Buenos Aires

As much as I loved all of the places we have been, I fell head over heels for Buenos Aires. The colour, the music, the tango, the wine, the late starts, the attitude - it was my perfect place. 

A bike tour of the city when we arrived was a fantastic way to see the city and to learn about the nuances of the different districts: Palermo for parties, Recoleta for Evita, La Boca for colour and tango and football, San Telmo for markets and the centre for shops and eats. I was actually attacked by a bulldog on the bike tour (he grabbed my foot and ripped my converse, but luckily not my foot!) but even that didn't dampen the day. The company we went with was called BA Bikes and the guides were fantastic, really knowledgeable and kept us totally safe in crazy BA traffic.

We stayed at Millhouse, which lived up to it's reputation as "the party hostel". They organised cool parties and fun day tours daily, and we were surrounded by plenty of like-minded people who spent days in bed and nights in the city. In Buenos Aires dinner is a night time affair at around 10pm and parties start at 2am until the wee hours of the morning.

We stayed for almost a week in Buenos Aires so there are too many great days to recount, but here are a few of my stand-out favourites: 

Walking tour of La Boca:

This is the colour-splashed district you will recognise from post cards and photos of Buenos Aires, with tango dancers in the streets and red wine flowing all day long. The story goes that a famous local painter enlisted the help of sailors to paint the town using the cheap and left-over colours from paint shops. The result is Caminito:

It is also the home of the Boca Stadium, which is apparently a big deal but was a little bit lost on me! 

Recoleta Cemetery: 

People recommend to visit this graveyard to see the final resting place of Evita, a beloved political figure in Buenos Aires. What they don't tell you how freakin' weird it is with enormous family vaults housing visible coffins and gothic statues guarding generations of lost souls. It has to be seen to be believed and by the time you find Evita's tomb you are relieved to leave the eeriness. It's definitely worth a visit, just don't get lost in there!

La Bomba de Tiempo:

I have been watching YouTube clips of La Bomba de Tiempo since last January (we left in May), so I was like a kid at Christmas when we finally got to see them live. They perform every Monday in the Konex theatre to thousands of entranced fans. They are are an improvised percussion group led by an ecstatic composer who flails around the stage to lead the intoxicating beat. No two nights are ever the same at LBDT, which makes me want to go to every single show! I have never been to a gig where every single person in the crowd was so captivated and taken over by the music. They do something to you, cast some kind of drum spell, and it's incredible! 

Cabrera

It may seem like a strange way to follow La Bomba de Tiempo, but after the gig we decided to hit up the most famous steak house in town, La Cabrera. It's hard to find a "bad" steak house in Argentina, but this one is the business. The steak was the size of my plate and I ate so much that I genuinely couldn't move afterwards. It was more expensive than what our budget allowed for but was 100% worth the splurge at least once. 

Tango 

Tango is infectious in BA. You can't take your eyes away from it and you wish you were able to do it. 

We wanted to find an authentic tango experience so we booked a table at the renowned Cafe Tortoni. It was everything. We had been captivated by dancers in La Boca and on random streets or restaurants, but with live tango singers and 2 world class dancers in a tiny cafe ballroom, surrounded by local Argentinians drinking coffee and red wine, I felt like I was in a different world for an hour. And I wanted to go there again and again. 

We were not quite so captivating and sexy ourselves when we turned up for our tango lesson at Millhouse the following night. It was like an episode of Take Me Out as the girls were introduced one by one to the boys who were then instructed to choose their partner. It was lots of fun and we did eventually get the hang of the basic steps and accents of the dance, we just won't be headlining at Cafe Tortoni any day soon. 

Nights Out:

As I mentioned earlier, Bunoes Aires is on a different schedule to the rest of us. Don't feel guilty for sleeping during the day because that means you get to see the Buenos Aires at night, which is when it comes alive anyway!

Next Stop: Iguazu Falls 

Iguazu Falls

It was touch and go for a while on the 19 hour bus from Buenos Aires to Iguazu as 6 days' worth of red wine left our systems. At one stage I genuinely think my skin turned yellow as my liver worked overtime, and we both shed a tear watching Dustin Hoffman give his father of the bride speech in "Last Chance Harvey". It was an emotional time for all involved but we made it to the Argentinian side of the falls where the sun was finally shining for us. 

We only had one day at the falls (most people do a day or two on each side) so it was a bit hectic getting checked in, fed and packed for the day all in the space of about half an hour. This was not helped by the fact that I had accidentally booked us into a hostel on the Brazillian side like a genius, but we found a fab hostel called Bambu with such a chilled out vibe and a really helpful girl working on reception. 

A bus leaves every twenty minutes to Iguazu National Park where you can walk around 3 different trails to see the waterfalls and the jungle. People had told us that photos can't prepare you for the falls and they were totally right. It was incredible. Enormous falls, water crashing like thunder and rainbows so close it seemed like you could touch them. 

Then there is the speed boat that takes you right under the spray of falls, so cold and strong it takes your breath away - literally! Everyone was soaked to the skin and screaming at the driver to let us do it one more time, it was such a buzz!

With cobwebs well and truly washed away we realised that we should have packed a towel, but luckily the receptionist told us to bring a spare set of clothes. She also told us not to eat food out in the open because of the crazy monkeys, which was great advice because those little bastards will actually beat you up for a sandwich! Insect repellant is also extremely necessary. 

The rest of the evening was spent at a BBQ back at the hostel and getting ready for BRAZIL BABY!

Next stop: Rio 

Mendoza and Cordoba

Even before I left Ireland for this trip, if anyone asked me which place I was most looking forward to seeing, I would answer with Mendoza. I had visions of me cycling through vineyards in the sunshine with a summer dress floating behind me, slightly tipsy and delighted with life. So while I wasn't prepared for it to be 2 degrees when we arrived, I DID get to do my cycle through the vineyards (I just did it in thermal leggings!). The creatively named "wine bike tour" took us between 4 different vineyards where we learned about the amount of work and time that goes into making a single bottle of wine. We learned about oak barrels and Malbec grapes and... I'm not sure what else because they each give you 3 glasses of wine which is quite distracting, but by glass 12 I declared myself a connoisseur anyway! We were with a really fun group of people and miraculously all stayed upright on our bikes for the entire day. 

We stayed in Hostel Campo Base, which was perfectly fine but a little bit subdued compared to what we are used to. The bunkbeds are also not suitable for people like me who fall out of their standing on a regular basis - they were so high (some of them 3 stories) with no railings whatsoever! 

We talked to a few people who stayed in Mendoza Inn, which is on a much busier street and sounded like a better option. 

There's lots to do in Mendoza for people who like hiking and climbing and ab-sailing etc. But luckily for people like us, there is also lots of wine to drink. 

After 3 nights in Mendoza we got the fanciest bus of all time to Cordoba. 

It was so comfy infact, that we almost ended up back in Mendoza because we were so fast asleep we didn't hear everyone getting off and the bus drivers changing over. Luckily the new bus driver checked the upper deck and woke us up by shouting "SEÑORITAS!" and tutting while we scrambled to get our stuff together! 

Cordoba is a student town so there are lots of nightclubs and lots of really cool clothes shops, which were very hard to resist. We stayed in Le Grand Hostel expecting a party, but we were almost the only people there. It was a pity because it was a cool place and apparently it gets very full at the weekends, but we were there on a Wednesday and found it bit of a stretch to keep ourselves occupied, not helped by the fact that it was lashing rain. So we wandered around the museums and drank a lot of tea, but decided to cut our Cordoba stay to one night and head to Buenos Aires a little earlier than planned. 

Next stop: Buenos Aires