I can’t believe today is our sixth full day in Buenos Aires. I’m so glad we had the opportunity to spend over a week in the city — I really have a sense of the city and all of its neighborhoods now, and feel like we’ve really gotten to do all of the things we initially listed out during our trip planning phase.

Today we had a much later start since we didn’t head to bed until after 2 AM. After our breakfast of coffee and media lunas — the Argentine equivalent of miniature, sweeter croissants — we took the good ol’ 152 almost its entire route to the El Caminito section of La Boca, a very touristy area of the same neighborhood where Erica lives. El Caminito is known as the birthplace of tango, and the two, small streets of the area are easily recognized by their brightly painted buildings.

Alison and I have been doing slightly touristy things, but for the most part, we’ve been wandering on our own, not taking group tours and avoiding being stared at too dramatically since Alison speaks fluently. In El Caminito men were talking to the three of us left and right, pushing fliers for their restaurants in our faces, asking if we wanted to stand in tango poses for photos, asking where we were from and telling us we were muy linda, very beautiful. After ignoring their cat calls we took lots of photos and wandered through the various art studios and souvenir stores.

Today was the first day we had sunshine and blue skies, and aside from the photos I posted of San Telmo, might have been my favorite photo day. We opted for lunch at Proa, a beautiful modern art space with an adorable cafe, delicious sandwiches, and very enticing large couches and low tables.

Gorgeous restaurant (and incredible view) from our lunch cafe

After a leisurely two hour lunch, and a delicious brownie, we got in a cab down to the Congressional Plaza. The Congressional building looks similar to the U.S. White House, with a beautiful dome atop the center of the building. After asking two different security guards about the tours for the day and getting two, very different answers, we returned to ask yet more questions. The guard, instead of being annoyed by the silly gringa chicas, decided to personally walk us into the building, through the temporary special art exhibit and show us the beautiful chamber room where all 257 deputies sit and vote. He let us look more at the art and then we made our way out and back downstairs — a perfect little peek inside!

From there we walked north on Callero Ave and did some shopping, and I purchased a beautiful pair of deep rojo (red) lace up oxfords with a wood kitten heel. I’m already obsessed, and can’t wait to wear them! Alison wanted the same pair in camel, but they were out of her size, so we’re on a mission to check out one of their other locations to find them for her.

From there we hoped on the metro a few stops back to our hostel, grabbed some olives, cheese and bread and are currently relaxing in the lobby of our B&B before picking our dinner destination!

I’m working on photos now, and will get up a second post soon with links to those!