After initially getting on the wrong bus, we find the right one and are on our way to La Boca. The faces on the bus are decidedly different to those we saw the day before in the posh neighbourhoods. No plastic surgery here! Wendy is on a mission to repay the debt we had to the kind guy who had paid for our bus fare the day before, by returning the favour to someone else. The old lady she pays for looks rather confused!
We ride the bus (AR3.50 without/AR1.75 with SuBe card) to the very end, to La Caminita, the home of the famous painted houses. As we arrive along the river, we get pulled into a souvenir shop, and end up doing all our souvenir shopping in one go, as the prices seem very good and the owner is friendly and chatty. He can't understand why Wendy and I call each other buddy, so he learns a new English word from us ;)
We reach the area of the painted houses and have a walk around, suddenly there are lots of tourists and we take some pics. The story goes that they often used bright coloured paint to paint the ships or docks. Whatever was left over the locals would take back to their shanty houses (often made of corrugated iron) and paint them equally colourfully.
The atmosphere is great, there is music playing and people dancing tango in the streets. We walk along and admire the excellent artworks on sale by local artists.
There are also strange statues all around on balconies, of personalities like Evita, Messi and Maradona. Maradona started out at the local football club here - the Boca juniors.
We walk further and check out some of the cute markets and shops, selling crafts, alfajores (an Argentinian biscuit filled with dulce de leche, yum) and clothing.
The restaurants all have touts outside, trying to get business. They are relatively harmless and friendly, and we get chatting to one guy who says "South Africa? Springboks, Amarula, Mandela..." He seems to think Mandela is still president so we set him straight, and he tried to memorise the name Zuma for the next bunch of South Africans he come across.
Initially we weren't going to eat in this area, but we realize it is sad that tourists come to this neighborhood, just take photos and leave again, without giving anything back, so we go back to our friend and try out his restaurant.
There are three couples taking turns to dance tango and another dance, which looks more like a gaucho dance, on the stage at the restaurant. Their shoes are scuffed and their outfits less immaculate than the ones in the tango show, but I tell you their dancing skills are just as good! Turns and lifts and fancy footwork, very impressive and enjoyable. Makes me want to take up dancing again :)
We order pizzas and once we are done, we head back to the bus, after being helped by a friendly policeman to find the right one. Luckily, the bus takes us all the way to the city centre, and Plaza de Mayo, close enough to our next destination. We have decided to visit Cafe Tortoni as our last stop in BA. We had tried to go there before, but the queues were huge. This time, there are no queues, and we seat ourselves inside the opulently decorated cafe.
It has a real old world feel, and the waiters are all dressed in tuxes. We all order submarinos - a BA speciality of hot milk served with a chocolate bar to melt inside, producing a rich hot chocolate. The unique thing about Cafe Tortoni is their chocolate bars are actually in the shape of submarines! At AR20 each they are pretty reasonable.
We walk back to pack for our onward flight - next stop Peru! We decide to take the bus again, as this time we are leaving from Jorge Newbury airport, much closer to the city. We manage to catch the bus from Ave 9 de Julio and Wendy continues her mission to give free bus rides to the citizens of BA, aided by the bus driver, who probably thinks we are crazy. We now have no need for the SuBe card and the remainder of the money loaded on there... We reach the airport and check in with no problems, except that my bag is covered in something disgusting it must have picked up on the bus :(
We grab last beers and empanadas at a restaurant in the airport before boarding our flight to São Paulo. The selection of restaurants is very good at this airport, although there is not much through the gates. Once in São Paulo we have a 7 hour layover, so thankfully we find some very comfortable seats at gate 4, hop into our sleeping bags and get a pretty decent sleep.
The onward fight to Lima is around 5 hours.
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Location:Buenos Aires, Argentina
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