Buenos Aires - Home of Tango, Soccer Passion, & Good Food

Buenos Aires, the huge, passionate, historic port city was the final leg of our 4 month long adventure. We decided to save time and bought a plane ticket from el Calafate in the south directly to the city.

Being in such a large urban area (over 13 million in metro area) was a stark contrast from our previous weeks in the wilds of Patagonia. Luckily, one of our new friends, Rolando, who we met on the Inca Trail in Peru, insisted that we send him our flight info so that he could pick us up at the airport in his home city.

Rolando Lopez and his wife Alicia basically adopted us during our week long stay in the city, and they were amazingly gracious and generous hosts. First, they found us an affordable hotel in Montserrat, a good neighborhood near the center of the city. As you'll see in the photos and videos, they also took us to all sorts of fun locations around the city. Knowing locals who could help us explore the city was priceless. Our trip ended in a spectacular fashion in the bustling city on the Rio de la Plata (River of Silver). A special, heartfelt thank you to Rolando and Alicia.

Here's a view of the famous Obelisco monumeent ont the very busy street - 9 de Julio. Our hotel was very near this area.

There are many wonderful areas of the city. Our first day we visited a district that has been totally renovated in the last decade and a half with expensive hotels, multinational companies and apartments for the rich and famous. Connecting the area to the downtown area is a famous bridge that models tango dancers -- imagine the man - the part in the air angled to the right, dipping the woman down (the actual bridge) and holding here (aka the cables of the bridge).

Rolando and Alicia took us to a restaurant in this area. The restaurant is named Siga la Vaca (Follow the Cow). It's an all you can eat (dangerous!) buffet with an enormous grill serving all sorts of outstanding Argentine meats from their country estancias (ranches). I don't think we were hungry for days after this outing.

Grill with meat choices at Siga la Vaca.

...and that was only one part of the grill!

As with many national capitals and especially in Latin America, protests of some form or fashion are the norm. Here was one such protest, apparently by the workers of the Province of Buenos Aires. They had their whole families there in the middle of a city street, and large drums were beat continuously for hours. I guess if the people in charge didn't cave in, at least they'd be very annoyed by the pounding all day.

These were the riot police between the protestors and the office building of the Province of Buenos Aires. Chad wanted to ask one of them if he could pose with his shield and helmet, but Kari didn't like the idea. Probably smart.

The Plaza de Mayo is the famous square in front of the Casa Rosada (Pink House) government palace. Hundreds of pictures of people killed in Argentina's "Dirty War" were posted in remembrance. The Dirty War was a period of time when the dictatorial, military government from 1976 - 1983 abducted and killed ("disappeared") as many as 30,000 of its own citizens. Many of the disappeared were left-wing guerillas or their sympathizers, but many were also people who didn't approve of the policies of the military regime.

While we were in town, court cases were being pursued against some of the government officials involved in the disappearings, and many Argentines marched in the streets, went on hunger strikes, and participated in other forms of public demonstrations to express their feelings about the Dirty War and its aftermath.

Here's Casa Rosada, the executive palace of the government.

Here's a picture at dusk of the building where Argentina's congress meets. This building is on the other end of a wide avenue which leads to the Casa Rosada. It reminded us a little bit of Washington DC and the mall.

Our first Friday in town was National Tango Day. That night we watched a tango concert in front of the Casa Rosada. Tango is a style of music and dance originated in Buenos Aires but now famous worldwide. You might remember it in the scene with Al Pacino in the movie, Scent of a Woman. Interestingly enough the music and dance originated in the brothels of the immigrant areas of town. After many years it gained more popularity with the elite class, and then spread around the world. I asked our host Rolando if he knew how to dance tango, and he told us that it was more of a tourist attraction. According to him, most of the normal Porteños, as residents of Buenos Aires are known, don't dance the tango or listen to it on a regular basis.

The video below will give you a flavor of the sound of tango from our concert:

Tango Music - Buenos Aires from Chad Carson on Vimeo.

Kari captured this beautiful sunset looking back over palm trees, a fountain, statues, and a clock tower.

One of the most anticipated parts of visiting Argentina and South America as a whole was going to a fútbol (soccer) game. We were lucky to get to Argentina when we did because it was the last weekend of soccer games for the club teams throughout the country. Rolando invited us to a game of his club team, Argentina Juniors, at the stadium that was right down the street from his house. The stadium is named after Diego Maradona (the Pele of Argentina) since that's where he started his career.

Rolando gave Chad a team jersey so he'd fit in at the game.

The game wasn't too crowded because it was the last game, and the final standings had already been announced.

Even though it wasn't a highly attended game, the crowd that was there was definitely riled up. They were shouting, cheering and beating drums throughout the whole game. They also threw toilet paper and confetti all over the field.

Argentine Soccer Game - Argentina Juniors from Chad Carson on Vimeo.

Argentina Juniors won the game 5 to 1 and finished #5 in the nation.

After the game Rolando and Alicia invited us to their house for dinner of homemade empanadas and a special bottle of wine that Rolando told us he'd been saving for important guests. We were very flattered and enjoyed the delicious dinner.

The next day Rolando and Alicia invited us to a street festival called Feria de Mataderos. It was kind of like a county fair... there was lots of food, street vendors with local crafts, dancing and

gauchos (cowboys).

Here's a picture of the grill (parrilla) with LOTS of meat... sausage (salchicha), ribs (asado) and steak (vacio).

We also ate tamales and humitas, which are like tamales but with creamed corn instead of meat inside the corn husk.

Here's a picture of a gaucho (cowboy). There was a competition similar to jausting later that evening.

We also got to see some traditional Argentine dances. Here's a short video:

Traditional Argentine Dancing from Chad Carson on Vimeo.

Rolando and Alicia were such gracious hosts. They wanted to show us different areas of Buenos Aires that the average tourist wouldn't get to see. I don't think we missed out on anything! On Monday, they took us to a town called Tigre, about an hour outside of the city. It's a great place for a relaxing day trip from Buenos Aires. We took a catamaran tour of the river.

Here's us on the boat:

There were lots of beautiful and interesting sights. There were lots of houses along the river that reminded us of the lakehouses in South Carolina.

We also saw a tugboat graveyard.

We also saw a weekend getaway house of a previous president- notice the bulletproofing all around the house!

You could see Buenos Aires on the horizon:

We love ice cream and any good excursion isn't complete without a tasty cone. Kari had the most unforgetable scoop of her lifetime... a foot high strawberry cone dipped in chocolate!

On our last full day in Buenos Aires, Rolando and Alicia invited us to their house for a proper asado (as cook-outs are known).

We learned that friends and neighbors have regular asados and take turns hosting it, and every asador (grill master) claims to be the best.

Here's the assistant:

And here with the master:

We had LOTS of food. We started off with a piqueo (appetizer) of cheese, olives, chips, etc. Then we had a choripan (saugage) sandwich. Then asado (ribs) - YUM!. Then morcilla (blood sausage), which was not as bad as we feared since we first spotted it in Spain (but not tasty enough to eat ever again).

After the huge and delicious meal they took us for a drive around town to see a nearby park, to walk in the commercial district, and to eat an ice cream cone before they took us to the airport. In the mall, we met up with a friend from back home... Papa Noel. He wished us a happy holiday, which was a great sendoff as we headed home for the holidays.

Papa Noel in Buenos Aires from Chad Carson on Vimeo.

With that, our four month journey drew to a close.

We hope you've enjoyed following our travels with us. Now that we're headed stateside we look forward to catching up and to hearing from you!

We wish you all a FELIZ NAVIDAD (Merry Christmas) and a very Happy and Prosperous New Year!!!