The Guardian has ranked El Ateneo in Recoleta as the ‘second most beautiful bookshop in the world’ (so you know, Polare in Masstricht was first at the time, though now I see it’s closed… hmm, so where does that leave El Ateneo I wonder?). Apart from its enormous proportions – 2000 square metres – it…

The 2018 Youth Olympics opened here on the weekend with 250,000 people heading downtown for the opening ceremony* along the Avenida 9 de Julio. Sadly, the budget was slashed 40% in recent months, perhaps dulling this first time Olympics for Argentina, albeit the lesser known Youth Games. The IOC president Thomas Bach, who opened things…

The San Telmo Sunday market is a huge draw for both locals and tourists, so it gets packed, especially on weekends, and on a 25-degree Spring Sunday afternoon like today. Wonderfully warmed by the sunshine you’re shuffling along at a snail’s pace, so plenty of time to peer and poke around in the jammed curio…

On the other side of Puerto Madero is one of BA’s greatest and most unexpected treasures, the 865-acre wetland park, the Reserva Ecológica Costanera Sur. This is an incredible resource to have so close to a city of 13 million, packed with 314 species of birds, 23 species of reptile including, surprisingly, caimans and iguanas,…

It’s been a glorious Spring week here in BA, not a cloud in the sky and temps in the low 20’s – perfect conditions for this morning’s wander down to the Rio de la Plata. It’s actually a bit of a hike, not as the crow flies perhaps but a 10k walk all the same…

Up on the roof terrace the roofs join up, separated by low walls and lattice fences full of flowering jasmine and for us, one giant cascading ivy down the whole light-well. I’m the self-designated gardener here, watering the multitude of potted plants, succulents and herbs and occasionally peering over a wall, down a light-well and…

We’ve rented a sprawling and very affordable ‘casa chorizo’ in San Telmo in a quiet residential street near Parque Lezama and around the corner from oh-so-stylish Caseros with its excellent restaurants and bars. There are thousands of these faded elegant gems all over Buenos Aires and dating from around the late 19thC and into the…

The central business and shopping district (Microcentro) is centered around the Plaza de Mayo and Casa Rosada – it was from this central balcony that Eva Peron would address the thousands of Peronists, ‘the shirtless ones’ – we weren’t shirtless (not since Mexico) but a tune or two did swirl around in my head as…

We stumbled upon a real Buenos Aires find over on Defensa, a large warehouse of mid-century furniture, chock-a-block with dusty pieces piled on top of each other, it’s a real treasure trove. Naturally my eye fell upon a classic 70’s dining table and four chairs (it’s the bronze wire chair in the window – one…

Argentines are angry that the government turned so quickly to the IMF for a bailout – to the tune of more than US$50 Billion I might add, a record for the IMF. The peso has lost over half of its value this year alone, inflation is spiralling, currently at over 40% and bank interest rates…