Days 196 to 205: Buenos Aires, ARG. The end of the road.

Day 196: Punta Arenas, CHL to Rio Gallegos, ARG

So on day 196, a Thursday, I hopped on my bus at around 1 pm and eagerly left the boring city of Punta Arenas. Some people were looking at me with obvious curiosity, probably wondering why is this dude riding on the bus in full motorcycle gear (minus the helmet ;). I had two bags stuffed with my belongings, so I had no other choice than to wear my riding jacket, pants and boots. 

Two hours later, we were at the Argentina-Chile border. I was still a little anxious about leaving the country without the bike. Fortunately, that part went smoothly. I just gave the temporary vehicle importation paper to the aduana agent, explained to him that I sold my bike and showed him the customs stamps from the zona franca in Punta Arenas, with the name of the buyer and the equivalent of his social security number. He kept the paper and let me off the hook. We ended up spending an extra hour waiting in the bus, because some dumb passenger screwed up his paperwork and had to go through the process a second time. And he wasn't even tourist... lol.

The bus made it to Rio Gallegos around 7 pm. Mihai had been here a week ago, so he had already emailed me the address of the hotel he stayed at. I was flying to Buenos Aires the following morning. From what I saw, Rio Gallegos is of Punta Arenas caliber, if not worse. I wasn't going to miss out on much.

Day 197: Rio Gallegos, ARG to Buenos Aires, ARG

I woke up at 5:30 am. My flight was at 9 am, but I didn't want to have to rush. I had the so called ''continental'' breakfast (dry bread, a bit of jam and instant coffee), packed my stuff and cabbed it to the airport. 

Dumb move on my behalf: I had my 12 inch. tire irons in my carry on bag. Needless to say once security x-rayed the it, they made me check it in and go through the security check for a second time. 

Three hours later, I was landing in Buenos Aires.

While I was in Punta Arenas, Mihai has been making his way north, at a pretty intense pace. It's over 3000 km from Ushuaia to BA, so we knew it would take him a few days. Well, our timing had been spot on. Once at the airport, I checked my emails. Mihai had already written to me that he would be in town around 2 PM. I had previously exchanged a few messages on Facebook with a friend of mine in Montreal who has recently spent 2 months in BA, and he recommended to stay in the Palermo neighbourhood. So I picked random hostel in Palermo from the Lonely planet, replied to Mihai with the address, and hopped in a cab.

The cab driver was a crook, and tried to scam me for 3 times what I had paid for a similar taxi ride in Rio Gallegos on the previous day. I told him fuck it, I'm not paying more than what I paid last night. The guy didn't argue, and just took the money. I'm guessing that I still might have paid a little more than I should have, but whatever... I was off to a bad start in this town, but fortunately it wasn't a taste of things to come. Once at the hostel, I waited for about half hour, and then Mihai showed up. 

We checked out a few hostels in the area, and settled for the Hostel Suites Palermo, which turned out to be a very cool place and our accommodation for the upcoming week. As I was at checking in at the front desk, I was approached by two gringos. The first one introduced himself as Bear. He was travelling on a bike as well, and we did see his KLR in front of the building. The other guy looked familar... He introduced himself as Kevin. Travelling on a KLR as well, but he had crashed a month earlier elsewhere in Argentina. He left the bike there and flew to BA for a forced break, with a broken arm and foot. 

I stepped outside the building with the guys, and that's when Mihai screamed: ''Oh shit, Mi Moto Rojo! What are you doing here?'' Then it came back to me... We had already met Kevin for a short while in Isla del Flores, back in Honduras. Mihai had done most of the talking at the time, and the conversation had been only about 10 minutes long, so I guess that's why I didn't connect the dots at first... Actually, I had even checked out Kevin's blog previously, and he was subscribed to mine...lol. (mimotorojo.blogspot.com, for the record...).

Days 198 to 205: Buenos Aires, ARG

My week in BA passed by so quickly that it now almost seems like a blur (the drinking might have something to do with it...haha). Buenos Aires is a great city. I loved it, and I wish I had at least an extra week to spend there. Actually, I did look into pushing back my flight back home, but the change fees were quite high, so I decided against it.

As I mentioned it previously, BA is great value if you have cash US dollars or Euros. While the official rate is around 5 pesos to a dollar, we exchanged our greenbacks at 9:1. Suddenly, the city became a bargain, and we could afford expensive restaurants. A nice change from the bread/cold cuts/cheese supermarket meals we have been accustomed to for the past few weeks.

There is a lot to do and see in BA, and I highly recommend it as a travel destination, if you 2-3 weeks to spare. One week is just not enough. The thing is, the night life is really the NIGHT life. People have dinner around 10 am, and bars and clubs only start to fill up around 2 am. The partying ends in the early hours of the morning, so forget about sightseeing the following day. I think that you need a week to just experience the nightlife, and another week where you focus on sightseeing.Try to do both at the same time, and you will burn out by the third day.

So all in all, I had a good time and it was a proper ending to this epic trip. We hung out with Bear, Kevin and a few other people we met at the hostel. I somehow managed to see the must-sees, to experience the nighlife and even to do some last minute shopping. My only souvenirs from this entire journey are three football jerseys (Boca Juniors - BA club, Bolivia national team, Colombia national team), and a little flute-like instrument from Ecuador. I would have picked up a few more things along the way, if it wasn't for the space constraints.

I had one scary moment in BA, when for about an hour I really thought that I had lost over 3000 USD cash. So far, I had been carrying the money from the bike sale hidden in the back of my jacket, where the spine protector pad goes. On our second day, Mihai and I wanted to change some of the dollars into pesos. I reached in the back pocket... and nothing. For the next hour, I searched all of my stuff. My morale sunk completely. I was panicked, thinking that's it, my money is gone. Definetely amongst my top 5 worst moments of my life...hehe. I was puzzled. I couldn't understand how the cash could have been gone if I never took it out and never left the jacket unattended since Punta Arenas...

In the end, I had pretty much abandonned, when Mihai was still going through my jacket one last time. Then he said all of a sudden... ''Dude, what's this? Feel this.. '' With a ray of hope, I grabbed the jacket. There was definetely something between the liner and the outer shell...A short moment later, I pulled out the money belt!! I was so pumped, that I gave Mihai a big bear hug...haha. In my defense, who wouldn't have been hyped up in such a moment? What had happened is that the bottom of the back pocket ripped, and my cash belt just fell at the bottom of the jacket.

Last batch of pictures from BA:


From ashy to classy.... After a few weeks of bread, cheese and coldcuts, we get to eat WELL.

Nicest bookstore I've ever been too. The picture doesn't do it justice; it was impressive.

There just has to be a Chinatown in a city as big as BA.

Watching the NBA finals in a Mexican restaurant in Argentina..lol.
 

We've seen a few of these abandoned cars in Palermo, where we stayed (and it's not even a ghetto neighborhood). Some are wrecked, some look like they haven't moved in months. I don't know why not even the city bothers towing them away. In Montreal, you'd have a ticket on your dash in less than 5 mins...