cheryl goes global: Days 6 & 7: Don't cry for me Argentina

For our third day in Buenos Aires, we explored some of the more historical/bougie parts of Buenos Aires. We began with a jaunt to El Ateneo, one of the most fabulous book stores I've ever seen then Recoleta and the ferias surrounding out. Similar to Sanitago, there were all the mausoleums! But unlike Santiago, it didn't go on forever. All the space seemed to have been taken so if your family doesn't have a space yet, too late, so sad, no room at the inn for you.

Only the prettiest book store I've ever seen! Housed in an old theatre, it gave extra grandeur to the books. I'd totally buy some coffee, grab a chair, and read all day in this place.

Group photos in front of the balcony! Because it's not a library and you're allowed to have fun in here. At least that's what we assumed since no one told us to stop.

Pano of El Ateneo

The store did have rules though, don't pick your nose and put it on the wall. But when have rules ever stopped me?

A nice little church outside of Recoleta cemetary

And so we start with the mausoleums. And of course imitating statues. And also of course, I made friends with all the cats we found. They just know I'm a cat lover.

Some truly amazing tombs! And if you're brave enough you can go down into the crypts underneath. We did not do that, but we also felt like we were not allowed to. Maybe next time.

Some were very tall as the creators clearly wanted to stand out in death.

And we each chose some favorites. None of which are these two, but they were still nice!

We even found one decorated with Genie smoke, so of course I posed in front. And then it started to pour rain, so I don't think the Genie liked me making fun of it. Especially since the rain stopped once we were 50 feet away... Creepy. And then here is one of our favorites. Is it a church? No. It's a mausoleum! Someone clearly had a lot of funds.

This was a memorial to the Paraguayan soldiers. Although some of them didn't look old enough to fight, like this boy on the left. So we got a picture of me looking all intimidating.

Mari walking upon the rows and rows of the dead. Me and one of my many feline friends. He escorted us for a while, clearly felt like we could use a friendly cat to guide us around.

Ryan outclassing the mausoleums, and a look down the row from Evita's resting place.

We saw Evita's resting place (although apparently she wasn't originally buried there but later her family requested she be moved into their tomb) and some other more fantastic mausoleums.

Unlike some of the tombs we saw, people still care to keep up the Duarte tomb and put flowers. Note to self, become first lady of a country, learn to sing, and have a musical written about my life and then I, too, can have massive amounts of people care about and decorate my resting place.

To give a foil to Evita's tomb, see this guy who has cobwebs all over his doors. However, this did not distract us from taking more fabulous photos.

And here we have the original photo of the one Mari shared on my wall. I look creeped out because I was, this statue was crying! Okay, maybe it was the rain, but creepily looked like tears coming down her face. She must have been one special lady to have inspired a statue in her likeness (turns out she was-ish? Died young in Austria apparently)

Seeing all the graves made us hungry so we stopped at a burger chain called Dean and Denny's and had burgers and fries. Similar to empanadas, we have also had a lot of papas fritas so far on this trip.

"I am not a barman, I am a bartender" because that's different? Yay for ads ver Italian drinks. And yay, our food! We love food!

After getting food in our bellies, we took a taxi back down to San Telmo for the mile long feria. The entire street was full of little shops set up along the sides--so many things to buy! Mafalda, a political cartoon of Argentina, was everywhere and Ryan got some magnets of Mafalda because she says she looks like her, and also her aunt. They also had some authentic "Toms" or the shoes that Toms were actually based on, tons of crafts, souvenirs, and paintings. It was a good time walking up and down the street trying to find anything we might like.

We came upon a tango demonstration! But of course, we didn't want to pay for it so we just watched creepily from the window. And here you have a decent view of some of the stalls along Defensa which is the San Telmo Feria. And Ryan (okay, all three of us) loved this store because we weren't exactly sure how it should be pronounced... Juanito Jo as in Joe or Ho? We shall never know.

And then we grabbed this photo because it reminded us of the poor soul who trekked around Buenos Aires with a very similar replica. Again, this is Argentina, not France.

Following that, we stopped at a Starbucks to warm up, use the wifi and plan our next move. We got a taxi back to the hotel in Palermo and then met up with some of Ryan's coworkers for dinner. The restaurant was super conveniently located on the street corner across from our hotel so it was a real tough walk. We enjoyed the dinner and then promptly fell asleep after our long walk back across the street.

For our last day in Buenos Aires, we found the loosely Harry Potter themed Felix Felicis Cafe and got lattes to wake us up. This was a quick stop before Mari and I went on to La Boca, which is a very colorful neighborhood towards the south of the city.

Along our walk to Felix Felicis, we stumbled upon a viking themed restaurant/bar. A place we will definitely need to check out if we ever go back. Who knew the vikings had made it to BA?!

Harry Potter! As you can see there was Hedwig, Platform 9 3/4, and lattes! But sadly, no butterbeer.

There was a lot of Blink 182 as that's what one of the baristas was listening to at the moment. He was super jealous when I told him I'd seen them live.

And now La Boca! As you can see colorful buildings and a strong affection for the Pope and Maradona.

Of course we had to get pictures in the Pope's armpit. He's quite tall apparently :)

And here you have Maradona again, Evita, and her husband, Peron. And La Boca! They are soccer mad in Argentina.

Fabulous graffiti is another thing we like to take pictures of, so a married couple in a gas mask, how could we resist?!

And now the stereotypical La Boca photo. The buildings are so pretty and colorfun!

We each had to take a turn standing in front of them.

And here's me with a map of Buenos Aires since now I have conquered all of it! (not quite true, but we'll go with it)

We met back up with Ryan after La Boca and trekked it out to La Flor, the big metal flower that begins to open as the sun rises and then gradually closes again at sun set. That was our big walk for the day so after we treated ourselves to a fantastic wine tasting/tapas experience that Ryan found. (If you haven't learned now, you should always travel with Ryan, she is the best and knows all the insider tips!) We had 5 wines paired with different tapas--all from boutique wineries in Argentina so you don't need to know the vineyards (and I can't remember them all) since you can't get them on your own. How bougie of us! It was a great experience to cap off our time in Buenos Aires!