It's 3:30pm, Where is Everyone?

When we found out we'd be in Buenos Aires for New Years, I googled what awesome things to do in the big city. Much to my dismay I found posts like "the worst New Years I ever had was in Buenos Aires," Or "New Years in BA is boring." While our New Years Eve was anything but boring it was amazing how the city cleared out in the afternoon. For the entire week the streets have been filled with people and cars, some streets are pedestrian only however streets with cars also have people spilling off the sidewalks into the streets for walking.

Yesterday early afternoon I was walking through Avenida Florida (and shopping), it was so lively, tango dancers, bands, people selling crafts, etc in the center of the street, so much energy it was amazing. When Oscar and I were walking back from the office New Years toast we noticed the vendors packing up. By 3:30pm the vendors were gone and the streets were deserted! I haven't really noticed too many Americans until 3:30pm, perhaps because they were mixed in with Argentines until that point. For the rest of the evening is was amazing to see the city so empty of pedestrians and cars. Prior, crossing the street was a fast game of frogger, now a leisurely stroll would get you across the street without incident.

Finding dinner proved a challenge! Like I said the city closed down, restaurants that were open were reservation only and full...we did not make reservations. If you know Oscar he's very much against being "locked in" to something. The past few nights we've passed this one particular restaurant that was empty, something a bit sketchy. But it was open last night and didn't require reservations. They had a prefix menu and the food was a bit rough. Had it not been for the two other couples we'd met and chatted with, the evening could have gone horribly wrong. However, these couples were lovely, one Israeli couple from Boston and another English couple from London. Being we spent 4 hours in the restaurant it was lovely to have such nice people to spend the time with. Oscar said the best thing about the food was the water! ha. It did come with a bottle of wine and a champagne toast to finish. The wine was rough also, but we drank it all (seriously 4 hours what were we to do!?)

I hope you all had lively New Years celebrations! While ours wasn't crazy partying, we were excited to be out for it and with each other.