Author: marionvermazen

We drove about 300 miles northwest today to the town of La Rioja. it took us about six hours. The beginning of the drive was through farming country but eventually that changed to desert.

Along the way did get stopped by the police because we didn’t have our headlights on. There is a bit of a story which I will tell after we leave Argentina. Everything turned out fine.

In La Rioja we are staying at Casa Adela – Cabanas Resort. We have one Cabana with two bedrooms. It is perfect.

We had dinner at a restaurant called Zoita just around the corner from where we are staying. They eat dinner very late in Argentina. The restaurant didn’t even open until nine.

Our goal today was to explore a bit of Córdoba, the second most populous city in Argentina. We started the day in the central square, Plaza San Martin. The Cathedrol and original government building are on the square. José San Martin was an Argentine general who led the Argentinians to gain their freedom from Spain.

From Plaza San Martin we walked to Parque Sarmiento. We explored a bit then took a break for coffee.

Ordering of a restaurant menu in a new area is always a bit of a challenge.

Today we drove 250 miles north and west across countryside that looks a lot like the Great Plains of the United States. We made one stop at a rest stop to stretch but other than that we drove straight through. It took us about 4 hours.

Córdoba is the second largest city in Argentina. When we got here we went grocery shopping then played cards.

In Córdoba we had dinner at an excellent restaurant called

Standard 69.

Today Duke had arranged a guide to show us the area around Rosario and also for us to visit a farm and the farmer. Our guide was Elizabeth Fregoni. She was an excellent guide

Next we drove across the Parana River and its flood plain to the town of Victoria where we had lunch.

This evening we had a great dinner in Rosario at a grill overlooking the river, Parrilla Don Ferro.

This morning after breakfast we walked to the rental car office and picked up the car we will be driving for the next 5 weeks.

Then we drove north and west from Buenos Aires along the Paraná River to the town of Rosario. We had a bit of trouble finding our hotel. (We had to go around the block at least four times.) When we finally got checked in we immediately walked to the Rosario Board of Trade which is the Argentinian equivalent of the Chicago Board of Trade. We had a tour scheduled at 1:00. The tour was really interesting.

After our tour we went back to the hotel and played cards for the first time on this trip.