On Fire in Buenos Aires!

It was bound to happen. Let's see...add together lack of sleep (maybe 2 hours on the plane and a one hour nap), change of time zones by 5 hours, swollen foot (ok that's just me) lot's of walking, and well you have the happenings for, let's say a "conversation".

So, for the last two weeks (and on the plane) I have been devouring all of our BA guide books from Lonely Planet looking for the best shopping, dining and sight seeing. We only have 2 days here now and one day on our return so I wanted to make the most of it.

Carl and I both want to immerse into the culture (i.e. no chinese or mexican food for us). I found this great sounding restaurant called Casa Blanca that boasted traditional Argentine food, some music and great nightlife. It is located in Palermo Vieja which is supposed to be one of the coolest places in BA. Carl called and had the front desk make reservations and call a taxi for us.

As we are getting ready to leave, Carl asks if I have the passports in my purse. Yes, I do. Are you going to take them with you? Yes, I am. Then, he asks, Do you think we should leave the passports in the safe or take them with us? Now, for any of you that know Carl well, when he asks you a third time about something, that means he has a strong opinion as to what should be done. So, I said, What do you want me to do? You wouldn't ask me again if you didn't want me to leave them here. Hence, the "conversation".....we were both a little snippy with each other on the topic, but decided in the end that I would take them with me.

We get down to the taxi but we hadn't brought our guide book (front desk said they would know how to get there) and the Bell Man was calling the concierge to get the address. We are waiting and waiting in the Taxi, with the meter running, and finally he gets the address and away we go. About 10 minutes later we pull up in front of the restaurant, and sure enough, there is a big "B" on the sign, so we assume that must be for the Blanca in Casa Blanca. Well, No, it wasn't, it was "B" for BURMANA, Burmeise food! Incense burning, nasty smells, the works.

Cab is gone so we don't really know where we are but there were other restaurants nearby, so we decide to find something else - it is now almost 10:00. We finally settled on La Raya - a combination Argentine and Italian (large Italian settlement here).

As we sat down outside to eat, I hung my purse on the side of my chair (as women do) only to immediately be told by the Manager/Owner - oh no, do not put purse there, and then he mimes to me basically that someone would come by and steal it. Great. I look up at my adoring husband and he has that look, you know the look, not really smug, not even totally, "I told you so", but more of a satisfied, hmmmm, well now baby, guess we should have left the passports at home....

Anyway, we found out we were in San Telmo, which is on the complete opposite side of town from where we wanted to be. But, the food was great, we had grilled Provolone cheese with olive oil and oregano for appetizer and was delish. This picture is of the Flaming Sambucca we had for dessert - quite a treat, we have had Sambucca many times, but never seen it presented this way.

Also, the wine here is fantastic - we shared a bottle of Malbec Reserve at dinner for a mere $20 USD.

Anyway, we are off for more shopping and sight seeing today.
Cheers to all!