Buenos Aires and Uruguay

We next made the drive across the plains of eastern Argentina to Buenos Aires. It was a long trek, but an interesting landscape. Spent one night behind a gas station in a small town, and arrived in Buenos Aires on December 14th. Found a nice AirBnB and had a couple days to explore the city before Sheri was to fly back home.

Buenos Aires is a beautiful, vibrant city. It is known as the Paris of South America for its beautiful architecture, wide boulevards, big city parks, and many statues. It is a unique blend of Latin American and European influences. It is a diverse city comprised of immigrants from around the world, especially from Italy and Spain. The Spanish spoken there has a distinct intonation that sounds like an Italian accent (which makes it difficult to understand relative to the Spanish to which I am accustomed). I must say that we thoroughly, and somewhat surprisingly, enjoyed the rich culture of the city.

One of the first things we did after arriving is go to a tango show. It is some impressive, energetic, and sensual dancing. Very entertaining. We spent our first full day in the city taking in many of the sites and neighborhoods. Our AirBnB was in the very nice Palermo nieghborhood with many restaurants, shops, and parks. It was Sunday, so we headed to the street market in the neigborhood of San Telmo, where we enjoyed watching people and I bought Zach a present of a fork and knife carved from an antler (for taking to the many barbecues hosted by them and their friends). Next we headed to Plaza de Mayo, the central hub of the city and the location of the presidential palace, Casa Rosada. We visited the Museo de Bicentertario behind the Casa Rosada, where we learned about Argentinia's proud history - including about Juan and Eva Perón. Also next to the plaza is the Buenos Aires Metropolitan Cathedral where Pope Francis was a bishop before becoming pope. There was an Asian cultural festival happening nearby, including some amazing Japanese drumming. That evening we went out to a delicious asado meal at a restaurant called Madre Rojas. Argentines love their meat!

The next day was mostly taken up with a wonderful bicycle tour to see street art in the neighborhoods south of city center. It was quite fun and interesting. One of our stops was in the colorful, working-class neighborhood of La Boca. La Boca is famous for the world-renowned football club, Boca Juniors. All around the neighborhood are murals of the famous footballers that played for Boca Juniors, including one of the best players in the sport, Diego Maradona. At the end of the tour, we got to see some street artists at work on some large murals, and had the opportunity to do some of our own street art with spray paint and stencils.

Returning to our AirBnB, we spent the rest of the day packing for Sheri to head home for the winter. On December 16th, I took Sheri to the airport for her flight home. The next day I headed to Uruguay to a campground where I could get organized to fly home myself and leave the truck until May when we plan to return. The campground, Posada Casavieja, is very nice, located in the country about 15 km east of the town of Colonia del Sacramento. It is owned by a wonderful expat couple from Switzerland, Susan and Ruedi. My last night there I enjoyed an excellent meal with them with some very good Uruguayan wine.

I spent most of my time getting organized to head home for the winter, but I did have one afternoon to go into town. Colonia del Sacramento is a small town (about 30,000 inhabitants) on the Rio de la Plata across from Buenos Aires. It is one of the earliest settlements in Uruguay, founded in 1680. For much of its history, it went back and forth between Portugal and Spain until Uruguayan independence in 1828. Its historic quarter is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Very nice.

After a few days in Uruguay, I took the ferry back to Buenos Aires and got a downtown hotel room for two nights. That gave me a free day to further explore some of the city. A must-see in Buenos Aires is the Recoleta Cemetery. The cemetery, established in 1822, contains 4,691 above-ground vaults with elaborate marbled mausoleums decorated with statues in a diversity of styles. It contains the graves of many of Argentina's most notable historical figures including presidents, military commanders, Nobel Prize winners, literary figures, and Eva Peron.

Later in the afternoon I visited the Museum of Latin American Art. Although the museum was small, there were some nice paintings.

December 23rd - home for Christmas, family, and hopefully a lot of skiing.