Back in the USSR...

Yes, we don't know how lucky we are, we really don't - people are unexpectedly celebrating us returning!

So, we are back, after a 15 hour flight back from Buenos Aires. We didn't arrive back in terminal 5, so we have all our luggage; despite being met off the plane by a sniffer dog. We now have our old phones back and a car so feel free to give us a ring and hear us moan about the cold in person.

Just for the memory, here is a taste of Flamenco from BA - no tango though I'm afraid.

Here is a peak at a football match in BA we went to. The weather was much like the UK that afternoon though, and the crowd was more worth watching than the football.

Crowd control:

Buen Ayre

Porteños are loud, brash, sentimental, kiss each other and pose a lot - much like Italians. This isn´t surprising given the number of Italians who emmigrated here, especially to La Boca, the Port district. There are currently hordings for Berlusconi and others all over town, so plenty of people obviously retain Italian citizenship too. The origins of Tango are in this misture of immigrants, and in here in Buenos Aires.
Tango in the street in San Telmo, BA.


La Boca, BA. The Port district of town.



Spaniards trying to reconquer BA.

The memorial to the Guerra de las Malvinas (Falklands War).


Centro Cultural Borges.


Unfortunately, Argentina seems to have been run by some despotic lunatics during the 20th Century. Although, unlike some others, Juan Perón is still a popular figure and has lots of streets named after him, you might argue that him and his on/off wife fitted this mould. Eva is buried in the Recolecta cemetary, along with all the other famous porteños from history. A lot of money has been spent on the dead and people still come to gush over Eva Perón´s tomb.




The local brand of Spanish has got more tricky as we head south. People have started changing their consonants and people are constantly telling me that I obviously learnt my Spanish back on the peninsular. Let´s hope it becomes less lispy before we leave.

Spot the Olympic Torch Competition

Take part in today´s spot the Olympic Torch competetion, along with Christina Kirchner, President of the Republic of Argentina. She has an advantage over you though, having a balcony view from the Casa Rosada, the presidential palace in Buenos Aires.

A few Free Tibet protests were lodged, but nothing like the quantity you would have expected given the number of police and torch minders around. The main show of strength was from BA´s Chinese community who scuffled with a handful of protesting students. Their Chinese flags were big enough to stifle any dissent.

So can you see the torch here?

the grape harvest

¡Hola de Argentina!

After escaping from the border marketplaces of Bolivia and then enjoying comfortable buses driving on roads that exist both on paper and in asphalt, instead of just river beds, we arrived in Salta. Salta might be more expensive than Bolivia, but the food more than made up for this. We could still pretend to be upmarket and eat at the best restaurants while trying to use the right cutlery. An excellent bottle of wine could be obtained for less than 2 quid, which would make anywhere rank highly on our list. Here are some humitas in the market - steamed parcels of vegtables/cereal.



Che Guevara´s Motorbike (or rather a much more reliable replica) at his house in Alta Gracia.

Argentina is enormous, and bus journeys take whole days and nights. To limit the number of them we prioritised Mendoza and its vinyards. We arrived for Wednesday with Lou thirsty for shopping but the town seemed strangely quiet. After cursing the laziness of the locals for opening up late we discovered that 2nd April is national holiday (perhaps only since last year) for the ´Malvinas´, which means everyone gets a day off to remember the Falklands war. This seems to be done by drinking wine or playing football in the park, so we followed suit and lazed around.


After a spot of haggling for a local bike and we started to tour around. Most Vinyards are quite small; the grape harvest was underway and here is a lorry load of them being forked into a giant press. Traditionally though, this event only starts after someone finds an extension lead long enough to reach the press. After a good tasting we cycled back, which was hard after a 3 course lunch with a bottle of Malbec, further degustation at vinyards, and the 35 degree heat.

Now we are in Buenos Aires and the shoe shops beckon. I am wondering if we will now get through the 'weigh in' for the flight back.