Buenos Aires Day 1

Our first day in Buenos Aires was spent exploring the historic center. Our first stop was the Palacio Barolo. This was a short walk from our hostel. When we arrived, we were greeted by people in white shirts, black trousers, and Italian hats. Once the four started in the main foyer, we were told that we'd entered Dante's 'Hell'. The Barolo Palace was designed by an Italian, Mario Pareti, and commissioned by an Italian, Luigi Barolo. The buildings decoration was inspired by Dante's Divine Comedy. The first floor was Hell. It had some gargoyles, and colored tiles to suggest it was Hell. It was very grandiose with lots of decorations.

We then took the elevator up a few floors to Purgatory. Here there's fewer colors and the walls are a bit plainer. We also could see down a circular opening into the main foyer. This is to cast your sins into Hell before you continue moving up through the building. We got into the elevator again and went up to floor 14 where we got our and climbed the rest of the stairs up to floor 20. The staircase got much narrower the closer we got to the top. Once at the top, we'd reached Dante's Heaven. It was the plainest here with no color or decoration. We had great 360° views from a few different openings in the tower. We also got to continue going up an even narrower staircase to the lighthouse at the top of the tower. The lighthouse had the large light in the middle that gets lit at 10pm every day for 10 minutes. Our guide turned it on, and as if rotated we saw our reflections upside down. It was pretty cool!

On our way back down, we made a brief stop in the museum. We saw some old pictures of the Barolo Palace and some pictures of the architect and designer. We also saw some old copies of Dante's book. Sadly, Barolo died a short while before the building was complete, so he never saw the finished product. It was a nice building with lots of nods to Dante's Divine Comedy and the freemasons. The tower and outside of the building are impressive and the play on numbers throughout, such as the 20 floors for the 20 chapters and the address adding up to important freemason numbers, are also nice touches. It's clear that the architect was very detail oriented.

After the palace we made the short walk down the street to Plaza Moreno and the Congreso de la Nacion Argentina. It's a large building with columns and an old fountain in front of it. I also liked the contrast of the white building with the green copper dome at the top. While we walked around the plaza, we were surprised by all the people exercising, running, and dancing. There were also a lot of dogs and some kids playing soccer. It seems like a very active place.

We got some cheap dinner at Big Pizza before continuing our exploration around the historic center. We walked up to the Teatro Colon and Obelisco. The theater looks short compared to some bigger theatres we've come across, and the architecture is similar to the Congress building from earlier. The columns and marble are very greco. A unique feature was in the area around the theatre, there are chunks of cement missing replaced with thick glass. You can see directly down to the stage area. Because it's January, all the actors are on a break, so unfortunately no shows and nothing to see on the stage.

The obelisk didn't look that big from far away, but as we got closer, the big bricks were much bigger than I thought. The white stone had red lights shining on it and some words engraved on each side of the obelisk. We walked around the other side and took a picture with the obelisk and the letters B and A cut in hedges.

We walked back to the hostel via Avenida Corrientes. This street reminded me a bit of Times Square with all the flashing lights, big screens with ads for food and shows, and theatre names flashing. There were some beautiful buildings as well on this street. The street was bustling with people going out to eat and looking at shows. There were also some shops still open. Sometimes it still surprises me how late South Americans stay out and do things!Read more