Pampered Dogs and Spa-Treated Cows

I've taken about 20 pictures of the Casa Rosada, the Argentine equivalent of the White House, from several angles and at several times of the day. I don't like any of them except this one, which shows the life of the surrounding plaza -- and I snapped this with pretty much no composition at all out the bus window as we rode past yesterday. Sometimes you just get lucky.

Yesterday was our city sightseeing tour, a five-hour affair that began just before 9 a.m. We rode around for an hour picking up other passengers for our minibus -- which I actually didn't mind because it gave us time to see more street life in Buenos Aires. Then we drove up to the Palermo and Recoleta neighborhoods and worked our way south.

This isn't a great photo but in Palermo we saw several dog walkers with HUGE numbers of dogs. This woman has at least 15 that I can count. The tour guide said middle-class dogs get walked in groups like this, but rich people's dogs get walked alone.

The guide's name was Luz, we think, although she said it so fast we weren't sure. There were two Scottish women on our tour and one other American, from Los Angeles. Everyone else was Brazilian, so we got an intro to Portuguese, hearing the tour conducted in both languages.

Luz, extolling the virtues of Argentine beef, said Argentine cows taste so good because they live on flat farmland and are pampered in "spas."

"If you have an animal without a spa, it's nervous," she said. And I specifically wrote down that quote to use on my blog because I thought it was so funny. Words to live by. I'm sure Olga would agree.

Anyway, in Recoleta we saw the famous cemetery from the outside, but we didn't have time to go in. So I may go back to do that today. We also saw a 200-year-old ficus tree in a public park, and the colonial Church of Nuestra Señora del Pilar.

Then we piled into the bus and made our way via several other sites to the Plaza de Mayo, the central square.

Inside the Metropolitan Cathedral, we saw the tomb of General José de San Martín, who is considered a founding father of Argentina (and also Peru and Chile). Yes, those are real guards standing there, but it's possible to walk in and look around the chapel, as you can see those kids are doing.

Then we went to the Caminito Market (above) by way of the football stadium, known as "La Bombonera" and one of the most famous in the world. Dave and I aren't much for football but we took an obligatory photo. The guide asked us a couple of questions early on about which team we followed and that kind of thing, but it was so clear we were utterly clueless that she gave up talking football to us.

The Caminito Market and surrounding neighborhood of La Boca were great for photography. Lots of brilliant colors and busy street life.

We finished up with an early afternoon wine tasting, and rather than ride back to the hotel with the group Dave and I left the tour at that point to have lunch and find our own way home. Dave got empanadas, which are quite popular here. And we bought this bottle of wine:

Because really, how could we pass up a giraffe boxing a man wearing a paper bag, with a UFO hovering in the background and beaming up a spa-treated, not-nervous cow? Oh, and all the musicians on the bottom of the label are monkeys.

Last night we went to La Brigada, a steakhouse and grill recommended by Luz. It was fabulous -- full of quirky photos and memorabilia, like framed, autographed football jerseys covering the ceiling. I had lomo (filet mignon) and it was tender and beautiful. That cow was clearly not nervous, though it should have been. I also had salad and tiramisu. We left happy. I'm not sure I have ever eaten so much beef in a single sitting.