Biking Buenos Aires: A Sightseeing Journey through History and Culture
Posted onI was lucky enough to go on a Buenos Aires City tour with Biking Buenos Aires during my first few days in the city, and man was I happy to get such a fantastic introduction! Buenos Aires is a huge city. It’s surely hard to manage for any traveler trying to somehow figure out how to go about seeing the best sights, in all the main areas, with all the best food and museums, in a short amount of time.
It’s pretty much impossible, and there’s really no right way to segment the amazing city of Buenos Aires into bite-sized chunks to make it more simple to be a tourist. The city is just a lot to take in. But luckily, Biking Buenos Aires took care of a lot of that confusion for me.
I did the full city (north + south) tour with Biking Buenos Aires, and it was the perfect way to orient myself both to the entire city and its layout, but also to Argentinian and Buenos Aires’s culture and history.
At the time, I had been traveling through Argentina for quite a while. But, I was mostly traveling through hiking and nature-based regions, leaving me familiar with the country’s terrain but still not entirely clued in about its history. This tour took care of that for me, and then some… but before I try to explain it, why don’t I just give a little outline of how the day went, and a brief intro to what I learned throughout it?
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Biking Buenos Aires Section 1: San Telmo
In that the office is situated in San Telmo, a more recently gentrified part of Buenos Aires, it was the perfect starting point to begin our tour and begin with our history lesson that would weave in and out of our tour all day. After sizing our bikes, filling our waters, and getting our ever-so-trendy helmets strapped on, it was time to head south.
We started learning about Buenos Aires’s turbulent history in Parque Lezama, a lovely park south of San Telmo. But, it wasn’t always this way. Our amazing guide, Santiago, told us about how dodgy the park used to be to be because of crime in this area of Buenos Aires that went from the rich area to dirt poor. It’s a bit rough, but here is why…
A Rough History in San Telmo
San Telmo used to be the waterfront area of Buenos Aires, with rich people and homes along the river that used to come up to the park we were standing in. But, during the War of the Triple Alliance in 1871 (where Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay wiped out nearly all of Paraguay’s male population and threw the corpses in the river) there was a bit of a problem. The river the corpses went into in Paraguay? Yeah, that flowed right to Buenos Aires. And guess what started showing up on the riverbank in front of these rich homes?
Corpses and an outbreak of yellow fever that decimated 1/4 of the city turned the area around VERY quickly. The rich abandoned their homes and moved to Recoleta (currently still the rich area of Buenos Aires). San Telmo became a place only for the very poor, with tons of families living in tiny dirty apartments. The area was actually quarentines for 25 years and had no police presence for nearly 50. It has only recently started becoming gentrified, or ‘hipster-fied,’ which is welcome to a lot of locals.
Click right here to see the rest of my photo gallery from this day biking Buenos Aires!
Biking Buenos Aires Section 2: Barrio La Boca
A Look into Argentinian Religion
After San Telmo, we stopped at the most famous Argentinian temple.. and no, it’s not a church. I’m talking about Boca Juniors Futbol Stadium, or La Bombonera. Apparently futbol is the most prominent religion in Argentina! 😛
La Bombonera is the smallest stadium yet the most popular team, and I would dare not wear anything but bright blue and yellow here! The entire area is coated in the colors, which were actually chosen when two boys decided to make the colors of their futbol club the same colors of the flag of the next ship that sailed into the nearby harbor – and it was Swedish!
A Look at the Immigrant Community-Turned-Most Colorful Part of the City
Next was a stop at Caminito de la Boca – the famous, brightly colored, lively neighborhood of Southern Buenos Aires. But, like many things on this tour, it was not always this way! See, the barrio of La Boca used to be a poor, working-class immigrant neighborhood. Many Italian/European families made their lives here, and it used to be another poor barrio where you wouldn’t really want to go.
But, it became famous because of a world-renowned tango that was apparently inspired there, and today you can still dress up in traditional tango garb and take photos in front of the colorful buildings. La Boca is another amazing example of a working class neighborhood-turned-art center of the city, and nowadays you can still see much art and creativity in the area.
It was here we also learned about some incredible political street art that was centered around the dictatorship in Argentina in the late 70’s. I didn’t realize how recent this turbulent history was, but we saw imagery of women who used to wear diapers on their heads to protest thedisappearancee of their children – often ones who spoke out against the leader. It was crazy and humbling to learn that a mere 40 years ago, this was still happening!
Biking Buenos Aires Section 3: Puerto Madero
Almost like biking into another dimension, we took a few turns from La Boca and were all of a sudden surrounded by skyscrapers. We had reached the ‘Dubai of Buenos Aires,’ Puerto Madero, which is close to La Boca but oh, so different.
Puerto Madero is the richest part of the city, and is actually technically a little island right next to the city. First we biked along a small bay that used to be a waterfront, but nowadays there’s actually an ecological reserve (which we didn’t get to go into since it had rained, sadly!). We biked past sculptures of Argentinian religious figures, er, futbol players, along the waterfront.
A Classic Argentinian Lunch
After riding a beautiful stretch of bay and passing by tons of what looked like little food kiosks, we stopped at one of them. Intrigued after glancing at a few of these colorful stands clad with about a dozen condiment bowls at the front of each, I was excited when our guide Santiago told us this is where lunch would be served.
At these little kiosks they served a classic Argentine lunch of different kinds of lomo sandwiches, which are long submarine-type sandwiches traditionally with beef. But here, they had pork and a vegeatrian cheese patty, which both sounded incredible. I loved that we had stopped for the same street food that many Porteños (the name of people from Buenos Aires) eat, themselves.
I ordered a ‘completo’ with pork, which came with ham, cheese, and an egg on it, and put on pretty much ALL the toppings from the kiosk. It was to die for!
Next, we stopped by the Women’s bridge – la Puente de La Mujer – which was designed to look like a woman doing the tango. Here, we learned that the now-defunct port was actually made to look like the busiest port in Europe at the time, Liverpool, and that many of the parts were actually imported from Wales. Unfortunately, though, once the port was finished (20 years after they started), boats had become much larger than the opening in the port – so it was totally useless. Fail.
Before moving on, we stopped for a coffee and a classic Argentinian cookie, an alfajor, at a local coffee shop. Alfajores are my favorite!
Biking Buenos Aires Section 4: Microcentro
After Puerto Madero, it was time to head to the center of town, called the Microcentro. We weaved in and out of a few cobblestone streets, following Santiago as he expertly made his way through the crowded town.
This area of town is home to bustling pedestrain shopping streets, hundreds of corporate workers scurrying around the town to their next meeting, coffee shops and restaurants on every corner, and some of the town’s most central monuments and squares.
Except, today was a bit different. As they apparently have multiple times a week in Buenos Aires, there was a demonstration on today.
And I’m not just talking any kind of demonstration. This was a huge, city-wide event – with live music, people frying and selling food on every corner, chanting, massive signs, fireworks, and blow horns. People of Buenos Aires sure do know how to put on a protest. In fact, it seems almost as if it’s a street party, with people laughing, singing, drinking mate, enjoying street food, catching up with old friends, banging on drums, and all-in-all really coming together by protesting whatever it was that they were protesting that day.
Today they were rallying against the president vetoing a law that kept house bills low – which seems a good reason to me! I couldn’t get over the energy and excitement in the square, and people being unified by a common cause.
We couldn’t really see too much on the main square because of all the people. But, Plaza de Mayo is the most important square in town that houses a few government buildings and is where the president works, has meetings, and addresses the people when he’s elected. I much preferred witnessing this protest first hand though – it was such an experience.
Biking Buenos Aires Section 5: Recoleta
After slowly leaving the noise and craziness of the Microcentro in our hypothetical rearview mirrors, we could let out a breath of fresh air as we reached a much quieter and beautiful part of the city – Recoleta. It seemed as if everyone in the whole city must have been in the main square, because it was quiet and calm here!
Our first stop was the massive, reflective ‘Floralis Genérica,’ which is a famous icon of the city. It was actually designed by the same artist as the Chicago Bean, and the similarities show! After learning about it we explored the large park around it, taking some photos of this amazing piece of art.
Next, we made our way up what was apparently the biggest hill in the city, which really wasn’t big at all! Santiago told us that Recoleta is the richest neighborhood (as all the rich people moved here from San Telmo during the outbreak years ago). Recoleta is full of high-end shops, tree-lined streets, and massive, opulent mansions which have now been converted into 5-star hotels.
At the highest point, we got some time to explore the Recoleta Cemetary. And if you are thinking what I was thinking – that it’s a bit strange to have a cemetery as a tourist attraction – bear with me here. This is where the elite of Argentina are buried – including Evita Perón – and is home to some of the biggest, grandest, most expensive, and most opulent mausoleums in the world. It’s also home to the highest concentration of statues in the world, and it was impressive to say the least. I’ve never seen anything like it!
Recoleta Cemetary
Learning the Mate Culture
After exploring the cemetery, Santiago had some mate (pronounced mah-tay) ready for us. I had already become familiar with this very special tea during my previous travels around Argentina, but it was great to hear from him how important this tradition is to Argentinians and explain to us the very specific ‘mate rules’ for drinking mate with your friends.
See, mate is a tea that you drink from a special gourd with a special straw. You pout the leaves into the gourd, fill it with hot water, and drink it through a special straw that only lets water through. It’s a favorite pastime of Argentinians, Uruguayans, and Paraguayans, and you usually drink it with your friends in a circle. One person is always the manager of the mate, and you must pass it back to them after you finish your turn so they can refill it and pass it to the next person in a clockwise direction.
Mate is honestly a way of life around here. In any park you will see that almost every group of people sitting down will have a little gourd and a thermos, happily sharing and chatting away.
Santiago taught us all about mate, while also explaining the complicated history and two sides of the city when it came to Evita and Argentina’s famous leader, Perón. It was so interesting to me to learn how divided the country was when leaders favored helping the poor! He also gave us a more complete rundown of the country’s economic crisis in 2001, when the country had 5 presidents in the last 10 days on the year! Learning about some of the country’s most fascinating and turbulent history and really put a lot of things in perspective for me – and doing it over a mate was as authentic as can be!
Biking Buenos Aires Section 6: Federal Building and Back to San Telmo
When we finished our mate, we headed back into the city towards the National Congress building – the place where the march we had witnessed in Plaza de Mayo had begun in the morning. Santiago gave us a rundown of all the buildings in this square, which was yet another amazing and beautiful part of the city.
It was a massive mission weaving through the hoards of people returning from the demonstration, but after some detours and adventures, we did it! We had made it back after biking 30km, learning a lot, eating and drinking Argentinian food, seeing more sights than would be possible any other way, and getting a pretty good workout in, too!
But, there was one last thing to do before parting – try some Fernet! We had learned in La Boca about the Argentinian tradition of drinking fernet, an Italian digestive herbal liquor, with coke (especially for futbol games!). Fernet was featured in a few amazing street art murals near the stadium, and is actually drank more in Argentina than anywhere else in the world.
So, to top off our amazing journey, we got to try some! Naturally, I was already familiar after being in Argentina about a month. It grew on me a lot in that time, and now, like most things Argentinian, I love it.
City Tours with Biking Buenos Aires – In Review
Biking Buenos Aires is unique because, as a company, they are all about bridging cultures. They don’t just stand there and rigidly spout information at you at all the different points of interest in the city. Their tours are engaging, and while sharing Argentinian culture with you, they encourage conversation about your own culture and what makes them both unique and similar.
Biking Buenos Aires actually has team members from all over the world, who are all passionate about and involved in Argentinian/Buenos Aires culture and history. This makes them even more unique because, rather than boasting ‘tours by locals,’ Biking Buenos Aires boasts bringing tons of cultures together via love of this beautiful city. Having people from so many different cultures who are so knowledgeable about Argentina is even more authentic and valuable to me as a traveler, because not only are you involved in conversations about how your own culture compares to Argentinian culture, but the different cultures of the guides and fellow riders as well. This is also huge because you know that if people from all over the world have settled and decided to work here, they must be passionate. And it really shows.
The way that Biking Buenos Aires even brings out a mate to pass around in the middle of the tour (and shows everyone the proper mate etiquette), makes sure the lunch is authentic street food, shares around an alfajor, and even pours everyone a fernet at the end of the day, is a testament to how proud they are to really share Argentinian culture with their clients. It’s not just a tour or the best way to see the city in one day, but it’s truly a cultural melting pot and a fun cultural education at the same time. It’s the perfect introduction to Buenos Aires and to Argentina, and I highly recommend it to anyone visiting the city.