Feria de los matadores

I got back to Buenos Aires yesterday, and spent the day loafing around. Today I got up early and took a loooong collectivo (bus) ride over to Mataderos--a neighborhood on the southern edge of Buenos Aires--to check out the Fería de Mataderos, which is a weekly folk market that features traditional music and dancing.

A short clip:

Some more dancing:

Unfortunately, I forgot to go to the Gaucho Museum...hopefully I´ll be able to do it when I return to Buenos Aires after touring the interior!

Iguazu Falls, Take Two

I arrived in Iguazu yesterday afternoon, after a 15ish-hour bus ride (which wasn´t that bad--the buses here are approximately a thousand times better than the Greyhound/Chinatown buses in the U.S.), checked into the hostel and spent the afternoon in Puerto Iguazu and the evening hanging out at the hostel.

This morning, I woke up early, met up with my tour group and headed over to the national park.

The falls were AMAZING, although kind of hard to describe, so here is a video of La garganta del Diablo (the Devil´s Throat), which was probably the most impressive in terms of size:

Other views of the waterfalls:

After trekking around the park, I took one of the boat rides on offer under the falls, which was really fun, although obviously I don´t have any pictures to prove it!

Iguazu Falls, Take 1

I was supposed to fly to Iguazu, which is in the northeastern province of Misiones, today to see the waterfalls, but unfortunately when I got to Aeroparque this morning, the Aerolineas Argentinas check-in counters looked like this:

Aren´t those guys supposed to be on the other side of the desks?

After days of delayed Aerolineas flights (due to the fog that has been blanketing the city on a daily basis since Thursday) the check in staff, tired of being harassed by passengers (or being opportunistic, depending on who´s doing the explaining) instituted a work slowdown yesterday--which (inevitably) lead to a pissed off passenger assaulting an employee--and walked off the job this morning, meaning that all flights today were cancelled, in addition to those cancelled yesterday and over the weekend.

So I spent the day waiting in line to talk to an Aerolineas employee, received a cash refund of my ticket, and booked myself on the bus to Iguazu, which leaves at 9pm tonight and gets to Iguazu at 1:30pm tomorrow.

Something Touristy!

I spent today downtown, trying to buy all of the stuff that I´m going to need during my upcoming roadtrip (details are forthcoming, I promise!). Since I was already in the area, I went over to the Casa Rosada and the Plaza de Mayo.

The Casa Rosada is the presidential palace, although, unlike the White House, the President of Argentina also resides in Olivios when he isn´t working at the Casa Rosada. Constructed in 1873, the pink color of the Casa Rosada is said to be due to either Domingo Faustino Sarmiento´s desire to demonstrate unity between the two political parties of the time, the Unitarists (white) and the Federalists (red), or it is due to the use of cow´s blood in the original paint job to protect against damage from humidity.

At any rate, the Casa Rosada used to be light pink, but it is currently being restored and is now more of a manly, um, pink:

The former color can be seen in the upper right hand corner of the picture, above the roof. The balcony in the center is where Evita, Madonna, etc did their thing.

Fería San Telmo

After getting back from Uruguay last night, I slept in this morning and then headed over to San Telmo to check out the antiques/flea market that is held every Sunday in Plaza Dorrego, although in reality the street fair extends for multiple blocks on either side of the plaza and even further up Calle Defensa.

During the 19th century, San Telmo was a fashionable neighborhood to live in until a yellow fever epidemic struck in 1871 century and the surviving porteño elites decided to move to higher ground north and west of the city center. The mansions of San Telmo were then converted into conventillos (tenements), however a lot of the neighborhood´s original colonial-style exterior architecture, as well as the neighborhood´s cobblestone streets, have been preserved.

The flea market was packed with merchants and shoppers, so there wasn´t really anything to take pictures of aside from other tourists, however the colonial architecture and overall atmosphere may make San Telmo my favorite Buenos Aires neighborhood so far.

On the way, back, in the subway station, I noticed these decorative tiles incorporated into the mosaic next to the platform:

Karen--any ideas? =)

Colonia del Sacramento, Uruguay

Today, for a change of pace, I went on a day trip to Colonia del Sacramento in Uruguay, which is right across the Río de la Plata, and accessible by high speed ferry. Unfortunately, the Port of Buenos Aires closed right before my ferry was supposed to leave due to heavy fog, so I was delayed for a couple of hours while the officials waited for the fog to disperse.

Nevertheless, I arrived in Colonia about 1pm, which left plenty of time for exploring the Historic District, which was named a UNESCO world heritage site due to its Spanish and Portuguese colonial architecture.

Calle de suspiros, with Portuguese-style cobblestone street

Colonia was founded by the Portuguese in 1680, however it was later captured by Spanish forces, and subsequently changed hands between the Spanish and Portuguese numerous times until Spanish rule was established at the end of the 18th century.

I spent pretty much all of my time wandering the streets of the historic district, and also walked to the top of the lighthouse:

View from faro (lighthouse), Colonia

Aside from the very cool colonial architecture, the city itself had a great vibe -- very laid back and friendly for what is, during the summer, a resort town overrun by tourists. Additionally, aside from the occasional moped, the streets were very quiet and I could hear the waves of the Río de la Plata against the shore, which was a nice change from the hustle of Buenos Aires.

Fall foliage, Colonia del Sacramento

SMB Graffito

WARNING, THE FOLLOWING POST MAY NOT MAKE ANY SENSE TO PEOPLE OVER THE AGE OF THIRTY AND/OR NON-NERDS

From a collectivo (bus) stop on Av. Callao:

"Sorry, but your Princess in in another castle"

Of course, this was a lot funnier yesterday, when it was written on Jorge Telerman´s forehead*, rather than the soap bottle you see here but I didn´t have my camera with me, and the advert was changed out in the meantime.

*There was an election on Sunday for the new head of the government of Buenos Aires, Telerman was the sort of incumbent as he is the current interim jefe because his predecessor got kicked out, and he didn´t get enough votes to make it to the runoff round.