Sunshine & Futbol

Our last long-distance bus ride was a quick and easy 19 hours from Puerto Madryn to the warmth of Buenos Aires. We've decided that someone needs to start an Argentine-style bus service in Canada. It'd be way simpler for short-to-medium trips than flying (especially with all the hassles and confusion in the airports these days) and not only cheaper and more comfortable but much more environmentally friendly. Who'd want to fly to Calgary cattle-class when you could take a sleeper bus for half the price and wake up to a view of the Rockies?

Like our last trip to Buenos Aires, we had big plans for what we'd spend our days doing, and again we shelved most of those plans in favour of wandering the city and hanging out in the many amazing parks and plazas. We stayed in San Telmo neighborhood this time, which put us in walking distance of the old harbour and a whole different set of shops and parks. And a pretty good tenedor libre vegetarian buffet on Avenida Florida, which is like a much busier pedestrian-only version of Robson St in Vancouver.

The old port was mostly empty when we wandered thru, but we did see one really interesting ship. The Sarmiento was the flagship of the Argentine navy for over 40 years, from the late 1800s thru to 1946. It is a 3-masted frigate with coal-fueled steam engines, a ship style that neither of us had ever seen before.



Puerto Madero also has a very interesting bridge, oddly named Puente de las Mujeres(womens' bridge). It is a one-armed suspension bridge that swings open to allow boats through. We both thought it odd that such a phallic construction was the womens' bridge :)

Throughout our trip we've visited many churches, ruins, and other locations of religious significance. On our last full day in Argentina we visited Estadio Monumental Antonio V. Liberti, aka River Plate Stadium, for a taste of the other major religion: futbol - Argentina vs. Bolivia in the FIFA World Cup eliminations! We went with a tour, since we'd heard that games can get extremely rowdy and it's safer to travel with a large group. Fortunately there were no problems at the game besides the incredible heat, which was dealt with by two pairs of firemen who sprayed the stands with a huge amount of water. Our seats were in the shade, so we stayed cooler and dry, but the cheap seats at the ends (the most crowded sections) got sprayed for around 10 minutes by fire hoses!!!

The relatively peaceful nature of the crowd was probably largely to do with the fact that Argentina dominated for most of the game (final score was 3-0 for Argentina) but the 100 or so cops in riot gear probably helped too. Also, the Bolivia fans were all together in a cage. Really - 10 foot high wire walls topped by two spools of razor wire! The Bolivia fans were outnumbered 10:1 or so, but they did their best to match the 65,000 or so Argentina fans in volume - at least until Argentina's third goal.

Our last morning was spent at the San Telmo market picking up a few last-minute gifts before we headed to the airport. After Argentine bus service the Air Canada economy-class trip home was a bit shocking, but we did get some spectacular views of the mountains as we flew back from Toronto to Vancouver.