Part 1 of South America- first 4 days.

Don't cry for me Argentina...

Buenos Aires was beautiful. Dave did such a great job. He picked a wonderful hotel in a great location of the city and we did some pretty exciting things before we flew up to Brazil. The city's French architecture was gorgeous. This is a city with beautiful tree lined streets, ornate wrought iron fences, courtyards and magnificent buildings. I loved it. The original and old parts of the city, (La Boco and San Telmo) were still beautiful even though poverty and time had taken a toll on them. The newer parts of the city like La Recoleta (built in the last 100 years) were fabulous--Dave told me the city reminded him of Paris. He actually used his French there. Many people spoke it and it was fun to see him use it. The restaurants were so delicious and the shopping was awesome. It was a little too ritzy for me. I was hopping to buy a few things but decided against that and opted for some postage stamps found down in the Sunday open market of San Telmo. They will make a great framed reminder of Argentina.

Many people we met were very educated and spoke many languages. The majority of people living there immigrated in the 1900's from Europe--when the US shut their doors on immigration. A tour guide told us that the city was considered the 5th wealthiest city in the world in the 1920's--hence the beautiful architecture. Many of the government buildings and embassies were originally the homes of the wealthy before the Great Depression and WWII changed the economy. The majority of prominent families sold their homes at that time and emigrated to America. Which is too bad--the city was really a neat place.

We saw a tango show, a crazy soccer game, and toured many famous locations (Evita's tomb etc...) My favorite part of Argentina was a 4 hour bike tour--through San Telmos, La Boco (the slums famous for the tango), the water front, and the ecological reserve. It was a little tough biking on some of old cobblestones. I had a close call with a bus in one of the tight allies, but it all turned out o.k. It was good to bike through the city. We saw ordinary people going about their daily activities. Argentina was really a neat place to go and four days did not seem like a enough ...the truth is I never left you.

La Recoleta
Is a beautiful cosmopolitan neighborhood that bears the name of
the famous cemetery. Here in this cemetery there are
row after row of ornate mausoleums.

Here is Dave at the famous Pink Building. Which
symbolizes the marriage of the Red and White Political Parties.

We attended a tango show at Michelangelo's. This building
was first occupied by monks in the year 1601. It
was beautiful with bricks from floor to ceiling. Dinner
was yummy and the dancing was so good. I never knew
that the Tango was actually more about the music than the dance
It was all so awesome! The accordion players were great.

La Boco Soccer Game
Here we are going into the scariest sporting event I have
ever attended. The building actually rocked back and forth
which was caused by the crazy fans.
They sang (yelling) the entire time. Dave loved it.
It doesn't look crowded because we went early to get inside
before all the crazy fans came- we were told that
it could get a little hairy.

Trying to keep up with the 20-year old kids
on their bikes was a work out.

There are weirdo's every where!

In La Boco (Italian-slums)- here is the famous corner
where the Tango was invented/played.

Wonderful musicians could be found everywhere.




Here we are on our last day looking at the map of the
original city of Buenos Aries-(San Telmo)
The open market was festive.