Get Off the Bus and We Are in Europe.

I have previously heralded the quality of South American buses, and my we have sampled many. The upper deck is like Business Class on an airplane. There are phone chargers, movies and they stop occasionally for meal and #2 breaks (if you must). The scenery rolls by like your own private movie.

 *Caveat Spoiler* Although they sell the seats as *full bed* they actually only go down to like 160 degrees. So by no means are you getting your bed at home. On long overnight trips, one gets better than nothing sleep.

We left the wine country of Mendoza and statrted the ~15 hour trip, including one sunset and one sunrise, across the Pampas of Central Argentina to Buenos Aires.

Instead we got off in, I don't know, Paris, somewhere is Spain or Italy?

Headed to the oldest neighborhood in Buenos Aires, San Telmo to this house that was built in 1897. Probably the financial Golden Age of Argentina.

San Telmo started in the 17th century as an industrial area for brickmakers and seafarers. The cobblestone streets have seen their ups and downs since then: home at various times to sailors, slaves, the poverty strickened, the well to do, yellow fever victims.....multicultural immigrants gave San Telmo a bohemian air that helped popularize Tango.

Our host is quite the character. If I didn't know Nelly Omar was dead, I would swear she was living in this house. Don't know her age, but older than me and she entertains or goes out most nights.

Alrighty then, lets get started on Argentine Beef Culture.

Beef be King in Argentina

The other major influence is Italian. Who knew?

Lilly leaning hard vegetarian, I would hit the parrillas, often in the afternoon when she was doing something else

The go to steak in Buenos Aires is the bife de chorizo. Looks to be a~30 oz NY strip. In this case, the waiter proudly cut the steak in half with a spoon. I am guessing a showy gesture to show me how tender the cut was.

I could only eat the first half. Don't want to be a salt snob, but I bring my own rock salt that I obtained in the Atacama Desert while in Chile.

Another day, another bife de chorizo. Going all fish for a while when I get back to the States.

So the Argentine asado, or backyard BBQ is a national religion. Seemingly practiced everywhere, by bums on the street all the way up the social scale to the backyards of the exclusive Recoleta neighborhood.

Here, our host Mercedes, invited us to an asado by the pool. She told us 6:30 and we were unawares of the Argentine custom of normally being an hour or two late. Hence, we were the lonely couple waiting awkwardly with our side dishes and bottles of Malbec, until the host, the grill man and his son arrived at ~8:30

The asador, the grill man, follows a rote process of burning wood in an iron basket next to the grill and as the embers drop through the mesh, he meticulously spreads them under the grill. TAKES FOREVER.

More guests arrived and flank steak, skirt steak, pork cutlets and various sausages were served at ~11:30. Awesome Buenos Aires experience!

So Argentina is bedeviled by hyperinflation. Bad news for Argentinians, good news for foreigners. There are two rates here. The official one, the one you get at an ATM, as of today's post is ~197 Argentine Pesos to the US Dollar. If you use your debit card at Western Union office, or exchange US$ in a slightly dodgy transaction on a certain street in BA, you get 373, close to doubling your money.

Those fat stacks of pesos above? That was US$500 that by magic became almost US$1000.

What does that mean for steak prices? That raw bone in rib eye pictured above would be under US$4. A perfectly drinkable Malbec at the grocery store can be had for US$1.50. Spend US$6 and you move to the head of the class. Those pictures of my steaks in a top tier steakhouse? The steak, salad, breads, wine, mineral water, generous tip......less than US$ 20.

Messi........

is King of da Streets. 

Nice Parks everywhere.

Many cafes and bars over 100 years old. This one opened in 1909.

My San Telmo neighborhood butcher.

Took a day trip to the outskirts of Buenos Aires to visit Charcarita Cemetery  The cemetery owes its existence to a yellow fever epidemic in 1871. The older cemeteries were overflowing and a special train station was constructed to receive the deceased that were to be buried in this graveyard, then on the outskirts of town.

It later became the repository for the mortal remains of prominent artists, singers, writers and composers. Juan Peron was buried here for a while,

Above, at the entrance, there seems to be some sort of Monument Avenue of the Dead. Quite peaceful though.

Some, many of the crypts were open due to neglect. I guess the remaining family members had died, moved on or simply stopped paying the maintenance fees. 

In any event, some of the doors had swung open, the ceilings were dropping debris and birds had moved in..

The wooden caskets were placed on niche like shelves within the mausoleums. Some went quite deep, containing maybe 18 coffins. Lots of Italian names on the crypts.

The top of the coffin in the back of the crypt in this picture had collapsed and Grandpa's bones were exposed.

What a great place to shoot a horror film.

Yerba Mate seems to be the national drink in Buenos Aires. The evergreen leaves of the shrub IIex Paraguariensis are caffeine loaded. First used by the indigenous tribes, it use became widespread during European colonization. Today it is quite popular in many southern South American countries and tons were shipped to Messi and the Argentine team during the World Cup.

One needs a bit of gear to be a mate user. You see them with their thermos bottles of hot water, mate container, gourd like cup and a special straw with a sieve like thingy on the end. We find it bitter and stick with coffee; although might suffer through a cup before an adventure.

Another joy that I like in BA and I haven't seen elsewhere, is this old school bottle of seltzer water that you can order for your table in many restaurants. The spout on top keeps the soda nice and bubbly.

So, sweet reader, a bit of a milestone (less of an event than being a double abuelito!). I wrote the first post of this blog over 10 years ago. At the time, at age 55, I just knew I wanted a change and was not sure what that change was going to be. I had a camper van and a vague lead on a job at a resort in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. Then Kalani Oceanside Retreat popped out of the Internet and forced me to travel to Wackyville, Hawaii. The Karma gods must have wanted me to meet Lilly.

In 2012, who knew it would be five years in the Hawaiian jungle and then perpetual travel: Mexico, Guatemala, Thailand, India, Nepal, Columbia, Ecuador, Peru, Chile and now Argentina?

This blog has mainly been my public diary covering a range of wanderings and a ponderings. Thousands of people bots from over 30 countries have stopped by over the years. Doesn't matter, but I hope these musings might have helped someone with something, maybe encouraged them to shake things up a bit, get off their asses and go do something different. One day, may my grandchildren read this and get an idea of what grandfather Chef Ted was all about.

So as we leave Buenos Aires tonight, bound for an extended stay in the US to visit new grandchildren, family, friends and catch up on governmental obligations and paperwork, I raise a glass of Mendoza Malbec to you tonight gentle reader, for putting up with all this and look forward to another 10 years of a wanderin' and a ponderin'.

As always.......

Thanks fot stopping by