Mariel's not really a maid, she only does our place. Long story, but she definitely won't do it.

Pictures please... and what type/stakes of poker does your roommate play?

I don't know, I've never actually seen him play...

hmmm.....

Gonna be doing a 2 week vacation in Argentina with my gf before settling down in BsAs. Thoughts on this pls?

- 5-6 days in BA (maybe like 3-4 at the beginning and 1-2 at the end)
- 2-3 days in Mendoza
- 3 days in Patagonia
- 1-2 days in Iguazu
- 2-3 days in Colonia/Rio de la plata

I wouldn't bother with Colonia, and spend more time in patagonia/mendoza.

To elaborate more on that, there's not enough stuff in Colonia to last more than a couple hours, from what everyone tells me. You just go there and walk around and look at the architecture and then leave.

Just giving my opinion on how you should divide your trip.. Do some research and put more time into things that you're more interested in!

2 nights Iguazu is perfect. Arrive in the morning and go do the Brazilian side + parque des aves (across the brasil entrance). Next day do the Argentine side and leave late evening or the next morning. You'll most of the time have to go back to BA before catching another destination.

Mendoza 2-3 days is good

skip colonia/rio de la plata IMO

spend 6 days in "Patagonia" (each place i mention 2 days): go to calafate (perito moreno, you can do hikes on the glaciar, taht's an unforgettable experience), Bariloche, and visit the parque nacional near lago futalaufquen (Esquel)

4 days in BA should be more then enough

and then i'm still forgetting Punta Valdés in Patagonia where you can see beautiful wildlife (also 2 days if you wanna go to the penguins in Punta Tombo & wildlife on the Island near Puerto Madryn

In the patagonia,the "parque nacional los alerces" its really good also.

Thanks for such an information rich response estoysinblanco. That will definitely come in handy...if anyone has any tips re: must see places and how best to do it please share =)

Chiming in just to say that I slightly disagree. If the weather is nice, I could easily spend 3-5 days in Colonia. Just get outside the city at various places along the coast to relax on the beach and maybe do some camping. But, I repeat that if you are not staying here long term and you have a limited amount of time to spend in Argentina and Uruguay, Colonia should not be on your list of places to visit.

I think overall this is good advice but you are REALLY pushing it as far as time. I understand that estoysinblanca was trying to give you a possible itinerary that fit your parameters but I just think very few travelers can do this pace.

- If you can arrange it with flights as advised above for Iguazu, than that it the perfect amount of time to spend there. Arrive in the morning, 1 day Argentine side, 1 day Brazilian side and then get out of there that night. Perfect.

- Mendoza: Like he said do some research about what you want to do cause Mendoza and the surrounding areas is a place where I could be happy with a trip of only a weekend but I also could easily spend 2-3 weeks there. Figure out what you want to do beforehand and plan accordingly.

- Trying to visit those places within Patagonia for only 2 days at each stop is in my opinion going to be a huge rush and you won't be able to do justice to any one of those places. Again do some research about what you really want to see and plan accordingly. I'd just choose 2 out of the 3 (Honestly, you wouldn't be wrong in just choosing 1 out of the 3). Another thing to add which is quite time intensive: If you go to Calafate, a decent jog from there is Torre del Paine National Park in Chile. Just an amazing hiking spot.

Don't forget that if you are traveling like this and rushing from place to place, you are going to get pretty tired. A lot of these trips involve a lot of walking/hiking. Make sure you take that into account.

It takes so long to get from A to B in Patagonia, I would just fly into Calafate in the morning... go see the glacier, eat some lamb, spend the night, then spend the next 4-5 days in El Chalten, which is 4 hours away or Torres Del Paine, about 8 hours iirc. Both places offer some of the best trekking/camping in the world. You can rent pretty much any gear you need to as well.

Fantastic feedback guys, thanks a lot. Gonna plan the trip out tonight.

Cheers,
Barry

thats the national park near lago futalaufquen that i mentionned u fish


Also agree with chairman woods opinion. I did the all around trip in 3 weeks. 2 weeks is very little time and you'll have to plan everything perfectly w tight schedules and choose perfect flights to do this. Cafayate is the most time consuming place to go since it's located remotely and you need to get there in the afternoon, in order to do the visiting the next day. It's worth it but doing some active things in Bariloche like rafting or so is fun as well. Def need to do Alerce Parq and take the boat trip up to the biggest alerce tree. It's amazing..

My best advice is that if you lack time, take another day of your time in BA.. BA in 3 days is very possible

Rest seems obvious and now it's your job to find out how you gonna goa bout it. Any questions or more info, just ask

Any recommendations for a decent hairdresser that speaks english? I live in Palermo.

I know a canadian who's really good at that. I'll sent you his email in private.

Hello everyone,

I'm going to be in Cordoba and then Buenos Aires for about a month each in mid March thru May. Would be cool to hang with some poker players while down there as I won't know anyone. Anyone know ppl in Cordoba that like to drink and speak at least some English?

I'm planning on taking a month-long intensive Spanish course in Cordoba so hopefully I'll be capable by the time I get to BA.

beats me why u would wanna spend a whole month in Cordoba.

Hey dudes, any thoughts on how to get these travel prices down?

Round-trip flights using decolar.com (all from BA) dates aren't solid...

Patagonia (El Calafate) - $550 (15th to 20th)
Iguazu - $441 (20th-21st)
Mendoza - $441 (22nd-25th)

Maybe bus it to Mendoza or something?

Just another big Argentine city. Far less cosmopolitan than Buenos Aires but maybe that is what he wants. I've been there but haven't spent lots of time; however people tell me there are lots to do. It's a big city with good night life. Also it's a university town with a young populace interested in meeting people. Mountains, rivers and all sorts of outdoorsy stuff within 3 hours. I could think of far worse places to be.

Again, I haven't been there for more than a weekend but I imagine that you will run into far less foreigners. If your goal is to really learn spanish by talking with argentines while having lots of fun stuff to do; maybe this isn't that bad of a place.

I always use http://www.kayak.com/ . You probably have already tried that. Try http://www.despegar.com.ar/ but you should get a similar price.

It depends on a lot of things but I'm betting that you are always doing Aeroparque (AEP) to wherever your destination is? The idea being that instead of flying Mendoza to Calafate you fly Mendoza to AEP to Calafate because there are no direct flights? I would first start to investigate bus fare and other transportation between Iguazu, Mendoza and Calafate that doesn't involve returning to Buenos Aires. Perhaps with all these flights, buses and transports you might like a travel agent. PM me and I can give you the email addresses of a few trustworthy ones I've used in the past.

There is also the idea of roadtripping it with a few other people and renting a car. I have no idea how much it would cost for a few weeks but it is another idea. I know Avis car rental is here and quite a few other well known brands. Just do a google search. I just want to say that off the top of my head, here to Iguazu seems doable ( i dunno, 10-12 hours?) Iguazu to Mendoza probably isn't that bad (dunno maybe 15 hours or so????). However, the trip down to Calafate and Calafate to Buenos Aires is going to be an absolute bitch. Terrible roads and a long long way. That said, if you are in for it, it will be a hell of a good time.

100% true, very good nightlife there, even superior to BA in many aspects, and there are really beautiful places outside the city:

Roadtripping in Argetina is impossible if you are on a tight shedule.. Prices are always quite expensive for all those flights.. Calafate is "unreachable" by bus.. From Esquel (parque nacional los alerces) you'd be taking a 30hour busride over a dirt route..

You can take the bus to Iguazu or Mendoza overnight. Anything further is something i would not recommend in this situation. I'd fly to Bariloche, u can go back and forth by bus to Esquel. After you're back in Bariloche, you can take a direct 5hour flight (not sure how long) to Calafate, buy a ticket back to BA. Then do Mendoza or Iguazu..

Despegar at first was an OK site but be carefull. They tried to scam me once. I had bought already a couple tickets for the roundtrip and then they called me claiming that foreigners - who don't have the argentine DNI to fill in when completing their forms - have to pay supplements and they tried to charge me more. I told these scammers to *** off and cancelled my payments. From then on i went straight to AEP to buy tickets at their desk directly from the flightcompanies and i got even most tickets at lower prices then on despegar.

Cordoba had alot of cool outdoors stuff there...I went on a few hikes/did rock climbing while visiting there. Only spent a few days there but enjoyed myself.

Is anyone here interested in going to Rosario for a couple of days? The biggest casino in South America is there, in the Pullman Hotel. I stayed there last year and it is incredibly nice, a legitimate five star hotel. Amazing place. They have poker cash games but I don't know the details. I can get a room for two nights for around $250 total, that would be $125 a person for two nights in a baller five star hotel/casino. Rosario is about four hours from BA. Looking to go February 22 and 23 (Tuesday and Wednesday nights).

If interested shoot me an email at phillycentric@gmail.com. Looking to book this within the next day or two. Cheers!