April 15, 2019 – May 12, 2019

Buenos Aires is often referred to as “the Paris of South America”. It is a multicultural city, full of parrillas (steak house), red wine, weekend ferias (craft/antique fairs), tango dancers and magnificent buildings.

Our first few days in the city were spent on some non touristic matters. The first order of business was to find a kennel for Piper for the flight home. We wanted to get a kennel several weeks before the flight so that she could get accustomed to the space. The airlines have ridiculous size requirements for the kennel…I mean, I realize the dog needs to be comfortable, but the space she is going to have far exceeds comfort of the space that Derek or I will have on the flight. Anyway, I found a used kennel on Facebook marketplace. The dimensions advertised were slightly bigger than what we needed, but we decided that it would do the job. The seller delivered the kennel, and we assembled it.

“Wow, that is a big kennel!”, we said to each other. I had written down the maximum allowable dimensions for Air Canada (flight to Toronto) and for West Jet (flight to Halifax), and as we inspected the kennel I began to worry that it was larger than what would be allowed. The problem was, we had no measuring tape with us (there is one in the toolbox tucked deep within Seymour, which is tucked deep within a container ship at the moment). Derek did have a small ruler imprinted on the side of a multitool. We used that to make marks on a broom handle, and then began to measure the kennel….and it was bigger than what the seller had advertised. It met the requirements for Air Canada, but was slightly too large for West Jet…

I kind of lost it. I was angry that we hadn’t measured the kennel when it was dropped off, I was angry that the seller had given us the wrong measurements, and it was not a cheap kennel either. At first we thought that it was just a little bit too high, and we remeasured several times with our crude yard stick, and talked about cutting the little feet off of the bottom. Then we found the official measurements of the kennel on line and we were just under the height restriction but were about 5 cm too wide…..no way to fix that!

We hadn’t booked our West Jet flight yet, so, after a day of stressing about the kennel, I decided to give them a call. When I told the booking agent about the size of the kennel, she said that it was only slightly bigger than the maximum allowed and that she didn’t think it would be a problem….okay, well, I guess time will tell. At least we will be in Canada by then and the flight is cheap if we need to find another kennel and rebook.

The other item we had to chase down was a MacBook computer repair shop. I had debated on whether to lug my heavy laptop to Buenos Aires with us or whether to leave it in the truck. I decided I would like to have it, and then one day after the truck got locked up in the container, the video card (which had acted up way back in Mexico only to then work again), finally failed for good.

I found what seemed like a good repair shop, and we dropped on the computer. 2 weeks and US$180 later, I got my laptop back and it seems to be working fine….pretty cheap repair, I think.

We settled into our Airbnb, but not without some difficulties. We had just spent a week in an apartment in Montevideo, and we had about 4 weeks to spend in Buenos Aires…problem was, we were starting to get bored with the stationary life, and all we could think about was getting back to Canada. We sort of had to push ourselves to get out and see some of the attractions of this great city.

On a wine tour in Mendoza we had spoken with a young American woman who was going to university in Buenos Aires. She told us that we needed to go and see La Bomba de Tiempo while in Buenos Aires. Every Monday night they put on a 2 hour, live drumming show in an open air venue. The tickets costs about $7 each, and it was a great show! We were definitely among the oldest people at the show, the majority of the attendees being in their early twenties.

We have walked a lot while in B.A. We are staying in Barrio Norte, which is close to the great parks of the neighbourhood of Palermo. We would take off mid morning and walk for hours.

And suddenly, here we are, the day before our flight to Canada. Tomorrow, the 13th of May, we will grab a cab to the airport, send Piper off in her huge kennel to the baggage compartment, and at 5am on the 14th of May we will arrive in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It seems strange that it took us over a year and a half to get here, but that in less than 24 hours of travel time we will be back in our home and native land. We have so loved South America, but we are looking forward to the ease of travel in our own country as we spend the summer exploring eastern Canada.

Ciao, Gracias Y hasta luego America sur.