Water Water and More Water - Iguazu Falls

Iguazu Falls, voted a new 7 Natural Wonder of the World, did not disappoint. It's an epic waterfall at the border point between Argentina, Brazil and Paraguay. Once we knew for sure we would be visiting Iguazu we didn't really bother going out of our way to see any other waterfalls because we new they would all fail in comparison.

Brazilian Side

Straight after our 17 hour bus ride to get to Puerto Iguazu (the town on the Argentinian side) we were convinced by one of the hostel workers to pop over to the Brazilian side of the falls for the afternoon as it was easier to get to from Argentina than Brazil. So we ended up spending our afternoon in Brazil, getting a taster of Portuguese. 

It's preferable, if you can, to see the falls first from the Brazilian side as this gives you a great Panoramic view.

This time of year is the wet season so there was a lot of extra water rushing through but this also meant the water was brown and we didn't get much sun to set off all those rainbows you usually see photos of. 

It was bigger than I thought it was going to be. It felt like it just kept going.

There's a walkway into the Devils Through where you can get close up to the action. This really put our raincoats to the test (they failed miserably) 

Close up to the falls

Panorama of the Devil's Throat

The Argentinian Side

You can spend a whole day on the Argentinian side. We splashed out on a boat ride that took us right up close to the falls so we could really appreciate their power. The Brazilian side has coatis but they aren't as scary as the Argentinian ones. Those guys rule the food court on the Argentinian side along with some monkeys.

Hot water for your mate. It was crazy the amount of families we saw walking around the park with their mate kit (that means mate, thermos, yerba and sugar). 

This is how we started our day off:

Coatis taking over. We think they have a sugar addiction. They really go for those sauce packets. 

There were so many monkeys hanging about. Of course people were still trying to feed them, despite the sign it's sitting on showing a messed up hand after a monkey/coati attack. 

This one creeped me out - look at it's face

On the Argentinian Side you get to walk above the falls

Panorama of the Devil's Throat

These guys roped off the best spot for photos and made you pay to get in there to have your photo taken . And people actually did it. Ridiculous. 

The spray back was amazing. It rose so far above the falls. We were told that the falls are so mesmerising that there is this weird thing going on where foreign women and local women take turns to jump into the falls (ending their lives). 

Buenos Aires - An Escape to Europe

We got off our 15 hour bus from Mendoza about 8 am and found our way into the city. Using the underground system this was a relatively easy task. We found the hostel easily and settled in to wait until we were able to check into our room. The hostel we had booked turned out to be a bit more of a hotel than a hostel with 4 bed dorm maximums with en-suits, an elevator and a key card system. Day One in the city all we achieved was a much needed shower, changing some money and washing our clothes. An early night meant we were keen to dive into it tomorrow.

Our home for a week

We stayed in the neighbourhood of San Telmo, the oldest neighbourhood in Buenos Aires. It was a nice, slightly dodgy in parts, area full of cafes, tango and antiques.

People from Buenos Aires are known as Portenos because of the city's port

Our hostel organised many different walking tours which led to me doing three consecutive days of walking tours. After 11 months on the road, it was a relief to just look at the board and see what I should do that day instead of having to plan.

Walking Tour #1 - San Telmo and La Boca

We wandered around San Telmo to learn more about the area we were staying in. It used to be full of the city's elite but as more immigrants made their way to Buenos Aires and moved into San Telmo the rich left to other areas. This lead to a few mansions being abandoned. The one we visited was turned into a hotel for immigrants.

Abandonded Mansion turned hotel for immigrants turned antique shop turned movie set for Focus

La Boca is a real working class neighbourhood famous for the colourful street of Caminito where you can buy some art or watch some street tango. Outside of this colourful area La Boca is actually a bit dangerous, so this part of our walking tour didn't take long. It's also home to the Boca Juniors Stadium (a local soccer team). To Alex's disappointment we didn't make it to a game here.

The three figures represent Buenos Aires's main Passions - Football (Maaidona), Politics (Evita) and Tango (Carlos Gardel)

The port of La Boca is actually the birth place of Tango as it came from the working class originally and over time has been reinvented with a new image

Buenos Aires is known for Tango so a must do is to go to a Tango Show. People say the kind of dancing you see in these shows isn't really real Tango, you find real Tango on the street. But it was damn impressive. I had no idea it was possible to move your legs that way.

Apologies for the potato photo, they moved so fast.

Walking Tour #2 - City Centre

Alex was sick this day so I was on my own. This was a tour of mainly government buildings and a lesson in Argentinian history. It ended with a free beer in a cafe and more Tango. 

This is the government house. There are two theories as to why it's pink. No. 1 - during a civil war the two different groups were each represented by white or red. When the war came to an end as a sign of peace they painted the building pink - a mix of white and red. No. 2 - they used to paint buildings with lime and cow's blood. Apparently cow's blood is good for weather proofing. 

Argentinian Coat of Arms

We also visited Evita's old office, learnt a bit about her story and had the pleasure of hearing from someone who had actually met her and was in Buenos Aires when she died speak about his experiences. This man, 85, became quite emotional during his story. It was a bit intense but interesting. You could really feel the effect she had had on people. If you're interested here is a link to Evita's wiki page. I think it's worth a read.

That night there was a free Tango lesson in the hostel. Conveniently Alex was still too sick to join in.

The teacher showing me how it's done

We were all pretty terrible but it didn't stop us having fun

Walking Tour #3 - Recoleta

Recoleta is one of the richer neigbourhoods of Buenos Aires. Here you can really feel the European influences. Sometimes it's hard to believe you're still in South America. This area is also home to the famous Recoleta Cemetery that is now home to Evita's body, which is a bit of a controversy as this cemetery is full of the rich meaning she now rests surrounded by her enemies. There is usually a group of people surrounding her grave (which in my opinion was a pretty average one). Sometimes you actually have to queue to get a look at it. Our tour group was one isle away from her grave and people were constantly coming up to the group and standing around until our guide told them that the grave was on the other side.

An example of the architecture 

San Martin's wife - this is before people got carried away, building themselves mini mansions for the after life

A group of people hanging around outside Evita's grave

Outside the Cemetery was quite a nice area

Apparently this building was used as inspiration for Buckingham Palace

That night we intended to go out for all you can eat BBQ and go on a pub crawl. Neither of these things came to fruition. Instead we cooked up a big meal of steak and veggies (you really have to consciously make an effort to eat vegetables in South America). As the time for the pub crawl drew near we realised it wasn't actually starting from the hostel as we had thought so we had missed it. We made our own pub crawl instead which ended up being a casual night in Palermo until 5 am when we got kicked out. Only in Argentina have I had such a casual late night. The pubs still serve food until 3 am!

Epic home cooked meal - you can still have good food in hostels

After our casual night out the group we had formed left us for Mendoza. Alex and I explored a bit more of the city by ourselves in the next few days and finally made it to the all you can eat BBQ.

El Ateneo Grand Splendid - the most beautiful bookshop I've ever been to (The Guardian ranked it as the second most beautiful bookshop in the world). As you can probably tell it's a converted theater. This photo doesn't do it justice. 

Finally got my meat fill

On our last morning we visited the Antiques Market in San Telmo which is held every Sunday. It was an eclectic mix of different goods as well as more Tango, some magic and even a puppeteer. 

Even after almost a week we were pretty sad to leave Buenos Aires. It has been one of the few big cities we have visited that we felt we could definitely come back to.

Wine Wine Wine - A week in Mendoza

The Mendoza region in Argentina is famous world wide for wine and in particular Malbec. This means we pretty much spent a week just hanging out, drinking wine, eating meat and drinking more wine. 

There are about 4 different wine regions outside the city and the easiest to get to is Maipu. The thing to do here is rent a bike and cycle around, dropping into whichever bodega takes your fancy. As you read that you probably pictured riding down a country road with grape vines either side of you like I did. It wasn't until we got to Mendoza that people told us you are actually just cycling around something similar to an industrial area and big highways. Not so scenic. After hearing this news we decided to splash out and do a top of the line wine tour. We came to Mendoza for wine so we might as well make the most of it. 

We went to four different bodegas during the day, each one had it's own character. We had our first tasting about 10:30 am. By the end of the day it's safe to say we were feeling it a bit. Of course we drank some of our wine in the hostel though. 

The view from the first bodega

We had to try and pair the different foods with the different wines. This was actually quite hard.

Yes, that vine really is from 1928

After the wine tasting at the second bodega we also shared in some yerba. This is a big this in Argentina and is so weird and interesting that under this photo is not the right place to explain it. If you're interested here is the wiki page.

Super fancy cellar

At the third bodega the tasting also consisted of an amazing 4 course meal, each course paired with the right wine.

The fourth and last bodega featured an extensive collection of ponchos (see the walls) and possibly the largest couch I have ever seen. The tasting was in a dungeon like room in the basement which was also fund. 

We didn't do a lot in Mendoza City itself. It was nice to wander around with all the trees though. They need a special irrigation system to survive as Mendoza is essentially a desert.

We were planning on going to Maipu anyway (because wine) when a Germain-Swiss couple in our Hostel asked if we wanted to rent a car with them the next day to visit a specific bodega (owned by the eccentric Swiss Dieter Meier) and get a little closer to the amazing mountain range near by. We said yes and had a fantastic day. It was amazing to feel the freedom of having your own car again. 

The Views from Ojo de Vino

The area around Mendoza was beautiful

We stopped on the side of the road to eat our modest picnic lunch

The view from the lunch spot. Our car looked so tiny.

There are a few sky fields outside Mendoza but they haven't opened for the last 5 years because there has been no snow. When this photo was taken it should have been ski season. A lot of the area relies on the the melted snow as a water source so who knows what will happen in the future. 

Inca Bridge

There was no snow but as you can see it was still pretty cold

Aconcagua - the highest peak outside of Asia at 6 960 m. We tried to go to the view point but for some reason you weren't allowed to drive to it anymore, making it a 1 - 2 hour walk. We couldn't be bothered with that, so this is the best we got. 

We took a different route home that involved some extremely windy dirt roads (that probably weren't covered by our car company's insurance) through a national park. It was worth it for the different landscape and animals we got to see. This fox was right up at the side of the road just hanging around which was amazing (I've never seen a wild fox before). Sadly though some people in another car were feeding it something.

Side Note: Please remember to NOT FEED wild animals. Seriously. We've seen too many people doing this through-out this trip. 

We also got to see guanacos (well we are pretty sure that's what they are.) They are similar to vicunas, being the wild ancestor of llamas. We'd heard about them before on different tours but this is the first time we actually got to see some. 

We really enjoyed our time in Mendoza. Our original plan was to break up our time between Mendoza and Buenos Aires by visiting Cordoba in between but we are really glad that we decided to skip Cordoba in the end and dedicate more time to Mendoza and Buenos Aires.



Update with photos from Alex's phone

So if Alex had been writing this blog there would have been a lot more mention about how the Copa America (an international football/soccer competition) was going whilst we were in Bolivia / Argentina. Here he is, blabbering about that:

Hello! So this competition includes all the countries you're likely aware of in South America, plus a few guests from other parts of the Americas (this time it was Mexico and Jamaica). 

For a few weeks there was football on the TV nearly every night, much to my delight and Vanessa's dismay. It was held in Chile meaning we were painfully close to the action but I thought it'd be a bit cruel to rearrange our travels to spend a lot of time and money on something which wouldn't really interest Ness. I will make it to a big tournament one day! Hopefully in a Scotland top instead (wishful thinking).

We were able to catch a couple of matches in local bars including Argentina's last three matches. We were in Mendoza for the semis and the final, so only a 7 hours drive away from where the matches were taking place. I settled on watching the match in an 'Irish' pub which had a great atmosphere but shocking bartenders. The culture in Argentina is apparently to give the pint as much head as you can unless specifically requested not to.

To my surprise there were a sizable number of Chileans in the bar and they weren't shy of letting you know who they were supporting. Oddly there was a camera crew in the bar when the match ended so when the Chileans started celebrating they only received a couple of threats of violence rather than any action.

Me enjoying some Mate before we went out to watch the football. From what I saw it was uncommon for guys to wear their team shirt but they would often wear tracksuits instead. The girls would all be wearing theirs though.

The bar - it had stools and everything.

The crowd before it really filled up.

Our BBQ at the hostel. A Swiss friend was in charge of the grill. The meat was fantastically cheap yet good quality so you could eat well for a few dollars each.

One of the steaks portioned up. The wine was a Malbec we bought at a bodega.