Iguazú Falls

No trip to South America would be complete without a visit to Iguazú Falls, presumably the world's most spectacular water falls (no offense to our Romanian friends, we know the Duruitoarea fall in Ceahlău is nice too), most likely contained in every "100 places to see before you die" list ever made, and recently declared one of the new seven wonders of nature (easily beating other finalist such as "Black Forest, Germany").

Discovered by some Spanish dude in 1541 according to Wikipedia, the falls have been a hugely popular tourist destination ever since. In fact, here's a picture of my (Max) parents visiting Iguazú Falls ... in May 1976:

From right to left: my dad, Traugott, my mom, Carola,
their friends Dieter and Thomas.

So, about 35 years later, we braved the post-holiday crowds at Retiro Bus Terminal (imagine a busy airport without the security barriers). 

From there we got on a bus in Buenos Aires bound for Puerto Iguazú, the gateway town for the falls right at the border of Argentina and Brazil. The bus ride took 17 hours, departing B.A. at 8 in the evening, so you get to spend the night on the bus. We were lucky enough to still get fairly comfortable "cama" seats which could be extended to something like a bed, so it was actually possible to catch a few hours of sleep.















On arrival day, we went to see the falls from the Argentinian side. After a short train ride we walked along raised walkways to the edge of the falls. The views were already pretty impressive:

But the highlight was clearly the view from the Brazilian side, which we visited the next day.
We caught the earliest bus to get us across the border. What would have only been a 20min drive if measured by distance, turned into a one and a half hour trip due to formalities on both sides of the border. Once we arrived at the park, it was another 90min (!) wait to buy tickets. Let's just say we will be forever grateful to the person that thought of building a simple covered walkway for a large part of the plaza in front of the park! Otherwise we'd be fried like chicken in the Brazilian sun... ;)

Once again we walked along several trails and raised walkways to view the different waterfalls. We both agree that it was definitely worth all the wait! The views were spectacular!
It's really hard to get an impression by just looking at pictures, but nevertheless here are a few more:

(Note the walkway leading up to the edge of the falls. We took the following pictures and final part of the video from that platform on the far right...)

Finally, here's a short video:

All in all, an amazing trip! Well worth spending 34+ hours in a bus. :) If you ever visit South America, don't miss out on seeing Iguazú Falls!

Merry Christmas! Feliz Navidad!

We wish everybody a wonderful holiday season 

filled with joy and peace.

Merry Christmas! 

Or as the locals say: Feliz Navidad! :)

We had a relaxing weekend, celebrating the holidays in Buenos Aires with a small feast and then watching the fireworks at midnight from the roof top deck of our building - yes, they do fireworks here both for Christmas and New Years.

City Tour & Evita Museum

City Bus Tour
The few days before Christmas we decided to play tourist and take a bus tour across the city, as well as visit the Evita museum. We've already seen most places along the tour, but it was a nice way to see the city from the top of a bus instead of fighting through the crowds...

The Casa Rosada, official seat of the Argentinian president.

The Evita Museum

The Evita museum, honors the life of Eva Duarte Peron (1919-1952), former first lady of Argentina. The museum is housed in an old mansion that was converted into a women's shelter by her Foundation during her life-time, before being turned into the museum just a few years ago. During her short life (she died at the early age of 33 due to cancer), she was already a polarizing figure. Her transformation from small-town girl to radio/TV star and then to wife of General Juan Peron who became president of Argentina has brought her many supporters as well as critics alike.  Some considered her a saint, others a calculating woman that took advantage of others. You can read more on Wiki: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evita_Peron

The museum showed a lot of historic footage, pictures and wardrobe from her life, as well as the role of the Foundation she formed to support lower-income Argentinians. A nice glimpse into life at the middle of the 20th century...

Towards the end of the tour we ended up in the mansions kitchens and connected courtyard, where Sylvia decided to take it easy while Max whipped up a delicious snack in the kitchen... ;)

Tango

You can't spend time in Buenos Aires without experiencing the tango! It was creating in the 1920's from a mix from multiple other musical styles and first only danced by people from the lower classes before becoming internationally famous in the 40's.

One of the most famous songs has to be Carlos Gardel's "Por Una Cabeza" ("For the head"). Not many people know that it's actually about a horse... ;)

So we've tried to make an effort that last week to go to a dance lesson and check out a milonga (more to that below).

The dance lesson was at the DNI Tango dance school in a part of town called Amargo.
We attended a 2hr beginner class last Monday (Sorry! didn't think of bringing our camera, so no embarrasing pics, yet!).
The class was pretty cool. Fantastic teachers. As expected, most of the students were other foreigners/tourists from all over the place, mostly Europe. We learned some basic steps, so we would be ready to go to a milonga and at least be able to dance a little bit. And I only had my toes crushed twice that evening! (not by Max though) :)



On Tuesday evening, our new friend Ana from Buenos Aires showed us a place called "La Catedral". The place is also in Amargo, pretty close to the school, in a rather non-descript old building. We never would have found it on our own.
Inside it has got to be one of the coolest places I have ever seen! Think old warehouse with eclectic/bohemian decorations (meaning lots of weird art) and mismatched/broken old furniture.
We snagged the last available table and watched the ongoing tango class before the free dancing started.
So officially this was a milonga, which is a dance evening where they only play tango music. Traditionally there's pretty strict rules around milongas, for example only the guy can ask the girl to dance, not vice versa. And if you are a single lady you should only dance with a man once, otherwise dancing with the same guy multiple times could mean you are his for the night (unless you came as a couple of course)... ;) We just danced to a few songs, and otherwise enjoyed the atmosphere and great people-watching. Thanks Ana for a great find! We'll definitely have to go back there. Then we'll maybe also have some tango photos of us.

Uruguay, part 2

Sorry for the delay. Here is finally the continuation from part 1:

After 5 days in a small beach town in the northeastern corner of Uruguay we started heading back south towards...

Punta del Este


Punta del Este, vacation spot of the rich and famous in South America.

Opinions were split when we asked people about Punta del Este. Known as the Hamptons of South America, it's a peninsula about 2 hours northeast of the capital Montevideo that is packed with luxery hotels, expensive restaurants, and of course a huge yacht club. We decided to stop by for just one day - call it curiosity - to see what the hype was all about.








What we found was exactly as promised: luxury hotels, yacht clubs, expensive restaurants, etc. But also very nice beaches! Perfect for endless walks or water sports. I guess the only thing we missed out on were the celebrities - we were a bit too early in the season. We've been told it's a madhouse here starting right after Christmas and through New Years. Which would explain why everything becomes twice as expensive (no kidding!).

The lighthouse (El Faro) right in front of our hotel in the old part of town. Also met these two beautiful sirens of the sea... :)

So instead we enjoyed the relative quiet....

Max practiced his imitation skills....


















Sylvia discovered the local appreciation for famous Polish composers...













We were able to observe the local wildlife...

(A huge sea lion lounging in the sun in the harbor, completely unperturbed by the 30+ tourists jockeying for good positions along the rail to take its picture. Rough guess that it was at least 300-400 lbs and 7+ ft length.)







And we had Max jumping for joy when we discovered a poker game going on at the famous Conrad Hotel that he could join in on... :)

After an exciting 24 hours we headed farther south to the capital...

Montevideo

Formed by the Spanish as a means to counter the smuggling by the Portuguese from Colonia to Buenos Aires, Montevideo sits right across the Rio del Plata from Buenos Aires. The capital is significantly smaller than it's Argentinian counterpart, and also infinitely more quiet and relaxed (notice the group playing chess in the street in pic below!). We spent 2 days enjoying the touristy and not so touristy sights. 

Along the Plaza Independencia, where the original citadel of Montevideo once stood, is now an imposing statue of national hero General Artigas (who is credited with doing the most for Uruguayan independence). The inner city can easily be covered on foot, so we walked from our hotel to the Centro and then on to the Harbor, where a huge cruise ship had landed just a few hours before (explained a lot of the hurried tourists walking around!).

Along the way we saw a few more nice sights...

Plaza de la Constitucion, the oldest square in the country, has a beautiful white fountain and an amazing array of architecture that shows the wealth of the city's past. Now it's home to the most popular street cafe's and bars/nightclubs in Montevideo.

Passing through the old part of the city you end up reaching the port, which is even active to today. Right by the port is the Mercado del Puerto, where in the old days fishermen would unload their wares to locals. Now it's a popular market that caters to tourists with a mouth-watering collection of restaurants. Very unlike South America, this place already closed by 8pm, so we were not able to grab dinner there as we had originally planned. Instead we ate a a fabulous restaurant right in front of the Mercado called Don Tiburon. Best steak I've ever had!!! (Sorry Argentina!). 

Lucky we covered most sights on day 1, since the second day started gray and rainy. We took it easy, first hanging in one of the local cafe's - of which there's surprisingly few compared with Argentina - before hitting up a few museums. 

The Bonafide Espresso cafe where we hid out for most of the morning is a local institution in itself, favorite coffee spot for the local movers and shakers. Saw many self-important people in suits, but nobody famous from what we could tell...

The museums were all relatively small, but free, so that was a nice side bonus. Only downside was that no photography was allowed inside, so no proof to show for it, sorry! Got to see how the wealthy upper-class lived in the 18th/19th century in Montevideo (imagine Versailles mixed with English manor), and some exhibits of modern artists from Uruguay ("I could have painted that!"). ;)

Shout out to our German friends - even here in Montevideo you can partake in a pretty decent Doener Kebab - with explanation of the menu in German by the restaurant's manager! Logo on the menu: "SCHMECKT NACH MEHR!"

In the afternoon the sun came back out and we hit the last big item on our must-see list - the beach! Yep, they have one in the city, and it's actually quite nice as you can see in the picture below. We explored the local culinary delights for dinner, including finding a new favorite beer for Max, before turning in early after an exciting week in Uruguay...