Buenos Aires, Day Two

Hi Everybody,

We left the ship this morning (sigh), and had to have our bags packed and put outside our door last night by 10 p.m. Since we couldn't be sure we would be back from the tango show by then, we packed everything and had it ready by 5 p.m. last night. What that means, of course, is that we had no packing to do this morning and, as a result, no choice in what we were going to wear. David just wore the suit he had worn to the tango show, which wasn't particularly comfortable for him. 

We were assigned groups to leave the ship. We were group 8, and that meant we were the last to leave. Since we had till 9:45 to meet up with our group, we enjoyed a leisurely morning shower and an equally leisurely breakfast. In fact, instead of eating on the upper (Lido) deck as we did most mornings, we went to the fancy central dining room. It was a nice send off. David resisted the urge to load up on mimosas, as this would be the last free booze!  But he wanted to be fresh for touring Buenos Aires. 

Everything Crystal does runs like clockwork. So, at 9:45 they called our group, and we all filed down the gangway and into the waiting buses. 

This was just a shuttle to the hotel. If you book a room through Crystal for an extra night after the cruise, they take care of everything. A really nice, new bus was waiting to take us to the hotel,

and a guide was provided to give commentary along the way. At the hotel, they had a special representative waiting to check us in and answer any questions. We got an early check in and were in our room by about 11:00 or so. Everything they do, they do first class.  Here is the front of our hotel, by the way. 

By noon we had rested our backs and decided to go exploring Buenos Aires. 

One thing we like to do when going to a new city is to ride on one of those double decker tourist buses and get an overview of the city. So off we went to find the closest stop for the tour bus. It was maybe a half mile from us. Just a very nice walk to get there. 

Usually these buses are quite nice and provide headphones with synchronized recorded information given in several languages for the area you are passing through. Well, the bus itself was not too bad this time, but the headsets were non-existent. The guide, bless her heart, tried. But we were in the upper deck in the wind, quite far from the speakers. And her English was not much better than our Spanish. Ok, our Spanish is nonexistent, and at least she had SOME English!

Here were some pictures we took along the way. Sadly, we have no idea what we were photographing, but it was beautiful nonetheless. 

After an hour or so of this, one of us had to go REALLY bad. So we got off at one of the stops and found a little cafe with baños (bathrooms). It is not polite to use their facilities without buying something, so we ordered an espresso and an ice cream (helado). David ordered whiskey/walnut ice cream, assuming it would be like rum raisin. Not so! It was ice cream covered with actual whiskey with walnuts chunks on top! Hic! It was excellent! Hic!

After cooling off a little in the cafe, we got back on the next bus that came by. They run every 20 minutes or so, and you can get on and off as much as you want. 

We toured for a couple of more hours and decided our brains were fried from the open-topped bus. So we got off at a stop fairly close to our hotel and walked back. 

We did some shopping (actually just looking) on the way back. We shopped on Florida Street, which is the famous shopping district in Buenos Aires. 

All along the street, people were calling out to you "cambio."  There must have been at least a hundred people in just a couple of blocks calling "cambio." We had no idea what it meant. We thought they were trying to entice us into their shops. Well, as it turns out, the people of Argentina do not trust either the government or the banks (with good reason), so there are black market people offering to exchange your pesos to dollars or dollars to pesos, whichever you need. As it was explained to us, people went to bed one night with money in the bank. When they woke up the next morning, the government had devalued the currency by over 80%. People were wiped out overnight. The only saving grace is that the government has done this more than once, so many people do not keep any money in the bank. 

By now we were hot, sweaty and tired, so we walked back to our hotel, which itself looked like some of the palaces we had seen while sightseeing.  We took long hot showers and flopped on the bed till dinner time. We had asked the concierge to make reservations for us to dine at a local restaurant. We asked for 7. However, upon confirming our reservation for us, he informed us that the restaurant didn't open till 8. We had been warned about this. They say Porteños (people from Buenos Aires) don't usually go out to eat till 9 at the earliest, but most dine between 10 and 11. 

It was a beautiful 15 minute walk to the restaurant. The area we were staying in is like Embassy Row. Many countries have their Embassies in this area. The buildings are quite beautiful - old world European in style. 

When we got to the restaurant, we were surprised that there was a crowd outside waiting to be seated. Guess who? All Americans! This was the only restaurant where you could dine early, and only our countrymen were here. Funny!

I wish I could say it was a wonderful meal. It was just okay. We had been so spoiled by the cruise that our standards were way high. David's ribeye was top notch, but the rest of the meal, other than the wine, was just okay. The ambience was very nice. We were seated on a second floor balcony and had a view of everyone dining below. It was fun people watching. We recognized several couples who had been on our tour. 

Back at the room now and looking forward to a good night's rest. 

Night all!!!

David and Karen