Monday 8 April 2013

Buenos Aries



Christina writes: I think the best thing about Buenos Aires was the apartment we stayed in. On the 27th floor of the Palermo Uno building, this two storey home ticked all the boxes. Large glass windows gave us beautiful views over this massive city (second biggest in South America after São Paulo) night and day, and because the building we were in was a great deal taller than surrounding buildings, you overlooked the city rather than directly into other buildings. Upstairs, two bedrooms and two full bathrooms and downstairs, a lounge room, balcony, kitchen and Dining plus a powder room.
 
Have you ever stayed in accommodation where there is a martini station?
It was probably because our digs were so good that we didn't go out much. We found a supermarket, stocked up on food, and enjoyed cooking - simple things like roast chicken and spaghetti. We walked through beautiful gardens (Palermo has lots, my favourite being the Japanese gardens) and we found nice places for coffee and sweet treats. We visited Volta, for dulce de leches icecream and generally just hung out.
Japanese gardens


Tree lined streets in Palermo


Dulce de leches and White chocolate - winning combination

On the last day we headed down to Plaza de mayo to see Casa Rosada, the pink government palace where Eva Peron made her famous last speech, the inspiration for the song 'Don't Cry for me Argentina'.
Charlie didn't think it was worth the subway trip.
The subway was hot and crowded. We could never get a seat, and poor Charlie, being considerably shorter than the rest of us always manages to get wedged between us and a strangers butt, which led to this conversation:

Charlie: Why do we have to use the subway
Me: Because it is the quickest way to get around a big city
Charlie: A helicopter would be the quickest.

I'll keep that in mind next time we need to cross a metropolis at peak hour.


Craig writes: 9/04/13, We fly out of B.A today having had five very relaxing nights in a beautiful 27th floor apartment in the Soho district. We didn't do much except catch up on sleep, some home cooked meals and journaling. There was a good gym with million dollar views that I got to everyday, except the last. 

We weren't completely house bound. We caught a very crowded subway out to the Pink Palace at the Plaza De Mayo to see the balcony Evita made her famous, Don't Cry For Me Argentina, speech from. We went to the Japanese Gardens, which ticked all the "japanese" boxes, lots of bonsai, koi, big solitary rocks and a nice little bridge, it all seemed a bit contrived to me. A bit unfair but I'm comparing it to the real thing we've seen in Japan.  We got to a couple of nice restaurants and a wicked ice cream parlour. But that was about it.

A bit disappointed after all the stories and the warnings that we didn't see or experience any of the infamous B.A kidnappings or pick pocketters. Even the manager of our apartment spent about 20 minutes on our first night roleplaying to us the hundred different crafty ways the young urchins of the city will con you and fleece you of your hard earnt possessions. After all the hype, I feel a bit robbed.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Guys , i am reading very carefully this Buenos Aires part..
Rafa from Dubrovnik :))

CVW said...

Glad your enjoying the read Rafa. Hope it's useful. Enjoy your time there and good luck with your future plans.