I feel a sense of combined satisfaction,
elation and sadness as the plane takes-off from Ushuaia’s over-sized airport on
the first leg on my way back to a northern hemisphere winter, after two months’
journeying metaphorically and literally now turning my back on the sun.
El Fin del Mundo becomes submerged
beneath a tide of dense, low cloud swallowing the dramatic black peaks I’ve
come to recognize. Cloud dogs the flight all the way along the coast to Buenos
Aires, save a small, transparent patch that allows a brief view of the
distinctive geography of the whale-watching mecca of the Peninsula Valdes.
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| Departing Ushuaia - El Fin del Mundo |
A slight climate shock follows as I arrive in the city’s warm, humid world of palm trees and other exotica. I’ve swapped a sub-Antarctic fractal landscape of mountains and tortuous coastlines for the regimented, angular urbanity of Buenos Aires.
I have only three more nights before my
journey ends and I leave for home, family and Christmas. My immediate
priorities, in order, are a hot bath, a grand dinner and a long sleep.
Afterwards, and as Christmas is just
around the corner, I’m minded to stock up on appropriately Latino presents for
the family, so set off on a walk. My hotel is only five minutes’ walk from
the Casa Rosada (the Pink House) – a splendid pink building that is the seat of
the government and houses the President’s offices outside which, in the Plaza
de Mayo, temporary raked seating is being dismantled after the inauguration
(or, re-inauguration) of the new President – Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner.
The Plaza is dominated not only by the Pink House, but also by a huge flag of
Argentina flapping gracefully behind a towering Christmas tree incongruously backed
by palms. |
| Casa Rosada |
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| Argentine Christmas |
I like exploring so I saunter along the
streets of central Buenos Aires for two days just to see what is around the
next corner and in a vain attempt to find a book on Patagonian geology – you
would think such an important part of the psyche of Argentine-Chilean culture
and economy – oil, gas, coal, dinosaurs, volcanoes, earthquakes, glaciers –
would be straight-forward. Alas, I tried eight good bookshops – no such book
exists (if you know differently, please point me in the right direction!).
Negotiating one corner I tangentially
join a political street protest – Argentine-style, with rhythmic drums and
pan-pipes – the protestors sporting white and blue clothing. Paranoid I
remember the internet travel advice to avoid political protests in case they
turn ugly, so I dodge through the column half-expecting to be clobbered by a
tear gas canister before being baton-charged or turned inside-out by a water
cannon. I make it through, unscathed and relieved. From the street-side I
pick-up one of the leaflets being distributed by the throng; it explains that
they are the Sanitary Workers Association of Argentina. President Kirchner,
just give them what they ask for – the alternatives are just too horrendous to
contemplate!
Christmas is coming, and shop-window
scenes of reindeers in snow and red-faced Santas complete with boots and hats,
don’t chime with the high-twenties heat, while in the centre of the
pedestrianized street, in the shade of young trees, street vendors display
their wares –fine hand-crafter artefacts sit awkwardly alongside bizarre,
head-banging cuddly toys. I don’t stop for fear of eliciting hard-to-escape and
potentially expensive interest! Desperately trying not to catch the eye of the
Captain Jack Sparrow mime artist atop a crudely painted treasure chest, I
almost topple the nine-foot Santa on stilts looming over me. I slip into a
bookshop on the pretence of searching for geology books – and watch only his
legs pass by the shop window. I rest my over-heating brain.
Venturing out again, now in a more
relaxed frame of mind, I decide on a mission to acquire family Christmas
presents and enter the Galerias Pacifico Shopping Centre. Under its Sistine
Chapel-esque ceiling I come face-to-face with a four-storey, conical Christmas
tree quivering as waves of lurid colour pass over it with a real-life Santa in
his grotto at its foot.
I have a rest on a park bench in the
dappled shade of the feathery-leaved trees of the Plaza San Martin. I reflect
on Buenos Aires: this city is certainly Latino, but its architecture expresses
1940’s Chicago with a Parisian twist and garnish of palm trees and parakeets.
After some minutes I detect a light drizzle, but there are no clouds to be
seen. Then, from an appropriate angle, I discern sap micro-droplets drifting
down from the tree tops, presumably having passed first through an aphid or
two!
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| Plaza San Martin |
Rested, I head for the city water-front
via the Torre de los Ingleses (the Tower of the English), so called because it
was completed in 1916 by Buenos Aires’ English residents as a gift to Argentina
to celebrate the country’s 1810 revolution, and symbolises friendship and the
broad European influence of the city. After the Falklands War, the tower was
renamed the Monument Tower and the square in which it sits was renamed the
Plaza Fuerza Aérea Argentina (Argentine Air Force Square) from the Plaza Británica
(British Square).
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| Torre de los Ingleses/ Monument Tower |
The estuary of the River de la Plata demarks
the north-east border of Buenos Aires and Argentina. On the water-front I pass
navy ships and square-rigged sailing ships and the buildings that administered
immigration into the country from the Old World. There’s a ferry port to
transport travellers to the Uruguayan capital of Montevideo – tempting, but now
no time! The main warehouse district and docks are a combination of modern,
high shiny buildings shimmering in the setting sun, opposite the dock-side,
red-brick warehouses restored to fine eateries, pedestrian ways and the
dinosaur-skeletons of spruced up old dockside cranes. Here, inadvertently, I
have stepped into the restoration of an urban landscape where the geology is
man-made and the ecology present by kind invitation. The restoration drivers
seem to be cultural – tangibly based on preserving a sense of place and
offering new opportunities for residents and visitors for recreation,
hospitality-related jobs and residential areas, attracting people to stay in a
place with the original purpose of high volume transit.
 |
| On the waterfront |
 |
| On the dockside |
It’s evening on the final night of my
Chasing the Sun adventure. I climb the stairs to the roof of my downtown hotel.
It’s not a classic sunset, but the modern water-front architecture weaves the
mellow light into a synergy of nature and artifice, the moment made special by
the brief illumination of a humming bird on a pot plant, here, six floors up in
the urban jungle.
 |
| Downtown BA and my last sunset |
My food obsession and the occasion
determine an almost ritualistic, final slap-up meal in the excellent
restaurant-cum-wine cellar of my hotel. I settle for the quintessential tastes
of Argentina – an asado (roast lamb)
accompanied by a bottle of rich, velvety Malbec. I am served by a fine waiter
in a white apron and a black tie with the hair, facial structure and moustache
of Borat.
As I sign-off on my journey all the
elements seem to fit as I contemplate the extraordinary experiences and
challenges of the last two months. I don’t think I am now the same person that
set out on this journey; I feel inspired and, armed with new knowledge and
motivation, am ready to try my best to “make a difference” – but I am also
ready for home and my beautiful family – just in time for Christmas.
Over the
last few months I have tried to share some of my travel experiences through
this blog. I hope you have enjoyed reading it and, in some way, being a part of
it. This blog is primarily concerned with the travel element of my journey. The
landscape restoration projects that I visited and the related key learnings and
conclusions from my journey are described in a separate report entitled,
“Exploring World Class Landscape Restoration”. This will be available to
download on my next blog posting in the near future. In the meantime, if you
would like me to send you a pdf of the reduced image version of the report,
please contact me at petewa@btinternet.com.
Finally,
I am currently writing a book of the whole experience that includes more of the
fascinating stories of the people I met and the places I visited, combined with
the story of the journey, threaded through with the uplifting examples of
people working hard to improve their world. Let me if you want a copy – it
should be available in a year to 18 months.
In the
meantime: Cheers!
