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For my recent trip to Argentina, we flew into Buenos Aires from Singapore. And we had two days to explore this capital city - said to be the most European of the Latin American cities. During these two days, we took public transport - subte (name for metro) and buses.
We also took the Hop-on-Hop-Off bus, so to see more of the cities with the commentaries given on board. Price is 180 Pesos.
(Official exchange rate - 1USD = 8.6 Pesos. But you could exchange for a better rate if you were to check with the hotel staff or the locals. I managed to change at different rates between 1USD = 11 Pesos to the best rate of 1 USD = 13 Pesos at various places across the country in Argentina)
I have selected some pictures that I took in the La Boca district and uploaded onto this post. And I will add more pictures of San Telmo in the next post.
LA BOCA
(From Wikipedia)
La Boca is a neighborhood, or barrio of the Argentine capital, Buenos Aires. It retains a strong European flavour, with many of its early settlers being from the Italian city of Genoa. In fact the name has a strong assonance with the Genoese neighborhood of Boccadasse (or Bocadaze in Genoese dialect), and some people believe that the Buenos Aires barrio was indeed named after it. The conventional explanation is that the neighborhood sits at the mouth ("boca" in Spanish) of the Riachuelo.
In 1882, after a lengthy general strike, La Boca seceded from Argentina, and the rebels raised the Genoese flag, which was immediately torn down personally by then President Julio Argentino Roca.
Among sports fans, Boca is best known for being the home of world renowned football club Boca Juniors. The club plays their home matches in the Estadio Alberto J. Armando, popularly known as La Bombonera (The chocolate box in Spanish)
La Boca is a popular destination for tourists visiting Argentina, with its colourful houses and pedestrian street, the Caminito, where tango artists perform and tango-related memorabilia is sold. Other attractions include the La Ribera theatre, many tango clubs and Italian taverns. The actual area visited by tourists is only a few blocks long and has been built up for tourism very actively over the last few years. Outside this tourist area, it is a fairly poor neighborhood that has had many regular occurrences of petty crimes reported.
GETTING THERE
There is no Subte (Metro) station nearby La Boca. You will need to take a bus there.
Bus 29, 64 will bring you there, and the fare is rather cheap.
0.80 peso (80 centavos) per person.
