Sun, Steak, Sushi & Other Stuff I'll Miss About Buenos Aires

Tomorrow - St. Patrick's Day, not insignificantly - I'm moving to Ireland. With it, I'm swapping Buenos Aires's Puente de la Mujer bridge for Dublin's Samuel Beckett; Malbec for Guinness (bleurrgh) and 30˚C sunshine for 5˚C sideways rain ... Can you tell I'm slightly apprehensive?

Spot the difference - Puente de la Mujer in Buenos Aires (top) and the Samuel Beckett bridge in Dublin (bottom)

I've lapped up my last bit of sunshine, nuzzled down a final few steaks at the likes of La Cabrera, had my last few bites of South American sushi at Sipan Palermitano and I'm about to spend my last night as a resident of beautiful Palermo Hollywood. It's fair to say I'll miss this place, so here's a little list of just a few of the things I'm sad to say goodbye to...

1. Steak (bife de chorizo, bife de lomo, La Cabrera, Miranda, El Obrero, to name but a few)

2. Sushi (Osaka, Tô, Sipan, Green Eat)

3. Sunshine (sunrise, sunset, scorching heat, all day, every day...)

4. Speakeasy bars (Frank's, 878, Oasis Clubhouse... shame I didn't get to sample more of them)

5. Street art (Dorrego area, Palermo Hollywood)

6. Wine (Malbec, Mendoza...)

7. Havanna (coffee, alfajores, Havannets...)

8. Running in the Bosques de Palermo (lazy Palermo Sundays, the Buenos Aires marathon, 10k runs in the park)

9. Shopping in Palermo Soho (too many places to name, and all way too expensive...)

10. Brunch (Oui Oui, Miranda, Olsen)

Steak. Just one of the many things I'll miss

And a few things I won't...

1. The subte (people attempting to pickpocket me on the subte/ getting squashed into someone's sweaty armpit on the subte/ the subte breaking down and not letting me off)

2. Getting lost (in the rain/ on the wrong side of the train tracks/ on streets with no street signs)

3. The oppressive heat of my apartment with its tragic lack of air conditioning (the only relief being the ceiling fan that looks so decrepit I have to sleep with one eye open to avoid getting my head chopped off mid-slumber)


4. Getting hissed and panted at by pervy businessmen and pervy workmen (on the way to work/ on the subte/ at conferences/ in interviews...)

5. Going out late (and eating dinner no earlier than 11pm/ not being able to go to a bar before 3am/ being out past 12 on a school night). Roll on 6pm dinners and 11pm pub closes!


Yep, this is it. Buenos Aires, I'll miss you.

Ceviche, Sours and Scams in Santiago and Valpo

Chile, the most European country of South America - that's what I'd always read. Isabel Allende, whose books I read as a teenager, had described Santiago as being like London, the people bustling around in business suits, always on time and always polite. So I hardly expect to be scammed the moment I arrive in Santiago, but that's exactly what happens.

It's my first time ever in Chile, after a decade or so of South American stays, so I'm really excited about getting to know a new country. Perhaps it's because of this excitement and false sense of security about Chile that I completely uncharacteristically let my guard down and decide to follow the man who says "Taxi?" as soon as I step out of the arrival gates. There's no sign of the official taxi stand and he is holding an official sign, so I presume it'll be ok. 

As the taxi man leads me out into a car park and makes me wait a moment for a non-standard-looking taxi to pull up beside me, I begin to have my reservations, but I already feel committed. As soon as I'm in the car and listening to the driver 'negotiating' a price with his boss over the phone, I know something is up. But with my lack of confidence with Chilean Spanish and my complete absence of research into a typical taxi price to the centre, I'm powerless to argue. 

We pull up at Hostel Los Andes and he charges me 35,000 pesos. That's about £45. I pay it, because I have to. I then check into the hostel and gingerly ask the staff what a typical fare from the airport would be, and my heart sinks when he tells me it's 12,000 to 18,000 pesos. Not a penny more. That'll certainly teach me...

Hostel Los Andes is a really cool backpackers' hostel on Monjitas, right next to the Bellas Artes subway stop. I highly recommend it to anyone visiting Santiago as it's a great place to meet people with a colourful social area and it's five minutes' walk from the main square, Plaza de Armas.

Mural outside Bellas Artes station and opposite Hostel Los Andes

Fortunately, I have a friend in Santiago, so no sooner have I arrived than I am treated to splendid views of the Plaza de Armas from his perfectly located apartment balcony. 

Plaza de Armas from above

Next up, he takes me on a hike up to the top of Cerro San Cristóbal, a big hill 300m above Santiago with views over the entire city. It's the second-highest point in Santiago, after Cerro Renca. Usually, I'm told, it's smoggy and difficult to see the view, but on certain days you can see the mountains. I don't think we've done too badly.

We stop at the top to look at the statue of the Virgin Mary and sup a typical drink called Mote con Huesillo - it's a liquid made of cooked, dried peaches and stewed corn. Very sweet and not exactly my cup of tea, but interesting all the same!

View from the top of Cerro San Cristóbal

After half an hour of people-watching (the top of Cerro San Cristóbal is a great spot for young couples seeking to make out away from their parents' homes!), we take the funicular railcar back down to the bottom of the mountain and head for an evening of pisco sours - the very typical Chilean alcoholic drink (originally from Peru, though the two countries argue over who invented it) made of pisco, lime, syrup and egg whites. In Buenos Aires, they're drunk from a cocktail glass but in Chile, it seems, it's champagne glasses all the way!

On Saturday, I intend to get up early to catch a bus to Valparaíso but in reality end up getting up so late as to have to wait an hour for a coach as the whole of Santiago attempts to decamp to the coast for the weekend. I make friends with a guy from the hostel and we make this trip together, which is handy as I intend to get the last bus back in the evening and could do with some company.

The first shock of Valparaíso - affectionately known as Valpo - is it's COLD. We leave Santiago wearing beach clothes because it's boiling hot, and on the coast it's about 15 degrees colder and everyone is wearing coats. I feel like a tool. 

We go straight to the market on Av. Uruguay con Brasil, as my friend has recommended this for a fish lunch. The market isn't quite what we expected - full of cats and dogs just roaming around and sitting among the fruit and veg (I'm fine with this but thousands wouldn't be!). Upstairs is the restaurant level and we're immediately bombarded with offers from different restaurants for their set-menu lunches.

Inside the market - how many cats can you see?!

We have a very standard, pretty unsatisfying fish lunch and then are wholly and utterly scammed with the price on paying the bill. Once again, I've let my guard down in Chile - the scamming capital of South America, it seems - and I will definitely not do it again!

After about an hour of confusedly walking around a very run-down, dilapidated area of Valparaíso and feeling extremely shortchanged, we eventually take a street-side elevator and wind up in the right part of down, amid beautiful winding streets lined with pretty, colourful houses, cute little coffee shops and views over the city. This part of Valpo is well-worth a visit, but I don't think I'd ever need to spend more than a day here.

Dogs in Valparaíso

Finally, determined to see as much of Chile as possible in two days, the pair of us jump on a rickety bus to Viña del Mar, just up the coast. Again, we don't really know where to go, so we just wander along the beach before settling down for a dinner of ceviche, lemon pie and a few more pisco sours.

My first Chilean ceviche

On my final day back in Santiago, I set out for a bit of exploration and wander around a few of the main tourist attractions - the beautiful Cerro Santa Lucía park, where President Sebastian Piñera is currently doing a speech, so I have to wait an hour to enter, and the Museo de Bellas Artes. 

Cerro Santa Lucía

My final stop is lunch, with a glass of Carmenere wine, before I head to the airport - this time in a pre-booked taxi with the fare agreed in advance. Chile, you will NOT scam me again!

Time for one last pisco sour? Actually, I had a coffee. - bar in Santiago airport

Mendoza Part II & Salta la Linda

Mendoza Part II is slightly more relaxed and refined than part I and takes us to the Bodega Séptima vineyard. By this point, I've been offered a new job in Dublin, so we celebrate with a five-course meal, including champagne and more varieties of wines than I could have dreamed of. 

My impressive beef main at Bodega Séptima

We were under the impression that our package at Bodega Séptima included a tour of the vineyards, but it turns out it's just a couple of hours of pure eating and drinking in the restaurant before we're shuffled out, so we make the most of the spectacular vista over the vineyard and eat til our hearts' content.

Vineyard view from Bodega Séptima

We stumble out of the restaurant, tipsy and half-comatose from the five courses by about 3pm but we just about manage to visit a second, much smaller, winery, in Luján de Cuyo, called CarinaE. It turns out to be worth staying awake for, as we get a proper tour of the small vineyard and a full explanation about the place's history by its French owner. We only just manage to fit in another glass of wine, though...

CarinaE Vineyard

On Tuesday, we take a flight to Salta, further north, and stay at Hotel La Candela, a charming and very friendly little place with a courtyard, garden and swimming pool out the back. It's raining when we arrive on Tuesday afternoon but we still manage to get a cable-car trip up to the top of Cerro San Bernardo, which offers great views over the top of the whole city, and a Submarino hot chocolate in the café at the top.

View from the cable car to Cerro San Bernardo

I'm seriously impressed with Salta - it's a beautiful, colourful little town that reminds me of Oaxaca in Mexico. It has bags of character and I could spend hours just wandering around the little colonial streets and sifting through all the silver trinkets for sale.

Wednesday, we take a fairly ambitious full-day coach trip that takes in the Cerro de los 7 Colores, the salt plains of Salinas Grandes and the cute little village of Purmamarca.

The coach journey takes us through every type of terrain imaginable - one minute we're up a mountain, surrounded by rocks, the next minute we're surrounded by rainforest and after that we see cacti and desert. It's truly an all-season day trip. The first quick stop is to take a photo of the very colourful Cerro de los 7 Colores, seen below:

Cerro de los 7 Colores

A couple of hours later, we arrive at the salt plains, which look like huge lakes. It's pouring with rain and feels freezing cold when we arrive, so unfortunately the photo opportunities are limited, but when the sun comes out a little later, the whole landscape is impressive.

Salt plains

Finally, we stop in Purmamarca and have a traditional Salta lunch of empanadas salteñas (the Salta variety of the traditional Argentine pasties, with the inclusion of potato), followed by braised lamb and potatoes.  

Empanadas salteñas

On Thursday, Mum and my godmother fly off to Iguaçu Falls and I'm heading back to Buenos Aires, so I spend my last day whiling the time in the garden of La Candela. It's boiling hot again and I'm aware that I'm moving to Ireland in two weeks and need all the sun I can get! After three weeks of visitors, I'm at my absolute happiest just absorbing the sun and silence, sipping coffee and making the most of my last days of Argentina...

La Candela garden

Horseriding in Tupungato

Friday night, I get the Andesmar overnight bingo bus back to Mendoza with my Mum and Godmother and the three of us are picked up on arrival Saturday morning by the owners of Rancho 'e Cuero, an estancia about 100km from Mendoza city.

As we pull up in a jeep along the rocky pathway to the ranch, I realise I have no mobile-phone reception. Agustina, one of the five beautiful daughters of the Palma family who own the ranch, is quick to inform me there's no internet reception either. In fact, we're not far away from civilization but we might as well be out in the middle of nowhere, for all the contact we have with the outside world. 24 hours with no internet or phone - what bliss!

Rancho 'e Cuero main house and terrace

We have half-planned to eat a light lunch and jump on some horses for a bit of riding in the mountains that surround us, but Agustina and family have other ideas. Pedro, the gaucho guide who works at the ranch, is already hard at work over a large cylindrical stone barbecue, cooking through enormous rows of beef ribs and the biggest chorizo sausages I've ever seen. Grey smoke billows away towards the valley and I see Pedro's sweating face through the smoky haze as the fire crackles and pops.

Pedro cooks the best meat on earth

“Take a seat,” said Agustina, as she pulls up a metal chair on the wooden decking outside the main house and gestures for me to sit.

Five hours later, we're still taking in the fresh mountain air and hot sunshine and basking in the complete absence of mobile-phone and internet coverage as we polish off the last glass of Malbec and a simply superb poached-pear dessert in sweet red-wine syrup.

Try and resist this dessert...

And then Pedro expects us to get on a horse!
 
As soon as we're able to adjust our belts enough to stand, he summons us to the small fenced area and helps us put on brown leather chaps and mount the most gentle of his horses. Leading us on horseback across the long, sun-scorched grass, he points out guanacos, an Andean species similar to the llama, camouflaged against the mountainside high above us. At the top of the lowest peak, huge black condors soar overhead as the sun begins to set and the air grows cooler.

 

Horseriding in the mountains

 

Two hours of relaxation in our luxurious lodges later, we're sitting on the black-and-white cowhide sofas, nibbling on pre-dinner canapés of fried quail’s eggs on toast before making room for homemade gnocchi, prepared by Pedro's wife, Roxana.

 

The following morning, Agustina and her boyfriend drive us out of the secluded ranch towards Mendoza in the jeep in which we arrived, stopping only to point out the snow-capped Tupungato volcano. At US$450 per head, Rancho ’e Cuero wasn’t cheap, but the welcoming family atmosphere and home-cooked food made it well worth the money. This is not a place I'm going to forget in a hurry.

 

Guanacos in the mountains

Siga La Vaca, Mum's Arrival and the Resignation

The same evening B leaves for her KLM flight, my Mum and Godmother arrive on the very flight that will take B back to Blighty. I'm about to have two more weeks of visitors in my home and journeys around Argentina. (No rest for the wicked).

On Tuesday night, a friend from London with Argentine family is visiting, so we all meet up with the parents and go to the Puerto Madero branch of Siga La Vaca, an eat-all-you-like beef restaurant chain. My friend and her family have been coming here for decades, but sadly I'm a bit disappointed. The cheap house red is good value but the salad and accompaniments bar is disappointing and the restaurant is nothing to look at. The meat is pretty good though, and abundant, if nothing else. The picanha beef is to die for.

Wednesday night, I recommend Miranda to my Mum and Godmother. They absolutely love it and are fairly happy to go nowhere else for the rest of their trip. Meanwhile, I stay in by myself to ponder the Big Day I have ahead of me...

Thursday, 1 March, 2012, I quit my job of 6 1/2 years. It's a biggie. I'm moving to Ireland and I have just a couple more weeks to enjoy the rest of Argentina and a little bit of South America, before I head to much colder climes.

After a fairly palm-sweating and emotional morning, I spend the day doing all the necessary bureaucracy - starting with going to the post office to file a resignation telegram. Probably the first and the last time I'll ever do a telegram...

It's a sobering process. I'm excited about new adventures to come, but I'm going to miss Argentina like crazy.

The Accidental Job Interview Flashing Incident

The morning B and I arrive on the Andesmar bus back into Buenos Aires, I have a job interview with my new company via Skype.

As soon as we get back to the flat, I jump in the shower, don a smart dress (and flipflops, natch - I only have to look presentable from the waist up) and set to preparing for my interview. B, in contrast, nips into the bedroom and lathers on a load of suncream.

"What time is your interview?" she asks.

"12 o'clock until 2pm," I say, already nervous about the four back-to-back half-hour interviews I'm about to endure.

"Ok, I'm going to sunbathe up on the roof. I promise I won't come back into the flat between 12 and 2," she says.

And off she goes.

So there I am, at 12:28, minding my own business and fully engrossed in my Skype interview with the HR recruiter all the way over in freezing-cold mid-February Dublin, when what should happen but I see in my own Skype video no other than my dear friend B walking behind me, scantily clad in her bikini!  

Not only does she disappear into her room to grab her towel, she then comes out of it again wrapped only in said skimpy towel, crosses back in front of the Skype video, and does the same again, dripping wet, on exiting the shower! 

Fortunately, the recruiter blinks at exactly the right moment and I am pretty convinced they didn’t see a thing. Either that, or it'll be the flashing incident that gets me the job...

The Overnight Bingo Bus to Mendoza

Coach travel in Argentina is simply genius.

After a few days at work after the Uruguay trip, B and I head off on another long weekend bank-holiday trip to wine heaven, aka Mendoza. Instead of getting the plane, we get a coach with Andesmar for about half the price. We opt for the most expensive first class tickets at about £75 return, still much cheaper than flying and well worth it for the dinner, wine (!), breakfast and entertainment.

I've been on overnight buses in Brazil before, but the Argie experience is second to none. You get a fully reclining, huge comfy seat with a curtain for privacy from your neighbours, a full, hot dinner (ours is roast chicken) with a glass of wine and/or champagne, and a very simple breakfast (of mostly biscuits and coffee with disgusting powdered milk). But the best bit is that each coach trip launches off with a game of bingo in which the entire coach participates - simply genius! Our wannabe compere-come-comedian bus entertainer/waiter etc reads out little jokes with every number as B and I try to recognise and scratch off all the numbers on our little card. We don't win, but we do have a hilarious old time in the process and it certainly makes the first half hour of the 13-hour trip go faster!

We just about manage to get a good night's sleep in our comfy coach seats and arrive in Mendoza bus station at 08:45 on the dot - Andesmar coaches are certainly more punctual than BQB Lineas Aereas.

We stay at Hostel Lao, a lovely, friendly little hostel with a fantastic outdoor pool area.

The pool at Hostel Lao

Our double room has a big bathroom and plenty of space and the hostel feels very safe and secure. The owners Mike and Celeste and the rest of the staff are super-helpful with their tourist recommendations, even drawing some directions onto a map for us to follow. 

For our first day, we take a bicycle wine tour around some of the main wineries, including the small and friendly Pulmary and the much larger Alta Vista. Lunch is a huge plate of antipasti with wine tasting at Pulmary as we slowly work ourselves into a lunchtime drunken stupor.

Antipasti at Pulmary

We just about manage to ride our bikes after lunch to get ourselves to Chocolateria A La Antigua, where the hostess is hell-bent on making us try every chutney in the shop. The place makes homemade chocolate liqueurs of every single variety, and jars of dulce de leche with whisky and hazelnut. Ordinarily I would jump at the chance to try everything in sight, but we're still so full from lunch that we can only manage a few mouthfuls of dulce de leche, a chocolate-cherry liqueur each and some flavoured artisan dark chocolate. (So, actually, quite a lot, then...) 

Dulce de leche at Chocolateria A La Antigua

The hostess is so friendly and insists on us leaving without even paying the full amount for the tasting, despite our total willingness to pay in full. 

Finally we go to Alta Vista, the biggest of the wineries, and take a tour of the huge vats of wine and the cellars stocked with hundreds of bottles of Mendozan red. 

Grapes at Alta Vista

Our first night in Mendoza, we discover there's a wine festival in the centre, so we spend the evening trying out a few different types. I'm a little surprised to find there are some interesting bright pink bottles with phallic designs made specially for women at the festival - I can't imagine these selling all that well, although you never know, right?

Strange Mendoza women's wine

The pink wine bottles aren't the only strange thing about Mendoza. Dotted around the city, there are also fountains with deep red/pink water. I can only assume it's supposed to look like wine, but it ends up looking a lot more like blood and is a little freaky and tacky! 

A Mendoza wine fountain by night

We also try out Malbec and vanilla-flavoured ice cream, which is surprisingly good - creamy and rich like vanilla but with a bitter, alcoholic after-taste. Perfect for enjoying in the shade of the extremely hot sunshine with a mid-afternoon coffee!

Malbec and vanilla ice cream

We spend Friday and Saturday night at the lovely Hostel Lao and by Sunday evening we're back on the overnight bus, departing Mendoza station at 20:15 on the dot, just like clockwork. I must say, I'm pretty impressed with Andesmar and I will be travelling with them again very soon indeed!
 

Coffee and Classic Cars in Colonia

On our way back to Buenos Aires from Punta del Este, we make the natural stop in Colonia del Sacramento, a little town on the coast just an hour or so by ferry from Buenos Aires.

It's my second visit to Colonia after visiting in 2008, but it's well worth the trip as it breaks up the return from Punta and it's a pretty little place to spend an afternoon. (You don't need more than a few hours in Colonia). 

If Punta del Este was like a step back in time, Colonia is even more so. It's the oldest town in Uruguay, so says Wikipedia, and is renowned for its beautiful, quaint, historic quarter. The place is also full of beat-up classic cars and reminds me a lot of Havana, Cuba - a forgotten, dilapidated old town with so much charm.

Classic cars of Colonia

The good thing is the historic quarter is reachable via a 10-minute walk from the ferry port and you can walk pretty much everywhere in the town. We spend the afternoon wandering around the old town, taking in the views of the River Plate and stopping for coffee and ice-cream in a quiet café. 

A rather 'overgrown' automobile...

Finally we settle into a restaurant with a great riverside view. Unfortunately, because of its location, it's very touristy and the food is terrible, but at least we get to spend our last evening in Uruguay watching the sunset over the River Plate before our 21:30 ferry back to the Argentine capital. 

Rio de la Plata at sunset

Rain, Roulette and Raving in Punta del Este

The day after I arrive home from the Brazilian surf trip, my friend B arrives from England for her two-week stay, in which we will attempt to see as much of South America as humanly possible whilst still working Monday to Friday.

After a week of work, we're going to Punta del Este in Uruguay for a long bank-holiday weekend of beach-life. We have a flight booked for 22:20 on Friday night to Punta, with Buquebus Lineas Aereas. Big mistake. Do not ever fly BQB Lineas Aereas. They are basically the tiny airline arm of Buquebus, the brilliant company that runs ferries and buses between Argentina and Uruguay. 

The problem is no one has ever heard of the airline, and consequently their planes are so tiny they cannot set off in a storm. And there is a storm. So we wait for, ummm, almost three hours in the tiniest, dingiest underground room of the airport, 15 minutes walk away from any shops or even toilets and not to mention freezing cold, with only the most minimal updates from the airline about what's happening with our plane. We can't go in search of food or warmth because they keep telling us we're expecting to fly "any time now". "Any time now," in BQB Lineas Aereas terms, means anything from minutes to hours to days.

Rodrigo, the owner of the hostel we've booked in Punta, has invited us to a party when we arrive just after midnight, but at this rate we'll be lucky if we arrive before Sunday, so we tell him it's unlikely. Eventually, we're shuffled onto a tiny propeller plane and we arrive in Punta some time around 3am.  

La Lomita del Chingolo is a small guest-house/hostel about 15 minutes' walk from the beach. It's set back from the main streets and beaches and is out on its own behind a bit of bush - not ideal for walking back late at night. (Get a taxi). The hostel is friendly and popular with international travellers, though, and quite frankly it's one of the cheapest places we could find through Hostelworld.com 

Punta del Este is known as one of the most expensive places in the whole of South America and, as such, you don't get a lot of value for your money. Our twin room out the back of the guesthouse is a little like a prison cell, with no natural light and only the tiniest of windows. There's no air conditioning, so it's a good job we don't need it - it's pouring with rain outside for most of our stay. The breakfast is half-decent but nothing to write home about: cheese and ham toasties, some cereal, coffee. Outside the hostel there's a pretty cool chill-out area, which would be ideal in good weather but the rain puts a bit of a dampener on things:

The chill-out area at La Lomita del Chingolo

I find Punta del Este to be a bit of a culture shock after Brazil and Argentina. It's a bit like going back in time, and the buildings are a total mishmash of modern stone artiness, old British brickwork and wooden shacks. We're just out of high season (January) when all the celebrities flock to Punta for their holidays, but the place seems a little deserted at times. I expected it to be totally glamorous and brimming with South American beauties and models wearing shades and heels, but it's not. It's just a little, well, curious. The beach is pretty average and it costs a fortune to hire a sunbed. 

On Saturday night, we head to the huge Casino at the Conrad Hotel, which seems to be one of the main things to do of a night in Punta. There's a fairly fun vibe, with some dancing and music, but unless you're a hardcore gambler, you'll get bored after a while. Neither of us know the first thing about gambling but we somehow manage to walk away with US$80 of winnings each on the roulette, so we cut our losses and leave!

Winnings at the casino

On Sunday, we take a bus out to a place up the coast from Punta called José Ignacio. It's more beautiful than Punta itself and has a much more exclusive feel. We go for Sunday brunch at a very famous restaurant right on the beach, La Huella. 

La Huella is a fairly exclusive, extended-wooden-shack type restaurant full of beautiful, rich people (just like I imagined Punta to be). It serves fresh sushi and seafood as well as enormous grilled fish and grilled vegetables. We've been told it's customary to spend all day chilling at La Huella, but there's an hour and a half wait for a table so we accept a bar seat while we wait, and order cocktails and sushi as we watch the chefs at work. 

Sushi and cocktails at La Huella

Accepting a bar seat seems to be a bit of a loophole to the massive waiting list as we don't have to wait long at all for the table at the bar and we're soon scoffing down delicious sushi that's prepared right in front of us. After about an hour and a half, we get an actual table outside with a beach view, and order fish and vegetables. The meal is superb and we while away the rest of the afternoon eating, drinking and people-watching in this very bustling restaurant.

Phallic veg at La Huella

For the rest of our stay in Punta, we enjoy the beach and local restaurants, some shopping in the town, plus a big home-cooked barbecue at La Lomita, courtesy of the owner, Rodrigo, and his wife. One of the nights, we head out to sample some of the cheesy nightlife at beachside bar Moby Dick. It's a British-style pub on a little strip of bars and nightclubs and is packed with young revellers. The music is very cheesy and the crowd in their early 20s. It would have been fun if we'd been a decade younger, but nevertheless we still have a good time and enjoy being amusingly chatted up by some way-too-young Argentines. 

After a long weekend in Punta, I've had a great time but the weather has definitely put a dampener on our enjoyment. The place is known as the San Tropez of South America, but it definitely ain't. There are plenty of nicer places in the South of Brazil - Florianópolis and Búzios, to name but two. Nevertheless, I'm glad I've been, and the great food we've had makes it more than worthwhile. That said, if your budget is low, don't even think about going to Punta.

A Surfer's Paradise in Itacaré, Brazil

Oh yes, now this is the life... 

We choose Itacaré, a surf resort on Brazil's northeast coast, mainly based on the fact that the weather might be a bit more reliable than that of rival surf paradise Florianópolis, in Brazil's South, but still with great waves. We are completely wrong, of course, and it rains pretty much every day of our trip to Itacaré, but only in small amounts that don't affect the holiday too much.

The view from my hammock at Pousada Hanalei

We stay at Pousada Hanalei, a guest house conveniently set just off Praia da Tiririca - the best beach for hard-core surfers in Itacaré. Our room, at the top of the pousada, is split over two levels, with a double and a single bed downstairs and another single mattress on the floor of the mezzanine level. We have a balcony with hammocks, though this is right next to the reception area, so not exactly private, and the view from the balcony and mezzanine look right out onto beautiful beach views.

The view of Tiririca beach from our penthouse room at Pousada Hanalei

The atmosphere at Hanalei is as you'd expect from any Bahian pousada - so relaxed it's almost horizontal. No rushing, no dressing up. It's all board shorts and Havaianas and the only rule is that you take your shoes off to walk on the perfectly polished floors of the breakfast area. 

Breakfast itself is something to look forward to: two fresh white bread rolls each with the customary Brazilian rolled-up slices of cheese and ham, a plate of fruit (often fresh watermelon, melon and papaya) a plate of packet-baked cake, and a plate of something different each day (which could be pão de queijo, or pancakes). The fruit juice is disappointingly from a packet, as is the cake, but the café com leite is exactly as it should be in Brazil (strong and milky) and this breakfast certainly sets you up for a day of surfing.

We booked our surfing with Local Surf, a school I found through www.itacare.com.br. It's not easy to find out about surf schools in Itacaré on the internet, and we choose Local Surf mainly because it's much cheaper and more relaxed than its main competitor, EasyDrop. 

We manage to arrange with Felipe, the helpful chap at Local Surf, to stay for 8 nights at Pousada Hanalei, with 3 days of surfing lessons, board and equipment hire and a transfer to and from Ilhéus airport for the grand total of R$2,700 for two people. It's expensive compared with what it used to be, but you can't do anything for cheap in Brazil these days.

We spend the next few days surfing the beaches of Resende, Pontal, Jeribucaçu and Engenhoca. It's a surfers paradise - great waves, beautiful beaches, a chilled vibe. But, in hindsight, I probably wouldn't have chosen Local Surf. The two instructors are very friendly and they're great people, but they're perhaps just a little too relaxed and they don't push me to try harder. After a couple of falls and a bit of scary water, I could do with a lot more encouragement to improve. They are, however, pretty flexible when it comes to lesson timings and locations, and I get the feeling things at EasyDrop would be the exact opposite. By the last day, though, we find our own instructors on seasoned-surfers beach Tiririca and pay by the hour, which is perfect if you're not a complete beginner.

The nightlife in Itacaré consists of just one main street, lined with restaurants and bars. Most of them are half-empty, even in high season, so I dread to think what it's like in low season. Our favourite place is Espaço Brasil, a funky surf-shack type pizza restaurant that also serves grilled fish and steak. Our waiter is the chattiest guy on earth and uses every opportunity to practice his English.

Inside Espaço Brasil

Be warned, though, Bahia is one of the worst places for bad food hygiene in Brazil. Within days, I find myself projectile vomiting on the street outside a petrol station after eating some dodgy salad and feijoada (Brazilian meat and bean stew). We spend an hour or so waiting in the blistering heat, flies swarming around us, at the tiny local hospital, but at least I am seen eventually and the service is decent and - more importantly - free!

Caipirinha on arrival at Espaço Brasil

Despite the minor food poisoning incident, Itacaré is an amazing, relaxing place and I'd recommend it to anyone. But by far the highlight of the trip is discovering Jeribucaçu beach. This place really is paradise on earth. It takes a 25-minute drive from Itacaré and then a 25-minute trek through rainforest, but eventually we arrive on the most breathtaking, secluded beach. At lunch time, we break from surfing and tuck into freshly fried fish, tapioca and delicious cocktails.

By the end of the afternoon, the tide comes in, covering the entire beach and making way for the freshwater pool where we bathe until sunset. Now, if only I could stay here forever...

The sign speaks for itself

Buenos Aires Sushi: Dashi & Ceviche

Despite the fact that Buenos Aires is dead in January, I manage to find a few food highlights to keep me going for the month:

Ceviche (Costa Rica, 5644, Palermo)

This Peruvian ceviche restaurant in Palermo Hollywood, right behind my flat, offers 25% discount on food and drink for chicas every Wednesday evening, so I book a table and head there with a group of gal-pals and a lucky token male. We are shown through the chic main restaurant, decorated with paintings, before being seated out the back in a leafy, decked patio area on a big, comfy, oval table.

Firstly, the menu is vast. Obviously, ceviche and sushi are offered in abundance, but there are also plenty of hot dishes, such as lomo salteado, and too many types of sushi rolls to even contemplate choosing from. We order a big selection of some very original creations, including:

Strawberry Roll: Philadelphia cheese, strawberry pieces, smoked salmon and teriyaki sauce

Honey Mustard Roll: Tempura chicken, lettuce and avocado with honey and mustard sauce 

Golden Roll: Philadelphia cheese, langoustine, mango and passionfruit sauce

Photo from Ceviche website

Ceviche certainly isn't cheap, but the 25% ladies' night discount makes it worthwhile and I'm well-impressed with the selection on offer and the quality of the food. I'll definitely go back!

Dashi Sushi (Fitz Roy, 1613, Palermo Hollywood)

A couple of days after my Ceviche experience, a friend gets in touch to say that a young couple he knows are visiting Buenos Aires and they want to meet up with ex-pats, so I agree to meet them for dinner at Dashi Sushi. It's a curious arrangement, as I don't know the couple in question, I'll probably never see them again, and they arrive 20 minutes late, but they turn out to be brilliant fun and it's great to have English-speaking company over good food.

Dashi Sushi has a tricky job, being located just a few minutes' walk from both Osaka and Ceviche, two of the best Peruvian restaurants in the area, and it doesn't help itself much by maintaining prices just as high as its rivals. As a consequence, the dim-lit restaurant is pretty empty, and lacks the atmosphere and ambience of Osaka and Ceviche.

Photo from Dashi's website

The food and cocktails are great at Dashi but the service just isn't as friendly, nor the atmosphere as good, as that of Osaka, and it's just too pricey to justify choosing it again over one of its superior rivals. Would I go back? Yes, I would, but it definitely wouldn't be my first choice.

The upside, of course, is that I don't get murdered by the two random strangers I meet there for dinner. Happy days.