View from our room – overlooking the historic Recoleta cemetery
After a restless sleep with lots of walking around we rose at 9.00am. No tea making service here. damn. We dressed quickly and went downstairs for the large hotel breakfast. There were very few people in to enjoy the quality breakfast meal.
I began to feel quite ill soon after the meal and retired to my room where I was quite ill and had to lay in for a while while the (mild food poisoning) took effect.
After I felt a little better we ventured out onto the streets and found a lovely place for some black coffee. Still feeling a little fragile but the walk seems to be good as I realise it’s been days since we have had a decent walk – all those airplane hours, taxi and strait to our room.
We talk a stroll through the amazing historic cemetery which houses in it’s resting places many religious and political people. The cemetery, right in the centre of town was created in 1872. Easy to get lost as the awe factor is strong. There are some 4,800 mausoleums in all kinds of styles from art deco, baroque, classical Greek and neo gothic. I’ve never seen so many angles and wonderful sculptures in one place. It’s a museum of art in itself. There are bronze relief works, marble and cast angles, priests, oils paintings and cycad plants. Each mausoleum has a door and many of them have full view of the coffins; some with whole families including small caskets for babies. The laneways would be a little creepy if here too late and one wonders if the larrikins who are supposed to be around to rob tourists find this a great place to work. Many of the laneways run into dark corners and at the time we were visiting the sun was bright in our eyes, rendering the lane in front blinding.
Buenos Aires comes alive after 8.00pm, there are cafe’s filling and people walking the streets. We found a great little outdoor cafe near the design centre for dinner and what I ordered was I thought a small steak – and was given a huge piece of tender meat I could not possibly ever eat on my own. Everyone these days makes serves far too large and it’s no wonder the western world is putting on weight. Strange to note there are not a lot of overweight Argentinians we have noticed. The flavour of the meat was quite different to what we are used to at home – it’s the distinct flavour we note all across the food and great. I wonder if the people in the tiny apartments and living on the streets ever get to taste this wonderful food. It all seems so unfair.
There is a sense of art everywhere – on the streets, in the parks and even the cobblestones are ornate. There are wonderful ironwork doors, windows and railings and one wonders about the good old days here when metal foundries must have been pumping out cast work. The architecture makes the city exceptional and a contrast to the neat and orderly clean cut high rise building apartments we noted on trip from airport. I think if we were to spend more time here the poverty would be extreme and this trip I don’t plan and putting myself out there and exploring the ‘real’ Argentina – feel to fragile.
