Our first few days

We have been in Buenos Aires for a few days now and are having a great time!

We left early Saturday morning and had a four and a half hour flight to Houston that was delayed about an hour, then a 5 hour layover in Houston and a ten hour overnight flight to Buenos Aires.  The kids did great!  We used painters tape that I brought in my purse to play hopscotch in the airport, walked around and looked at stores etc. and everyone got a fair bit of sleep on the overnight flight too.

When we got to the airport I had arranged to have a transport company pick us up and confirmed with them that we would have two car seats and a can since we would have lots of stuff.  They assured me this was the case and that the driver would be waiting for us with a sign that had my name.  Well, he was waiting and took us to a toyota corolla with no car seats.  So….we ended up having Lleyton in a regular seatbelts and Adalynn with me.  I was scared and felt bad but also know that they do not use car seats (or often seatbelts) here and that navigating the bus and stuff would have been a nightmare at that point.  We all arrived safely and it was fine but I will be emailing or calling them to talk about our ride back.  

We were so grateful to have our good friend Sarah’s family friend, Robert, meet us at the curb in front of our hotel.  He lives in Buenos Aires for half the year and had wanted to meet us to help us navigate check in to our apartment.  It was great that he did!!!  Our host wasn’t here, but had emailed me (while we were flying) to tell me that the housekeeper would be here and he would leave the keys with her.  Robert was a huge help as our Spanish is less than minimal.  After checking in we spent some time walking around Recoleta (the neighborhood we are staying in) and then put the kids down for a nap.  

Buenos Aires has many barios (neighborhoods) and we are trying to explore a few of them and the different things to see in each.  On Monday we went to Palermo which is a trendy working class area with lots and lots of green space.  We went to the zoo for most of the morning which was awesome.  So many cool animals to see!  We then walked and tried to find the Japanese gardens but Lleyton got tired and we headed home for nap.  Lleyton is loving the subway trains I might add.  That night we ate at a place that had regional Arengtine food.  So yummy!  And cheap!

Yesterday, we went to the outlets in Villa Crespo after meeting Robert for coffee.  There is street with a whole bunch of leather outlets and I got a really nice new purse 🙂  We came home for nap and had another nice meal at a bbq style argentinian restaurant.  

Today was rainy, yesterday too actually, so we went to a couple malls.  First we went to the Galleria Pacifico.  It is old…1850 or something like that.  There are beautiful frescos painted on the ceiling…yes of a mall!  There is also a huge Christmas tree set up which is beautiful.  We then took the train to another mall to go to the Children’s museum.  So fun!!!!!!!!!  This was the coolest place.  They had a grocery store, a gas station, a train, plane, baby room… It was unreal.  I went shopping in the kids’ nap today which was fun, and I ran this morning too.  It has been nice to have a bit of me time as well as lots of family time.  Loving it all.  After nap today we headed out to see a tango show!  There are many that are very theatrical with dinner and a show.  We were nervous for that with the kids and opted for one with just the show.  The kids did great.  Lleyton loved watching the dancing and the singing.  

Having so much fun!  I’ll include a few photos in a separate post that I took with my phone but we’ll have more to share later from Jarett’s camera.  Next time  I will post sooner as this felt like a list even thought it seemed to take forever.  I need to get back to my wine 🙂

Anticipation

I can hardly believe that after months of waiting and planning we are leaving on this exciting adventure tomorrow morning! Packing to travel with two little ones was quite interesting. We wanted to be sure that we had everything we needed without bringing too much stuff. We will see how we did I guess!
We decided to not bring car seats and have arranged transportation to and from airports that have car seats. Other than that we will be relying on public transportation and our feet. We are bringing a small umbrella stroller that should be helpful sometimes but we will see.
I’m curious to see how the kids do with the time difference. Buenos Aires is four hours ahead of us, but apparently people stay up much later (eat dinner between 8 and midnight) so we may just try to stay on Edmonton time. We will just have to see how they do though.
The plane ride should be an adventure in itself 🙂 We have a 4.5 hour flight to Houston where we have a long layover followed by a ten hour overnight flight to Argentina. I have all kinds of things to hopefully keep Lleyton busy and happy but who knows! Hopefully they will both sleep lots!!!
Once we get there we have lots we would love to see but no set plans. We want to take each day at a time and see what makes sense with how the kids are doing. This is quite different for Jarett and I as we are both planners by nature but I think it will be good for us.
I am so excited! I’m looking forward to seeing the sights, experiencing the culture, the food, the wine, the music, dancing etc. I am also looking forward to the way that I know traveling forces me to step out of my comfort zone a little bit, to stretch myself, to think differently. I am looking forward to the opportunity to get to know Jarett, Lleyton, Adalynn and myself in ways that might be different than I would in our everyday routines. Mostly, I am looking forward to doing this together and embarking on a fun family adventure.

We will keep you posted.

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things that you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” – Mark Twain

“Certainly, travel is more than the seeing of sights; it is a change that goes on, deep and permanent, in the ideas of living.” – Miriam Beard

“A ship in harbor is safe, but that is not what ships are built for” – John A. Shedd

Getting Ready!

My lists have lists! 

On one of the million sticky notes decorating various places around my house I saw “blog?”  So…instead of tackling more serious to-do items I have decided to get this started.  I’m sure that Jarett will likely change it to make it a bit nicer, but it’s a start.  I’ve always loved journaling on trips but thought that this way I could keep you all updated as well as write down my ramblings 🙂  No pressure to read it at all, but if you’re wondering how it’s going I will try to update it every couple days or so.  That’s the plan anyways!

I am in a funny space of being micro manager, planner, packer etc and also trying to maintain the attitude that we will just go with the flow and see what happens and all will be well.  I think that getting ready makes me more anal than the actual travelling because when we’re there it will just be and we can take any unexpected turns in stride but right now I have control (or so I like to think) so I am using it to fill up post it notes 🙂 

We are going to be spending 11 days in Buenos Aires and 4 in Miami.  We have rented apartments in both places that look fantastic, and we are so excited!  I’ve been busy googling “flying with young children” and I have a bag of stuff to keep Lleyton busy and will be downloading some movies. 

Lots of packing to do still, but we are getting there.  It’s going to be so fun!!!!