Antique Heaven

The cobbled streets of San Telmo are filled with hundreds of antiques stalls selling all kinds of memorbilia from gramaphones to postcards. The selection and quality is incredible, but of course, there´s always the tat as well. I suppose though, one man´s tat is another man´s treasure! Here´s a selection of some of the stalls.

A Sunday Stroll through San Telmo

Yesterday we went for a stroll through the cobbled streets and market vendors of San Telmo. The area is now famous for it´s antique market and tango dancers on this street. At every corner you turn, you´re confronted by tango bands, dancers, models dressed in tango regalia or street artists all vying for your attention. Mixed in with this is are old relics left over from the golden years of 30´s and 40´s that fill the antiques stalls and shops. It´s a real feast for the senses, the visual appeal of the stalls, dancers and colonial architecture, the sound of the music filling the air, the heat from the sun and the smell from the antiques on the stalls. It all combines together to creates a great vibe, that is special to this area.

If you take away the performers and the vendors, San Telmo is stripped back to reveal the grandiose, colonial buildings with intricate ironwork and pretty facades. Coupled with the cobbled streets and old tram lines, you get a glimpse of the what the grand Buenos Aires was like. Now though, that grandeur has gone, only to leave crumbling paint. The only new paint in this area is now graffiti.

I do like San Telmo. It offers a most pleasurable way to spend a Sunday. I think we´ll end up there a few more times before leave.

Perfect Pastries

We pop into our local panaderia, Confeteria La Campana, every day, whether for a small little sweet snack, a tarte for lunch or some bread rolls. I´m sure they think we´re mad as we´re always popping in. They´re really friendly and very chatty. It turns out that they make everything on the premises, including the chocolates, pastries and tartes - all of which are delicious.

The Women and Food in Buenos Aires

I have been in awe at the women here in BsAs. They are so thin and toned. Not only are they thin, but they´re generally very petite. After seeing what they eat I´m not surprised. Steak and salad. So without knowing it they´re all on Atkins! Even with this slim build, they´re looking after themselves as well. There are lots of toned women of all ages around - it´s such a contrast to the ever increasing waistline of Britain.

The women in the milongas are especially thin, mainly because they dance tango all night and don´t drink alcohol. The simple reason is that it´s almost impossible to dance after couple of drinks, so if you want to dance, you avoid the drinks and sip soft drinks or coffee.

The Argentines don´t just eat steak and salad. There´s lots of lovely pasta from the Italian heritage and they also do fabulous pastries and biscuits. The panaderies (bread shops) stock hundreds of different kinds of petit fours, tarts and cakes and they really are fabulous. But because they´re all so small, you can easily taste just one, without having to buy a dozen and then eat them all in one go! Alternatively, you can go for a coffee where they will provide a small glass of water and a couple of the petit fours as an accompaniment.

A couple of things they don´t do very well is fish and cheese. Firstly, fish. Because meat is such high quality and so cheap, fish doesn´t really get in a look in. And if you find fish on the menu, the restaurant often won´t have it in. If they do, then they don´t cook it very well or the quality isn´t great. This is true even on the coast. In Argentina meat rules. Secondly, cheese. They´ve got all these cows and then the European influence from Spain, Germany and Italy, but still the cheese isn´t that great. Their cheese shops double as delicatessens and these are often overrun with hundreds of varieties of sausages. Damn! Not that great for a fish eating vegetarian.

Moved into our Apartment

We´ve moved into our little apartment in San Cristobel, an area between Once and San Telmo. Once is great for local milongas and San Telmo is perfect for living and breathing tango (for tourists). It´s also only a few stops to the centre of town, so a perfect location all in all. It´s nice to have our own space, own kitchen and own sofa to chill out. We´ve found a language school a few blocks away, a great coffee shop, a fast, cheap internet shop and generally a lovely, little neighborhood. As you walk down the street, you can hear teh old classic tango songs coming from porteño´s radio. The locals sit on their door steps and watch the world go by as the smell of coffee shops and parillas (Argentine BBQ) fill the air.

It´s quite different to the UK. The set up is quite traditional with small shop keepers providing different services - from laundry shops, greengrocer, small supermarket and panaderia (special bread shop). Since they´re all close by, we´ve been shopping as we need it. We go into the same shops every day and so we´re building relationships with the owners. People smile, talk and have a conversation with us. It´s quite a leap from the unfriendly areas of London where the large supermarkets dominate in a huge cold and clinical warehouse (not a big fan of this - bring back local services!).

Our First Taste of a Milonga

In the evening of New Year´s Day we met with our soon-to-be landlord and Bridget and Leo, our tango teachers from London, in a lovely, traditional ´salon de tango´ in Once. Once is an area of Buenos Aires close to the centre. It´s a bit rough around the edges, but there are lots of milongas (tango nights) held around here. (Photo here by Carlos Alkim).

The tango salon was a traditional old tango hall with a four large marble columns supporting the ceiling which also marked out the edge of the dancefloor. Tables and chairs were laid out around the edge of the dancefloor and a waitress provided a slow, Argie style table service. The club was frequented by porteños (the term used for people who live in BsAs) and not for foreigners. As we arrived at the door, the organiser checked us out and offered us a table in the worst spot - at the back, against the wall and close to the door, so we would have been distracted and annoyed by the comings and goings of the club. As it happened, our porteños had reserved a table, on which we were included, so we informed the organiser and he allowed us to wander freely to find them. Throughout the night, he asked us three times if we found our friends, with a slight feeling of mistrust I think!

Our porteños had a great spot, right on the edge of the dancefloor and close to the bar. After greeting our friends we put on our shoes and took the dancefloor, whilst it was still not too busy. The music was all the old tango classics that we´re familiar with. After four songs, there is an intercession of 50´s rock and roll to denote the end of the session and to change partners.

By 1am, we´d had enough (New Year´s Eve catching up with us) so we headed back to our hostel and went to bed.

Stuart Little

The South Americans really seem to struggle with our names. For ease I call myself Nicole (Nicola is actually a man´s name over here - which is nice) and Stuart, well everyone knows his name. The other day, I had nipped off to get something and met Stuart in a clothes shop. He was in the changing room and so I asked the shop assistant if he was still here. He asked for his name and so I said "Stuart" and he replied, "Ah, Stuart Little". The children at Seeds of Hope all called him "Stuart Little" as well. So there, I´m married to a small hairy mouse - I never realised how popular that movie was!

Happy New Year!

Well, we were at a bit of a loss about what to do for New Year´s Eve. Thinking Buenos Aires was one of the party capitals of South America, it seems that NYE is family time and believe it or not, the bars close! Yes, you read that right. There are only two nights of the year that bars and many bistro type bars are closed - NYE and Christmas Eve. The Argies celebrate by eating late (as usual) with the family and then maybe wandering to a bar on the way home or perhaps a club - but the bars and clubs don´t open until 2am.

So where does that leave all the tourists? Mainly, stuck! You can´t get into a restaurant for love nor money, so a group of us from the hostel ended up down in the port on the waterfront. There was a small kiosk, which sold crappy wine and beer, so we chilled out and watched some fireworks. By 1.30am, we decided to go a club nearby - Opera Bay - which, I have to say is one of the coolest clubs I´ve ever been in. It´s kind of like a squashed Sydney Opera House and it looks over the port. There are five large rooms, stylish water features, a decked area outside and fabulous views over Puerto Madero. Great for summer, but I imagine it to be a little chilly in the winter!

Stu and I crawled home at about 5am - quite a strange night. Here´s us at the end of the night...

New Year´s Day

We spent New Year´s Day chilling out in the hostel as virtually all of BsAs was closed, except for a street called Lavalle where all the tourists eat, drink and generally hang out. It´s a bit like Soho, with naff, overpriced restaurants that aren´t very good. We managed to get some lunch in one of these restaurants with two of our other hosteleers. Stu was his usual monkey-self as he had hangover and managed to break a glass in the restaurant as we chatted with our companions about the explosion of the internet. One of the guys with us headed up a sales team at Google, so the conversation was fascinating.

Arriving in Buenos Aires

Having left the south earlier then expected as there wasn´t much in Puerto San Julian, we arrived in Buenos Aires (BsAs) about a week early. As we stepped off the bus, we were hit with an enormous wave of hot, humid air and a smile certainly came to my face! Warmth at last!

We found our hostel in the centre and chilled out for the rest of the day. We spent the next few days buying summer clothes and trying desperately to work out what to do for New Years Eve to ensure it wasn´t the wash out Christmas was.

Our hostel was V&S Hostel Club. It´s a lovely hostel in a town house in central BsAs, located close to the main shopping strip and with good access to all the touristy stuff. The rooms are clean and airy, the bathrooms nice and the place generally ok. However, the price is different to the website, you have to pay additionally for the air conditioning and the staff are a bit disorganised (although I hear, they´re the most organised in BsAs). The most frustrating thing was that you couldn't bring in your own drinks, so you had to buy their beer (only one option). This makes it quite hard to socialise in the hostel and meet new people. We still met some cool characters though.

Christmas in Puerto San Julian

We moved on from El Calafate as we wanted to spend Christmas up the coast in the hope of seeing some wildlife and warmer temperatures. We decided to go to Puerto San Julian and arrived on Christmas Eve, only to find everything closed. Luckily we found a hotel, but literally everything else was closed, and would be for the next few days.

After further investigation, we found a small corner shop and an internet shop, but as it happens were open for much of the time. The owner of the shop was a Bolivan - and so works all hours God sends to scratch a living. The shop never seemed to close and so we manage to buy enough food for our Christmas dinner. This consisted of cheese sarnies, some fruit and some lovely red wine.

Strangely enough, it was similar to most Christmases - sitting around watching naff films on cable TV and eating junk. The only thing missing was friends and family!

As Boxing Day arrived, the town livened up again and we managed to get a bus out that night - straight to Buenos Aires.

No photos as there really was nothing to take pictures of.

Crashing Icebergs and Huge Glaciers

From El Calafate, there are lots of excursions as you´ve probably guessed. Our final ´must do´ tour was to the Perito Moreno Glacier in Los Glaciers National Park. The glacier is part of the southern Patagonia ice field which is where we´ve seen all the various glaciers, however this glacier is different. It´s the largest, most active and most impressive glacier in the ice field and the good thing is you can get right up close, allowing you to see how truely awesome a glacier is.

I´m hoping you´ve read Stu´s glacier facts from his ice-climbing trip, so you´ll know a little about them. Well, this glacier is stories high and as I said, this one is active, which means huge chunks fall off and drop into the lake frequently. You can hear the glacier groaning and cracking as it´s slowly moving, and then when a section splits off, the sound is like thunder. Unfortunately, by the time you´ve heard it, the section of ice is already in the water creating a small tidal wave across the lake!

It´s possible to take a boat trip near the glacier, but you don´t actually get that close, mainly because it´s so dangerous! To give you some scale, here´s a picture of the glacier with a boat. You can just about see the boat - it´s the little black dot on the right!

We spent around two hours here, simply gazing in awe at the mass of ice, waiting for the next chunk of ice to drop off. Quite incredible.

Searching for the Towers at the Torres del Paine

After ice climbing and generally freezing our arses off down in El Chalten and Fitz Roy, we returned to El Calafate to sort out the next big tour - Torres del Paine. This is another incredible national park with stunning mountain ranges, except this time just over the border in Chile. It´s possible to do an 8 day trek around the mountain range, but we opted for the slightly easier 4 day ´W´ trek (as it resembles the letter W). We also decided to take our time and do it in 5 days, particularly since we were camping and it was likely that our sleep would be disrupted by the gale force winds, with which we became very familar!

The walk itself is stunning. On the first day we saw glacial lakes and stayed in a campsite at the foot of a glacier. We spent the evening staring out of the refugio window as icebergs floated by and sipping cheap red wine. The second we returned to our starting point and that evening we stared out of another refugio window at an incredible mountain. Again we sipped cheap red wine and chatted the night away. The third day we crossed moors and marshes to reach a valley between the mountains and a fabulous look out point. Unfortunately at this point the weather turned a bit nasty and snow and ice-rain whipped our faces - so no great views today. The fourth day we walked to our final campsite and settled in as tomorrow we were to climb to a high look out point for a close up view of the Towers. In the morning, Stu went alone to the look out as one of my tendons had been acting up and so I rested. It had been cloudy and the Towers hadn´t been visible for a day or so, but Stu was blessed that morning. Just as he reached the look out, the clouds parted and rewarded him with perfect views.

We were quite surprised how easily we found it. The walks are easy to moderate, but there are some steep hills and hard climbs, particularly when you´ve been walking for a few days. At first I was surprised how many people had walking poles, but by the third day I was so envious - I really could have done with some!

The views are stunning to say the least and we were blessed with good weather (well, good for Torres del Paine), so most of our views were clear. Camping was hard. It was cold and very windy, but spending the evenings in the refugios was great. Warmth and red wine - what more can a girl ask for!

On our return to Puerto Natales, we made a beeline for El Living , a small cafe with fabulous food, so we could stock up on fruit and veg after camping for 5 days. The food was delicious, my favourite so far. Yum.

In Search of Accommodation in Puerto Natales

Just a quick note here about Puerto Natales, Chile. It is a very stange place, but the point to reach the Torres del Paine. The houses are all very ramshackled and the town is terribly poor, so the budget accommodation is particularly bad. We stayed in a couple of hostels. The first was filthy and awful so when we returned from our trek, we went out on the search for an alternative.

We were recommended a little hostel called Casa Teresa which we found easily as it was a two floored, bright pink house made from corrogated iron. We thought we´d also check out a few other places, but we found much the same - filthy, strange houses run by people that were straight out of the League of Gentlemen. Our little hostel was spotlessly clean, the owner incredibly helpful, the bed was heaven and the breakfast was lovely (far better then the usual bread and jam).

Ice Climbing and Clambering on a Glacier

We set off at 7.00am in the morning to make it to the base camp of the glacier by 9.00am. We made a quick stop at the base camp to collect our equipment and have some tea and biscuits before the final part of our trek to the glacier. The second section held the treat of crossing the river using a fixed rope, so we had to drag ourselves across.

After a further climb over a woodland pass we decended onto the glacier. Our guide gave us a demostration of how to use the crampons and a few pointers about how to walk safely. The basics of which are - don´t step on anyones feet, don´t kick anyone and walk like a duck which felt a bit quackers! Luckily Nicky had to decided to stay at the hostel otherwise I would have had a few spikes up my jacksee. The crampons are excellent they allow you to walk on icey surfaces that are at extreme angles!

A few glacial facts:
• Glaciers are formed by large amounts of snow falling, melting and compressing into ice.
• There is no air in the ice when the glacier is formed in this way, so the glacier looks blue instead of white.
• When a body of ice is formed and is greater than 20 tonnes it can be classed as a glacier.
• The weight of the ice and snow high up the glacier causes the glacier to move slowly down the mountin valley. As the glacial moves, rocks and debris under the glacier are crushed into small pieces which form a lubricanting layer allowing the glacier to continue moving. As the glacier shifts down the valley the ice breaks and cracks creating large in the glacier.
• At the end of the glacier there is usually a lake and river formed from the glacial melt. The lake takes on a bluish turquoise colour from the small particles of debris.
• Where the glacier meets the lake, this section is called the tongue of the glacier. High up in the mountains small glaciers form called hanging glaciers, which I have renamed the `ears of the glacier´!
• 5,000 years ago the glacial tongue which I walked on was 200km longer than it is today. Since the last ice age, the earth has slowly warmed and the tongue has retracted.

We also has a chance to try ice climbing on a small wall in the glacier, this was excellent, if not a little slippy. Wacking ice axes into the wall was harder than it looked and the once grippy crampons suddenly were not much help with a very hard compacted vertical wall of ice.

In all I spent about 3 hours walking and climbing on the glacier, it was really excellent. The 4 hour trek to the glacier and 4 hour return was definately worth it, even if I had to walk like a duck the next day because my legs were so stiff!

On the way back we were lucky enough to see a skunk carrying its little baby in it´s mouth. It was very cute until she got a bit perturbed by us and chased us away, there we were 4 grown males running away from a tiny fluffy animal, felt like something from the Monty Pythons Holy Grail! Better that, then stinking for a week!