Buenos Aires for Thanksgiving

For Thanksgiving, Britt and Valerie joined up with Valerie's brother for a very fun long weekend in Buenos Aires.
It was spring. The trees and gardens were full of flowers.
The sky was blue and weather warm.
We caught up with friends, if not with sleep.
We saw tango, drank malbec, and ate steak.

It's a great city.

Ahh, the omnipresent tango

City seal, Buenos Aires

Spring, and bits that look like European cities

Britt and Alan in one of the many parks filled with magnificent trees

the mix of old and new (I can't seem to do anything about the random direction in which photos are loaded)

Plaza de Mayo, white scarves of the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo, in honor of the 10s of thousands of individuals who "disappeared" during the Dirty War, 1976-83

Typical street scene, and "look" of the young B.A. professional

Cafe Tortoni

Two B.A. institutions: Cafe Tortoni and Nat'l Tango Academy

San Telmo

Bits that really look like Paris, San Telmo

Valerie and Mafalda - a cartoon character from the 1960s-70s, who was very concerned about humanity and the state of the world and still appears all over tourist items in Buenos Aires

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Recoleta Cemetary

Just some of the beautiful tree-filled parks 

Calle Florida, pedestrian shopping street, detail

Shopping gallery, in Calle Florida, ready for Christmas

Choripan, a sausage sandwich and one of Britt's favorites

La Boca

Like the Callao neighborhood in Lima, La Boca has a port and brightly colored houses,
said to have been painted with leftover paints from the boats

love notes

There's something compelling and interesting about graffitti - the ephemeral nature of it, what it expresses, the artistic vs. naughty nature of it. We've taken some great graffitti photos here in Peru and throughout our many recent trips.
Recently, Valerie has started collecting love graffitti. Here are some early examples.

Arequipa, Peru

Rome

Paris, Pont des Arts

Paris

Rome

Athens

Buenos Aires

Foggy Day Trip

November 1 is a holiday here.
We celebrated with friends by going north to a natural park, Lomos de Lachay, for a hike.
We had thought to get out of the fog and into some sunshine. That wasn't the case. And it took forever to get there and back, as traffic was even worse then usual.
Still, the company was great, views striking, and expedition well worth the effort.

Birds, beach, and breaking in a new driver

Over the past two weekends, we've discovered some new oceanside spots just outside of Lima.

The first is called Pantanos de Villa, where there is a natural reserve designed to protect the marshland. it is located just south of Lima, technically still within the municipality, and within view of some of the southern slums.  There are trails and viewing towers for better bird watching. You can hire a guide, as we did, and even go out in a rowboat for a water-level view of the area.

the marshes are just beyond the slums

there are all kinds of migratory birds

A little further south, near the archeological site of Pachacamac and the Lurin River, are beaches, which are nice and quiet this time of year. They offer several kilometers of uninterrupted sand, and a rarely traveled and very straight road, which is an excellent spot for one's teenage son to learn how to drive. While Britt showed Addison how to manage the stick shift and maneuver our giant yellow car, Bacchus the dog entertained himself (and Valerie) by chasing sea birds and these funny red crabs.

crabs en masse

egret

egrets

Bacchus vs. the crab

ibises

Bacchus discovers that crabs have pinchers

more ibises

a beachside chapel

Bacchus is not a fan of the water, but he does love chasing the water birds

Addison driving, managing both the clutch and to avoid hitting the packs of wild dogs, an everpresent phenomenon in Peru.

For lunch, we headed to a nearby beachside village and to a very popular restaurant called Sarita's, which is famous for its "chicharron" (deep fried) seafood and pork.

A favorite with the Gwinner guys, this sandwhich has pork chicharron and a slice of sweetpotato.