Valparaiso & 'The Fat Cow' for dinner

One more UNESCO site ticked off the list! Valparaiso was awesome, once we found out which area we were supposed to be in... After another ample breakfast at our hostel we caught the bus to Valparaiso from the Parajitos subway station in Santiago. It was really convenient, buses left frequently and connected directly pretty much.

Once we got to Valparaiso we were immediately accosted by a bunch of people trying to sell us guided tours of the city, of course if people accost you when you get off the bus alarm bells go off and you generally don't dive headfirst into their offer, at least we managed to get a free city map and some advice from a guy before we turned down his deal, and wandered toward the touristy bit.

At Plaza Arturo Plat we stopped at a cafe for a quick break and managed to ask the somewhat-English speaking waitress for some advice, which was basically that we shouldn't go past a certain point of the city area since it wasn't safe for tourists - sure enough, when we ventured past a certain square to look at the oldest church in Chile, a policeman (and his police dog) came up and, again, told us we should leave as it wasn't safe for tourists there... Given this was now the second time we'd been told, we thought we should probably listen to their advice and headed back towards the Concepcion funicular, the one that was safe for tourists.

At the top we found a fantastic view of the city and also all the colourful houses and street art Valparaiso is famous for:

This one's for you, Mel! =)

We had lunch up the top there, and again, got told by another waitress where was safe/unsafe for tourists. Fortunately the scenic road to one of Pablo Neruda's houses was safe, so we ambled along that till we got to 'La Sebastiana'. It was definitely worthwhile going in, a great audio tour, and you can definitely conclude by the end of it that the guy was an absolute nutter... 

After that we basically went back down the hill through the 'open air museum' (a bit disappointing actually after all the other street art), and back onto the bus to Santiago. The bus steward (or conductor) was incredibly attentive and nice, he automatically got blankets to tuck in passengers who were dozing off, and also turned on the reading light for someone when it was getting dark, without being asked. Better service than our Aerolineas Argentinas flight! Though that's probably  not too difficult.

Back in Santiago, we got a recommendation to go to a restaurant called 'The Fat Cow' (or in Spanish "La Vaca Gordo'). When we got there it was absolutely choca full of locals, which was probably a good sign, and decided to wait the 20-30 mins to get a table. And wasn't it worth it! Definitely the best steak (and dinner, period) we've had on the trip so far, probably helped that we had a few Pisco Sours (the local cocktail of choice) and a very friendly waiter. Would definitely recommend this restaurant to anyone who visits Santiago! Best of all the prices were awesome, I had a 400g Chilean Wagyu steak for NZ$18, the cocktails were about NZ$2 each (and believe me it was much stronger than the usual stuff in NZ that costs NZ$15). Plus we got free empanadas and even a free Armaretto at the end - we probably made up for it in the generous tip we left behind but totally worthwhile!

Tomorrow we have an early start to Mendoza... if we can wake up in time! Hopefully can get some great photos of the Andes as we cross over. 

Too much walking

This morning we did an excellent walking tour of Santiago, which gave a really good overview of the city and its history, then James and I settled into an Irish pub (yes, Irish) to watch the Spain-Portugal game, where I enjoyed my first Pisco Sour, which was really nice and strong... so strong I had a bit of a nap near the end of the second half, but managed to recover to see Spain finish one-up and go through to the next round.

Next was the funicular up the San Christobal hill, where unfortunately the grand vista of the city was pretty much covered in smog - we could still make out the mountains, not that it really matters since we'll be going over them ourselves soon enough!

Unfortunately I was overruled about buying a return trip down the hill, and we ended up walking... 7.2km back the long way down the vehicle road. As I had suspected, the more direct pedestrian route was completely unsafe to use near sundown, in fact security guards were posted along the entrances to deter dumb tourists from going down, which is probably quite a good idea.

After a dinner of traditional Chilean comfort food/home-style cooking, we took the metro back to our hostel - the metro system here is noticeably cleaner and more modern than Buenos Aires, but still not as good as Hong Kong. =)

Tomorrow we're off to Valparaiso, hopefully can fit in a visit to one of Pablo Neruda's houses there too!

Vamos Argentina!

Yesterday (Sunday), despite being drizzly and grey, there were still plenty of stands at the antiques market by 10am, with more and more opening up. I certainly saw plenty of cool things I wouldn't have minded having at home, but a) would have had to carry it for the next three weeks, and b) they weren't actually that cheap. We did end up getting three flattened glass beer bottles though, just couldn't resist when we saw them:

Which one of these things is not like the others...?

Took heaps more photos of the market (James might say too many) but will leave them for when we've actually had time to sort, tag them properly and upload to Flickr. Afterwards we wandered down to Cafe Tortoni just in time to catch the second half of Germany's thrashing of England at the World Cup... I have to say I was a bit disappointed in their churros, even the ones I've had at a restaurant in Albany were better, and you can really tell it's recommended in every tourist guidebook (and website) as the whole place was probably 95% filled with tourists. And probably American ones, as very few other people bothered to watch the game.

For lunch we enjoyed a ham and cheese pizza at Guerrin (recommended on Chowhound), and in contrast it was full of locals, and also very nice! Their specialty was lots of cheese, which was evident:

When we finally got to Av. 9 de Julio (9th of July) and saw the Obelisk and later the Congreso building, I have to say it was a bit anticlimactic, having been to Washington DC... Plus, the buildings on either side of the 'grand', twelve-laned avenue kind of ruined the look of the whole thing. Still, we were tourists in BA and it was just one of those places you're supposed to go to I guess!

By the time we were heading into a subway station the whole city was like a ghost-town, probably due to the combination of it being Sunday morning, wet/cold for BA standards, and the big game was about to begin. There were still a few enterprising individuals hawking Argentinian flags, shirts and vuvuzelas at various streetcorners and intersections up until the last moment. 

Portenos combining their love for dogs & football

When we finally got back to San Telmo we (luckily) managed to get a seat in a crowded bar back in Plaza Dorrego just before kickoff, after already failing to find a spot at two other places. Good thing it was mostly full of locals too, because they just went absolutely nuts when Argentina scored the first goal! 

Of course the fact that it was offside didn't matter in the least, and there was wild applause for the ref when he let it stand. Then it was just all downhill from there for Mexico, except for one goal in the second half. Overall, definitely glad we managed to catch that game while we were here in Argentina, a bit of a shame the weather was bad and we didn't end up in Plaza San Martin with the big screen, but given the choice between sitting in mud/standing for two hours, and being in a warm bar, definitely would go with the latter...

At dinner we chose a local joint close to the place we went on the first night, and I ordered the offal:

Plus a chorizo sausage. In retrospect I probably felt more like a steak and got this dish just for the sake of being adventurous - I still don't know exactly what part of the (I presume) cow this came out of, I assume some part of the digestive system (and no, you don't need to tell me if you know), but it didn't taste that bad, though the appeal of eating it definitely lessened as it cooled and I became less hungry. Still, good to try it I suppose! The sausage was very tasty.

We're off to Santiago this afternoon, just hanging around the hostel for another hour before our taxi to the airport arrives, unfortunately not quite enough time to have another excursion, but overall I think we've seen all that we set out to see here on this trip!

Tren de la Costa and the Tigre Delta

After two days in Argentina, I have to say that our Spanish is still quite rusty - this morning when we were trying to buy the train tickets to transfer from Retiro to B. Mitre to catch the Tren de la Costa, at the ticket window when the guy said 'quatro' I just went blank because I thought there was no way it was going to be FOUR pesos only! That's like NZ$0.35 each for a train trip from Auckland Central to Papatoetoe. In fact, all subway trips are capped at ARS$1.10 (about 40c NZD) each way no matter how far you go or how many transfers you make. Really wish Auckland had at least something remotely resembling a decent public transport network...

Anyway, after we got all that sorted and arrived at the first Tren de la Costa station, it seemed a little bit weird how run down it was given it was such a popular (local) tourist route.

Still, the trip was nice and we saw plenty of kids playing Saturday morning sports in fields along the way, and we got a glimpse of BA from across the water as well (though passed by too quickly to take a photo).

At the end was the 'Delta' stop of Tigre, where, on our way to the Tourist Info Office, James made an important discovery!

That's right, turns out you can get V in Argentina too... good to know!

Then it was a river ferry up to Tres Bocas, where three of us had a lovely lunch of grilled fish, the local speciality (James got grilled short-ribs).

I also finally gave in and decided to give beer another go, since it was so much more economical to get a bottle of that instead of wine or anything else - Quilmes seems to be the local choice, and the main reason I can tolerate it is because it tastes more like just cider, lacking the strong barley/hops aftertaste. I like how they brought it in an practical though not particularly attractive polystyrene enclosure to keep the bottle cool.

After that, we had intended to do a loop walk of the island, but thanks to some bad planning and lack of map/sign reading, we crossed several bridges that we shouldn't have and ended up 3km south of where we were trying to go... was finally forced to turn back when we ran out of track. Oops! Oh well, at least it was still a nice walk, and we made some canine friends along the way - basically these dogs would just follow us around for absolutely ages, for no particular reason.

Eventually we got all the way back safe and sound, and tired! Tomorrow is the antiques market in our neighbourhood so really looking forward to that, afterwards will finally check out 'El Obelisco' and Congreso, maybe go up the tower at Palacio Barolo.

Lots of walking (+ a bit of subway)

Today we wandered all over the place, covering Puerto Madero, Retiro and Recoleta, and visiting Plaza San Martin (where we might return on Sunday afternoon for the Argentina vs Mexico 'mundial/World Cup game), an arms museum, a Cloister, and of course the famous Recoleta cemetery.

The Hyundai 'Mundial' Fanzone

Eva Peron's grave

I actually walked right past Eva Peron's grave and wouldn't have turned back if Bruce hadn't told me, I was probably more interested in the cats wandering around.

Lunch near Plaza San Martin.

Took the subway (or 'subte') all the way from Pueyrredon to San Juan at rush hour, wasn't too bad actually - I really do miss living in cities with a subway system, just so much easier and more convenient than the alternatives...


Anyway, tonight we'll probably head to a tango show, and then tomorrow a day trip to Colonia in Uruguay. Looking forward to the antiques market here in San Telmo on Sunday!

Parrilla!

Meat & potatoes, the staple of the South American diet... And our dinner! Delicious.