[18th - 24th December 2006 - Christmas edition!]

Oh dear. I have been a very bad boy this week…not one blog post

I think I got burnt out after all those posts last week. Or I’m just reverting to my usual laziness…although in my defence, I have been visiting family most of this week and internet access was not as easy to come by as usual.

At least a few other bloggers in Buenos Aires have been a little more active ….

Buenos Aires Sightseeing

• Dan has some photos of a wonderful, decrepit old mansion on the equally wonderful, upmarket Avenida Alvear, in the heart of Recoleta. I used to talk about this great old mansion back when I was a tour guide, but can’t for the life of me remember it’s supposed history - and my tour notes are back in Argentina so I can’t check them for another week…
• Not strictly ’sightseeing’, but there are certainly some interesting ’sights’ to be seen at Club 69, as pointed out by ‘Trendhunter Buenos Aires’. The night is held every Thursday in Club Niceto, Palermo Hollywood
• Goyoworld posted a few nice photos of varying scenes around Buenos Aires, all taken on the same day
• Robert Wright has yet more amazing photos of Recoleta cemetery. Not once, but twice! I can’t wait for his guide book / map of the cemetery to come out…
• And he followed those up with some interesting photos all along a new theme he is working on: Buenos Aires is a beautiful, yet gritty, city
• Karine has been Caminando por Caminito, in La Boca. For (a lot) more information on this small, colorful street, you could also check out my recent Caminito post.
• Trendy Palermo Viejo notes that notable Argentine entrepreneur Martin Varsavsky posted up a nice video of Palermo Viejo here on his blog

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[11th - 17th December 2006]

It’s back…what is surely already your favorite weekly round-up of the Buenos Aires blogosphere…putting aside the small issue that it is the only weekly round-up of the Buenos Aires blogosphere! We made it to a 2nd week, which is a mild surprise because last week’s instalment took so long to write due some heavy blogging in the Buenos Aires area.

Fortunately, or unfortunately, depending on your viewpoint, there were less relevant Buenos Aires blog posts to report on this week, but still a fair amount for you to get through, partly thanks to my hyperactive blogging this week. Here they are…

Buenos Aires Sightseeing

• As I was saying in this week’s post on Caminito, there is more to La Boca than touristy tack, and these photos reveal some of the gritty modern reality of this famous barrio.
• I wrote a post about the history and modern day use of the wonderful El Mercado de Abasto building.
• All about El Cabildo, the government house during colonial times in Buenos Aires.
• The Buenos Aires Japanese Gardens are a nice place to relax in an oasis of Zen tranquillity. The Buenos Aires city government (blog in Spanish) also notes that the gardens are in a top ten list of the best places to read in peace in Buenos Aires, along with the Botanical Gardens and Plaza San Martin.

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Imagine it is your last day ever in Buenos Aires, and you have just 24 hours to see and do all of the things you love in Buenos Aires for the very last time. Makes you think, no?

24 Hours in Buenos Aires

This thought inspired the following blog post, an itinerary for which I would definitely need all 24 hours of the day to pack everything in. I hope at least some of my fellow bloggers in Buenos Aires will read this and be able to weigh in with their own post about their perfect day in BA.

Please read on for mine…

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Avenida Santa Fe 1826 (near corner with Av. Callao), Recoleta

The best Ice Cream / Helado / Gelato in Buenos Aires?

Out of all the ice cream parlors I have tried in Buenos Aires, Un Altra Volta in Recoleta is certainly the best quality so far. And this is in a city where the ice cream is some of the best in the world, due to the heavy Italian influence here.

Perhaps these sentences and the mouthwatering picture above are enough for you to decide to visit Un Altra Volta for a scoop or two of icy heaven. You won’t regret it. But if you enjoy a little background info and my verbose ramblings, by all means read on!

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On the corner of Don Pedro de Mendoza & Del Valle Iberlucea, La Boca

Quite possibly the biggest mainstream tourist hotspot in Buenos Aires, the colorful Caminito street in the otherwise run down barrio of La Boca is often looked down upon as commercial, touristy, tacky, tango-ey rubbish by locals and travel guides alike.

However, I really think it is just trendy to say such things, because this small road and the immediate area around it do in fact have both an interesting history and the opportunity for taking some great photos, even though you will probably be surrounded by several American and Japanese tourists also happily snapping away before they quickly hop back onto their tour bus.

But give Caminito a chance! You might just like it…

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