Primera Dia

Day one in Argentina was awesome. We arrived to the airport--which was simple as we didn´t check any bags. Our guide and ride to the city Max was waiting for us. He was very helpful. He was also very Italian-like: mannerisms, language, incessant use of "eh" after completing a thought. Our drive into the city was really great. We got to pass through the province area outside of Bs As.

Our hotel is on Carlos Pellegrini Avenue--which is a little outlet of this huge street Avenida de 9 de Julio named after the Argentine Independence Day. The room is tiny and we each have our own twin bed, but there is a bidday (have no clue how to spell that). The room faces the street--so while loud--we have an amazing view of the Avenida and the Obelisko.

After settling in a little bit, we decided to start exploring. Evita and her mausoleum was the first stop. The Cementario de Recoleta is very close to our hotel, so we walked through the tony little streets of Recoleta to arrive at the Cemetary. The streets are like something out of Paris including the ridiculous price of goods and clothes within them too.

The Cemetary was really great but totally different that anything I have seen. There is no grass and the dead people are not buried. Each family that can buy the expensive plot has there own Mausoleum and within it are the caskets, urns, and in a few cases leftover bones of their loved ones. Evita was with her paternal family the Duarte´s. Some of the mausoleums were in horrid conditions--broken roof, shelves falling in, caskets popped open. In one we saw a wooden casket made from cheap plywood that had bones in it! It was open and we could see the bones. I promise--we have pics! There are so many homeless cats living in there too.

After that we went to find some lunch nearby. We ate this cute little Italian restaurant called La Strada. The Italian food here is great because many Argentine´s are Italian through immigration a number of generations back. We had a delicious pizza, salad, and a bottle of wine for about $15 each. The bottle of wine was one of the nicer ones too!

On the way back to the hotel, we wondered the streets visiting every pharmacy we could to find batteries for my pump. We finally found some. Yay. I can live. One of you was really close to getting a call asking you to overnight me some AAA batteries to Argentina.

We came back to nap (Phil) and shower (me). Later we decided to visit an area called Puerto Madera--which is the commercial shipping and port area. There is a university there and lots of restaurants. The place we were headed too is called Siga La Vaca (Follow the cow). It is a priced fixe place where you pay 36$ pesos for all you can eat including vino. 36$ pesos is about 12 bucks. Insane--as was the wait. So we headed into San Telmo--the birthplace of Tango--to find some food.

We ended up eating at this great little Parrillada--grill place. It was awesome. We got a Parillada para dos which included various meats. I didn´t realize that would mean kidneys, intestine, and congealed blood (OH MY). Phil enjoyed those while I stuck to the steak, chicken, and sausage. We also got a salad and two bottles of delicious wine for about 100$ pesos (yep that is about 33 USD).

Drunk, we walked home and went to sleep.

What adventures will the new day bring?

Stay tuned to find out.