Beautiful Buenos Aires, Paris of South America

Diego Maradona, Evita Peron, and tango crooner Carlos Cabrel—all national heroes

It's relatively easy to travel to Buenos Aires and spend almost a week in Argentina—but it is rather difficult to put the experience into words. So many impressions, so much diversity, so much life! Paying $28 or so for taxes and fees and cashing in 165,000 American Airlines miles for a business class flight to EZE make the logistics easy, and everybody can afford a modern $280 Airbnb in the center of town. But trying to put all the experiences into words is a much tougher task. I hope I'm up to it.

Sorry to forget el Papa, of course next to Maradona

Buenos Aires. Even though I had visited Argentina three time before—my first trip led me to Mendoza in the wine country, then to Bariloche in Patagonia, and then the third time for the Vuelta A San Juan—I had never had a chance to see the capital. To a large degree this trip was set in motion by my conversations with Gino a few weeks ago when I was in Lima and was voicing questions of how to burn some miles. Gino immediately said: Go to Buenos Aires!

My comfortable Airbnb in Recoleta

And so I booked the ticket, reserved an Airbnb, and took the 10-hour overnight flight from DFW to EZE. I had been in touch with my Airbnb host, and he had suggested to have his divorced and somewhat elderly mother (in other words, somebody of my generation) pick me up from the airport and deliver me to the apartment that he manages in Recoleta, a fairly tony barrio in downtown Buenos Aires. In retrospect, those $50 in cash to pay Mayra were well spent, even though I could have done the same transport (with my knowledge now) for about $1.50 via public transport and an extra 30 minutes! But Argentinos need the money.

200 pesos translates to $1—and those meat prices are per kilo (2.2 lbs)

Oh my gosh, do they need the money! Their economy has tanked to a degree that we gringos can't really fathom. Of course, if you are in politics, have an important managerial position, or come from an old, established family with real estate and money, you're all set. But the masses are hurting in today's economy, especially in the times of COVID. Mayra, my "taxi driver," speaks excellent English and filled me in on the financial realities of the vast majority of porteños, as the citizens of Buenos Aires call themselves. Graft and corruption siphon off money that could go to the public good, a story that is repeated in so many other South American countries and elsewhere in the world.

My Airbnb host had told me ahead of time to make sure to bring cash dollars to pay his mom. The simple reason is that currently the official exchange rate (what you'd get in bank or if you were to use your credit card for purchases) pegs the equivalent of one US dollar to be 100 pesos; bring cash and go to a money changing place, and that dollar is now going to buy you 196 pesos! You have just doubled your purchase power! (BTW, these money changing houses are legitimate and people use them left and right.) To put things in perspective, I spent $180 for my entire week for all meals in restaurants, way too much wine, visits to eight microbreweries, transportation, two walking tours with guides, renting a bike for a day, and everything else that comes along. A pint of IPA during Happy Hour will set you back $1.25 to $1.50; having a decent bottle of Malbec with your steak dinner means that your total bill (yes, for steak and the bottle) comes in around $8 to $10; and taking a ride in a bus or the subway costs a dime.

Could be Paris, right?

On my prior trips to Argentina I had not been aware of these two separate exchange rates. In San Juan, all of my expenses had been covered by the race organizer, and the economy had been in better shape during the two earlier trips. My advice: Scrape together money for the airfare (which post-holiday season and with COVID should be rather low) and then live like a king for a couple of weeks in Buenos Aires and Bariloche.

Unfortunately, the famed Ricoleta cemetery has been closed for the
 past two years because of COVID

Winter, of course, is the perfect time for us northerners to visit Buenos Aires, where the temperatures are spring-like and pleasant. Except for my first full day being rather rainy the rest of the time I had ample of sunshine and temperatures in the mid- to high 70s. Obviously, being right on the vast Rio de La Plata means that the summer doesn't come with extreme heat as you'd find inland. It is a temperate climate, and even the winters (our summers) are mild. Buenos Aires has untold parks and green spaces, and the purple jacaranda trees emanate a smell not unlike honeysuckle. Or maybe it is the yellow-blossoming la tipas that are so fragrant. Both trees are ubiquitous all over the city and add beautiful touches of color.

The yellow blossoms come from the la tipa trees while the purple ones are jacarandas

During my two three-hour walking tours with local guides I learned more about Buenos Aires and Argentina than I would have thought possible. Politics, history, architecture, immigration, the love/hate relationship with Britain, the people's pride that certainly resembles that found in Brazil ("We have the widest street in the world, but los brasileños cheated so the Guinness Book of Records had to create for them a separate category, but ours is wider, of course."), the tango, the close connection to Paris—it's all a bit complicated, as one of the guides liked to say, and it certainly is interesting. Think of it: This place is really, really far away from Europe and New York ("we had the first skyscraper in all of south America"), yet it sees itself as a cosmopolitan hotspot, the economy be damned.

The first skyscraper in South America—and quite likely the ugliest, too

Said skyscraper is one of the ugliest buildings I saw, and I can't believe that some of the porteño gentility still pays a lot of money to live in that thing. Maybe they have to do so because the expansive mansions that were built in the mid-19th century were sold to foreign countries to serve as embassies in the swank sections of Recoleta and Beltrano. If you travel to Buenos Aires you will be astonished that there are essentially no colonial buildings. Most of the monumental buildings that are built in a neo-classical style are barely 120 years old, and in one block you can find any architectural epoch from the past 150 years, next to one another other. Both guides used the word "eclectic" to describe the face of Buenos Aires.

La Casa Rosada, where the president works (but not lives)

One of the very few colonial buildings, the Cabildo

The Ministry of Health building, which features two 10-story tall metal murals of Evita Peron on opposite sides

The Congress building

I spent much time walking through various neighborhoods, which differ dramatically in character. My excursion to La Boca, south of the city center, showed me a more bohemian and certainly blue collar barrio. Some claim that the tango was born here, and it makes sense as this is still a gritty area close to the port facilities; guide books recommend that tourists not visit at night. It is also the neighborhood where Argentina's demi-god, Diego Maradona, started to play for the Argentinos Juniors and then the famed Boca Juniors. Almost palpable is the huge rivalry between the folks of La Boca, home of the Bombonera, as the Boca Juniors' soccer stadium is affectionately nicknamed, and the fans up to the north in Belgrano who have the Estadio Monumental, home to rival team River Plate.

La Bonbonera, La Boca's famed soccer stadium

One of countless murals in La Boca (the Puente Transbordador presents a recurring motif)

Locals enjoying a few tango songs in La Boca

The Puente Transboardador moved pedestrians, carts, cars, and trams on a platform from one side of the Rio Riachuelo to the other, starting in 1914

I was surprised by the large number of people who exercise in the many green spaces that Buenos Aires has. Maybe it's part of COVID, since I saw many small groups of folks who were doing weight training, tai chi, intervals, or other types of exercise that seemed to be led by personal trainers. People jog, people walk, people ride their bikes. If you were to look at a city plan of BA you'd see several extremely large parks in the northern sector of the city that have wide bike lanes, exercise stations, water fountains, and everything else that one could ask for as someone who wants to stay fit. Of course, on the wide avenues and boulevards that surround these parks (which also house the huge horse track, the regatta stadium, the polo field, and several golf and tennis facilities) you will see less fortunate citizens pulling a cart loaded with cardboard and other recyclables in the fashion of a human mule.

I've never seen as many professional dog walkers

I visited two museums. Because of COVID it is necessary to make online reservations that require registering your passport and picking a time. (I had to do the same for my walking tours.) After noting the rainy condition forecast for Sunday I reserved a slot at the Modern Art Museum in the San Telmo area, in itself an interesting and very attractive neighborhood. Modern art is modern art, and I usually find myself slowly walking through the halls and enjoying the colors or the novelty or the sheer craziness of the works on display. 

The Museo des Bellas Artes was actually in my neighborhood, and I was astonished by the wide cross section of well known artists. Rubens, Rembrandt, Manet, Picasso—you name it. Juxtaposed to these masters were works of contemporary Argentinian painters, and it was interesting to see the influence of Europe on South America. One section of the Bellas Artes is dedicated to Aguste Rodin, who had a special relationship to Argentina, resulting in one of his five or six castings of The Thinker being in front of the Congress Building. I don't want to bore with historical detail; just go there and check it out for yourself.

This work has a very modern title: No work and no bread

Congress

The Cabildo, before part of the building was truncated to widen the Avenida Mayo

Rodin's The Kiss, gifted by Rodin to Buenos Aires

Another interesting excursion took me to the Puerto Madero neighborhood. For a long time this area had been rough and tumble and eventually fell into ill repair and repute, being part of the old port facilities. Then, 25 years or so ago, investors started to do what had been done in European cities for a while: build office space, lofts, and bars and restaurants in an effort to rehabilitate the area. The investment paid off, and now Puerto Madero is an attractive and vibrant part of town, especially in the late afternoons and evenings, attracting a mostly young crowd of porteños who come to eat, drink, and party.

The early barrio Puerto Madero 

Toward the end of my week I rented a bicycle from a small place that was mainly a wine cave that featured artisan cheese and other delicatessen; the name of the place was Sommelier en Bicicleta. Nice. I paid $4.50 to rent my bicicleta naranja for five or six hours. Earlier in the trip I had thought I'd use BA's bike share system, but it requires a convoluted online registration process and I figured this one-day rental was going to be much easier, and I'd get a bike that actually worked.

I had brought a helmet to Argentina (not a small feat when you travel just with carry-on) as well as my handlebar phone holder so that I could use Locus in real time to navigate. I know, I sound like a broken record, but that app just continues to amaze me. (As an aside, I used Locus to navigate on all my walks. I have a really hard time staying oriented in the southern hemisphere. Even after a week I'd still be fooled by the way the sun makes its way across the sky, and Locus avoided many extra miles of walking in the wrong direction.) I rode about 23 miles on my orange bike, all the way to the bank of the Rio de La Plata. No, it's really not silvery but rather murky, but it is vast. I could just very faintly make out some of the tallest buildings of Montevideo, Uruguay, in the very far distance, across what looks like the ocean. Wow, that was cool.

Most of Buenos Aires' streets are one-way, so even the locals use their GPS to get where they're going. Quite a few of these neighborhood and larger through streets will have small strip separated from the cars with pylons or small barriers, and on a bike you can go in both directions. It's all a bit dicey, but after a while one gets used to it. Many intersections are controlled by traffic lights, and everybody brakes hard on yellow; Mayra had told me that the fines for red-light-running are very costly, and nobody takes a chance. I didn't see a single accident, although some situations looked pretty hairy. Riding the buses opens up yet another dimension, namely the bus lanes in the middle of the large boulevards, often going against the personal traffic. Nobody takes prisoners—they all drive fast and change lanes often without using the blinker. Yet everybody stops—hard!—for the red lights.

The bus system is fascinating. Usually I prefer taking the subway to taking a bus because the stops are so well defined on an underground's system map. With about 110 different bus lines in BA you won't find a simple map that will help you navigate. But as they say, there's always an app, right? Try this one: Rome to Rio, free on Google Play and without bothersome ads. Put in your starting and destination addresses (or use the GPS to determine where you are and pinpoint the destination on the map), and Rome to Rio will give you numerous options on how to get there—bus, subway, Uber, taxi, or mix thereof, plus how to walk to the next public transport station. It will tell you the bus route number and also the name of the station where you need to get off, something that is rather handy in BA as you need to tell the driver that tidbit of information to activate the card reader that will deduct ten cents from your SUBE (the rechargeable plastic public transportation card). 

However, there is something else you need to understand about how the bus system works: In a given block you may have buses from six to nine different lines barreling through, and they couldn't just all stop in the same area. So, each line has a designated stop in this block that corresponds to the house number of the street (e.g., "2469 Santa Fe"). Stand by the curb at the address (cleared marked on the wall of each building) and wait until the bus you need comes into sight, wave your arm, and hop on after the driver comes to a screeching stop. Genius, and Rome to Rio gives you all this info! Once you have the hang of it, riding the bus in Buenos Aires and actually getting where you intend to go is easier than in any other city that I have ever visited.

Evening excursion to the rather exclusive Salón 1923 and its 16th-floor
open rooftop bar, in the Palacio Barolo

In the paragraphs about La Boca I briefly mentioned the tango, Argentina's greatest cultural gift to the world. You may have seen dancing competitions and remember the tango for a fairly fast pace and wild gymnastic feats. The true tango, however, is much slower paced and thrives on precision and decorum. One night I went to one of the few currently open dancehalls where one can watch and/or dance the tango. It was fascinating. This was not a tourist place but rather an establishment where I appeared to be the only non-porteño. It was a Tuesday night and the place wasn't too crowded. The large, wooden dance floor was surrounded by a carpeted strip that had small tables and old chairs. The walk-up bar area on the far side sold wine, beer, and mixed drinks, and the music was piped in through a sound system that appeared to be almost as old as the origins of the tango itself.

The crowd of locals could not be defined by one particular age or one particular dress code. Young and old, sneakers and stilettos, t-shirts and fancy dresses—there was no norm. some couples danced just one dance, others stayed on the floor for the duration of the five or six dance "set" that was separated from the next set by five minutes of pop music. The dancers displayed various degrees of precision in their moves, but they all approached the dance with great seriousness. I could only guess whether they were out to simply enjoy the dance, apply what they had learned in a recent lesson at the same venue, or prepare for some formal occasion where they needed to be spot-on. It was rather fascinating. The tango exudes a sensuality and sexuality that I have never seen in any other dance form, and it is simply beautiful to observe. It is a pas-de-deux that is difficult to describe. A couple of days later I watched from the anonymity of the rooftop beergarden of a microbrewery a couple that was trying to make a few pesos by dancing in the street. 

If Argentina has given the tango to the world, it is also responsible for two culinary joys that are a highlight to this part of the world: asado and malbec. Even if vintners in other parts of the world make fine malbecs (LOL, I'm looking at a bottle of  2015  Paicines Malbec from California right now) it is a varietal that is tied to Mendoza, the Uco Valley, and the San Juan region. I'm happy to report that you can enjoy a nice bottle for $5 to $10 in most restaurants in Buenos Aires. As for the asado, some folks translate it into our barbecue, which in itself is a poor description of what originated in Mexico as barbacoa. All three styles involve subjecting the meat to a natural heat source (so, not an oven), but that's where it ends. True barbacoa is cooked in a pit in the ground, without open flames. Barbecue in the US generally involves placing meat on a grill above burning charcoal or wood. Asado, in its truest form, is stacked up on one side of a fire pit while the wood fire burns on the opposite side, and the relatively thin but large slabs of meat are turned so that one side faces the direct heat. Regardless, all three are fabulous, and don't leave Argentina without having your fill of asado and malbec.

I ate exceedingly well for literally pennies, and that in itself is reason to contemplate another trip down below the Tropic of Capricorn. Argentina's beef is second to none, but being right on the Atlantic also means that Buenos Aires has a lot of excellent seafood. The burgers that I had for a couple of lunches are simply not comparable to what one is served in a brewpub in the US. Since Italians make up a very large part of Argentina's immigrant population pizzas are outstanding and ubiquitous. And for breakfast I enjoyed for a buck or less a good cup of coffee and two or three media lunas, croissant-like pastries without the layering and but with a fluffy doughy-ness and a light honey glazing. The only problem about eating in Argentina is that it happens fairly late, similar to what you encounter in Spain, and it is not uncommon to finish dinner just shortly before midnight or even later.

I think I could go on and on gushing about this fabulous trip. Everything clicked, even getting my mandatory COVID test 72 hours before my departure. (With the new rule of 24 hours before departure for re-entry into the US having gone into effect today things will be much more difficult.) My flights were comfortable and relaxing, my accommodations central and safe, all transportation trouble free, the food superb, the many IPAs fresh and tasty, the wines smooth and complex, the people super friendly, the weather almost ideal, and the sightseeing simply overwhelming. Add to that the negligible cost (about $550 plus the miles) and you can see why I was so stoked about my week in Buenos Aires, the Paris of South America. Do yourself a favor, and try to visit!

Jürgen