Day 200 - Buenos Aires

  Buenos Aires, Argentina
Thursday, March 20, 2008

TODAY IS DAY TWO HUNDRED OF OUR TRAVELS, WOOOOOOH !!!!!!!

Sorry ;)

Top of our list of things to do was getting our haircut, so after brekkie we got the subway to the place recommended by the girl behind the front desk.

It proved to be exactly what Katie wanted and exactly what I feared (poncey & very pricey), so I left my dear wife in their capable hands and found somewhere where I didn't have to sell my kidneys to be able to afford getting my hair cut.

I was in & out in 30 minutes and headed back to the local subway station, where a few dog walkers where hanging out, who seemed to be walking about 15 dogs each?!



From the subway I headed back to the hostel via the famous obelisk, which is situated right in the middle of the widest road that I've ever seen in a city, I think there were about 8 lanes in each direction? Cuh-rayzee.



After that I cut through the centre of town, which has some beautiful modern architecture...



...and then walked the 15 blocks up the pedestrian street ('Florida') which took ages, but it was a nice day so I couldn't really complain.

 

This street gets pretty packed but it's probably the closest we've come to a busy London street since we left there in September!



My destination was the "Tangol" tour office, where I'd learnt was one of the best places to book tickets to the Boca v Colon Sante Fe game on Sunday. 

I had a bit of a shock when we got to the price, because the tickets were unfeasibly expensive (50 quid each!) but all the books say that you need to book an organised tour to watch La Boca because apparently it's a pretty dangerous place to watch football by yourself.

They wouldn't even charge you £50 at Old Trafford or Stamford Bridge, so I knew it was a rip-off, but at least it included collection & drop-off from/to our hostel & we knew we'd be safe.

We asked the hostel what ticket agency they recommended before we left this morning and they suggested a package which involved standing rather than sitting in the stadium.

I really fancied this (those were the days etc) but Katie would rather pickle her head in acid than stand and watch football, so I had to look for somewhere (more expensive) that offered seating

"Tangol" ticked those boxes, but the price really is extorionate considering all they do is arrange a bus and buy you tickets at the top of the stadium behind the goal, which are probably about 10 quid each, MAX... oh well, hopefully it will be worth it.

I then went back to wait for Katie at the hostel and started to get worried when she still wasn't home an hour later.

Just as I was about to call the hairdressers with my basic Spanish she showed up, so we contacted our friend Olly from the Torres del Paine trek, to make plans for some drinks & food tonight.

We relaxed for an hour or so before heading out to meet Olly at a cool bar called Radioset, in Puerto Madero, the recently converted docklands area of the city.



We had a couple of pints waiting for Olly, plus a couple of cheeky cocktails... and then had a few more when he arrived, just to be sociable! ;)

It was here that I saw some Copa Libertadores highlights from that night's games and was HORRIFIED to see my favourite Argentinian player Riquelme limp out of the Boca game!!!

He was one of the main reason I'd forked out £100 for us to see Boca play rather than River Plate, so I would be absolutely GUTTED if he was injured and missed the game...



After a few more drinks we got hungry and headed to a local all-you-can-eat place that the hostel & guidebooks recommended, only to find a MASSIVE queue waiting OUTSIDE the restaurant!

It looked fantastic so we made a reservation for an hour's time and headed back to the bar district for a few more drinks!

We crossed a bridge which gave us good views of this new docklands area, which looked expensive but really nice...





We found a really nice wine bar, where we allowed the waiter to order us a nice Malbec, which turned out to be one of the best wines we've had since leaving London.

As the locals say, "delicioso!" ;)



When we got back to the restaurant we were seated right away and while Olly & I got stuck into the barbecued meats, Katie was happy that the veggie (i.e. salad!) options were pretty good too.

The cost included a bottle of wine EACH, so by the time we'd finished we were all rather tiddled, to say the least.

At least by this time the queue outside had disappeared, but it was getting late even by local standards!



We fancied a few more drinks somewhere, so Olly recommended a club up in Palermo called Club 69.

It sounded a bit dodgy but he said that apparently tonight was "dwarf night", with vertically-challenged individuals on the door, behind the bar and generally freaking you out all over the place. Being a bit drunk this sounded AMAZING, so we jumped in a taxi and sped off into the hills.

Naturally when we got out the taxi it was just a normal club, without a dwarf in sight, so we paid our entry and got some drinks in.

In a lot of places in Argentina they ask you to pay for goods at a 'cashier' and then take a receipt to the people serving you, rather than giving the servers the money. It's all a bit weird and can get a bit painful. Presumably they don't trust the people serving the food & drink to handle money?

Still, it didn't stop us getting stuck in and we were soon enjoying some more beers (served in a can?), a few tequilas (one of which was particularly disgusting and had us all retching!)...



... but worst of all, they managed to interpret my order of "2 beers and a vodka coke please" as "3 of the worst drinks that you could ever make please" or maybe ever "do your worst, you losers!"

We still have no idea what the hell it was, it was like paint stripper mixed with petrol and filtered through a used baby's nappy. I kid you not.

Katie was certainly very popular with the local menfolk (all the girls here have dark hair) and one of them was able to identify our foul drinks as a local "speciality".

I literally couldn't do any more than sip the tiniest of mouthfulls each time; it was without doubt the worst drink that I've ever had in my life.

It was so rank that at one point I was sick in my mouth (nice), before making my way to the gents and cleaning out my mouth!



Terrified to order any more weird drinks we had another quick dance and left the club at about 5am, when people were still queueing round the block to get in, amazing...

The taxi home was fun & games as neither of us could remember the address of our hostel (!), but eventually we got there and collapsed on the bed, not looking forward to the 11am checkout as we were bound to have hangovers! 


Lots of love,


Al & Katie xx