Buenos Aires

We arrived on time in Buenos Aires and all of our luggage did to!! We left the arrivals area to find our driver. Again, no problem! Andrea, the bilingual guide was there to meet us and take us to our car.There was not a lot for her to do as we were in a bit of a brainfog, but we will get to see her again tomorrow when we go to an Estancia. Traffic was good and we were at our hotel within a half hour. We are staying at the Savoy Golden Tulip or Golden Tulip Savoy. The room is great, plenty of space for us and wonder of wonders- in room WIFI. The room was ready, so we were able to check in at 9:30 AM. We took a short nap before we headed out for our City Tour.

Since we had decided not to bring our umbrellas, it decided to rain pretty hard at the first place we stopped! Our guide, Lucia, was a wealth of historical information and we saw the pink palace, the Camenita, the Recoleta, and several different parts of the city. Buenos Aires reminded my partly of a European city- lots of big apartment blocks, main streets filled with shops. It also reminded me of Mexico- the poorer parts of town are just kind of cobbled together in a hodge podge way.

Two interesting stops were the Camenita, a colorful area where artists hang out and the Recoleta, a graveyard. The Camenita is interesting because the tradition of the houses being colorful comes from when the area was a port area. The people would paint their houses with the left over paint from painting the ships. The Recoleta was a city of the dead. It is filled with crypts and vaults and cats! Many of the crypts you could peek into and it was very interesting. Some were well cared for, some looked like they had not seen a human hand in years, make that generations.

The next day we headed out of town to an Estancia. The Estancias are working ranches. Many of them are open now for 'Agriturisme.' The one that we went to was named for a local tree, the ombu. When we arrived we were given some empenadas and water (tea or coffee if we had wanted). Then we walked around the estancia for a bit.

Linnea immediately went to the horses and tried to make friends. For the moment they were rebuffing her attempts! Then we went on a horseback ride around the ranch. Those who did not want to ride went on a carriage instead. It was beautiful and green. The ranch dogs were running along with us and it was quite fun to watch them. Off in the distance we spotted a flamingo flying by! I did not realize that there were flamingos here! The area is a birder's paradise! We also saw a cute little brown owl and a flock of parrots.

After the ride, we walked around some more. We enjoyed the flowers around the pond and looked for turtles, no luck on the turtles! Then it was off to the Asado, or bbq! They had put out some tables under the trees and we were served many different types of meat from the ranch. We also had rice and salad and a yummy ice cream cake with berry sauce! (we may not need dinner tonight!) To top it off there was a lovely Argentinian Malbec wine. The gauchos from the ranch sang to us and also demonstrated some 'horse whispering'. They would get the horses to lie down and then roll them on their backs, definitely not a natural position for the horses!!

After all the good food and wine, I was ready for a nap and managed to sleep most of the way backon our return. Traffic was much heavier, it seemed that all of Buenos Aires was out to enjoy the lovely day. It is a bit different here, I saw groups of bicyclists riding on the freeway. Near the football stadium, people were walking along the side of the freeway. On the freeway, the lines seem to be more of a suggestion than a rule. People kind of drift from one place to another!