Rio to Buenos Aires - 1/10/25
- sridgway38
- Jan 9
- 2 min read
We had a quite early start to the day getting up at 3:15 to get ready for our 5 Am departure to the airport. When we looked out on the water around 4 AM we could see masses of Stand up Paddle Boarders entering the water for some sort of sunrise session. This city takes their fitness very seriously.
We headed to the airport for our flight to Argentina. We few British Airways and it was our first time in their club world seats and they were very nice. The plane nad come in from London with a stop in Rio to let off some passengers and take on more. The flight was easy and uneventful except that as a rule of the Argentinian government the plane had to be sprayed with some kind of repellent because it was entering from Brazil where there is an outbreak of mosquito borne illnesses. We'd never see that before, the flight attendants passed down each aisle spraying some sort of insect repellent towards the ceiling just before landing. They kept announcing that it wasn't dangerous to humans but it was really odd and smelled like bad perfume.
We were met outside of customs by a driver sent from the hotel and it was about a 30 minute drive to the Alvear Icon hotel in Buenos Aires. Our room wasn't ready so we had lunch at the bar, excellent burgers. We then hit up an ATM where the most money we could withdraw was 15,000 Pesos, which amounts to about 15.00. This is due to the unstable currency in Argentina so we will use that for tip money because like in Brazil, tips have to be in cash and can not be added to the credit card slips.
We got in touch with Sergio K and will meet him for lunch tomorrow in the city. Then we spent the afternoon at the hotel pool, had an early dinner and went to bed early. We met a few people at the pool who will be on our trip and it seems that most of the hotel guests at this point are heading where we are. Tomorrow we have a day in Buenos Aires to get organized, meet the tour group around 5 PM and have lunch with Sergio.