Bourgeois Bohemian

Temporarily at least, I have been reaquinted with my more usual self. Temporarily at least I actually feel like I´m on holiday.

This change began last Friday when, in saying farewell to my backpacking mindset, I caught a 6.30AM bus to the international airport on the outskirts of Buenos Aires. For around twenty pence this made complete sense although it did take in excess of two hours and was by far the most laboured way of getting there. This mattered little though as when I did eventually arrive, so too did my South African friend Kobus, having made the slightly longer trip from Manchester via Paris.

Handshakes and hugs out of the way, I joined Kobus in the almost alien surroundings of a taxi and this took us back into the city and the sophisticated surroundings of the Tribeca Hotel. After opening all my correspondance and packages from back home, we took to the streets in search of food and a new camera for the visitor, having left his in the previously mentioned taxi.

Both objectives were met so to celebrate we aimed our feet in the direction of Puerto Madero, the Salford Quays of the city. Here the rich people hang out and with Kobus by my side, we blended in hansomely and to rubber stamp our convictions, ordered a bottle of champagne and veal-stuffed olives to kick things off. With both the chatter and alcohol flowing freely, we kept the momentum going by ordering another two bottles of the peachy-looking champagne. This caused a substantial amount of disbelief amongst the otherwise redundant waiters but we were paying so they kept pouring.

By early evening we´d been gripped by the chemicals hidden within this beautiful fluid and with our legs a touch wobbly, caught a cab back to the hotel. A little bit of sick gave relief to my confused insides and this enabled me to collapse on my bed and wave goodbye to my first day with my eager to please chum.

A shade subdued from the exertions of the previous night, a good buffet breakfast in the hotel restaurant soon shook us into life as did the prospect of a five hour drive to the coastal town of Pinamar. First we needed a car and this was waiting for us back at the airport. Or so we thought.

Despite having booked the car around five months ago, this clearly wasn´t enough in advance as when we got there, our car was nowhere to be seen. The rental company rep apologised and proceded to pace around the terminal for well over an hour before eventually, our Renault Logan 1.6 arrived.

With time against us, we through our bags in the boot and set about laughing in the face of the three hundred and fifty kilometres ahead of us.

By late afternoon, we had indeed laughed much and also successfully made it to the imposing Hotel Del Bosque in the centre of Pinamar.

We took a stroll around the town which was pleasant but also quite ghostly as it is spring in Argentina so as with most tourist towns, people at this time of year are quite scarce. In the evening we ate meat at a parrilla then hit a lively little bar for some beers and Kobus´ first taste of Fernet, a traditional spirit they like over here but one that Kobus´ expression seemed to disagree with.

Back at Del Bosque, we checked in at the hotel´s casino which was crammed full of locals and also housed mine and Kobus´ dreamy visions of scooping some vast amounts of cash. We were tempted but in the end thought it best not to risk wasting our (Kobus´) hard-earned cash. The cheaper alternative was pool and table tennis and this is what we pursued.

Sunday began with a run along the sun-drenched beach and Kobus´ wasted little time in sampling the waves the sea had to offer. We tried to refresh ourselves with a beer at a beach cafe but this went a little wrong as we ended up with a plate of squid rings. We still got the beer though and with a bowl of bread, it ended up being a fairly satisfying brunch.

Energised by the weather and our efforts, we tried our hand at a game of tennis back at the hotel and after a three-set sizzler, believed we deserved a well-earned break in the hotel´s pool, jacuzzi and sauna.

Eventually we made it to a parrilla in town for meat and beers before a fairly early night and much-welcomed sleep.

The weather on Monday was not so good but this did little to dampen the spirits. After a brief consultation at the local tourist office, we made a short trip to the nearby Valeria Del Mar, where we found a place to rent us a quad bike for a couple of hours.

Setting out through a neighbourhood in the forest, we soon found the deserted beach and powered on towards some funky looking dunes where we larked around like schoolboys for some considerable time. When we made it back to the HQ we noticed we´d punctured a tyre but the boss didn´t seem to hold us accountable so we made a quick exit nevertheless.

With the skies still reluctant to bring us happiness, we drove a few miles south to the town of Villa Gessell. Here we had food and a little walk towards the sea but with little to offer us, we said goodbye to the place.

Tennis again got the energy going as did a few beers in the jacuzzi. We enjoyed veal for tea and a bit of cinema back in our room.

Tuesday was a slow starter and after visiting some seaside towns up the coast, we returned to Pinamar and La Reina cafe for some excellent pasta dishes.

With enthusiasm as minimal as the sunshine, after pool and ping-pong, we eventually crumbled and decided upon beers in the jacuzzi. Some fourteen beers and numerous deep conversations later, we were back on track. Kevin Costner and Waterworld tidied things up before our weary legs and stomachs meant a quick trip to McDonald´s for a TripleMac.

We waved goodbye to Pinamar on Wednesday morning and in good time, we were back in Buenos Aires. Again though, the rental company let us down and it was a good couple of hours before we could leave the airport in search of our new accommodation.

By around 6PM we had arrived, once more by taxi, in Palermo and more specifically, BoBo Hotel. Luxurious and modern, this place to sleep promises to be both ¨bourgeois and bohemian¨ although the latter has yet to be truly discovered.

Initially we went in search of food at La Cabrera, Palermo´s number one venue for steak dinner but we didn´t fancy the two hour wait so we instead settled for a delicious Mexican down the road with some Mendoza wine to wash things down.

My energy is low right now and Kobus is waiting for a beer on our balcony so this last section must be brief.

We got things going this morning with an overwheliming breakfast in the hotel restaurant then caught the metro in the glorious sunshine to Plaza de Mayo. From here we made the long walk through the antique-filled streets of San Telmo and eventually onto La Boca. Although I visited here previously with Alex from Seatlle, I left plenty undiscovered in anticipation of this day.

Although a stadium and museum tour sounded interesting, the ¨Quick Visit¨option seemed the more favourable on arriving at Boca Juniors´La Bombonera. After a few pictures we left and took in the colours of the surrounding area.

Looking for an alternate way home, we took the route along the docks and after soon realising the area was a little rough, our pace quickened. This quickened further when a police car pulled over and told us to get the other side of a nearby road as the part we were embracing was dangerous.

We made it out in once piece and celebrated with a meat feast and Quilmes at a quaint restaurant. Rather than continue walking and catch the packed metro back, we hailed a cab instead in order to get back to Bobo for some air-con and relaxation.

Please note, any praise for the panoramic photos are not welcome as it is only Kobus´ camera that has this facility and from Monday, you won´t ever be seeing the like of these again.

And finally...

Apologies for formatting issues in this post and the numerous typos that are probably present. This computer is useless and I can´t spend another minute with it.

The waiting game

With a matter of hours to go before young Kobus joins me on these shores, my lazy time in Buenos Aires is almost at an end. Although for an adventurer this period has not been the most invigorating and for you the reader, maybe not the most interesting, it has nonetheless been profitable in terms of relaxation and unexpected pleasures.

The epitomy of my account outlined above occured last Saturday. After getting up somewhere close to midday, I met up with Alex, and Simon from Australia, and we found a dodgy looking parrilla where the meat and service defied our presumptuous concerns. We laboured back to Simon´s hostel where the best dessert we could find was a friendly bewteen Brazil and England. Unsurprisingly this didn´t quite reach the levels of the main course and there was a feeling of relief at hearing the final whistle.

By now it was late afternoon and for a second time (first being in Rosario if you´ve been paying attention), I said my goodbye to Alex who was heading back to Seattle and a strong slap in the face from the hand of reality.

After consuming you-know-what for tea, my day appeared to be heading for a fairly mundane conclusion but everything changed when a trip to the bathroom turned into a sensory blitzkreig. With my penny spent, I was suddenly standing face-to-face with a pair of guys; one showering happily while sipping a gin and tonic; the other standing beside him, draped in a towel and sporting a bizarre yet seductive combination of dyed black hair and a blonde handlebar moustache. Probably the first and last traveller I´ll meet from Chorley, I stood and chatted with him and his friend for a good five minutes while I marvelled at our crazy little cocoon of manhood and steam.

Eventually they got clothed in pursuit of a worthy dancefloor and audience, while I stayed at the hostel bar chatting with a funny and lightly bearded Norweigan.

Sunday got underway shortly after lunch with a trip to the San Telmo street market. Famed for it´s huge array of craft stalls, cafes and street performers, it was something even I, the lethargic budget traveller, had to go and check out. I walked a good ten blocks through a tangle of tourists and downed a cup of freshly squeezed orange juice to reward my efforts. The main attractions I came across were a foot-painter and a faceless man. With money-saving a key ingredient of my stay in Buenos Aires, I congratulated myself on leaving this trail of temptation with only the fruit juice leaving a trace of unrest in my pockets.





Another attraction synonymous with this city is football. The two big teams Boca Juniors and River Plate enjoy one of the fiercest rivalries in world football and when in Buenos Aires, watching a game is something you can´t afford to miss. Sadly for goingcaracas.blogspot.com, I missed the derby as it was played a few weeks ago but I did still get the chance to see River take on the cute and cuddly sounding Tucuman.

Being a fairly well travelled football fan, I was extremely reluctant to stump up thirty quid for an organised trip to this game which promised great seats and a ¨FULL stadium¨. After a quick look on the River website, I targeted the five pound tickets and a counter-organised trip. By departure time, we had an army of twelve and after a twenty pence metro journey, followed up by a thirty minute trek, we were inside the gates of El Monumental. If I was a feeling clever, I´d make some reference to it indeed being Monu-mental but I won´t.

Once inside the stadium it soon became apparent that we were in amongst the fanatics as our route through to the seats was met with a blockade of delerious fans singing, jumping and waving their hands about. This belief was clarified when I got a tap on my shoulder.



Though I couldn´t interpret all of what the man was saying, I did understand that his general point was that as tourists, we probably shouldn´t be where we were and that this might be the last time we saw our cameras and watches. With a smile and a wave, I left him behind and rejoined the group as we made our way up into the stands, close to but not completely amongst the nutters.

As I anticipated, the stadium was by no means ¨FULL¨ but being where we were, the atmosphere was sheer madness. Like in Brazil, the endless stream of songs and orchestral ensemble worthy of headlining Glastonbury, seriously put in the shade my memories of United´s Stretford End. It´s like comparing a playground squabble at school with the Iraq war.





Whether everyone was watching, I don´t know, but the game itself was a decent spectacle in it´s own right. River went one-nil down within five minutes and looked a beaten team until midway through the second half. After missing a whole host of chances, eventually they nicked one and with the crowd injecting them with further belief, they grabbed another couple to seal a much needed win.

Our group got broken up on the way home but my faction had a good spread at a local restaurant where we were joined by a local who was eying up one of the girls we were with in the stadium. My final memories of the day were beers on the roof terrace.

While most of those reading this blog will have endured the usual grind that Monday brings, my greatest struggle was trying to minimise the amount of naps I had throughout the day. In between a couple of solid sessions on my bunk, I managed to have a good browse in the shops on Florida Street and enjoy a lengthy chat about travel with a couple from Ireland.

I apologise once more, for Tuesday followed a similar path.

Where the day before there was sleep, on this day I wrote the odd letter and postcard. Also on my agenda was enquiring about volunteer work which so far has yielded little. An orphanage was high on my agenda but after looking into the costs, soon discovered that after a few weeks of working there, the kids would probably have more money than me.

Onto yesterday and another encounter with Che Guevara.



Having heard reports that a museum in his name existed here in BA, I hopped on the ninety six year old ¨Línea A¨ (South America´s oldest subway line) and ventured out. Ten stops along, I found the address I´d been quoted and there I found ¨Bagatella¨, a junk shop so full, you could barely get in. I knew I´d found the correct place however, as amongst the guitars, rubber masks and bike chains, were lots of traces of Che. After a short wait, I was introduced to Eladio, the founder of South America´s first Che Guevara museum. Unfortunately this wasn´t it.







Opened in the mid-nineties, Eladio ¨Toto¨Gonzalez Rodriguez´s museum was a shrine-cum-community centre, where he would teach about the life of Ernesto Guevara while also holding a range of activities from dance classes and music shows, to fundraising events for Cuba. Despite the hostility of the local council due to his affilitions with the communist state, he and his wife made it a success for six years until they could fund or run it no more. From then on, they aquired the shop that now stands today and within this, the traces of ¨Toto´s¨ greatest acheivement.



For over an hour, he spoke of his love for Che and the spirit he embodied. He welcomed all visitors to his shrine as he revealed ¨We all need each other.¨ To him, El Commandante was an example to society who fought above all else for equality among people and that in order for people to be better they should look at people not only like Guevara, but also figures such as Gandhi, Luther-King and Schweitzer.

For six years, Eladio and his community helped the stranded island of Cuba by sending three tonnes of aid a month and this would have continued until this day had it not been for the Argentine government´s intervention. In the end, he had seven tonnes of aid sitting around in his museum that he could not send but when a hurricane hit the Caribbean some years later, he saw this as a perfect opportunity to make use of his stock. On realising who he was and his ties with helping Cuba, the local authorities blocked his attempts to get the aid shipped over. Defiant, Eladio marched round Congresso Square in the city centre complete with loudspeakers and placard until someone paid him some attention. Eventually, he got to speak to a local minister who subsequently backed down and Eladio at last got his wish.

Before I left, he also shared with me the identities of who he calls the ¨Godfathers¨. By this term he was just referring to important visitors he´d had and as you may expect, one was Alberto Granado, the friend Che Guevara travelled round South America with. The other went by the name of ¨Pombo¨. This probably means little to you, but I tell you, it´s a coup, as he was one of only four who escaped from Bolivia in 1967 and was only 200m away from Che when he was captured and days later, executed.

On my way out, he told me I have good soil and that I just need to start sowing the seeds.

Armed with my leftist ideology, I made my way back into the centre and met up with an American called Jack, from which point we both went to attend a free thirty-minute Spanish class. It was free and it was Spanish so it was good.

Back at the hostel, I watched all the World Cup play-offs that were being televised and that took me through to late night beers and a viewing of Jarhead.

And so here I am. The remainder of my day will involve basic organisation activities ahead of Kobus´ arrival in the morning and then hopefully a good sleep so I´m ready for ten days of hardcore fun.

The wait is almost over...

No bueno

Having navigated my way safely through hazardous cities such as Rio and Sao Paulo, it was of some surprise to find that my first minor disaster of my trip was a self-inflicted one.

Waiting for me in San Antonio de Areco last Saturday, alongside the annual Dia de la Tradición festival was the discovery of my none to cheery finances. Although I feel Brazil on the whole had treated me well throughout the month of October, now I realised it was at a quite a cost. Issues with online banking had until this point prevented me from seeing that I´d been spending roughly three times more than what I´d planned for.

I´d been paying around £6 a night for most accomodations in Argentina so spending five days at the £18 a night Hostel Gaucho was not the remedy I was looking for. Swiftly I looked to stem this rapid loss of capital and when confirming my reservation with the propiertors, immediately reduced my stay to a couple of days.

Checked in and with a certain amount of composure restored I set about checking out the festivities that had drawn me here. Because of heavy rainfall over the previous days, the Saturday was to be a none event as the ground was still damp in places and this was deemed unsafe for the horses. With the sun shining brightly though, it offered me the chance to take a wander and get my bearings ahead of the next days main event.





Having grown tired of the grid layouts of Cordoba, Rosario and Posadas, I suppose it was only to be expetced that this farming town I´d hyped up so much was to also have the same street structure. So it did, but that is not where the fun was to be had. On the perimeter of the main block runs a tranquil little river and on the other side of this, the fields and buildings where the gaucho festival was being held. Even without any major events going on, there was plenty to do and see with craft stalls lining the riverfront, gauchos prowling the streets on horseback and giant cuts of meat being cooked over the equally expansive asados.

This kept me occupied into the early evening and as night fell, I crossed the river to check out the entertainment that had been promised. Eventually around a thousand people turned up to enjoy steak sandwiches, empanadas, beer and traditonal dancing. I joined a group of Americans who between them had a great selection of names. They were of no great significance on a relationship level but the names Maryweather and Fielding made me giggle inside and will remain there for some time.

By 11.30PM it had got pretty chilly so I headed back for some rest.

A buzz of excitement filled the streets on Sunday morning as everyone prepared for the day ahead. I left the hostel with another American, this time called Andrew (although he prefers ¨Drew¨) and we set up camp in the old town square to wait for the party to unravel.

Things kicked off with a display of dance and a band parade, capped off with a rousing rendition of the national anthem. Then the moment everyone had been waiting was upon us and for a solid two hours, we were treated to an unrivalled parade of macho men on horseback, some with slippers on, others just looking damn mean.





With my legs feeling heavy and my nose a little red, I had a brief break at the hostel before making my way over to the main park for the afternoon festivities. Me and Andrew had a mammoth steak sandwich before he went in pursuit of gaucho gifts, of which one was a knife with an osterich toe for the handle. ¨Ecstatic¨ doesn´t do his emotions justice.



We sat down on the grass and after a lenghty wait, were treated to a spectacular display of horsemanship as herds of them thundered around the ring, each group following their gaucho and his big bell.







By late afternoon we were hanging out with a mate drinking couple who ran one of the craft stalls and Drew was revelling in what became an impromptu Spanish lesson. This lasted around three hours at which point it was dark and I could barely stand.

Eventually food was on the cards so pizza between us and a local drunk was what we found. At around midnight I followed Drew in his search for a party that may still have been going on over at the park. It wasn´t but we did come across over three hundred bottles of Quilmes. In the midst of weighing up whether we should take some, we were rumbled by an old man we´d not seen, who was lying down on the grass behind us. Here ended the gaucho festival.

Since I´m paying for this internet access and until this point, my progress has been somewhat laboured, I´ll pick things up a little so you can get back to whatever you were doing.

Right, Monday and a return to something resembling normality.

I caught an early afternoon coach to Buenos Aires with a thirty two year old girl (lady?) called Kristina who was surprisingly pleasant despite coming from LA and loving the place. While she slept, possibly tired from my company, I planned what to do next. After much flicking through my guidebooks I settled on alleviating Chile from my travel plans in order to cut costs and also feel the warmth of Bolivia a little sooner. That will be at the begining of December however as with good friend Kobus joining me for ten days in Buenos Aires on the nineteenth of this month, I I will until this point be locked to the land on which I currently stand.

This rambling must stop.

By mid afternoon I had landed at Lime House Hostel where for five pounds a night, life is cheap and I am happy. Being slap bang next to Avenida 9 de Julio in the centre of the city, the location is excellent and as the sun set, I went for an amble around the local streets and plazas. Some lounging around at the hostel rounded things off before an inexpensive and welcomed sleep.



Tuesday was shared with Alex who I met up with again after hanging out with him in Cordoba and Rosario. As there was a subway strike, we were forced to make an hour-long walk to the La Boca district of the city, famous for its coloured buildings and home to Diego Maradona´s old club, Boca Juniors. Smaller than I´d imagined and slightly underwhelmed by the place, we got some pictures and returned to the centre. With an asado on the roof terrace at Alex´s hostel, my evening was taken care of, although the meat didn´t quite match up to what I´d enountered the previous night in gaucho country.





¨Five pesos Wednesday¨ centered around a visit to the Museum of Latin American Art and entry at the aforementioned cost. On display were some of the works of Andy Warhol which were appreciated to a decent degree but against the backdrop of my trip, will ultimately matter little. This time was spent with Alex and a jovial couple of Aussie blokes and during the day I picked up a cheap guide to Bolivia at a cozy little book shop which they´d been recommended. My evening consisted of steak once more and research into volunteer work as a means to saving money and helping civilisation.

Some people may take literacy offence to my repeated references to all the red meat I´m eating, however, I feel it is important in stressing my frequent consumption as I know it´s something you folks back home can´t afford to do and with Bolivia on the horizon, my time spent with this luxury is at a premium. Talking about food generally isn´t interesting but the being able to walk into a supermarket everyday and get half a kilo of steak for less than £1.50 is.

Yesterday was on the large very leisurely, with internet duties in the morning and an afternoon of walking and talking.

With no meat on the menu for lunch I instead went in search of some cultural nourishment. I found this at the Plaza de Mayo, where twenty three years after Argentinas Dirty War, the Mothers of Plaza de Mayo march around the square, as they do every Thrusday, as way of remembering their ¨lost¨children/relatives who disappeared during the military dictatorship of that time. Their logo which is a white shawl, is painted on the ground all around the plaza and while I was there, they also had a substantial range of branded merchandise which American culture-vultures were eager to snap up.







Afterwards I caught up with three Aussies I met in Rio and joined them for beers at their place, before a quick steak-break and onto an average burelsque show at a nearby bar.

With 6 six days until Kobus´arrival, I will continue to enjoy this lovely city, keep a low profile and make sure I don´t let my final moments in Argentina hurt me as much as those dreamy days in Brazil.

A grid reference

Last Tuesday, Cordoba was ticked off my list and by tomorrow morning, so too will it´s close neighbour Rosario.

I arrived in Argentina´s second city last Saturday at around noon, having made the brief forty kilometre bus ride over from Alta Gracia. Being the weekend there were markets aplenty and unluckily for me, the main one lead up a long and crowded street, all the way to my hostel. Weekend dithrerers are frustrating at the best of times but when you have no intention of shopping, the heat is in the mid thirties and you´re lugging around a fully laden military backpack, boy does the blood boil.

Fury aside I found my hostel with ease and after dumping my belongings and setting up with a room full of Irish travellers, I went for a recon mission around the centre. By the time I´d managed to get out the hostel it was siesta time and in Cordoba, they really do love to siesta. The only attractions that remained open were shopping malls and ice cream parlours so I headed for the former. There was not much to see but I did find the internet so I could discover which Cordoban football team was playing at home that weekend. The best on offer was a third division team and that immediately put to rest any plans of me seeing football in the city.

With little on offer, I cut short my sightseeing and returned to Baluch Backpackers where by early evening I´d had a couple of first stabs at the game of chess and was heading for possible catastrophe with drinking games on the roof terrace with a group of British and American guys. I managed to get off far lighter than some of the others and as 2PM arrived, our group departed for a nightclub on the city´s outskirts.

A fairly standard setup but for half of it being outdoors and by 5AM I and a couple of the Americans (Tad and Ruffin) headed for the exit and flagged a cab.

Sunday and I eventually made aquintance sometime after noon and as a cure for the nights exploits, went in search of Cordoba´s park in the south of the city. This was both uninspiring and uninteresting and after a brief break to write my diary and cool down, with my own sanity in mind, I performed a u-turn. Little consolation was found in seeing another former home of Che Guevara but you wouldn´t have known this unless you carried as much knowledge and literature as myself.



Finding food also proved difficult and the best I could conjure was a Big Mac.

Back at Baluch I chatted at length on the terrace with a Japanese girl who had been away from home for two years already and had no plans on returning any time soon. I followed this up by watching The Machinist starring Christian Bale and then it was onto more practise games of chess and finally more beers and poker where I once again was quite aggresive and paid the price.

More tired eyes were on display come Monday morning, only to be opened slightly wider by the appearance of a girl, who I found out over pastries, lived within a mile of me back in Didsbury. (I don´t mean to say there are pastries between where we live.)

Invigorated by this discovery and that of a Canadian girl in my room, myself, them and Alex from Seattle decided upon a walking tour of the city now things were open for the week. I picked up a bus ticket from the bus station, destination Rosario the following day and Alex did likewise. After a good half hour we landed at the Museum of Contemporary Art or something to that effect but being Cordoba, it was shut. As the conversation was good, it did little to dampen our spirits and our outing then consisted of more steps, pizza, beers and a visit to Argentina´s oldest cathedral.

I caught the end of Gladiator on our return to the hostel and post-credits, me and Alex went in pursuit of an evening meal. With most cafés shut with little explanation, the supermarket yelled at us, so we went inside and for £6 we managed to smuggle out half a kilo of steak, potato noisettes, peas and three litres of beer.

As three English boys had forgotten to polish off some of their steak and were leaving that night, they happily passed it on to us and we gleefully threw this half kilo in the pan along with ours. While we let technology take over, I shared a sweet maté with Alex which was consumed through his cow´s hoof gourd he´d bought earlier in the day. Forty minutes later, me, Alex and Norweigan Magnus were found destroying what we had in front of us and were soon full and brimming with pride.

Sarah from Didsbury then joined us at the dining table as did two bottles of Mendoza wine.

Tuesday landed along with a passing reunification with an Australian girl I´d met previously in Foz Do Iguacu. Time was not at hand so me and Alex said our goodbyes and got a taxi to the bus station. The six hours on the bus was relaxing and before we new it Argentina´s third city, Rosario, was cradling us.

A new city yes but different, not so much. Of the three cities I´ve passed through, including Posadas, all have virtually the same layout and naming structure. Generally, all the street names are the same and refer to important people, places and dates related to the country. In Rosario, as in Posadas, you´ll find Evra Peron, 3 de Febrero and 9 de Julio and in Cordoba, like here, you´ll find yourself walking down Bolivar, Entre Rios and 25 de Mayo. Likewise, all the cities seem to love a grid layout. Cordoba had the widest avenues whereas Rosario has smaller blocks and thus narrower roads. I hope you find it as fascinating as I find it annoying.



Having done some reading on the bus, we opted not to stay at Posada Juan Ignacio where I´d previously booked and isntead decided to try out La Casona Don Jaime. In the guidebook, this little venue promised a lot, with entertainment every night, ping-pong tournaments and a free welcome drink. In truth, it delivered very little and the the free Quilmes only came when I stressed this offer in my little book.

A South African couple recommended a buffet restaurant around the corner and we needed little time to consider this option for our evening meal. Nick from Australia tagged along and all three of us left content and barely able to walk.

On Wednesday morning I moved across to Juan Ignacio, purely on the basis that it had a pool.

According to the Lonely Planet guide, despite the city only having a bordering river, it does also have white sandy beaches. Inevitably me and Alex went in pursuit of this, especially with a blue sky hanging over us. On the way, we visited a huge memorial that we went up for some decent panoramic views and then tried to locate the bus outlined in the guide book. Here we were let down as we couldn´t find the elusive bus 153 and instead opted to take on the six kilometre journey to the beach on foot.






Walking along the river was fairly pleasant although the mirky brown water did raise questions as to what we would evevntually find. An hour and a half later we did find the sand but that´s all it was, as you couldn´t go in the water because it was unsafe.

An unexpected bonus was finding the football stadium of Rosario Central right behind the ´beach´although we couldn´t go inside as it was shut. The area around it was worth note however as everything from the pavements to lamp posts were painted in the clubs colours of blue and yellow.



Shattered and slightly underwhelmed, we caught the 153 back to town and went in search of more steak for tea. This in the end fell short of what we´d cooked up before but it still went down the same way and did it´s job.

Before sleep found us, we played cards and then Yatsy with a couple from Switzerland and a pair of friends from Holland.

Yesterday, I waved goodbye to Alex at the bus station and in return, he helped buy my next bus ticket with his far more developed Spanish. Before I travelled, I couldn´t have forseen spending more than five minutes with an American but this ´Jacob´s Crackers-dry´ young man dispelled some of my beliefs and our few days together enlightened me in many ways. His most notable contributions to my person were his teaching of chess and phrases I need to respond to at a grocery store.

With the tears dried, I caught a quick bus ride to the Che Guevara Plaza. Here in 2008 in his city of birth, a statue was erected and a plaza named in his honour. More significant than this is it´s location and timing of it´s unveiling. Very much on the outskirts of the city and created some thirty or so years after his death, the memorial in many ways reflects Argentina´s reluctance to embrace this global icon who to many did very little for the country in which he was born.



Political issues aside, the sculpture itself was cast from over seventy five thousand pieces of bronze, donated from people all over the world. Among these pieces are keys of houses abandoned by Argentines who fled the military dictatorship of the seventies.



From the plaza, I walked back through the centre and eventually returned to Juan Ignacio´s for a power nap and shower.

I joined up with the Dutch girls from the previous night, Peggy and Marjolijn, and set out to find a jazz festival that was on in the city for the whole month of November. We witnessed two events, neither of which could be described as anything close to ´jazz´.



The first was in a beautiful hall but this was juxtaposed with some very strange and out of sync dancing, performed by groups of students in tight black leggings and vests. They did also sing to some music being piped in but the visual horror show rendered this irrelevent.

After a pizza we were joined by a couple of Argentine cousins and with them we moved on to the next venue. This was in a bar and featured a girl swinging light sticks, a group of men talking on a terrace and a man portraying someone that seemed depressed and liked to thump tables. Very bizarre but as long as the beers were flowing, I was happy.



Eventually, we ditched the sleezy locals and went back to Don Jaime for some chats and a final beer.

Today has been very lazy with a three hour sleep in the afternoon and the only other notable activities being the purchase of an alarm clock and a pen. Skype has been hard to come by in this city and this was echoed in my hour long walk to find an internet cafe that had it.

Tomorrow, I catch the 8.15AM to San Antonio De Areco and the 70th annual Day of the Gaucho Festival. I´ll be there for five days of drinking, dancing, gaucho games and crafts.

Fingers crossed the festival beats walking round in squares.

Also on Saturday is Auntie Joan´s 70th birthday but with my Gaucho Hostel reservation already made, I will regeretably be unable to attend. I send my love to everyone who can make it.