Visiting Buenos Aires and Patagonia

In December of 2018, my family and I decided to do an end-of-the-year trip to Argentina. The going exchange rate was definitely an incentive as a dollar converted to around 37 Argentine Pesos – a steal!  Buenos Aires was going to be our main locale but picking out other cities to visit became a challenge as Argentina is a vast country and distances and flights can get expensive. After reading travel books, I figured that some of the destinations worth visiting were Mendoza, Iguazu falls, Bariloche and Patagonia. I don’t believe you can go wrong with any of these but I fancy nature and adventure, and had never been to the southern hemisphere, so picked Patagonia.

The Best Things to do in Buenos Aires

Buenos Aires is a walking city. It is filled with parks, and a few neighborhoods like Ricoletta are strikingly beautiful to stroll around as it’s architecturally arresting. We stayed in some quaint old-fashioned buildings; one with a manually operated elevator that is rarely seen these days.

There are many museums and tours in Buenos Aires but because of time constrains we were only able to do the following that I highly recommend:

Attend a show at Teatro Colon: an Italian styled opera house whose auditorium is horseshoe-shaped and boasts a capacity of more than 2000 seats. Since it was December we saw the Nutcracker but the theater also presents opera. When booking tickets make sure you get center seats as the side seats do not have a full view of the stage. And of course, we did attend a tango show! The one that was reasonably priced and did not disappoint was Tango Porteno.

A walk through La Recoleta Cemetery: The cemetery contains the graves of some notable Argentinian personalities like Eva Peron and former presidents of Argentina.

There is a downloadable app that gives background stories of the dead; the one I enjoyed was of love and tragedy –  especially, a story of a couple who during their 20-year marriage did not speak to each other because the husband refused to pay the wife’s outstanding bills, but decided to remain buried next to each other!

The Evita Peron Museum: Housed in a grand mansion the museum is worthwhile for understanding some of Peron’s political history.  The museum pays homage to Eva Peron, champion of the downtrodden, who was instrumental in opening hospitals, orphanages, old age homes, and framed necessary social security legislation and welfare programs.

Free walking tours: These excellent and not be missed tours can be found on www.buenosairesfreewalks.com The walks do request a $10 contribution/person which we paid willingly.

The one we did was a tour of La Boca, a neighborhood that is artsy, colorful and recognized for originating tango.

Biking Tours: We did a full day Buenos Aires city bike tour with www.bikingbuenosaires.com that included a visit to the Plaza de Mayo and the presidential palace. It gave us a nice overview of the city on bike.    

On the last day we decided to visit the Espacio Memoria Y Derechos Humanos or the ESMA Memory Site Museum – a clandestine detention center where approximately 5000 men and women were held during Argentina’s dictatorship from 1976 to 1983. On paper the museum looked interesting but we were disappointed with the visit. Firstly, the museum was on the outskirts of the city and hard to get to and secondly, all the testimonies we heard were in Spanish and did not have translations. As one Argentinian remarked to me later, “Over the past two years we have been getting so many visitors that some of our institutions are really not ready in presenting material to the English speaking public.”

Restaurants and a Search for the Best Steak House 

We ate at some very good Italian and steak restaurants in Buenos Aires. Be sure to pair your food with excellent Argentinian Malbec wine.

Lunch and a pre-fixe at Sottovoice: During the week do not miss this excellent Italian restaurant as they have a reasonably priced menu. The Rittolo’s is fantastic. 

Dinner at La Pechora Nera:  Another excellent Italian restaurant that makes delicious in-house pasta and ice-creams.

Try their dessert called Trilogia which has a chocolate base topped with delicious cranberry fruit, dulce de leche, Chantilly cream and chocolate mousse and topped with shaved almonds! The result is just divine! I would make a trip back there just to try this all over again.

Parrilla Pena: My son says he had one of the best beef tenderloins at the restaurant. He described it as being ‘very tender and juicy.’ There are vegetarian options for those who prefer.

Patagonia

After a few days in Buenos Aires we flew to Patagonia, specifically El Calafate and booked a hotel there for 3 days. I debated visiting Torres del Pain, the well-known national park in Chile but decided against, as that would require another stopover in Chile.

Irresistible Beauty of the Southern Hemisphere and Los Glaciares National Park

One needs a car in El Calafate so that you are not bound to tourist buses and their schedules. As it was December, I was having trouble finding a car rental agency that had available cars but I found this website https://www.interpatagonia.com/ where one can request a car which goes out to all car agencies in the area. I was lucky to find a car through them with PBA rent-a-car.

In El Calafate we visited the Glaciarium Museum that explains the scientific formation of glaciers and delves into the first explorers of the southern hemisphere.

Minitrekking over the Perito Moreno Glacier, part of the Los Glaciares National Park:

The park covers an area of nearly 3000 square miles and was formed to protect a significant portion of the glaciers, forests and steppe. A fun outdoor adventures is to trekking over the Perito Moreno Glacier. If one is physically able, one should not miss this as it involves walking with crampons over ice, observing glacial ice peaks and crevices, and watching water drain within the glacier into a lagoon.

We did the trek with Hielo&Aventura who were very organized and knowledgeable. They reward participants, at the conclusion, with a shot of whiskey.

After the trek, we went over to the balconies to see the glacier up close. I was so taken in by the beauty of the glacier and hearing crashes of ice fall periodically that we stayed mesmerized till around 9 pm! Sunset in winter this part of the world is late, around 10 pm, so we watched natures beauty unfold in bright sunlight.

The next day we drove about two hours to El Chalten, enjoying the steppe landscape, interjected with stunning aquamarine lakes and some wild life including foxes and birds. When we got there, we did a day hike to yet another glacier and lagoon with the famed Roy Fitz mountain in our horizon. Before venturing on a hike, I would advise checking in with the local tourist office to see which trails are open and safe as the weather there is unpredictable.

In El Calefate, we had a wonderful meal at Isabel Cocina al Disco which has a wine cellar where guests can select their own wine.

We chose a Patagonian Malbec which accompanied our meal of Hunter’s Lamb and Fish Plough. Another meal we enjoyed was at La posta located in the Hotel Posada Los Alamos.

I hope you enjoyed my write-up of my trip to Argentina. If you have, please comment. Thanks