Anyway, when I look back at it, Buenos Aires is a picturesque city, lots of tree lined streets, cobblestones in San Telmo and winding streets which could be nice to walk along except that a lot of places are closed or are struggling. There's graffiti everywhere and no one is particularly happy. This is a place where the official exchange rate is 6 pesos to the dollar (just about) but people are prepared to exchange dollars for pesos at a rate of 10 to 1. Why? The inflation rate is currently at 30% and they anticipate the exchange rate will hit 12 to 1 early next year. The government is almost universally hated (the president lives 20km from the main government palace and takes a helicopter to and from every day). People are struggling and Buenos Aires seems to be feeling it, there aren't many smiling faces.
Secondly, as we turn our attention to the night, there are some nice enough pubs and bars but they're nowhere near each other. You might go to one but then it's a good three / four blocks to get to the next one. in Mendoza you can hop from bar to restaurant to bar all down one street with nice seating out on the pavement and friendly waiters.
I'm not saying the people in Buenos Aires are unfriendly, I met a few on my last night there who were fantastically bilingual and really open, one was just about to travel to the US and was one hell of a pool player. He owned the table for the whole time I was there, had to be a good three hours. But I've said before, and I stand by it, a city is only as good as the people you know there. Some places can make up for it but if you drop someone on their own in Sydney, Hong Kong, Dubai, London, New York, Buenos Aires, wherever, you have to work hard to go out and meet people and sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't. Now, some places lend themselves to going out on your own thanks to the culture but frankly if all you've got is a Lonely Planet guide you're in trouble........
For a start they don't focus much on the solo traveler, there's a lot of different people who travel so I don't fault them, but many of the restaurants and the like aren't really set up for one person to go. You have to really put yourself out there, my recommendation is find somewhere with a pool table, dartboard, something where you can sign up and play. It gives you something to talk about and maybe a new friend but without those you've just got to step up and sometimes make a fool of yourself, don't worry you'll likely never see these people ever again or if you do neither of you will remember (probably).
For me, that's difficult, a lot of people laugh when I tell them but I'm naturally quite shy around people I don't know. Once I've talked to someone for 5 minutes good luck getting me to shut up but that's your fault, you shouldn't have talked to me in the first place :o). I think this trip is getting me over some of those self inflicted handicaps, you might find a new and improved, even more talkative version at the end of all this - scary, right?
Ok, what started as a little bit of a description of the feel of Buenos Aires has plunged off another cliff of shameless self analysis and a little bit of random venting, so I'm going to stop here. Next stop is El Calafate and Patagonia, mountains but different! We'll see. This should be interesting, everyone who goes there goes for the countryside and the hiking so at least you know you've got something in common with people already. Let's see what happens :o)
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