quite make UK Premiere league standards...
We wandered these streets for an hour or so, marvelling at the colours, the slightly odd tree decorations which seem to be prevalent in Buenos Aires, and absorbing the lively atmosphere. Andy was particularly impressed (or not) with the Maradonna impersonator who was wandering around muttering 'Diego, Diego).
We enjoyed one final 'last night' dinner with our friends from Patagonia on our last night in Buenos Aires, this involved the six of us digging in to a combined total of around 2.4kg of meat (mostly steak), with the consensus being that this was far and away the best steak we had ever tasted.
The giant knife wasn't really needed - steak was like butter!
Following it up with Crepes con Dulce de Leche (I'm an addict), and the bill being delivered with a lollipop tree for us to help ourselves, we then set out into the night to experience some late night drinking Palermo style. The upshot of this was that Andy and I made it back to the hotel at about 4.30am, with a 7.30am taxi booked to take us to the airport to depart for Santiago. Not one of our finest moments, to say we were a bit dusty (still drunk) was an understatement. The lovely Tarelle dragged herself out of bed from down the road and came to wave us off. My lull note that Andy has looked better...
One thing we definitely learned from that experience, is that travelling when hungover on 2 hours sleep is not advise able! When will we learn...
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