We´re here!

Watching the world go by and listening to the live music

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Buenos Aires (according to Mel)

After a long flight we touched down in Buenos Aires yesterday morning. Our rucksacks turned up too - so we were off to a great start!

Decided to make a brave start and spurned the easy to negotiate taxis and tourist buses into town in favour of good old public transport. After wandering around in the heat with heavy rucksacks we could see no sign of any bus stops and realised that we were going to have to attempt to speak to someone in Spanish (scary stuff). Much to my surprise the man we asked actually understood me - amazing - and more amazingly we got the gist of his directions and found a tiny shelter next to a petrol station with no signs or bus numbers on it whatsoever. Confidence high now, managed to ask an old man if the number 86 bus went from there and it did - wow this travelling lark is easy! However after being on the bus for approx an hour (the airport is only 35k from the city centre)we did start to worry slightly and pulled out all kinds of maps etc. and came to the conclusion we had no idea where we were or if we´d missed our stop. Overestimating my lingo expertise asked a girl if it was far to San Telmo and she didn´t have a clue what I was talking about. Bus driver came to the rescue and through a variety of gestures he explained he would let us know when we got there - phew, could relax and enjoy the city and made it fairly easily to the hostel - so far so good!

Checking out bargains in the antiques market

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First impression of Buenos Aires is it´s a great city. It´s very European and cosmopolitan and everyone is very friendly and eager to help. We´re staying in San Telmo which is the only area we have had chance to explore properly. It is full of beatutiful old crumbling buidlings and is very artistic with tons of art shops and antique markets.

So far we have only had chance to wander around and get our bearings, sample the cafe culture and the perillos (wonderful grilled steaks) and are off to explore more now!

We´ll add photos soon!