With only a little over a week left in Buenos Aires we made a list of all the things we had left that we wanted to do and matched them with the weather forecast to what we could do on each day. So far it's been a pretty successful week especially now it seems Spring has finally arrived and the sun has been shining making walking around a lot more pleasant.
We went to the Eva Perón museum which we both found really interesting. For those of you who don't know who she is (I am ashamed to say I didn't before coming here) she is the lady that the film Evita is about. She was married to the President of Argentina and made massive changes for all people in the country, in particular the working class, low income, women's rights, children and welfare. She sadly died of cancer aged 33. The museum is a fantastic tribute and a way to remember her. Nathan and I also went back to Recoleta Cemetery (which I mentioned in a previous blog post) to see her grave. We also saw the beautiful church of Our Lady of Pilar which is next door to the Cemetery.
On Monday we went and had a lovely picnic next to the river (basically the sea) but because it is the sea between Uruguay and Argentina it is technically a river as it comes in from the sea.
On Tuesday we walked 5 miles into the city centre to Teatro Colón to buy tickets for a performance on Thursday evening but when we arrived they told us they had sold out! OMG I had just walked 5 miles!!! But the guy started to rip tickets off the stack he had and hand them to Nathan. I turned to him and asked 'What's going on?' to which he responded 'We are getting tickets to a free concert at 5pm on Thursday instead!' Well that was worth the walk then!
We headed to another neighbourhood just to find the Kosher McDonalds! I needed to see it as it is the only one outside of Israel and serves no dairy at all so Jewish families can order kosher hamburgers with no fear of dairy being anywhere near their meat!
Tuesday evening we were going to return to the Tango class we went to last week but we were so shattered from all the walking we stayed home and watched 'Boyhood' which I would recommend. It was very cleverly filmed over 13 years so the actors actually grow up in the movie rather than having to get new actors to play the same part, I thought it was very clever.
Wednesday was a beautiful day so we went to the park and read. I read all about South America and tried to put a rough plan together for our last month here as we need to get from Chile (kinda near the south) all the way up Chile, into Bolivia, then Peru and to Columbia. I worked out we would be getting over 100 hours of buses so that should be a pretty big adventure.
In the evening we went back for a run as I really like running in the dark (let me make it clear I don't like running but I know I need to do it and running in the dark is nicer than the day) as all the lights from the city shine all around as I run around the lake. We then went to the same restaurant we went to for my birthday as we enjoyed it so much and said we would go one more time before leaving Buenos Aires.
Thursday we went to the Museum of Natural Sciences which was really good. I particularly enjoyed the fish (alive ones in tanks) the dinosaur bones and the bird exhibition. The bird exhibition was actually worked on by the man we are staying with Marcelo and it was excellent.
We then headed off to see Orquesta Académica del Instituto Superior de Arte del Teatro Colón.
The building was absolutely stunning, the music was beautiful and the experience was fantastic!
Yesterday saw us having another chilled out park day and in the evening we went to see the National Orchestra for the third Friday in a row. I actually look forward to our 45 min walk there at 5pm to collect our ticket then we walk to the supermarket and buy our dinner and then take it back to our place for later after the show and then we walk back to the concert hall ready to take our seats at 7.45. Last nights performance was excellent, the first piece was interesting as afterwards the composer who was in the audience stood up and took a bow which was nice to see.
So only 4 nights left in Buenos Aires now until 3 months of travelling and volunteering around Chile, Bolivia, Peru and Columbia begins!