After Cape Town we had a 13 day crossing to get to South America. It actually went much faster and smoother than we expected. I don't think either of us was really feeling cooped up at all, at least until the night before we docked in Buenos Aires when we finally saw land (Uruguay) for the first time in almost two weeks!
The morning we were supposed to dock in Argentina I was up super early to see us arrive. I was so excited that I was bouncing off the walls and all the other people up early on the ship were teasing me. It was worth getting up early because the last bit into port was beautiful! We got a wonderful sunrise...
And figured out why the Rio de la Plata (River of Silver) is called by that name.
The city looked particularly pretty with the early morning light bouncing off the buildings.
I don't have a lot of pictures from our first two days in Argentina. On day one I had a field lab with my class. A field lab is essentially a class day in port, so I was in charge of leading my 20 students for 8 educational hours. We met up with Mempo Giardinelli, a very famous Argentine author and friend I met through UVA at the famous Cafe Tortoni. Then we took a city tour and had a wonderful tango class. My students were awesome and it was a very fun day.
The second night I set up a date night for Jason and I. A very popular thing in Buenos Aires these days is "puertas cerradas" - restaurants in someone's house. You make a reservation and then they give you an address and a time to show up. I made us a reservation at Casa Felix, and we had to be there at 9:30 on Wednesday night. It was way out in the outskirts of Buenos Aires, and when we got to the address there was no sign or anything. We knocked and were let in to a beautiful courtyard and garden.
This particular restaurant specialized in pescatarian and vegetarian food. Our first course was ceviche (raw fish) for Jason and the same dish made out of mushrooms for me. All of the courses were incredible, with flavor combinations we'd never tried before.
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| Blanc de Malbec wine |
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| Gazpacho soup, northern Argentine indigenous people style |
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| Mint and melon sorbet as a palate cleanser |
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| Our main course - I had eggplant, Jason had fish |
Another highlight of our time in Buenos Aires was returning to our favorite pizza restaurant. They have great food and there are tons of cute old men having lunch together.
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| Future cute old man |
On the fourth day we gathered a group of faculty and staff and headed out of the city into the country. We visited the small town of San Antonio de Areco, the center of Argentine gaucho culture. The gauchos are sort of like American cowboys. We took a tour of the town and then headed to a ranch for our own day of being like gauchos.
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| Old-style bar and restaurant |
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| Silversmith's workshop |
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| Traditional gaucho hat - boina. I'm not sure it's really Jason's style |
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| The church in San Antonio |
When we headed to the ranch we were immediately taken to the horses and we all got to take a very nice ride. I don't have many pictures as my camera battery died, but trust me that it was absolutely gorgeous and the horses were very nice. Somehow Jason got put on pretty much the smallest horse they had while the little kids were on even bigger ones!
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| Cowboy Jason |
After the riding we had a huge lunch with more meat than anyone could ever possibly finish. Everything was absolutely delicious and the company was also wonderful. After lunch we heard traditional gaucho music and saw a gaucho-horse whisperer work his magic.
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| Our wonderful group |
Argentina was just as great as it has been in the past, and we didn't really want to leave. But it was time to head to Brazil!
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