Spring Break in the Fall, Part III: Buenos Aires

On our first day in Buenos Aires, we took a little walking tour that was organized by our hostel. The main attraction was the Casa Rosada (Pink House), which is the Argentinean equivalent of the White House—but more colorful, obviously. Among other things, the Casa Rosada is famous for being the place where Evita gave her speech (you know, “Don’t Cry For Me, Argentina”). Oh, and here’s a fun fact: they say the building is pink because it was originally painted with cows’ blood, which apparently protected it from the humidity.

Plaza de Mayo, with the Casa Rosada in the background

The next day we visited the Palermo neighborhood, which has lots of nice parks. In particular, the botanical garden was quite lovely… assuming you’re able to ignore all the stray cats.

Botanical garden

May 1 was International Workers Day, so just about everything was closed. But the Socialists were having a demonstration in front of the capitol building, so that was fun to watch.

Workers of the world, unite!

In the Recoleta neighborhood, there’s a big cemetery where Argentina’s rich and famous are buried. It’s a really beautiful place, but it’s basically a game of one-upmanship among dead people: “my tomb is bigger than your tomb!”

Recoleta Cemetery

One night we took a stroll to Puerto Madero. A few decades ago, it was one of the city’s worst neighborhoods, with decaying docks and abandoned warehouses. But these days it’s one of the trendiest spots in town, and it’s filled with art galleries, high-rise condos, and expensive restaurants.

On the docks in Puerto Madero

The most colorful spot in Buenos Aires is the Boca neighborhood. The buildings are painted in bright hues, and there are lots of narrow pedestrian streets. These days it’s completely overrun by tourists (like us), but it’s fun to imagine what it would’ve been like a hundred years ago.

Colorful houses in Boca

Argentina is pretty famous for its meat, so we made a point of going out for steak one night. I’m sure we didn’t go to the city’s best restaurant, but still… we were a little underwhelmed. It was fine, but it wasn’t any better than the meat in Brazil or the United States. I guess meat is meat.

There are plenty of shopping opportunities in Buenos Aires. I can’t tolerate more than a few minutes in most stores, but I make a couple exceptions: bookstores and record shops. Buenos Aires didn’t have many of the latter, but it did have the most amazing bookstore I’ve ever seen. The building used to be a fancy theater, but now it’s filled with books. The luxury boxes—you know, the places on the side where rich people sit—have been converted to reading areas with big cushy chairs. And the stage has been converted to a café. However, despite the fact that it’s the best bookstore ever, there was one significant drawback: I couldn’t read any of the books, because they were all in Spanish! (Can you believe the nerve of those Argentineans?) Unfortunately, the children’s section was the only place where I could find a book at my reading level.

Best bookstore ever!

And of course we couldn’t visit Buenos Aires without seeing a tango show. In fact, I think all tourists are legally obligated to attend one. Before the show, everyone in the audience got a free tango lesson. After making fools of ourselves for an hour, it was time to watch the pros. Somehow we got seats directly in front of the stage, so the view couldn’t have been much better. To be honest, I’m generally not a big fan of watching people dance, but the tango show was really incredible to watch.

Tango

After a week in Buenos Aires, we took a plane back to Brazil. We figured that was a better option than a 24-hour bus ride. However, a big storm rolled into São Paulo just as we were about to land, so our plane got diverted to Rio de Janeiro. After sitting in Rio’s airport for a couple hours, they told us it was okay to go back to São Paulo. So within the course of a few hours, we went from South America’s third-biggest city (Buenos Aires), to its second-biggest city (Rio de Janeiro), to its biggest (São Paulo).

Unexpected stop in Rio

And even then, the adventure wasn’t quite over. As we were going through customs, the agent told me I could only have one day in Brazil, and I had to go see the Federal Police the next day because my visa wasn’t valid anymore. After a moment of panic, I looked at my visa and noticed it clearly said, in English and Portuguese, that it was valid for five years. So, with as much respect as I could muster, I showed it to the moronic customs agent. He looked at it for a couple seconds and said, “Oh… okay,” as if it was no big deal. With that, he changed my stamp from 1 day to 90 days. Whew, I’m glad I said something!

So now we’re back in São Paulo, safe and sound. Kim has begun her new classes, and they seem like they’ll be very interesting but very challenging. And I’m still working part-time, thanks to my incredibly generous employer in Minnesota.

The next month should be really fun. In a couple weeks, Kim’s friend Carla will be visiting us. And the day after Carla leaves, Kim’s friend Katherine will be visiting. It’ll be fun to show people around the city… we don’t exactly feel like locals, but we’ve definitely grown quite fond of São Paulo, and it will be nice to show it off a bit.

Spring Break in the Fall, Part II: Uruguay

Nobody really talks about Uruguay—probably because it’s a small country squished between South America’s two giants—but it’s a great place, and we had a really fun time there.

Montevideo feels sort of like a European city. For one thing, there’s lots of great architecture (which is a lot more than São Paulo can say). Even though there aren’t a whole lot of tourist attractions, you can walk around for a few days and entertain yourself just by looking at the buildings.

Rocket-ship building

The city also has lots of plazas. And where there’s a plaza, it’s a good bet there’s also a statue of a guy on a horse. Uruguayans really love statues of guys on horses. Seriously, if I had a dollar for every time we saw a statue of a guy on a horse, I’d have… three bucks, at least.

A lovely plaza in Montevideo

Man on horse

On Saturday, we were a bit confounded by the fact that just about every store was closed. But then we realized everyone does their shopping at street markets on the weekend. We didn’t really need any vegetables, but that didn’t stop us from walking around looking at all the colorful stalls.

Street market in Montevideo

There’s also a great path that goes along the coast of Montevideo, so we rented bikes and spent an afternoon riding along the ocean. (Technically, they say it’s a river… but if you look at a map I’m sure you’ll agree it’s the ocean.)

Riding along the beach

Anyway, our next stop was a city called Punta del Este, which is a resort town known for attracting famous people. (Brad Pitt is apparently a big fan.) We were there during the low season, however, which meant the town was pretty much vacant. Consequently, we didn’t spot any celebrities. But on the plus side, we had an entire beach to ourselves!

Posing in front of the rich folks’ yachts

There’s no such thing as a budget restaurant in Punta del Este. In fact, you’d be hard pressed to find a restaurant that doesn’t have a cover charge. So we acted like high rollers and treated ourselves to a great meal overlooking the ocean (or river, whatever). Kim had the best meal of her life—chicken in a white wine sauce.

Sunset in Punta del Este

Famous statue in Punta del Este:

“The Hand in the Sand”

Our own private beach!

After Punta del Este, we went to a little town called Colonia. It’s a UNESCO World Heritage site, so I was expecting it to be pretty great. Not that it was ugly, it just wasn’t as interesting as Paraty, Brazil (which I described a few weeks ago).

A street in Colonia

Another street in Colonia

Colonia is pretty tiny, and all the museums were closed, so we got bored after a couple hours. To kill some time, we went to a restaurant for the rest of the afternoon. After two bottles of wine, we decided Colonia wasn’t so bad after all.

Adios, Uruguay. Next stop: Argentina.

That night, we took the ferry to Buenos Aires, Argentina, which is only an hour away. I guess I expected a plain old ferry with standing room only, but wow—it was like the Titanic or something, with a grand staircase, a bar, and comfy recliners. Then I realized we were looking at the VIP area. So we walked over to the regular people’s area, which was a bit more… regular.

Spring Break in the Fall, Part I: Southern Brazil

Sorry about the lack of updates lately. Kim had a two-week break in her semester—spring break, basically (except it’s fall here). So anyway, we’ve been traveling for a while.

The night her last class ended, we took an 11-hour bus ride to a place called Florianópolis, which is in the south of Brazil. Trains are pretty much nonexistent in this country, so buses are the only way to travel on a budget. And they’re actually pretty decent. The seats have foot rests that you can extend, and you can recline almost all the way back. It’s kind of like sitting in a La-Z-Boy, but not as comfortable. Plus you have someone else’s seat right over your lap—but that doesn’t really matter, since you’re sleeping (or trying to, anyway).

Barra da Lagoa, the little village we stayed in

We arrived around 10:00 the next morning, a bit groggy but ready to begin our vacation. Florianópolis is a fairly large island just off the coast. There are dozens of beaches, so it’s not hard to find a place overlooking the ocean. Our hostel, for example, had a patio with a lovely view.

Not a bad view for 18 bucks a night.

One of this island’s beaches features some large sand dunes. It’s a really impressive sight, especially when you’re at the bottom of a dune and the only thing you can see in any direction is a big hill of sand. We rented boards and tried “sand surfing.” The first time down was pretty fun, but then I realized why ski slopes always have tow ropes and chair lifts. Walking in sand is hard enough, but going uphill is downright exhausting. So, against my wishes, I got a bit of a workout that day.

Sand surfing

The next day we hiked out to a beach that’s only accessible by foot. The waves were about four feet high, so I spent most of the day playing in the water like a little kid.

Secluded beach

A little farther out, there were some big boulders that you could jump off of. I couldn’t resist.

Don’t worry, Mom, the water was very deep.

After three days in Florianópolis, we took another overnight bus to a little town called Canela. The differences between Canela and Florianópolis were stunning. For one thing, it actually felt like fall. I think the temperature in Canela was about 60 degrees, whereas Florianópolis was around 80. The biggest difference, however, was the architecture. Back in the 1800s, a bunch of Germans immigrated to southern Brazil (to escape the effects of the Napoleonic Wars, if you’re interested). As a result, the majority of the buildings were constructed in the traditional German style. In fact, it would be easy to think you were in Germany if it weren’t for the occasional palm tree on the side of the road.

Not Munich, I assure you.

Not far from Canela, there’s a park with a lovely waterfall. At the top of the falls there’s a rickety staircase with about 1000 steps, so we went all the way down to the bottom. Much like our day at the sand dunes, I got an unwelcomed workout on the way back up.

Caracol Falls

We spent several hours walking around the park, just enjoying the trees—which is one of the things we miss most in the concrete jungle of São Paulo.

Actual nature!

After a few days in and around Canela, we headed farther south to Uruguay. But first, we had a layover in Porto Alegre, a large city in the southernmost part of Brazil. We had five or six hours to kill, so instead of just sitting in the bus station we went out to see the city.

It’s probably unfair to judge a city based on just a few hours, but I’ll go ahead and judge it anyway: it’s a crap-hole. There are a few really nice-looking buildings, but they’re surrounded by a sea of ugliness.

One of the few buildings in Porto Alegre that isn’t ugly

Here’s a quick way to tell if you don’t like a place: you’re excited to begin a 12-hour bus ride just to get out of there. And indeed, we were pretty excited to leave Porto Alegre and take the night bus to Uruguay. (I wasn’t really thinking ahead when I called this blog “Nick and Kim in Brazil,” so please accept my humble apologies for the inaccurate title.) We left around 10:00 p.m. and arrived in Montevideo the next morning.

Stay tuned for our adventures in Uruguay!