Buenas Aires Day trip

La Boca on the day tour

In the Emirates lounge in Johannesburg
I am traveling again. This time I am in Argentina and will be going to Brazil after a week in Argentina. As normal, I flew with Emirates, which means an 8 hour flight if I flew SAA from Johannesburg to Buenos Aires became a much, much longer trip (about 24 hours long!) The flights, believe it or not, cost more or less the same, but the service on Emirates, and might I say, the servicing of the planes by Emirates, is just so much better than SAA. So, I would rather spends hours on Emirates then fly SAA.

I am staying in Espacia Suites hotel in BA. This is a nice hotel with a good continental breakfast. Nice fresh cut fruit and a variety of breads, honey, cheese, ham, and Delche de Lechi (for those who do not speak Spanish - me included - this means "Sweet milk", or as we know it, caramel!)  The area I am in is not really in a major tourist area. As I found out later, the hotel is in walking distance of the office were I was working for the week. Not being in a tourist area can be quite a bit of fun, as the local eateries do not really speak much English, and my Spanish is pretty much limited to being able to order a beer. But with smiles and good will on both sides, one can get by! At least I can get a beer! I can also order meat, so what more do you need - beer and meat - the perfect meal.
BA looks a lot like Paris.

Messi - the star of Argentina
So, I planned my trip to arrive on Saturday, after the very long flights on Emirates, so that I could spend Sunday resting and getting ready for the work part of the trip. My flight from Dubai to BA, with a stop over in Rio was quite empty, so I was fairly rested when I got here. After a good nights sleep, and after I had woken up, I decided to have a look at the tour options and found an afternoon city tour. I booked this with Viator (www.viator.com). They seem to be pretty good. I have also booked a few things through them for the Brazil part of the trip. So I booked an afternoon tour.

Shortly after booking my tour, I had a phone call telling me that I needed to get to a hotel in a tourist area. I had to take a taxis to get to a pick up point. As I mentioned, my hotel is a bit our of the tourist areas. So this was also "fun". Again, not much in the way of English by the taxis drivers, but I had written the names down of the point I needed to be. So, I got to the pick up point for the tour and, much more importantly, I made it back to my hotel after the tour!

Getting ready for the big match
I did a half day city tour of BA. The tour guide was great and very informative. We had other pick ups in the up-market area around the old docks area. This was also very interesting. The most expensive hotel in BA in now in this area and in a converted warehouse. After getting everyone on board, the tour started. Firstly, through the old district where the Tango was started. The shady history of the dance was explained and how the Pope, decided it was not a sin to dance the dance the tango. The Tango is no longer a dance performed with the main aim of getting men to visit the houses of ill repute and is now regarded, and rightly so, as an amazing art form (all thanks to the pope!).   On Sundays, there is a massive street market in the streets of the old city. The streets are closed for many blocks and apparently you can buy just about anything at these markets. Would probably be an interesting place to spend a few hours if you are in BA on a Sunday.

The next stop was the poor working class region of La Boca. This was, and still is, pretty much a slum area for the very poor. It is also the home to one of Argentina's best football teams, Boca juniors, and on this day, they had a home game in the evening. Things were starting to liven up around the stadium. There is a beautiful area, showing how the old tenement houses were built. According to the stories, the houses were built from leftover material, and any colour paint which could be found was used to paint the houses. The end result, a very colourful area. This being match day, the bars were also full and very lively. A great vibe at the area.I will need to continue with the trip in the next post!
Inside a museum to the tenement buildings


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Looking for Tigers in Ranthambore

Image
Spotted deer. All my photos The star of the Indian wildlife reserves must be Ranthambore. This is a massive area of some 392  square km and it is a great place to look for Tigers. This was my third trip to look for wild Tigers, so, hopefully, 3rd time lucky. My first attempt to see wild Tigers was in Chitwan National Park in Nepal and the second effort was Jim Corbett Reserve in India. Came close in both reserves, but just saw beautiful tiger tracks. Ranthambore is close to the town of Sawai Madhopur in Rajastan. Apart from the main attraction - the tigers - Ranthambore is also a famous heritage site with various ruins within the boundaries of the reserve. Local gathering wood outside the reserve Tiger painting at the train station My trip started with a hotel close to one of the railway stations in Delhi. All of my previous trips to India, I was doing consulting for companies in India, and I had only been accommodated in top of the range hotels, so this was my fi...
Read more

The Embassed Elephant

Image
Charging elephant - not my photo Yet another elephant story! Anyone would think I like elephants. Well, I do. They are amazing animals and I just have a few very interesting elephant stories to tell you. Just wait until I start on tigers! I love tigers. In fact, I pretty much love all animals and any travel option which includes looking for animals is right up my ally! Now, an elephant story from the dim and distant past! Many many years ago in a kingdom far far away, there was an elephant. No - back to the real story. Many years ago I was working on diseases of fish and we (I was working at Onderstepoort Veterinary Institute) had a meeting and we invited one of the world leaders in fish diseases from the UK to the meeting. This meeting was held close to Lydenburg (where many of the trout farms can be found). The director of Veterinary Services was also attending this meeting and as we were quite close to the Kruger National Park, we decided to treat our overseas guest to a visi...
Read more

Richard Bragg in the First World War - Part 2 - Trench trains

Image
Damaged railway line at Ypres In the first part on the history of my Grandfather in the First World War, I explained that I only had very limited information on his story during the Great war. To my surprise, when going into his military records, I discovered that he also took part in the South West African campaign from 1914 to 1915. This I discussed in Part 1 of this series. According to his records, he was discharged from the army after the successful completion, and defeat of the Germans in S.W.A. He was discharged on 31 August 1915. He was a train driver, so I presume he continued with his life as a train driver. I obtained some information from a family member that his brother, Joe Bragg (it was probably Joseph Bragg - as this was a family name at that stage), also came to South Africa with him as a train driver. I understand that he was killed in a train accident. There was a train crash in the Cape on 22 April 1911 in which 30 people were killed. Another fatal train crash i...
Read more