Buenos Aires

Wednesday, 28 Dec 2011 – Today was the second day in a row of rising fairly early to go on an excursion.  Our bus headed first to the La Boca district, the birth place of the Tango.  We passed colorful houses, a soccer stadium, and Plaza de Mayo surrounded by the presidential residence where Eva Peron addressed the Argentine people.  Our bus had to leave that area in a hurry because of some political event taking place shortly, and police on horses were clearing the streets.  According to news that our tour guide read on the internet, their president had been diagnosed with thyroid cancer and the official announcement was to be made the following afternoon. 

We walked through part of the La Recoleta Cemetery.  If you visualize a normal cemetery, you would be very much mistaken.  This one is like a few city blocks of impressive monuments, often with statues.  Although it might cost $1,000,000 to be buried there, if your descendants don’t continue to pay maintenance fees, your coffin will be scooped up and moved elsewhere!  Eva Peron’s burial site is also there.  We didn’t remember ever knowing much about her, but our guide made her life story sound interesting.  Apparently, even yet, Argentineans are divided over whether they hate or love her memory.  She was responsible for women getting to vote, and for the 8-hour working day, among other things.  

Besides walking in the cemetery, we also stopped for a short time to shop and grab a bite to eat – but we forgot to ask for someone to take our photo today.

As we’re sailing south along the east coast of South America, we’re noticing a gradual change of climate.  Recife, Brazil was definitely tropical.  In Rio de Janeiro (also Brazil), it was still very hot.  Yesterday we were in Montevideo (Uruguay), where the temperature, palm trees, and cool ocean breeze reminded us of Los Angeles, though the guide said that it gets very hot further inland.  Today in Buenos Aires, the sun was hot, but it was in the upper 70’s.  December 21 was their first day of summer; the guide said it will be much hotter next month (like July at home).

Now we will have two days of leisure (at sea) before our next excursion, and the weather will be chilly at our next stop.

For some reason, dancing for tonight was not scheduled to begin until 9:15 P.M; so we decided to stay in and enjoy the night watching movies on TV.