As you may know we had just got back from Argentina. And after a whole week of fun and one day in Washington D.C after our 2 hour flight delay and missing our flight going to Buenos Aires. We went to Argentina to visit friends. We went all over the B.A. For a tour we even went on a double-decker-bus. We saw lots of buildings,memorials,and even a cemetery. We also went to a place called the Estancia, witch is spanish for ranch.  You can go horse back riding,swimming,and tennis. They have fancy food and a lot of meat. When we were there we ordered hamburger and fries and literally they gave us a hamburger with no bun no nothing and fries. Another good thing we got was stretched out    ice cream cone dipped in chocolate. They were tall and good. Well those were some of my Argentina highlights. This is Grace sighning off.

After a few hours of sleep, we woke up about an hour from landing.  Erin and I peered out the window to overcast skies above a lush green countryside.  We landed, deplaned and headed to Immigration.  The US has a really nice thing going with a few countries where we charge their citizens a fee to enter the US.  In return, those countries do the same thing to Americans.  Argentina is one of those places.  We had to pay $131 per person to enter the country and, in exchange, we each got a nice sticker in our passports which permits us to re-enter the country for the next 10yrs without paying the “reciprocal entry fee” again.  Such a deal.  $524 lighter, we checked through immigration… learning both the Spanish word for cricket (“grillo”) and that, in the opinion of the immigration agent, Julie looks like she could be an Argentine… and claimed our bags.  Proceeding through customs we entered the hysteria of an international airport’s main terminal.  After looking around for a few minutes, we found the driver from the car service that our friends and hosts, the Parkers, had arranged for us.

We loaded up and headed into the city.  As we drove, the skies became steadily darker.  After about a 45min ride, we arrived at the Parker home in San Isidro.  Finally!  We were extremely relieved to be there.  Grace and Erin immediately scampered off with the Parker kids, 3^rd grader Lauryn (a one-time soccer teammate of Grace’s) and 6^th grader Lyndsey, to explore the house.  Meanwhile, Julie and I had a cup of the local coffee and chatted with Doug who gave us a quick tour of the house (we found the girls hanging out in the attic playing games), helped us lug our bags to our rooms and informed us we were having a BBQ that day with some folks from Doug’s company.  We all enjoyed long showers, then back downstairs.  Kelly had arrived home from some errands and we all caught up, then it was time for Doug and I to make a beer run and try to find the Europcar office where I had arranged a rental car.  Renting a car in Argentina is not like renting a car in the US; more on that over on OpenKimono.

Our first stop was the Coto minimercado located near the center of San Isidro.  Doug grabbed some of the local Malbec wine while I hunted down beer.  I couldn’t find anything in a box or six-pack carton, so I ended up with a dozen loose bottles of Corona.  It seems the most common packaging for beer in Argentina is big, 750ml bottles which are shared around like a bottle of wine.  Makes sense, but different.  It’s funny how mundane things can become interesting.

We then set out for the car rental place which was supposedly near Aeroparque Jorge Newbery.  Like some European cities, BA has an international airport (Ezeiza) and a domestic / regional airport (Newbery).  These two airports are about 40km apart.  Flights from the US, Europe and so forth go to the Ezeiza; flights around Argentina and surrounding countries go to Newbery.  Not sure how you’d get to someplace like Ushuaia or Mendoza from the US… possibly a long shuttle ride between the airports.

By the time we arrived at Newbery, the gray skies had turned into a full-on downpour.  One of those storms where you are soaked to the skin about 15sec after stepping out of the car.  I hopped out of the car and wandered the airport, not finding a kiosk for my car agency.  I tried to speak to a person at one of the other rental agency counters, but it was futile as my Spanish is terrible and his English not much better.  Doug and I returned to the car.  I had brought TomTom with me, with a newly installed copy of the maps for Argentina and Uruguay, so we thought we’d give that a shot.  I punched in the address I had written down off my rental confirmation e-mail and we set off in the direction TomTom indicated.  10min later we were in the CBD.  After a little looking around, we found the Europcar office.  Naturally, the lights were off and the door locked despite it being about 2:00pm in the afternoon (clearly within the office hours on my confirmation).  We decided to head home so I could try to make some phone calls and figure out what the next step might be.

As we drove along Avenida del Libertador, Doug pointed out some of the sights.  Liberator is the main drag running north from the CBD and stretches for about 25km north; sort of BA’s version of Wilshire Boulevard.  Along the street are dozens of high rise apartment buildings where many of the more affluent Porteños reside.  There are also all sorts of businesses, including high-end car dealerships, restaurants and boutique shopping.

While we were gone, Julie and Kelly took the girls to an outdoor Sunday market in the main San Isidro square near the Coto where Doug and I had stopped.  Unfortunately, the rain forced the market to close early, but they still had fun walking around in the pouring rain.

After we arrived at home, I called the US number for Europcar as I knew I’d get an English speaker.  Somehow, I was routed to a call center in the UK.  They told me to try back in a few minutes so I could speak with someone in the US.  I tried again and got the UK again.  This time the person agreed to try to help.  I explained the situation and she told me there weren’t any special instructions in the system for picking up a car.  Now what?

Horacio and Doug. Master chefs.

Then the BBQ guests started to arrive.  The first two were colleagues of Doug’s that were visiting from Denver for a work-related project.  Next to arrive were Mercedes and Horacio.  Our first real interaction with locals!  Mercedes works with Doug and is firmly in charge of keeping him out of trouble (she is VERY, VERY good at what she does as apparently she has a lot of practice in keeping Doug out of trouble ).  Her husband Horacio works for one of the airlines and is an avid support of the Lanús soccer club.  Both of them spoke excellent English and Mercedes offered to make a couple calls to the Europcar office to get the scoop.  I was relieved.

Meanwhile, Doug and Horacio were standing around in the downpour looking at the bar-b-que and hoping the food would eventually be cooked.   We ended up enjoying a great dinner with the other visitors including the excellent Malbec we’d bought and some of Kelly’s favorite local beer from Casa Isenbeck (this brand is brewed by Warsteiner, so obviously it’s pretty good).

We eventually collapsed into bed after a fine first day.  What’s next?

At the East Falls Church station.

We woke up the next day, got cleaned-up and made a plan for the day.  We decided to head down to the National Mall to see the Washington Monument, US Capital building and check out a museum or two. Since it was Saturday, we knew it would be pure insanity to try to drive into the city, so we grabbed the Metro train at East Falls Church and rode into the city.  The train grew gradually more crowded and we soon learned pretty much everyone was on their way to a big protest against the healthcare bill.  Listening to the people talk, it seems like there’s a whole social group dedicated to going to protests.  Some of us go shopping or attend sporting events.  These people protest every weekend.

Once at the Mall, we walked around and could see the protesters blanketing the Mall in front of the Capital.  We continued east and headed to the National Air and Space Museum.

I need gum gum, dum dum.

Apparently, you need to camp out over night to get into that place because the admission line was out the door.  We later learned this museum has a massive annex near Dulles Airport called the Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center which is supposed to be almost as good as the one in the city.  Oh well, we end up at the National Museum of Natural History where we saw minerals, mummies, bugs, a T-Rex skeleton, 40ft tall totem poles and learned about early Colonial life in the US.  Plus lunch.

Back outside, we cruised towards the Washington Monument for some photo ops, then north to the White House.  There must have been a high threat condition because there were cops EVERYWHERE and they had blocked Pennsylvania Avenue off from pedestrian traffic.  We continued walking north and ran into another pack of police trying to contain an anti-war protest which was rocking along in Lafayette Park.  We grabbed some Starbucks at the corner of 15^th & I, then headed back to the Metro.

After some mindless driving around, we enjoyed dinner at Pei Wei in Herndon, VA.  It was an okay day, but nothing compared to what we were supposed to have done in Argentina: attend the San Lorenzo vs Colón soccer game with our friends.  Seeing a Primera División Argentina match was really a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for us which United had robbed us of.  We were all bitter.

We headed off to the airport for our 2^nd attempt to fly to BA.  This time, it actually worked.  Naturally, it was not without complications.  The prior evening, they had re-booked us, but had found us 4 seats in 3 different rows.  Very convenient when traveling with children.  Luckily, we were able to sort that out.  We also met again with our fellow stranded traveler.  It turns out he was a blogger and behind the top movie review website in Argentina, CinesArgentinos.com.ar.  He had been in the US for an interview with Bruce Willis to cover his most recent film, Cop Out.

Once aboard, I settle in with Erin and Julie with Grace.  Julie and Grace soon determined their TVs weren’t working.  Naturally, when you’re been assigned to sit in Row 39 of 39 (i.e. steerage), one should not expect the in-flight entertainment system to function.  We did depart on time, a pleasant surprise, and settled in for the 10hr 43min overnight flight.

Our big adventure began on Mar 19^th about 12:00pm with Grace and Erin taking off from school at lunchtime so Grandma Cindy could drive all four of us to the airport in a smallish snow storm.  The snow had arrived early in the morning, but up to that point, it hadn’t been sticking.  We made it easily enough, checked our bags, meandered through security and hung out at the gate.  Our first leg was a flight to Washington Dulles to make our connection to Buenos Aires Ezeiza.  The plane boarded on-time and we figured we were home free.  Not so fast, my friend.  About 15min after our scheduled pushback from the gate, the captain announced we were holding at the gate to wait on baggage for one of the passengers.  We later learned the missing cargo was also some stuff for the US Mail.  20min later, we finally pushed back, but by then the snow was really coming down, so off to the de-icing pad we went.  An eternity later, we finally took off: 2hrs after our scheduled departure time.  And what was our layover duration you ask?  2hrs 6min.  Gonna be tight.

We ended up touching down about 1hr 45min late.  Our connecting gate was on the same concourse and we sprinted to the gate figuring the worst that could happen would be bags arriving a day late.   When we got to the gate, there wasn’t a soul in site.  Not even a gate agent.  As we wandered the boarding area, we noticed the gate agent walking back up the Jetway from the aircraft.  We explained what had happened, presented our boarding passes and he told us to hustle down to the plane.  When we got to the door we were greeted by a person in plain clothes (very, very weird) who indicated the aircraft was full and the door was summarily slammed in our faces.  The gate agent shooed us back up to the boarding area just as another passenger raced into the boarding area.  The five of us were told to find our way to United Airlines customer service center.  And have a nice evening.

There we were.  10:00pm at night.  Julie is crying.  Grace is crying because Julie is crying.  Erin is standing there going “Eh. Whatever.”  I am furious.  We marched to customer service where we were greeted with the following options:

1. We can get you a flight to Miami, then on to BA on American Airlines.  At 6:00pm the next day.
2. We can get you on the same flight we were supposed to be on, but 24hrs later.

Some options.  We chose door # 2. and decided that if we were going to be stuck in Washington, we may as well make the best of it and enjoy the sights.  There are way worse places to be stranded.  Once re-booked I inquired about lodging for the evening and was told that our delay was due to weather and not United’s problem.  Excuse me?  We would have made it in time had they not sacrificed the first 35min waiting on bags and US Mail.  All around me in customer service were other passengers that had been on our flight that had also missed their connections and were looking at a long night because there are not many flights to Scranton, PA or Knoxville, TN at 10pm.  After 45min of haggling and arguing, I finally convinced the shift supervisor they were being totally unreasonable.  Apparently, my United Premier Executive status tipped the balance.  (What a dubious thing to have an elite status on an airline that is so clearly out of touch with customer experience.  Don’t get me started on what they did to us on our last trip to Maui.)

United ended up giving us a pair of hotel room vouchers and about $50 in food vouchers.  Then the supervisor asked if we wanted our luggage brought to the baggage return.  It was perhaps the most ridiculously rhetorical question I have ever been asked.  We are stuck here for 24hrs and are sweaty / smelly from running all over the place and arguing with airline people.  Um, no, we don’t want our stuff.  We’ll just wear these clothes for another 36hrs.  Gosh.  I found a rental car quick on Kayak.com and we prepared to head out to get our bags.  As we did, we noticed the other stranded passenger (an Argentine man) from our flight sitting on the ground with his laptop trying to figure out a place to stay (he was apparently unworthy of the “courtesy” we had received).  Julie and I decided to offer him one of our hotel vouchers and told him he could go sightseeing with us the next day, but he must have thought we were a family of American-style ax murderers or something and declined.  I gave him my business card in case he changed his mind, we said hasta mañana and off we went.

By 11:30pm, we’d made it to the very nice Landsdowne Resort in Leesburg, VA  where United had sent us (no kidding… it was really nice and we were very surprised), ate some Panini sandwiches Julie had picked up before we left the airport and everyone hopped into bed.  12:36am.  End of Day 1.  Yikes.

Somehow we’ve gotten in that habit of taking our big annual family trip during Spring Break.  This year was no exception.  However, instead of Maui or some other US destination, we headed south.  WAY south.  Buenos Aires, Argentina where we would be staying with the Parkers, family friends from Broomfield who are on an ex-patriot assignment.  Because of the nature of this trip and it being a foreign destination, I have a lot of material to share with readers of this blog as well as my practically defunct OpenKimono blog.  I’m going to split the content up and share it across both sites.  On this blog will be our daily account of activities.  On OpenKimono will be more “technical” posts talking about the challenges and tricks of traveling not only in a country where we didn’t know the language, but also within a massive city with nearly 13M residents in the metropolitan area.

Now, without further ado…