Day 24 & 25 – Buenos Aires / Travel / Iguazu
Monday March 5 was likely our longest travel day this trip – pushing the edge for our aging bodies! It should not have been so long though! We arrived early at the bus station and managed to catch a 1/2 hr earlier bus from PdE to Montevideo. We had time in MV to catch a bite to eat and spend the remnants of our Uruguay pesos before departing. And then the delays started…
The bus from MV to the ferry were very late. But that enabled us to meet some interesting people in line 🙂 We met 2 Argentinians, an Israeli guy, and a girl from London. She was Romanian and an engineer taking a year off to travel – just starting. She reminded me of Patrick; great skill and capability but still more keen on self fulfillment than corporate success. Eventually 3 busses showed up and took us to the ferry. The ferry crossing was on a much smaller boat this time (no cars on board), and it was a rough crossing. Many on the ferry suffered – one woman clenched white knuckles the whole ride, another guy laid out on the floor, several people fanning themselves or their travel mates. No one could walk around without falling over. But the worst was when we arrived in Buenos Aires…
With only 30 pesos of Argentinian money, we expected to arrive at the ferry terminal, take out cash at the ATM and take a taxi to our hotel. But no ATM, the taxis would not take US dollars, and the terminal was in the middle of nowhere! After searching endlessly for an ATM, the local police aided us on how to take a bus. But you need a SUBE card. We found a very helpful friend – Charles -who used his card to pay for us and he even ensured that we got to the right stop with the driver. A very nice man! We finally arrived and it was nice to have a hotel (Loi Suites Arenales) rather than BnB this time to simplify arrival. The location and price were actually very good – worth considering if we ever return to Buenos Aires!
In the morning we rearranged our bag contents to limit the weight in our checked bags – but alas, we needed to pay for every bag! But to our advantage, Andes Linea airlines were ridiculously unorganized. After a super long check in line, we needed to go to another line to pay for our bags. As our flight time came and went, many of us in line were stressed to the max. We were in line to pay for our bags along with anyone buying a ticket to anywhere. And credit card processing wasn’t working. Finally, they just let everyone in line waiting to pay for baggage on our flight to board without payment. So we saved 600 pesos but were delayed a 1/2 hour – guess it’s a good deal!
So finally late Tuesday afternoon we arrived in Iguazu and found our hotel no problem. The organized tour to town was skipped due to timing of other tour member arrivals (which was fine), so we ventured ourselves in to town – first on foot then catching a bus due to the muddy shoulder. We wanted to eat at La Rueda and as it didn’t open till later, we walked to the 3 frontiers to check out the Brazil / Paraguay view from Argentina. Back at La Rueda we had a fantastic meal of local Riverfish and then taxied back to the hotel for an early morning tour departure.
Oh travel in 3rd world countries! Great attitude though!
I love the child playing in the water. Are those figs? And is that your hotel/lodge on the riverside?
Yes Cynthia those are figs. As far as the hotel; no that is not our hotel. That section of water is were the three South American Countries meet, (Brasil, Argentina and Paraguay).