Hello all,

as we come to leave buenos aires it falls to me (miguel) again to update you with whats been going on in Sudamerica.

So, down to it! On monday after the football and the particularly heavy Saturday we decided to kick back and relax in san telmo before getting an early night (alas, this was not to be the case, but more of that later.) We spent the day perusing the neighbourhood and taking in the sights and sounds. It was a bank holiday in Argie on monday so the streets were pretty packed out, and the automobile club of argentina was showing off some of their cars (evidence in photos). We then retired to the hostal for a 80p Steak and a 1.04 bottle of wine. The plan was to head for a local backpackers bar to watch the nights footy and to retire to bed early. While we were there we met a girl from stoke who suggested the more appealing proposition of hitting a b.a party hostal and a few bars. I think you can probably tell from the photo´s how the rest of the night went but we improved on saturdays showing by arriving back at the hostel at jus half past the four!!!!

After popping the appropriate amount of ibuprofen on tuesday morning it was off to Florida!!!! unfortunately not the sub-tropical state but the main shopping strip of b.a where we could buy some warm jackets needed for patagonia, where the temp is ranging from -12 to 0 at the moment. There are loads of shops on florida and an unbelievable amount of leather goods on sale but it was difficult to find what we wanted considering that its winter. Anyway, shopping is pretty uneventful and normally so is getting your haircut, but not when in argentina it seems!! Mark had come with us for the day in case we needed some translation and was umming and aring about getting a a haircut, to ensure he got one he made me cut some of it off, after which he´d be forced into it. So it came to pass that we entered a a small barbers off florida so that he could get his head shaves. As Andy and I sat in the waiting chairs whilst Mark was shorn, the barber kindly asked if we would like a massage from one of his assistants. We weren´t too weary so we politely declined, it was then that he explained that it would be una masaje completo, at which point we realised that we had wandered into a barbers/brothel and decided to leave sharpish, no wonder marks haircut was expensive!!!! In the night we went for the best steak yet, in a lovely parilla in san telmo and then on for a few drinks, honestly uncle michael if we lived in argentina we´d have no arteries left!!!

Yesterday Andy and I took a lengthy walk to the historical district of La Boca to take in the sights and sounds of what we were promised is the real Buenos aires, and of course visit the famous Bombanera stadium, home of Boca Juniors!!! I have to say that La boca is great, its dirty, run down, smelly and strangley beautiful it has lots of painted houses that are ruins of what they once were. It was great to see such a raw side of the city even if there was an overwhelming scent of dog muck. As for the stadium itself, it was fantastic. Far more impressive than that of river it oozed the character of the working classes that populate it at weekends, this was Maradonna country and his face was everywhere, adorning walls and statues all around the stadium. There were paintings of the working classes and socialist slogans everywhere, unfortunately there aren´t more photos as the area is becoming more dangerous and thefts of cameras and money are frequent.

Today we leave for Rio Gallegos in the far south of patagonia, before moving on to ushuaia (the worlds most southerly city). We´ve bought some new books and generally chilled out in preparation for the staggering 36 hour bus journey. Fortunately bus companies here are very luxurious and operate like airlines so we should be quite comfortable. It may be a week or so before we post again because access is more limited in the south, but when we do write again i´m sure we´ll have more stories to tell.

chao

Mike And Andy