We left Tobago for South America and Buenos Aires on the morning of Tuesday 15th March. We flew American Airlines via Miami, I wouldn't recommend the airline. The first flight was several hours late meaning we had to be rebooked for the flight from Miami to Buenos Aires. Luckily there was another flight that night so we weren't stuck in Miami. However, despite the flight being long haul they charged for alcoholic drinks and there was a very small selection of films to watch. It was a bit of a comedown after our last international flight with BA.
Anyway, we eventually arrived at our hotel in Buenos Aires at lunchtime Wednesday. We decided to treat ourselves to a little bit of luxury to kick off our 6 months of backpacking and stayed in the Awwa Spa and Suites hotel in the Palermo district. It had the biggest bed I've ever seen, a small pool, sauna and gym in the basement and a breakfast buffet that included cakes! The room also had two electric hobs but no pans to cook with which we thought was a little odd. The wifi didn't work properly for the first day or so and the pool was closed for maintenance or cleaning on two occasions we wanted to use it. We also had to wait for the sauna to heat up when we wanted to use it as it wasn't turned on the whole time. But overall we had a pleasant stay and it was a good base for exploring the Palermo parks and Recoleta district.
Our first full day in Buenos Aires was St Patricks Day - a seemingly worldwide excuse to drink! Even here there are several 'Irish' pubs although an actual pint of draught Guinness proved hard to find. Bottles were the best option. We started the day with a guided tour of the Recoleta Cemetery, archetecturially the third best cemetery in the world. It's a maze of upper class tombs including many presidents and it is also the final resting place of Eva Peron whose body was eventually buried here after 2 decades of being moved around the world.
Another tomb belongs to Admiral William Brown, the Irish founder of the Argentine Navy. As it was St Patrick's Day there was a military ceremony to commemorate him. This included a mixture of Irish music and the Argentine national anthem played by a military band and lots of raising and lowering of Irish and Argentine flags.
Later we headed out to find an Irish pub to drink in and found many. We had a few drinks in one just out of the centre first and then moved to the 'Irish' pub district where thousands of people were crammed into and fenced off area in the street and there was no way to get into any pub. Eventually, the need for the toilet overcame the need for a drink and we headed back to the hotel.
On Friday we explored the gardens and parks of Palermo which are very picturesque and varied. Especially nice is the Japanese Gardens although not being allowed to sit on the grass meant we couldn't relax there as much as we wanted to. We did see probably the biggest Koi carp in the world though, they are monsters. The planetarium is also in the parks but is currently closed for refurbishments so we couldn't see a show. They are running events at the weekends where the public can use telescopes but we decided not to do this.
Saturday was the final day of the six nations tournament and having not been in a country that broadcasts rugby for 6 months we found a bar showing the games and stayed there all day! Disappointingly, the first game I saw England play in ages was a poor performance against Ireland but at least we won the tournament if not the grand slam.
Most shops in Buenos Aires are closed on Sundays but there is a huge street market in San Telmo selling pretty much everything from really nice art and handicrafts to mass produced souvenirs. It's probably on a similar scale to Portobello market in London but more varied stalls. It ends in a square that is packed with stalls and a small cleared area where free tango shows are performed throughout the day. A very pleasant way to spend a Sunday.
Monday we planned to leave BA in the evening on the overnight bus to Puerto Iguazu so we had the day to do more sightseeing. Turns out this was scuppered by almost everything in the city being closed on Mondays. All museums were shut and even the Rose Garden in the parks wasn't open. On one way past the zoo we saw a group of dogs tied up outside - maybe they were trying to get in! Dog walking seems to be quite a common job here. We saw many people with 20-30 dogs each in the parks.
We pootled around the city doing not very much until we needed to head to the bus station. We chose to travel by first class 'super cama' bus which means a fully flat bed, dinner and breakfast including wine and champagne/whisky, personal video screens with a choice of 3 channels including films in English. Even though it takes 16 hours to get to the falls it was a very pleasant journey. It's overnight so we saved on a night's accommodation and got two meals included and it was also half the price of flying. We also didn't have the hanging around at the airport that you get with flying. Shame there are no buses like these in Europe!
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