You would think someone who travels as much as I do (and to be honest as much as any of the three of us) would be better at reading all the instructions. Especially someone like myself who had a trip aborted at its inception before, not being allowed to South Africa in 2017 due to a lack of blank pages in my passport. But alas some lessons need to be re-learned and re-learned.
This time it was us not realizing you have to go quite early
to go through immigration for the ferry to Colonia del Sacramento in Uruguay.
The fine print of the ticket says you have to be 2 hrs early. We did not know
this and woke up about 90 min early. It was about 60 minutes ahead of schedule
when I first noticed. After some googling said 60 is more like the true
cut-off, we made a call not to go also because what was unsaid is that we have
to go early for the ferry back as well, which would put the grand total time of
our trip at about three hours in Uruguay, even if we were able to sneak our way
on the ferry in the first place.
What this did give us was an extra day in Buenos Aires. Even
after taking advantage of it – admittedly with a slower pace than even our
other days here – there are still things we won’t have done. One was on our
list today, the Japanese Garden (Jardin Japonoes) which had a truly lengthy
line. Granted, it was moving fast, but we figured that this place wasn’t enticing
enough to us for any of us to put it on our list to visit, it is probably okay
skipping and avoiding the line.
We did walk around the entirety basically of the giant,
sprawling park that has the Japanese Garden walled off in one corner. The main
attraction of the park is a really well manicured rose garden in a little
peninsula with a giant lake placed around it. This whole area is wide open. Buenos
Aires, like all South American cities I’ve been to, are magically green despite
their heavy density.
The best part of the day was our lunch at San Telmo Market,
a sprawling indoor market in the San Telmo neighborhood, a part of the city
that is a bit older and weary. This haven of food and shopping livens it right
up however. The food stalls were in the middle and packed to the gills – a choripan
stall (which is where we ate, seemed to be the busiest), a tapas joint, a open-flame
grill joint, and so much more. We had a late lunch, around 3pm, and the place
was still packed where we had to silently circle like hawks waiting for three
poor seats to open up. The actual choripan was great as well, personally better
than Chori, which was our lunch the first day. I got an “Espanol”, which had
the Chorizo, with friend string onions, patatas bravas and an egg. Decadent for
sure, but also was my first bite to eat at 3pm.
Another interesting part of the day was seeing different
parts of Buenos Aires, namely as we drove in an uber we went past the more
modern Puerta Madero area, which we walked around the following day. Here,
Beunos Aires suddenly transforms into Toronto or something, with ornate
government buildings and glistening glass ones side by side, with trees
everywhere. Certainly, I did not expect this random little gem inside of Buenos
Aires.
The last two meals on the trip deserve some mention as well.
The last was our lunch on the final day at La Carniceria, which is a parilla of
some reknown, though certainly not Don Julio famous. Still, the place was
packed full right at the crack of 1pm (opening time). The place has a similar
menu with a few sides and starters (we got a lamb spiral sausage) and then four
meat choices. What was interesting was how elevated the starters and sides were.
We were seated near the pass so I could see some of them come out that were not
stuff we ordered and they all looked like fine dining.
The star though is the steak, which was being cooked in the
fire in front of us, with the guy taking giant slabs of steak onto the parilla
with indirect heat for a good 40 minutes before they were taken off and I guess
finished in the main room. For as delicate the plating of the appetizers were,
the main star was served on a plancha, glistening and fat as ever. Too much
meat, in reality, but we made good dents into it.
The other meal was at Misheguene the night before, which is
a Jewish-Argentinean restaurant in a trendy upscale area (a corner of Palermo).
The place was full when we arrived at 8:30, seemingly in the middle of their
two main seating times. Around the 9pm mark tables were slowly emptying, but by
10pm they were all filled. Understandably, we very clearly noticed the early
diners included a lot of English speakers, and the later set seemed all Spanish
speaking. We got the 6-course tasting menu (that increases to 8 with a bread
starter that it seems everyone gets, and a chocholate & nut covered matza
as a last course). The food was uniformly excellent, but also was mayb e the
heaviest tasting menu I’ve had.
The best course was either the kibbeh served with such
perfectly made za’atar dusted crackers, or the centerpiece which is a perfectly
cooked cube of pastrami (the places signature dish) smothered in a perfect wine
reduced sauce with an accompanying side that was beautiful itself. The food is
truly elevated and earnest to what chef Thomaz Kalika wanted when showing off
the cooking of his abuelo and bis-abuelo (his words).
The last few bits in Buenos Aires were dawdying around main
areas just soaking in life. Another aspect I’ve come to really appreciate about
traveling in certain cities is how rich a life the city has by itself. I would contrast
this with say Bangkok, which would cease to exist in its current form without
the incredible number of tourists that it brings in. Granted, tourists are
going there for a reason (me included), but in Buenos Aires, I wouldn’t be
shocked if a high majority of people we interacted with, or who went to the same
restaruants or bars we did, are locals. It helps that it was a Holiday weekend but
Buenos Aires was popping. No better example than our last spot on the last full
night, when going back to Under, we left in about an hour feeling a bit too
overwhelmed with the sheer size of the crowd. It wasn’t getting any thinner
from 2am when we got there to around 3:15 when we left. I’ve been to clubs
before, even in a country that much like Buenos Aires, has their clubs run the
beautiful 11:50pm to 7am schedule (Seoul), but seeing this maw of people just
having an amazing time, was heartening.
A few people did ask if it was weird we went to Buenos Aires
for four days. Like, wouldn’t you want to see the rest of the country. Granted,
I had technically been many years back (for a day stop in Buenos Aires, and
then El Calafate being in Argentinean Patagonia). But in a way, I’m happy I got
to immerse myself in Buenos Aires whole hog. Certainly there is much more to
see in Argentina. Hell, there is more to see in Buenos Aires itself – from the
Teatro Colon tour that eluded me, to seeing a Tango show, or going to a Guacho
ranch, or actually going to Uruguay…. But when (not if) I do make a return trip
to Argentina, I can focus on the rest of the country and give lesser time to Buenos
Aires, knowing that I’ve lived a full four days here already.
**EXTRA: City Ranking
As I come to the end of my four days here, I’ve started
thinking about where this city ranks on my list. I have the following South
& Latin American cities already there:
45 – Punta Arenas
40 – El Calafate
35 – Panama City
18 – Lima
17 – Mexico City
5 – Santiago
Firstly, I really do need to go back to Santiago and give
that #6 ranking a more serious look. I don’t like dropping cities until I do
get another chance to evaluate. But leaving that aside, the real question is do
I find Buenos Aires better than Lima or Mexico City. It really is tough. Lima
and Mexico City have more latin culture – not to mention in the case of Mexico
City, more authentically “latin” food. Buenos Aires is more green and probably
more touristically meaningful than Mexico City. They all have the same cool
neighborhoods, such as Palermo in Buenos Aires vs. Barranco in Lima vs. Polanco
in Mexico City. Where Buenos Aires may suffer is the other two have better food
and as good bars/cocktails. Buenos Aires has the party scene over Lima and
Mexico City (at least to my knowledge). It’s close. Buenos Aires probably fits
right in that range, if slightly below the other two. Either way, it more than
stacks up and right now I have another data point supporting my belief that
this is the most underrated part of the world, travel wise.**
