Buenos Aires
ARGENTINA
And Then There Were Three...
By LYNDI
Sunday, November 7, 2010
If there is anything my two years as a tour leader has taught me – it is that Buenos Aires ranks right up there with Gotham City when it comes to crime. Unfortunately, Buenos Aires doesn’t have a winged superhero to thwart the bad guys. That I know of.
It’s a shame, really, because the city boasts some of the best nightlife on the continent, some of the nicest cultural districts and legendary football clubs, and you have to watch your back every single place you go. And their trick is nearly always the same: someone sprays you with a substance – mustard, mayonnaise and ketchup being the favorites – and then a new “friend” comes by to help clean you off and in the meantime, cleans you out.
I always warned my passengers about this timeless trick, and so one guy wandered into the famous La Boca district with only what he needed for the day. A camera, a little bit of cash and a credit card in a wallet with the wallet chained to his belt. And sure enough, he arrives in La Boca and someone threw mud at his back. He knew what to expect so when an older lady asked if she could help clean him off he told her to get away, don’t touch him, etc., and she obliged. Later when he went to pay for something in a different part of town, he pulled out his wallet only to find that it was completely empty. Someone had gotten into his wallet, taken everything out and put it back without him noticing. Seeing as how this is quite the accomplishment, my passenger reluctantly admitted they probably earned that little bit of cash he was carrying.
And so Aaron and I arrive into Buenos Aires via the Retiro bus station. We had walked outside in the beautiful spring day for all of probably 10 seconds before we hear “My friend! My friend! Let me help you!”. Aaron was walking behind me and felt behind him on his bag and found his hand covered in a gooey white substance. We don’t like to think of what it might have been. Aaron’s new “friend” tried grabbing his arm and offering assistance and Aaron had to forcefully shrug him off and we picked up our pace. 10 seconds! Those thieves don’t mess around! Buenos Aires certainly lived up to its reputation as the most dangerous city for tourists in our book.
Luckily, that was our only run-in with any sort of scam – though we were on alert from thereon out. We arrived at our hostel San Granado in the San Telmo district easily enough. We arrived on a Sunday so as we approached our hostel we had to wade through hoards of people shopping in a popular street market. But as soon as we put our stuff in the hostel, we joined the hoard and walked up and down the streets enjoying all sorts of antiques, crafts, food and live music. We couldn’t waste too much time though, because we had reservations at one of Buenos Aires’ most legendary restaurants – La Cabrera.
Aaron and I were celebrating our 5 year anniversary of being together, and we couldn’t think of a better way to do it than with a bottle of nice Argentinean Malbec and a huge cut of Argentinean beef. At La Cabrera you have to reserve ahead of time. If you don’t – you’ll wait in line for hours. But they serve you sparkling wine while you wait, so it’s not all bad. Since it was our anniversary we went all out. Not only did we dress up as best our backpacking wardrobe could afford, but we ordered a bottle of Los Alamos Malbec to accompany our ginormous 600gm ribeye steak. It came out on a chopping block and was accompanied by about 10 different sides ranging from salad to mashed pumpkin, potato salad and different relishes. At the end of the night, our total with tip and the Argentinean table service charge came to about 200 pesos – or less than US$50. Buenos Aires was back in our good books!
All of Sunday had been absolutely sweltering in Buenos Aires – at our dinner reservations at 9pm we were sweating just sitting in place. So when Monday dawned dreary and rainy it was quite unexpected. Not wanting that to thwart our plans for the day, we took off to see the city in the rain. Without rain jackets. Or umbrellas. Bad idea.
Aaron had to look for good hiking boots since we were headed down to Patagonia and all he had was some old running shoes and I wanted to see the sights of the city. I started at the Casa Rosada – the famous balcony that Evita sang from in the Madonna movie – and walked down the main streets passing tango clubs, coffee shops and little restaurants. On the other end of the main street is the governmental palace – and on a wet, gray day, the aged, gray building doesn’t look so impressive. At this point I was pretty cold and pretty wet, so I decided I would treat myself to a nice lunch. And I had just the place in mind. If you’ve ever been to the U.S. you’ve probably heard of Chipotle – a burrito shop where you choose your own ingredients. And believe you me, nothing sounded better than an enormous, fresh burrito.
Buenos Aires has their own version called the California Burrito Company, so after asking around a bit I headed towards my burrito fix. Half an hour and an enormous rainstorm later I made it and had the best burrito – it was exactly what I wanted. Although at that point, I was so hungry and cold that they could have wrapped up dog food in a tortilla and I wouldn’t have noticed. The worst part about getting back to the hostel was crossing the stupid Avenida 11 de Julio – the world’s widest street. In the chilly, wet rain it took me 4 crosswalk signals to actually cross the 18 lanes of traffic. Absolutely miserable as you watch all the cars go by and splash you. Eventually I made it back to the hostel where I found Aaron soaking wet but a pair of Gortex boots richer.
Speaking of soaking wet, my brother arrived that day. Aaron and I were waiting for him at the hostel and around 8pm a dark, matted and thoroughly drenched brother walked through the front door. Apparently he’d gotten out at the wrong bus stop and had to wander through the dark streets in the rain. We fed him some food and some Argentinean wine, but he was dead to the world so we all crashed early that night.
The next day was much nicer, so once we roused Cal at noon we headed out to see the town. We hit up all the normal Buenos Aires sights and wore out our feet going from neighborhood to neighborhood to get the full experience. I was even able to drag the guys to a City Museum which is probably number one in my Top Ten Worst Museum Experiences. You’d think a City Museum in one of Latin America’s greatest cities would be impressive right? Nope. It was just one big room with a bunch of doors. Boooooring.
After that disaster, I knew I wouldn’t be able to talk them into any future museums so we split ways. Aaron and Cal headed to the zoo and I went to the Anthropology Museum and the “Manzana de las Luces” tour that takes you to the city’s underground tunnels. Knowing that we would return to Buenos Aires at the end of our trip in late December, we only spent a few days exploring the streets. We had overnight bus tickets to Mendoza that night so we packed up and left our Gotham City for our Wine Mecca.
