Buenos Aires tour

Today was our scheduled Buenos Aires city tour, with a 9am start and a day that quickly warmed up under a bright sun that definitely had a bit of bite to it.
Our first stop was a small but interesting chapel, a quiet place that felt a world away from the busy streets outside. From there we moved on to one of the city’s well-known parks to see the huge shiny aluminium flower sculpture — Floralis Genérica. The idea is that the giant petals open during the day and close at night like a real flower… except it was stuck open and apparently not working at the moment. Still impressive though.
Next stop was another large park containing a beautiful rose garden, said to have more than 18,000 rose bushes. It was a lovely place to wander through, with joggers and walkers making the most of the sunny morning. The resident geese also seemed to think they owned the place and happily wandered around the lawns.
From there we visited Recoleta Cemetery, where we paid the $10 USD (!) entry to see the famous mausoleum of Eva Perón (Evita). The cemetery itself is fascinating — more like a small stone city filled with elaborate family tombs, statues and mausoleums from Argentina’s wealthy past. (And at 10US each, still working on wealthy!)
After a short wander through the city centre we arrived at a much larger and very impressive church — the Metropolitan Cathedral of Buenos Aires. This is an important church here and has been visited twice by Pope Francis back when he was Archbishop of Buenos Aires. We happened to arrive just in time to see the changing of the guards outside one of the more important side chapels, which was a nice bonus.
One of the more unusual stops was a visit to a spectacular bookstore that used to be a theatre. The old stage, balconies and ornate decorations have all been preserved, making it one of the most unique bookstores we’ve seen — and it was very busy with people browsing and taking photos.
Our final major stop was La Boca, considered one of the original neighbourhoods where many immigrants first settled in the late 1800s. The area is famous for its colourful buildings along Caminito, and it was easily the most vibrant and interesting part of the tour. Street art, music, dancers and bright painted houses everywhere.
We stopped there for lunch and tried some empanadas, which were very good… although the iced coffee didn’t quite reach the same standard.
After one last wander through the colourful streets of La Boca, we wrapped up the tour and were dropped back at the hotel around 3pm, ready for a bit of a rest after a full and very warm day exploring Buenos Aires.Read more