 |
| The geography of this place is wild. |
 |
| A long shot of a length of the falls. |
 |
| Seeing waterfalls below a waterfall. |
 |
| And more waterfalls below. |
 |
| Other cascades beyond the edge of a waterfall. |
 |
| A bridge over water on its way to a fall. |
 |
| Trees manage to grow in some ridiculous places. |
 |
| Views like this tickle the part of my brain that used to figure out routes in Tomb Raider games. |
With Liz's eye issue not worsening we trusted that it would indeed eventually sort itself out and set about enjoying the first part of our South American leg, which was a return to Buenos Aires. Well, I say we did, but in truth it was mostly Liz. It seems that I had picked up a bug of some kind on the cruise, which is I suppose impressive given the absence of people beyond those on the ship. However a fortnight isn't enough for all bugs to die off, so this one was passed from passenger to passenger until it reached me and rendered me tired and achy in Buenos Aires. As such I missed an afternoon's exploring in favour of going back to bed. It is partly for this reason that there are no View-Master photos of this time in Buenos Aires. The other reason is that it absolutely chucked it down almost constantly. I stuck with the digital cameras, they were easier to keep dry and did better in the gloom.
The good news was that while we had been off communing with the penguins, the previous mosquito infestation had subsided. The rain was much less trouble. I had packed a brolly.
We had some excursions arranged by our travel agent this time. There was a minibus tour of locations around the city, including La Boca. Being as indifferent to football as a penguin apparently is to an ex-penguin (see earlier entry on Hannah Point), this wasn't tremendously exciting for that reason. However it was an interesting area and a good place to stretch our legs.
It was also initially odd to see someone from the cruise on the minibus. However it transpired they had also booked through Trailfinders and given the majority of cruise passengers would be travelling home via Buenos Aires, it would have been odder not to bump into anyone.
This theory was reinforced after the minibus dropped us off near a cafe in Recoleta, where we found even more people from the cruise. The cafe, La Biela, had carved wooden mannequins of Argentine writers Jorge Luis Borges and Adolfo Bioy Casares sitting at a table by the entrance. Between my lurghi-induced sleep deprivation and Liz's recovering pupil, the effect was quite disconcerting. Things weren't helped by a man sitting at a table by himself, reading a book and sipping from a cup of coffee. That's quite normal behaviour in a cafe, but there was something unsettling about the way he was doing it. He managed to be both robotic and theatrical at the same time. Liz was convinced it was an act to amuse the customers. I saw him leave and pay. Surely it couldn't be an act, but it was also really quite strange. I decided that the confines of a busy cafe were not a suitable place for us to lose our minds, so we headed out into the nearby cemetery. There, hopefully, the residents wouldn't be getting up to any theatrics.
On our own steam, we did a guided tour of the Teatro Colón opera house, which was terrific and highly recommended. Tours are regular but English speaking ones less frequent. It's best to book ahead – we would have done it when first in town, but it was sold out.
We had a final night out in Buenos Aires courtesy of our package itinerary – dinner and a tango show at Café Los Angelinos. This was one of those arrangements where you are picked up by a bus which meanders around collecting people from other hotels. Eventually we were ushered into what was in effect a small theatre with long tables arranged such that everyone could easily turn to see the stage.
I had reservations about this part as the potential to be whisked in, perfunctorily fed to musical accompaniment then unceremoniously whisked out was quite high. However I'm happy to say that the food was excellent and the tango highly entertaining. I don't know enough about the subject to give a comparison with anything similar available, but I recommend it nonetheless.
And that was Buenos Aires. I really liked the city, and hope to find an excuse to return at some point. We had only spent a few days there and had barely scratched its surface. The next stop is Iguazu Falls, which you should be at least slightly familiar with because this and the last post have featured photographs taken there.
Comments
Post a Comment