shipping cargo from Argentina

our stuff arrives in a big truck!

This is most of it. It doesn’t even look like that much stuff!

We had all our stuff shipped to Maine from Buenos Aires, Argentina, by cargo freight ship! It took a long time and caused lots of stress but it was cheap and … miraculously, here’s our stuff! delivered to our doorstep. Arrived on Wednesday, right on time!

A few people have asked us for details about how we shipped all our cargo from Argentina home to the United States, so here’s the nitty gritty, as much of it as I can recall: We used a shipping agent called Pluscargo Argentina. Our contact person there was Agustina Villanueva. I don’t know if I would recommend it… we were looking for the rock-bottom-cheapest price quote, which is why we went with PlusCargo. We explained that we could handle EVERY aspect of the shipping, all the tramites and paperwork and packing and transportation and everything, except for the actual cargo ship. So we asked for a cheap price and bare-bones service and that is what we got! It ended up being really complicated and pretty stressful, my spanish is pretty good so I was able to navigate a confusing maze of bureaucracy and paperwork, though it took a LOT of time and energy. The worst problem was that our shipping agent never really explained to us what we needed to actually do! She was just like “OK, here’s the name of your ship and the departure date, you do the rest” and didn’t always answer phone calls or emails when I asked her to explain more. So I was bouncing around from one agency to another, asking questions and begging everyone to help me out and tell me what to do! This process is normally handled by shipping agents who know the whole process and are friendly with everyone involved and take care of all the paperwork, so it’s very strange for a person like me to show up in the customs office with no contacts and idea what I’m doing. If you decide to go with a bare-bones service like this, it will probably help you a lot to actually know what the steps are:

• you need to pack up all your stuff in boxes and estimate the volume (in cubic meters) of your items, in order to get a price quote from your shipping company. Use sturdy boxes, as they’ll be shipped in cargo containers on high seas. We used lots of bubble wrap and were very careful with fragile items. Wooden crates might be helpful. We did everything in cardboard boxes, some of them (containing clothes) were a bit smashed-up when they arrived but nothing was broken, even glass stuff arrived in one piece.
• you need to keep a detailed list of EVERY single item that is packed in your boxes. You will need to show this to customs.
• be careful with WOOD items such as furniture. Customs requires a certificate to prove they have been fumigated before they can enter the USA.
• be careful with ART of any kind. Whether it’s childrens’ drawings or a cheap magazine photo in a picture frame, anything that looks remotely like art, or anything in a frame, will raise red flags at customs. Argentina is very concerned about fine art being illegally removed from the country. You are supposed to contact some agency (perhaps affiliated with La UBA?) and show them photographs of every piece of art or framed picture you are transporting. They are specialists who certify that it’s NOT a valuable work of art (or if it is, they value it and you have to pay proper duties on it). People have said this is actually not such a difficult process, but we didn’t want to deal with it so we just took all of our “art” (nothing valuable) out of the frames and folded or rolled them or otherwise packed them up in a way that made them not look like valuable art.
• EMBA (Estación Marítima Buenos Aires) is the govt. agency that handles exporting personal effects. Their office is located down by the port, in the general area of Retiro – you probably will want to take a taxi over there, though you can walk from Retiro. Get the address from your shipping agent, I can’t remember it!
• your shipping agency should give you a checklist of tramites, from EMBA, that you must do, and documentation that you must provide. I forget all the stuff on it. You need to have an escribano certify a copy of your passport showing that you are a US citizen, and a copy of your working papers or residency papers or other evidence that you’ve been a legal resident of Argentina for at least one year (I was not a legal resident but my boyfriend DID have a working visa so we shipped everything in his name). You need copies of your list of what’s in your boxes. You need a booking sheet (from your shipping agent) that tells what freight company and what boat your stuff will be traveling on. And I think there were a few more…
• if you have a shipping agent who will handle the tramites for you, you will need to have an Escribano write up a form that gives your shipping agent the power to handle all duties related to exporting your personal effects for you. If you are going to do it all yourself, you don’t need this “poder.” The people in EMBA seem to work with an escribano named Emilio Perasso (Paraná 123 piso 7, 4372-4341) but after visiting his office twice, we finally figured out that we don’t need to work with him at all, since he handles the “poder” which we didn’t need to do. We went to a cheaper neighborhood escribano to have the residency & passport copies certified.
• discuss insurance with your shipping agency. We decided to forego it since we mostly were shipping things with emotional value but little monetary value. But for valuables I’m sure it would be a very good idea.
• your shipping agency should give you the name and address of a cargo-storage “deposito fiscal” down by the port that will receive your boxes and hold them until they are packed on the ship.
• once you’ve assembled all your paperwork, bring it in to EMBA at the port. Make sure you don’t go at lunchtime when everything is closed!! If they approve your paperwork they will send you across the street to a customs office that will take a copy of your packing list and make an appointment for you to have your boxes reviewed by a customs officer (he will come to meet you at the deposito fiscal and do the inspection there).
• talk to the deposito fiscal to find out exact procedures and hours to drop off your stuff. You should drop it around a week or at least a few days before the ship departure date.
• hire a flete (truck and driver) to pick up your boxes and bring you, and the boxes, down to the deposito fiscal. Again, make sure you avoid the lunch hour! We had a hell of a time with this step of the process, it ended up taking AN ENTIRE DAY because we were missing some certification from the customs officer so the deposito fiscal did not want to let us in. Again, they are accustomed to seeing familiar faces of shipping agents who normally handle this process, so they didn’t really know how to handle us and I think part of the delay was just them being like “who are you? what the hell? where’s your shipping agent?” We had to keep the flete waiting, on the clock, for like 6 hours while the whole thing got worked out. Again, you’ll need to present copies of all your paperwork at this stage.
• the customs officer should meet you at the deposito fiscal. You will need to fill out more paperwork and get a security badge to enter the storage facility with him. He and his team will open up about 25% of your carefully-packed boxes and rifle through your stuff to make sure it’s not contraband. He was very nice and they taped everything back up very carefully when they were done.
• Afterwards we got more papers and tracking numbers, confirming the cargo had been delivered to the deposito fiscal.
• then go pay the shipping company and give them copies of the papers from the deposito fiscal. We gave them our address in the USA where we wanted our boxes delivered, and they contracted with a US cargo transporter to have our boxes picked up at the port in New York and delivered by cargo truck to our address in Maine.
• Then … wait! It took about 6 weeks for our cargo to arrive at our doorstep in Maine. The US cargo company handled the customs paperwork on the US entry side, and charged us an additional fee for US customs clearance. The customs clearance took about a week, as our boxes got pulled out for special x-ray inspection and then further personal inspection by hand. The US company did complain that PlusCargo Argentina had not filled out their part of the paperwork correctly!
• The total price was around US$1000 for less than 1 cubic meter of cargo. I think we paid about $850 to PlusCargo and the rest to the company in NJ that handled our US customs clearance. This was only for shipping and handling and stuff, We did NOT have to pay any customs charges to the country of Argentina or to the USA, since we were able to prove that all our goods were just personal effects, nothing for sale.

If you have a little bit more money to spend, I would suggest seeking a slightly more full-service agency because this whole process gave me a lot of grey hairs and I might’ve rather spent my last days in Argentina drinking wine in San Telmo, not sweating in the cargo port. Although for me the hardest part was actually figuring out what we were supposed to do, since nobody would tell us all the steps and how to do them! Hopefully this info would be helpful for somebody else trying to navigate this maze on their own, and perhaps it wouldn’t be so difficult if you go into the process armed with this knowledge.

Here is another place we considered because they had a relatively low price quote. No idea if they’re any good or not. http://internicmovingservices.com/eurotransport/us_booking.php

Hope this helps anybody who’s thinking of trying to do the same thing!

Back to Buenos Aires and then onwards again…

Finally back to our house in Buenos Aires for just two short weeks. So good to see the dogs after such a long absence! Inga didn’t recognize us, and thought we were tired, stinky burglars with large backpacks. Chris and Courtney had been dog/house sitting while we were gone, they were excited for our return because it meant that they could leave town and start their own big South American adventure. We were very excited to be on home ground and have good long hot showers in our own bathroom, wash our clothes, clean our blisters, eat good food, sleep long hours and generally regroup for a day before beginning the next leg of our crazy transformation.
Immediately after touching down in Buenos Aires, we had to start planning our attack for packing and cleaning and moving overseas! I had to catch up on a bit of work, so Mike handled most of the paperwork and bureaucracy related to bringing our dogs to the United States. We bought some boxes and bubble wrap, packing tape, and started furiously sorting and packing EVERYTHING in our house. We wanted to ship some boxes via container freight, but were uncertain whether it would be prohibitively expensive or impossible due to impenetrable mazes of paperwork and typical Argentine bureaucracy. As the designated Expert Spanish Speaker of the house, it fell to me to handle most of the phone conversations and paperwork surrounding this scary and stressful task. We basically had NO IDEA how to go about doing this. Everyone we talked to said “I can’t tell you what to do, you should talk to someone else.” Our bargain-priced shipping agent said “I’m not sure what you need to do, maybe you should talk to the people in the port.” We ventured down into the strange world of the shipping port in person, and the people in the port said “Your shipping agent needs to handle this for you.” When we said that our shipping agent had sent us to the port in the first place, the port agency told us to go see a public notary. We begged them to give us a recommendation for a notary who could help us; when we went to see that notary, they were perplexed by our needs and said “Tell your shipping agent to call us.” When we called the shipping agent, she said “I’ve never heard of this notary, I don’t work with them.” Ultimately, NOBODY would advise us about what we needed to do and how to do it, nor how much it would cost. And all of these conversations were in Spanish which made them 10% more confusing and frustrating! We could’ve gone with a full-service shipping agent but we didn’t want to pay for it so we’d chosen someone who gave us a rock-bottom price and offered absolutely no service other than giving us a cargo spot on a boat. So, despite great adversity, we did cobble together a terribly vague idea of what we kinda imagined that maybe we could try to do in order to get our stuff shipped. Nothing to do but try it, hope for the best, and see how it goes. After much labored sorting and organizing and packing and taping and bubble-wrapping, we had 38 small cardboard boxes plus one bike in a cardboard box, ready to go. We hired a van and driver to pick it up and drive us and our cargo down to the shipping port. It’s a strange no-man’s-land out there, beyond the edge of the known city, a kinda fascinating maze of mud roads and container stacks and shipping warehouses, populated by truck drivers and stevedores, shipping employees, forklift drivers and team captains, almost exclusively big burly industry men. Normally, shipping agents handle this side of the business and they all know the warehouse managers by name. We were the only disoriented and confused gringos in the whole port. We got totally lost driving around this maze and our poor driver was very patient as we made phone call after phone call to locate our specified warehouse complex. When we got there… bad luck, it was 11:45 and the whole place closes down for 2 hours for lunch break. They wouldn’t even let us through the door to drop our cargo. So we had to pay our driver by the hour to sit outside the door in the van with us for two long hours, waiting for all these guys to finish their lunch and let us in. When they finally got around to dealing with us, of course we were missing important papers that nobody had told us about… there were more phone calls and more hours of delays… finally we were admitted and our cargo weighed… in a giant warehouse filled with pallets of wine and flat-screen tv’s, we met a customs agent who ripped open a few boxes to make sure we were really exporting personal effects, not contraband. Bla, bla, bla, more hours of paperwork and confusion, finally after about 8 hours we got home with a stack of papers in spanish, to show that we’d left all our goods for shipment!
Then on to packing the suitcases and cleaning the apartment, farewell dinners and despedida parties, last dates with friends and a few quiet moments to enjoy our beautiful neighborhood and quiet terrace for the last time ever! Wednesday, March 3rd we left home at 5:00 pm with two dogs in travel crates and six suitcases, never to return again…

Humuhuaca, waiting for the bus

Bus is twenty-five minutes late, dusty gusts of wind and hot sun and heavy packs. Nun waiting next to me doesn’t seem bothered by any of it. Earlier there was a six-year-old futbol champion kicking a ball around next to us and giving me big toothless smiles every time he hit me in the leg, but he’s gone now. The last few days were beautiful, driving and hiking through red and pink and purple mountains, green river valleys, cacti and goats and llamas, eating lots of empanadas. Just said goodbye to Andrew and Vickie, who took the car back to Jujuy; we’re busing it and hoofing it from here on. Will write more later.

Quebrada de Humuhuaca

The Quebrada de Humuhuaca is the name of the valley that stretches from the town of Yala, north of the city of San Salvador de Jujuy, Argentina, up to the city of Humuhuaca, Argentina. AR Route 9 follows the Rio Grande up through the valley, and around the river is green and lush, while the mountains above are dry and dusty, with lots of cacti and brush and not much other vegetation. The valley is oriented more or less north-south, and as you drive north the elevation increases steadily. Purmamarca is near the southern end, Tilcara is around the middle, and the city of Humuhuaca is near the northern end. In between there are a few smaller towns, and a few groups of adobe houses, with farmers herding goats and llamas and growing corn and potatoes in terraced gardens.

Waking up in Purmamarca, we had a nice breakfast of bollo (homemade bread) and cafe con leche, then hiked up a big cliff to look out across the town of Purmamarca to the famous Cerro de Siete Colores, a stripey colored mountain behind the village.

climbing up

Purmamarca and the Cerro de Siete Colores

Driving around the Cerro de Siete Colores

Purmamarca Cemetery

Before leaving town, we took a drive around a kind of sketchy dirt road that goes around the Cerro de Siete Colors and stopped at the amazing and beautiful town cemetery. We decided to take a side-trip to visit the Salinas Grandes salt flats a few hours west of Purmamarca, along the road towards Chile. To get to the salt flats we had to basically drive up out of the river valley and across the mountain range, onto the high altiplano. It’s a crazy switchback stretch of road called the Cuesta de Lipan, it’s a really dramatic ascent (the high point of the pass is 4,170 meters) but the road is two lanes and it’s in good condition.

Cuesta de Lipan

above the clouds

Salinas Grandes salt flats

We saw lots of llamas and vicuña and goats grazing happily among the cacti on the steep dry hills, and looking back over the road we could see clouds far below us. The Cuesta de Lipan ascends about 1,978 meters in elevation, then descends another 800 meters to the salt flats, over 17 kilometers of driving, which our tiny little rental car managed happily with Mike at the wheel. The salt flats are weird and unwelcoming, as soon as we arrived I felt blasted by heat and light and had to fight the urge to retreat as fast as possible. I remember feeling the same way when I drove through the salt flats in Utah long ago, it just feels intensely alien and unfriendly. We wrapped scarves and towels around our heads to fight the sun and glare, and wandered around a bit. There are square pools of salt water where salt has been harvested and water has seeped into the square hole. The salt underfoot is crunchy and crackly. There were some cool crystallized chunks of salt lying around. Unbelievably, there were some guys there selling handcrafts carved from salt blocks. They all had t-shirts wrapped around their heads too. I can’t imagine spending the whole day working there, yikes.
After the salt flats we had to descend by the same road again, and then headed further along the valley to Tilcara, another town along the Quebrada de Humuhuaca. It’s a slightly bigger tourist town, cute but a bit overstuffed with other backpackers. We found a place to stay at the local cooperative schoolhouse! The kids are on summer vacation, so they put beds in the classrooms and rent the little schoolhouse to travelers! It was a perfect place for us, with a kitchen and a barbecue in the back yard and beautiful fruit trees and gardens that the kids had planted. We felt super comfy and ended up staying a few nights in Tilcara.

our schoolhouse home in Tilcara

our schoolhouse home in Tilcara

There was lots of music and festivities for Three Kings Day, which I believe is a big holiday in all of Latin America. There were tons of kids in costumes marching around to drum and flute music all day, and there was a stage with performances in the town square, and there was a maypole dance which kind of blew my mind because I thought that maypoles were just a european folk tradition, I had no idea there were maypole dances in the Andes!

Three Kings Day in Tilcara

One day we did a great hike to a canyon with a waterfall called El Garganta del Diablo, it’s a 12km hike there and back, and there are really amazing views of the valley and striped mountains, there were only a few steep parts but it felt like we were so incredibly high up, we could look waaaayyy down into canyons below us and across to the pastel rows of mountains beyond.

Andrew and Vickie hike home from La Garganta del Diablo

Garganta del Diablo waterfall

Another day we climbed up to the Pukara, which is the site of a pre-incan walled city that’s been excavated and partially reconstructed by archaeologists from the University of Buenos Aires. The site is covered in cacti, with a maze of low stone houses that look very tidy and new. It was incredibly windy and surprisingly cold up there so I spent a lot of our visit hiding in the little stone huts trying to stay warm.

Salta, Jujuy

Friday afternoon (New Years day), we left Buenos Aires by sleeper bus. Traveling with Andrew and Vickie for this week, two of our friends who are visiting from New York. Our bus arrived in Salta on Saturday afternoon and we checked into Grandma’s hostel. Wandered around town in the rain, ate empanadas, tamales and humita (all regional specialties. Humita is cheesy creamy sweet corn mixture, wrapped in a corn husk and steamed). Went to visit two insanely ornate churches and spent some moments contemplating the intensity and strangeness of these looming, over-wrought and slightly creepy places.

the spectacularly fancy Convento de San Francisco, Salta

another grand and elaborate church in Salta

The sky cleared a bit and we went for a hike up the Cerro San Bernardo. The path is a steep, twisting stone stairway punctuated by prayer shrines every few hundred meters, each one representing one of the 14 stations of the cross. I think Salta seems very religious compared to Buenos Aires. It was a long, sweaty climb (1,070 stairs! winding through lush jungly forest) with beautiful views out across the city. At the top there’s a park with spectacular panoramic views and more Jesus stuff. We rode the gondola car back down and then wandered off to dinner.

We walked up the 1,070 steps to the top of the hill! And then rode the gondola cars back down.

Roasted goat for dinner in Salta

Ate roasted goat and locro (more Salteño specialties – locro is a tasty stew) and then went to listen to some folklorico music at a place recommended by our taxi driver called La Casona del Molino, it was a beautiful and crowded place with casual, spontaneous music performances, I wish we’d stayed longer. Had to wake up early for the bus to Jujuy. Two hour bus ride, then rented a car and headed out of town. Tried to visit the hot springs at Termas de Reyes but it was mysteriously closed.

Hot springs closed, waded in the icy river instead.

river valley near Yala

Waded in the river, drove onwards towards Purmamarca. Spectacular scenery as we passed Yala, as green lush river gorge turned to dramatic gravel and rock canyon, carved by water.

Quebrada de Humuhuaca

Turned up in Purmamarca and explored town, checked out the touristy handcrafts at the market and found a cheap hospedaje to sleep for the night. Purmamarca is a little tourist town with brightly colored, striated reddish mountains for a backdrop, situated in this lovely gorge, very photogenic. We discovered that we were sunburned and exhausted and hungry, went out to get dinner at a peña around the corner (peña is a place to listen to folklorico music). Had goat stew (thinking of the many cute little flocks of goats and sheep we’d encountered in the middle of the road during our days’ drive) and more locro and tamales. The peña started out a bit somber but got louder and more fun as the hour got later, with dancing and clapping and singing along. Sleepy and ready for bed now. I think we’ll go for a hike tomorrow morning, then we might head further up the gorge towards Tilcara, we’ll see.

South America tour ideas

So, the idea was to not plan our trip too much – but of course we’re excited to travel and whenever we get a spare moment we can’t help ourselves from flipping through our dog-eared Lonely Planet and browsing through pictures, picking out which places we hope to see along the way. The only reservations we’ll make in advance are our first bus tickets out of Buenos Aires, our final flight home from Lima back to Buenos Aires, and we’ve reserved dates for the Choquequirao hiking trip in the middle. In between those dates we’ll just see what we feel like doing and see what fits in. We’ve never really had enough free time to travel without set plans, so we’re looking forward to having the luxury of making it up as we go along. Also, we’ve heard that transport in Bolivia can be pretty unpredictable so it’s best to keep an open itinerary with lots of extra time for delays. Anyway here are some of the places we’re hoping we might see!

first step: January 1st, 6:00 pm overnight bus from Buenos Aires Retiro bus station to Salta, arrive in Salta at 1:00 pm on January 2nd.

Convento de San Francisco, Salta

Salta street

We’ve visited Salta before but we’ll be traveling with Andrew & Vickie, who’ve never been there, so we might stop over for a few days to see this beautiful colonial city and/or visit some of the surrounding countryside, perhaps Cafayate or Cachi.

Quebrada de Las Conchas (near Cafayate), Salta, Argentina

Cuesta del Obispo. The road from Salta to Cachi runs through the Valle Encantada (The Enchanted Valley).

Then northwards to Jujuy and the Quebrada de Humuhuaca, maybe stay a night in Purmamarca or Tilcara.

Purmamarca. Jujuy provincia, Argentina.

Camino del Colorado – Quebrado de Humuhuaca, Jujuy, Argentina

If we can fit it in, we are eager to visit the isolated mountainside village of Iruya, 4 hours’ bus ride from Humuhuaca, over steep hairpin gravel roads but it sounds like it’s worth the detour.

remote mountainside town of Iruya, Salta, Argentina

Then we’ll part ways with Andrew and Vickie, who will fly out of Jujuy back to Buenos Aires and then head back to the US.

We’ll head northwards and cross the border from Argentina into Bolivia at the border town of Villazon. From Villazon there’s a train that runs north on Tuesdays and Saturdays or something like that. We’re thinking of riding the train up to Tupiza, and then in Tupiza find a jeep tour to bring us out to the salt flats (a place you can really only visit with a tour guide and a jeep). After the salt flats we’ll end up in Uyuni, and continue northwards, we’re thinking of stopping in Potosi, probably Sucre, maybe Ororu or Cochabamba, then a few days in La Paz, then on to Lake Titicaca…

Arequipa, Peru, with volcano Misti in the distance

Monasterio Santa Catalina, Arequipa, Peru

Monasterio Santa Catalina, Arequipa, Peru

TO BE CONTINUED…

going home

so… yes, we are finally making plans to move back home! and by home, i don’t just mean the united states; we’re going back to stay at my childhood home in Maine, with my parents, and look for work and our own apartment in the Portland area… hooray!

we’ll be flying out of Buenos Aires on March 3rd. Arriving in Boston on March 4th.
but first mike’s going to quit his job and we’re planning to travel around south america for a month or two! of course I’m sad to leave argentina – but very excited for all that is to come.

this is our tentative plan:

December 11th: Mike’s last day at work
then we’ll have two weeks to pack and sell everything we own!
December 29th: Andrew & Vickie coming to visit
then we’ll go travel somewhere with A&V – we’re thinking maybe go to the beach near Valparaiso, Chile, or maybe head north towards Tucuman or Salta (in the North of Argentina). We’ll definitely find somewhere beautiful and interesting to spend some quality time with them, we’re totally excited for the visit! Then maybe we’ll continue northward towards Bolivia, after they head back home. So we’ll spend January and maybe part of February exploring Bolivia and Peru by bus. We want to try and do lots of hiking. We’re thinking we might end up avoiding Machu Picchu because it’s SO touristy and expensive – there are lots of other amazing Incan ruins and beautiful hiking around the same area – this article about Choquequirao really piqued our interest!
At this point our trip plans are totally up in the air, we’ve done a ton of research but haven’t managed to figure out exactly what we want to do. We are totally open to suggestions if anybody has ideas about great stuff to do (on a small budget) in Peru and Bolivia!!! I think to some extent we will enjoy the freedom of having more time and just figuring stuff out as we go along, depending on weather or what we feel like doing or what we hear from fellow travelers we meet along the way. Our biggest concern is that January and February are rainy season in Peru and Bolivia, so that would make the going a bit harder. Supposedly there can be serious problems with muddy, impassable roads and even mudslides in Bolivia, but there’s also the chance that it will be totally fine, so we’ll see… Otherwise, there’s just a TON of stuff we really want to do and not enough time or money to do all of it. But I’m sure it will be awesome and exciting, no matter where we end up…
we’re hopefully going to have some friends staying at our house in Buenos Aires while we’re gone, taking care of the dogs and keeping an eye on the place for us.
then… sometime in the beginning or middle of February we should get back to Buenos Aires to pick up our dogs and suitcases and say goodbye. And then…
March 3: fly back to the USA! we’ll arrive in Boston in the morning on March 4th.

I can’t believe we’re really doing this – when Mike first mentioned that he wanted to go back, I thought it might be a passing whim… but a few weeks later it seems to be a real plan, and now we’ve bought our tickets so it’s definitely on. I’m sad about leaving behind Argentina and all our friends here, and there are tons of things that I’m sorry we haven’t had time to do… but we’re also totally excited about starting the next chapter in Maine, it’s always irresistibly exciting to think about what the future might bring. We really have no idea. But for sure the move to Maine will mean spending lots more time with my family, and getting to do lots more outdoorsy and nature stuff, hiking and beaches and all that good stuff. Dogs running free in the fields instead of cooped up in an apartment.

So for now, I’m trying to focus on making the most of the time we’ve got left here- spending time with friends, spending some good hours making stuff in my studio, going out to see all the museums and places that we’ve always wanted to check out but somehow never got around to visiting.

Trimarchi

man, I have been totally crazy these past few weeks, working on this and that and the other. Teaching, freelance work, endless errands, chores, etc. It all kind of blurs together. Except for one awesome thing that I did the other weekend: I joined my friends Tyler and Flavia of Nomad Ink for a trip to Mar del Plata, Argentina to attend the 8th annual Trimarchi design conference (TMDG for short).

Alex Trochut presenting at TMDG

It was awesome, Tyler and Flavia really took me under their wing and made me feel like part of the family. I got to help out with the Cross-Cultural Design Workshop that they presented, and they introduced me to about a million exciting and talented designers. They’re based out of Curitiba, Brazil – and they introduced me to lots of other interesting Brazilian designers, such as their friends from Colletivo, who were one of the major presenters at the conference. Colletivo’s presentation was really impressive and they were all totally nice and fun to hang out with.

fun work by Brazilian design studio Colletivo

The whole trip was totally fun and a bit of sensory overload with so many interesting things to do and see and learn about. A million thanks to Tyler and Flavia for really making it an awesome weekend!

Tyler and Flavia, aka Nomad Ink

Nomad Ink’s Cross-Cultural Design Workshop

Atypica booth, Trimarchi

warm afternoon on the beach, Mar del Plata

a(n incomplete) designer’s guide to buenos aires

stencil/graffiti mural in Carabobo subte station

every now and then friends ask me about art-and-design-related stuff to do and things to see in Buenos Aires. It’s fun answering this question; the city is bountiful of eye candy. I’ve been sticking together a rough and of course incomplete list of memorable places and things to suggest to like-minded design enthusiasts, here’s what i’ve got so far:

DESIGN SHOPS:

Papelera Palermo = Palermo Soho. beautiful space selling handmade and hand-printed papers, notebooks, art books, etc… retail store at Honduras 4945. they also have a workshop where they give classes (and make most of the stuff sold in the shop) at Cabrera 5227

CouCou

CouCou = gurruchaga 1783. Palermo Soho. very cute little shop that carries lots of fun objects made by independent designers: home goods, stationery, jewelry, lots of cute tote-bags, baby clothes, etc. The owner Emi is very nice and friendly! She has a great eye, the store always looks super cute and she has a wonderful selection of interesting things!

Fabrolab = Nicaragua 4677. Palermo Soho. big space with some of everything.

Calma Chicha = Honduras 4925. Palermo. home & interior stuff, modern poppy vibe. i think they specialize in argentine-made goods.

Pic Nic = Nicaragua 6080. Palermo Hollywood. patterned wallpaper, pillows, etc.

Cualquier Verdura = Humberto 1º 517. San Telmo. a beautiful house where everything is for sale.

Wussman = Venezuela 570. San Telmo. art gallery in the front and a wonderful stationery shop with fine papers and gifts and a letterpress printing operation in the back and an art-books-store downstairs.

El Mercado de las Pulgas

El Mercado de las Pulgas = Niceto Vega y Dorrego. Palermo Hollywood. Flea market with lots of modern home stuff.

La Pasionaria = Godoy Cruz 1541. Palermo Soho. wonderful warehouse filled with a jumble of vintage 20th century objects, , Palermo Soho. (open 4pm-8pm mon-fri, 11-8 sat)

Canasta = Delgado 1235. Colegiales. a tiny little gallery/bookstore/shop. minimal, eclectic and cute. open tues-sat 2pm-7pm.

CLOTHING:

Lupe = El Salvador 4657, Palermo Soho

and on the same block, Rapsodia. El Salvador 4757, Palermo Soho

AY Not Dead = Soler 4193, Palermo Soho

Pesqueria = armenia 1493. Palermo Soho.

Juana de Arco = El Salvador 4762. Palermo Soho.

Objeto = gurruchaga 1335. Palermo Soho.

Tramando = Rodriquez Peña 1973. Recoleta. interesting textiles and clothing by designer Martin Churba.

DAM = Honduras 4775. Palermo Soho. wacky stuff.

CAFES / RESTAURANTS / etc

Lepi Boulangerie = Roseti 1769. Chacarita. Cute bakery.

Oui Oui = Nicaragua 6068. Palermo Hollywood. coffee shop, bakery, café

Arevalito = Arevalo 1478. Palermo Hollywood. Delicious, filling, homey vegetarian café. Good coffee too. And they serve food all day long (many other BsAs restaurants close down between 2pm and 8pm which often causes visiting yankees searching for an afternoon snack to become hunger-crazed and desperate during these hours!)

an uncharacteristically quiet afternoon at Ølsen

Olsen = Gorriti 5870. Palermo Hollywood. lofty scandinavian restaurant, good brunch and impressive design (from the menus to the plates to the architecture of the restaurant itself)

Milion = Parana 1048. Recoleta. Cool, fancy bar/restaurant in a converted mansion. It’s a beautiful space. It’s always nice to have a mojito in the upstairs bar. (the bar-top is glowing alabaster!)

Cusic = El Salvador 6016. Palermo Hollywood. Cute, quiet café with two nice gardens.

Home Hotel = Honduras 5860. really cute boutique hotel with a nice bar/restaurant in the back, lovely view of the garden and pool from the café, i think in nice weather you can eat in the garden. It’s a great spot for brunches or afternoon tea. They have different cool wallpaper in each room, it’s worth taking a peek around. And they have a wonderful spa if you want to drop a bit of cash on a massage or a day of pampering.

La Catedral

La Catedral = Sarmiento 4006 (corner of Medrano). Almagro. Scruffy, dark & atmospheric tango bar, upstairs in an immense dusty warehouse.

COFFEE SHOPS & BOOKSTORES etc

Eterna Cadencia = Honduras 5574. Palermo Hollywood.a beautiful space, bookstore and cafe.

El Boutique del Libro

El Boutique del Libro = Thames 1762. Palermo Soho. another cozy bookstore/cafe. A great place to take a break from wandering around Palermo, or to bring your laptop and get some work done while you drink coffee. (ED: since this post was written, this bookstore has changed names. El Boutique del Libro opened a new location on Plaza Armenia; this bookstore is now operating under a different name but is otherwise unchanged!)

Helena = Nicaragua 4816. Palermo Soho. Cute coffee shop (no books)

El Ateneo

Ateneo Grand Splendid = Santa Fe 1860. Recoleta. This is a really impressive bookstore, converted from an old movie theater, and the café is located on the stage!

ART & GALLERIES

Espacio Fundación Telefonica = Arenales 1540. Recoleta. Arts foundation with exhibitions in gallery spaces, also an extensive library of art books, workshops, events, etc.

Fundacion PROA = Av. Pedro de Mendoza 1929. La Boca. Contemporary arts museum & gallery space

Hollywood in Cambodia = Thames 1885. Palermo Soho. Graffiti art gallery and bar. Open 5pm – 9pm

Jardin Oculto = Venezuela 926. San Telmo. Art gallery

713 ARTE CONTEMPORANEO = Defensa 713. San Telmo. Art gallery.
http://www.arte713.com

Centro Cultural Borges / Galerias Pacifico = Viamonte esquina San Martín. Centro. art museum (CC Borges) is located upstairs from a very luxe shopping mall (Galerias Pacifico) in a beautiful old building.

MISC:

Graffiti Mundo tour = sounds like fun! It’s a tour of walls, galleries and studios to learn about different artists in the Buenos aires graffiti scene.

A FEW INTERESTING LOCAL DESIGNERS AND ARTISTS:

KOMware

Ana Laura Perez

Patricia Tewel

Lala Ladcani

Marina de Caro (Bola de Nieve)

http://www.proyectopanda.com.ar/

Cristian Turdera

patagonia!

April 2009: 6 days in the deep south of Argentina. Parque Nacional Los Glaciares, El Calafate, Glaciar Perito Moreno, El Chalten, Cerro Fitz Roy…

Day 1: it took us most of the day to get from Buenos Aires to El Calafate; we finally arrived at our hostel around 4:00 and then explored El Calafate. It’s a lot like Bariloche or any other Argentine touristy town; lots of fake-alpine architecture and chocolate shops and souvenirs. The view from our hostel was awesome, out over Lago Argentino to the mountains beyond.

Day 2: a visit to Perito Moreno Glacier and Parque Nacional Los Glaciares. We woke up bright & early and had a scenic two-hour bus ride through foothills and pastures and lakes, out from El Calafate to get to the park.

There’s an impressive series of boardwalks and platforms from which to admire the front edge of the glacier, watch little icebergs calving off from the icy mass and crashing into the lake below.

this ice is 400 years old! These spires of ice began as humid air moving east over the Pacific ocean and over Chile they condensed to clouds and then over the Andes they became snowflakes which fell on the Patagonian continental ice field and slowly made their way down to Argentina a few hundred years later. This is one of the only glaciers in the world that’s not receding. Between the melting and the giant icebergs constantly crumbling off the front end, it’s not really advancing either, but it’s more or less holding its own and neither advancing nor retreating.

After an hour or two of admiring the glacial action, we went to the tourist center and had a hot chocolate, then headed out for our hike across the glacier! We took a boat across the lake, then hiked along the lakeshore and up alongside the edge of the glacier.

Our herd of tourists split into smaller groups and we all strapped on crampons over our boots and gingerly marched, single-file, up onto the side of the glacier. From across the lake you see how massively wide it is, but from this vantage you realize how tall it is, like a giant ice mountain and all of the climbers are little tiny ants on its side.

The ice was all pebbly, just like crushed ice. Every now and then we came across crevasses where you could see deep into the ice, and it glows bright blue inside. The sun was surprisingly warm and there were rivers and lakes of melted glacier-water running all over the place.

Our guide told us to fill up our water bottles and drink from the puddles, it’s the purest water in the world! With the crampons it was really easy to climb up and down the ice. We had sweet views of the lake and mountains from atop the glacier. After clambering around for a while, we arrived at a little wooden chest nestled inbetween two great ice-drifts. Inside: a pile of hand-made chocolates, a bottle of whiskey and a dozen glasses; the guide scooped up glasses full of glacier ice and we each had a whiskey on the rocks and a tasty chocolate.

We were sleepy on the bus ride back to El Calafate but I was glad I stayed awake because it was the best colored sunset I have ever seen.

Day 3: bus ride to El Chalten and an afternoon hike to Laguna Capri brings us face-to-face with the mighty Cerro Fitz Roy.

Day 4: Blustery buckets of rain. Stayed inside the hostel knitting a scarf and cooked a pot of pea soup.

Day 5: hiked the Laguna Torre trail, a long but easy trail through amazingly bright fall foliage, and at the end a spectacular view of the laguna, Glaciar Torre, and the cloud-covered Cerro Torre. Snow flurry at the summit.

Day 6: bus back to El Calafate, had a few hours to relax in Calafate and then flew back home to Buenos Aires.

here are more pictures!!!