Summer Is Hot? Buenos Aires

The flight from Ushuaia was uneventful and we landed in Buenos Aires about 15 minutes early. The approach from the east to the domestic Aeroparque airport is very nice if you have a window seat on the left, with great views of the city. Clapping in the plane still appears to be a thing here and strangely it started right at the moment of touchdown when many things could still happen, including a go around. According to the pilot’s announcement it was 29 degrees at 19:30, a far cry from Fuegian summer, to put it mildly. The bike and box appear to have survived just fine.

The drive into the city was “interesting”. Wide avenues, busy traffic on a Sunday evening and large monuments and buildings are quite the change. The city proper has 3 million inhabitants and the urban area well over 10 million. The last metropolis I visited was Mendoza in October, so this took some getting used to. I got to the hostel at 21:00 and I was glad to find out they have a bar that also serves pizza, so I didn’t have to go out for dinner. Of course this was a perfectly normal or even early time to do so, but I was tired enough that I took the easy way out. Another welcome change is the return of the litre bottles of beer as well as reasonable prices for everything. A big bottle here is cheaper than a pint in Patagonia.

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At World’s End: Ushuaia

I celebrated the completion of my tour with steak – what else – and then had some beers in the local Irish pub, since that’s where tourists everywhere are supposed to go for a drink or two. Or more.

Thursday 4 January

Thursday morning I took a bus tour of the city. The tour might seem expensive at first, but it comes with discounts for a few of Ushuaia’s top attractions which I wanted to visit anyway, so I gained money instead on the tour. It was also a nice and gentle introduction to the city. Afterwards I went to the combined maritime and prison museum, which tells much of the history of Ushuaia and Tierra del Fuego. Continue reading “At World’s End: Ushuaia”