A Day in BA

Saturday begins with brunch at Oui Oui, a cute little French-ish cafe close to my flat on Nicaragua. There are tons of brunch places and cute cafes along the same street but Food Factory, directly opposite, doesn't have a chance against Oui Oui, where it's hard to even get a table. 

Brunch at Oui Oui

We flukily manage to get a table on the street and I tuck into omelette and salad while the Irishman feasts on scrambled egg, smoked salmon and grilled asparagus. We finish up with freshly squeezed juice and a pot of tea.

Scrambled egg, smoked salmon and asparagus

The sun is out and the Irishman and I decide to head to the Bosques de Palermo for a walk around the lake. The place is packed on weekends with roller-bladers, runners, dog-walkers and sunbathers alike, and it's a real pleasure to just go for a stroll. I normally come running here so I don't have time to appreciate the views. We walk through the Rosedal, a beautiful rose-garden in a park next to the lake, and afterwards we hire a pedalo.

Pedalo in the park, Bosques de Palermo

After the pedalo session, we decide to hire some bikes and we ask a few different people where we can do this. A few people tell us different things and we go on a wild goose chase for an hour or so. We struggle to find any bike hire places so we go to the only one I know, which is back near my flat, on Avenida Bullrich. 

I have walked past the bike hire place many times and I've heard the bikes are free, so we walk into the little hut to ask about the Mejor en Bici (Better by Bike) scheme. After about ten minutes of negotiating with a fairly rude bike-hire guy, we are told we simply cannot hire bikes because we don't have the required documentation. A passport is not enough - we need some kind of proof of address for each of us and, as I don't have my DNI ID document yet, I class as a tourist and not a resident. We can't believe it's so difficult for a tourist to hire a bike here and it seems rather unfair. Finally we walk out but the Irishman cracks a smile from the moody bike-hire guy after he spots he's wearing an Irish rugby t-shirt, thus they have something in common.

After a little casual Googling, we find a place called Bicicleta Naranja on Nicaragua street in Palermo. We go there expecting to be turned away again and it's getting late in the afternoon so we know we won't have much time to hire the bikes. Once we get there, however, the bike-hire people turn out to be as friendly and relaxed as anything and they say we can hire bikes in return for me leaving my driver's license as a deposit. They don't take any money upfront and they quickly and efficiently issue us with helmets and bright orange bikes before sending us on our merry way, telling us to be back for 7pm.

Bicicleta Naranja bicycle hire, Buenos Aires

Cycling in Buenos Aires is brilliant fun. There are cycle lanes that go all the way from the centre and back to some of the neighbourhoods like Palermo and it feels truly safe as the cycle lanes are protected by huge bollards so the cars can't even cross into them. We cycle to Palermo Soho and stop for coffee and ice cream on Honduras and then cycle all the way to the centre and back. The traffic is heavy in places and I'd be scared doing this on my own, but fortunately the Irishman is a little more confident and gets us back to Nicaragua in one piece.

The bike shop is just closing up and they take our bikes back in exchange for our money - it's cheap as chips. Who needs free government bikes anyway?!