So, Ezra and I caught a cab to JFK Thursday night for a 10:00pm flight out of NY directly to Buenos Aires. It was a 10 and 1/2 hour flight, but it seemed to go by rather quickly. Ezra slept well, but I was up most of the time. I did manage to squeeze in a couple of uncomfortable hours, but what can you do. Anyhow, we arrived in Buenos Aires around 11am (BA is 2 hours ahead of NY).
We got to immigration and waited in a real long line. This was the first time I whipped out my camera. Ezra does not look happy here
Nobody wants to wait in a long line after 10.5 hours of flying. But the prospect of being in BA was keeping us going. By the way, all these pictures were taken with my new Pentax K10D digital camera. I have this sweet fisheye lens that I used a lot.
Waiting for luggage.
Our apartment wasn't ready until Saturday, so we stayed at this little place in El Centro, which is a group of neighborhoods in the heart of the downtown district of Buenos Aires.
So, after dropping our stuff and talking with Jorge, the guy who ran the place we were staying at, we decided to hit the streets and check the city out.
Ezra had come very well versed in the Time Out guide to Buenos Aires, and already had a long list of restaurants to go see.
We found this little place in Barrio Norte that had great empanadas. I won't say more about it as Ezra's basically covered it all in his blog which is all about the food we ate. Needless to say, it was very tasty. Eating beef stew on a hot summer's day isn't always ideal, unless it taste ridiculously good.
After lunch we decided to walk around Recoletta and the surrounding areas.
I picked up a watch at a place around the corner. I don't usually wear one, but I left my phone at home and needed something slick, so I picked up a nice Oceana, or something like that
Buenos Aires is a very big city made up of many different neighborhoods, much like New York. We walked through a few of these, looking for places in the guidebook, on the map, or just to look around.
I didn't bring my medium lens with me when we went out, so I only had my 10-17mm (becomes 16-27mm with my camera) so a lot of these pictures are more than a little distorted. Takes a cool picture, but I promise, as cool as the architecture is here, it's not as wacky as it appears in some of these photos.
We stopped at a cafe near the Recoleta Cemetery
, a famous and grandiose place that I'll definitely come back to later and take more pictures. Recoleta is a mroe upscale neighborhood with a mixture of tourists and diplomats depending on which part you're in. This cafe was jsut what we needed to keep us going.
When you order a cafe in BA you get a tasty little espresso, which are usually accompanied by a packet of small sugar cookies. Right next to this cafe was a massive tree (see pictures above) that canopied part of it. As we walked around, I saw a lot of these ancient behemoths in little parks and gardens.
The rest of these are some more interesting images from walking around.
Ezra made fun of me, and rightly so, for my poor sense of direction in this new city. My excuse was I wasn't paying attention because I was too busy taking pictures. This is only partially true.
Anyhow, after all this we headed abck to our room. I put the camera away for the night and a while later we headed out again to hit up another cafe. It was around 8:30pm and we weren't quite ready to have dinner yet. Everything starts much later here in BA than in America. We figured by 9:30pm people would be out having dinner. Not so. It was pretty dead, and a Friday no less. The place Ezra wanted to check out had a few old people in it, so we decided maybe another time. We walked around for another hour or so and ended up eating at this big restaurant near our building. This was our first steak experience here, and it was definitely not disappointing.
We turned in around 12:30am, determined to catch up on sleep and be all set for day 2.
DAY 2: THE ADVENTURE CONTINUES
We woke up inadvertantly around 8:45am. Much like dinner, nobody was out and about. But we decided to head down to the famous Cafe Tortoni, a popular hangout of many artists, politicians, you name it. It was very nice, parisian, and filled with tourists, some of which who came only to take pictures. I ordered what I imagined to be a small plate of cheese and olives (as it said for one person), and they brought me this giant plate of food. On a side note, the food here is exceptionally cheap. Not a point of pride of the Argentinians, as it is a result of the major economic collapse they had here around the turn of the century. However, it does allow foreigners to enjoy amazing cuisine at 1/2 to 1/3 of typical New York prices.
I made a small dent in the cheese plate, and then it was off to Florida St, where all the main touristy shops are. We walked down block after block of basically the same 5 stores: Sunglasses, Shoes, Clothes, Chachkis, Specialized or American knockoff or an American store. It was interesting, but not very engaging. Ezra did not find the sunglasses he was looking for, nor did I find anywhere to buy new shoes or shirts. My big purchase was a few Cuban cigars, Partagas, to enjoy later. We then headed back tot he room and chilled for a while
Around 3:00 we caught a cab to Palermo Soho and moved into our permanent residence for the next two months. Here are some pictures of the place.
Here is a view from our terrace, which I might add has a sweet BBQ we will definitely use for asado.
This one is a little panorama I whipped together. Click on it for a bigger picture.
Befitting our hedonistic natures, Ezra and I decided to christen the new place with a tasty cigar and some beer the previous occupants, a German couple, had left.
We chilled out for a while and I decided to call my friend Paule. She's a french girl I met in the states through my college friend Vanessa. Vanessa knew I was going to BA, and threw a little party with her friends who had been or were going so I could meet them. Paule had been here for a month and a half already and had found a job working at a shoe design company. I just called her to say hello and let her know I was here, but she immediately invited us out to have dinner with her and friends. We of course didn't make it to the restaurant till about midnight, but we had a great time and a lot of... you guessed it, red meat (there was a little chicken, but who's counting?) They told us about a lot of cool stuff going on around here and where to go to get concentrated Spanish lessons.
Ezra and I got back around 2:30am and here I am posting this immensely long blog entry. It's now 5am and I need to head to bed, not that I have a pressing agenda tomorrow or anything ;)
So that's the first installment of my trip to BA. Don't forget to check out Ezra's blog. No pictures but good food descriptions. I will be out and about with my camera in the next week, so keep checking back for more updates.
Adios till then.
3 comments:
Looks like you are off to a good start. Have fun! xoxo - m
This is great! Can't wait to keep up with you. Have fun!
you lucky bastards...
Post a Comment