Week in BA with Chris´fam
Trip Start
Feb 23, 2008
1
33
43
Trip End
Jul 04, 2008
Buenos Aires,
Argentina
Friday, May 30, 2008
Most of the trip involved waking up, making coffee, emailing, etc. Then we would walk around for a while, stop for a great lunch with a glass or two of wine, then take the subway home for siesta time. On the walk from the subway to the condo we would stop a grocery store with the beer Nazi (a sales clerk at the store who refused to give us our deposit back for our beer bottles and would not answer any questions about it!). Eventually we found a grocery store with a nicer clerk to help us with all of our siesta needs (aka alcohol!) Siestas included: more emailing, calling people on skype, drinking (wine, beer, or homemade medio y medio
on the porch of the condo
. Steve got really good at making it!), playing hearts or spades, and napping. Siestas lasted until dinner which is also late here. The dinners we had were amazing! Some of the highlights of the trip include:
Dinner at Las Caberas-During the middle of our order the waiter stopped us and told us that is enough food! I think he meant I cannot fit anymore food on the table! We ordered a huge meat and cheese platter for an appetizer (definitely not needed) and 3 meat entrees. The entrees come with about 20 little side dishes each. It was so fun to try everything. And they gave us a free glass of champagne.
Sunday afternoon at San Telmo-On Sunday the streets are set up with craft markets. We had lunch outside with the pigeons showing no fear of landing on our table or chairs. After walking through San Telmo we took a cab to La Boca (apparently it is not safe to walk there). La Boca is a neighborhood full of colorful houses and small streets. The story goes that the people were so poor they would just paint their house with whatever paint was available. But now they paint their houses rainbow colored to attract tourists, and it worked! It looks very quaint. Plus we saw the funniest dog there
streets of San Telmo
. He had on jeans, a baseball cap, a soccor jersey, keys hanging from his jeans, and a wallet in his back pocket! The stray dogs were barking like crazy at him!Kelly eats sushi!-We talked Kelly who insisted she hates sushi to come to eat dinner at a sushi joint. She tried the rolls, then the sushi, loving both. She even said she liked it better than the chicken dish she ordered. Kelly really branched out on this trip with food. success!
Recoleta district-great area to walk around. Lots of shops and restaurants, definitely upper class. We also went to the Recoleta cemetary where we visited Eva Peron's tomb. The cemetery was small streets lined with the tombs that looked like small, but elaborate, houses. Some of the tombs were bigger than my apartment.
Coffee and Tango at Cafe Tortoni-a very old, very grand coffee shop. The waiters are dressed in tuxes and the decor is a lot of brass and pillars. You feel very elegant drinking your cafe cortado and medialunas (small croissants that are very popular for breakfast). One night we went to a tango show in a room in the basement. It is a small stage with a band set up on one side
colorful buildings in La Boca BA
. The violinist was the main attraction in the band. The tango show started out a little strange with a gangster/prostitute theme with very little dancing. Eventually the show picked up with tango dances. A part I really enjoyed was the two brothers swinging glowing balls to make a percussion instrument. It looked really hard to control, but they did a great job and produced cool music.Riding the A train-a very old wooden subway train that will soon be extinct. When on train breaks the replace it with a newer model. The conductor was even trying to get me to drive the train. I wanted to do something except he explained everything to me in Spanish so fast I was afraid to touch anything!
Dinner at Las Lilas- A restaurant in Puerto Madero that is famous for its steak. They actually have their own ranch where raise their own cows. I was really impressed how good everyones steak was, including lomo (which is a filet mignon cut), rib eye, and something called baby beef. Definitely the best steak we had. I hear that most locals do not consider Las Lilas the best steak, but I think that is because it is more expensive than other restaurants in BA. It is also pretty touristy, but it is for good reason-the food and the service are top notch. The cubiertos here were $7 a person
Drinking beers in La Boca (Buenos Aires)
! I mean the knife was nice but . . .As soon as we arrived in Argentina we noticed people trying to rip us off more often. Mostly charging us the wrong prices on the bill, totaling the bills wrong, or giving us the wrong change. It happened a couple times while Steve and Kelly were here. The most annoying was the subway attendant trying to rip us off 50 pesos-saying he already gave it to us. Fortunately Chris was on the ball to watch out for this and insisted on our money, until he gave in.
There were many catch phrases we kept repeating throughout the weekend, but one of Chris and Kelly's favorites was the McFly laugh from Back to the Future. Here is the link for your listening pleasure.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9wy4wq_lTbc
