In 2011 I spent three months living in the beautiful country of Argentina in South America. I enjoyed my trip so much that in 2012 I went back and spent another two months there. From the steaks and tango in Buenos Aires, to the vineyards of Mendoza, to the rolling hills and epic landscape of Patagonia, the Argentina scenery all around the country is absolutely amazing. If you're thinking about taking a trip to South America, then definitely make sure you visit Argentina, one of the prettiest countries that I've ever been to. It's also a great place to eat steak, if you're a meat eater. Here are ...

In just a few days I'll be leaving for the city of Buenos Aires again. As people who read this blog know, I started off this great travel adventure of mine last year in that very city. At the time I was a pretty green traveler, and struggled with the language and figuring out how the city worked for the first month or so of my trip. I was frustrated a few times, and a little disheartened with how hard it was at first to meet people. But I eventually overcame most of those obstacles, and probably grew as a person in the process. When my three months were up in Argentina, I was looking forward ...

In North America, it's pretty easy to get by without carrying much cash around. For the most part I pay for all my smaller purchases with debit these days. If I have a larger purchase to make, I generally use my credit card to accumulate some points. But outside of North America and Europe, it's been my experience that cash is generally still king. And while having a credit card is great for emergencies (such as being able to get a hotel or a flight in a pinch), I generally make a run to an ATM machine once a week and pull out enough cash to get me by. Local currency is best for obvious reasons, ...

Six months ago I was sitting back in my apartment in Chilliwack trying to figure out where the first destination on my big adventure would take me. I immediately thought of the Caribbean, since it was an area I had been to many times and I was familiar with. Since the goal of my trip was to also work while exploring the world, that meant wherever I ended up would have to have decent access to the internet. That took Cuba off the list, as well as most small towns. I was actually homing in on the Dominican Republic when, out of boredom, I started thumbing through The 4-Hour Workweek, a popular book ...

I'll probably do a summary post on Buenos Aires the night when I leave, but this is my last weekly update from Buenos Aires. My little widget says that I'm leaving my apartment in four days, at which point I'll be migrating to a hotel for my final night. I've been trying to get my landlord to commit to a time to do the final walkthrough so I can get my damage deposit, but he hasn't responded to me. I'm not worried, since I do hold the keys and he can't really rent it until he gets them back from me. But it would be nice to have that all in place for peace of mind. I'll send another email in a ...

So, I've lost track of how many days that I've been here. I was originally coming for something like 87 days, so it must be near day 80 or so. As the title of the post says, I'm down to only 8 days left. I spent the weekend down in Ushuaia, Argentina, the southernmost city in the world. I had a great time, and was almost sad to leave when the time came. Staying in a hostel was a great experience, and I always had people around. Compared to Buenos Aires, where I work mostly solo during the weeks, it was nice to have some company around again, even if for a few days. I'll do a full trip review as ...

Yes sports fans, it's time for another update. Today is day 65 in Buenos Aires. About an hour ago I had my last hair-cut in the city, and going forward there are a bunch of "lasts" about to happen. In fact, it seems like most of the expats I've met in the city are already gone or on their way out. A guy named Emerick from Montreal left two weeks ago, and another guy from New York is leaving this weekend. I suspect many people came to experience a summer in Buenos Aires, and now that summer is trailing off, it's time to leave. Everyone I've talked to had enjoyed their time here, but like ...

This last week was a weird week. I met up with a few friends and had some great times, but it was also the first real time I've been homesick in any capacity. There was nothing really that happened to make me feel that way, I was just sitting around and realized I was a long way from home. So I spent a day or so of being a bit melancholy. Thankfully the feeling has past, and it's business as usual again. Weekends always get me excited, mostly because I have more opportunities to get out and explore on Saturday and Sunday than during the week. My Mac widget says I have 26 days left in Buenos Aires, ...

I went for a walk at lunch to clear my mind, and ended up strolling through a little park in Palermo. There was an empty bench that was cast in a bit of shade from a large tree, so I sat down with the intention of relaxing for a few minutes while listening to music. About 45 degrees to my right was another guy on a bench casually reading a book, and 45 degrees to my left was another guy who was taking a little nap on his bench. Just a couple of dudes enjoying a nice sunshiny day in the park. A few minutes later, this old women approaches the guy reading a book and starts muttering to him in Spanish. ...

It shouldn't be a huge surprise based on the previous few entries, but I'm starting to get a tad restless in Buenos Aires. Unlike Canada where the WiFi is generally reliable, the WiFi here is pretty spotty, which makes it hard to get out of the house to work. The last week and a half it's been absolutely terrible, with constant drop outs and complete blackouts for an hour or more from time to time. Back home, I would often go to Starbucks to break the day up a bit, but the WiFi at the nearest Starbucks has been down about 50% of the time I've been there, and none of my e-mail works for some strange ...

Last weekend I flew up to Puerto Iguazu and checked out Iguazu Falls. It was a great trip, and it was nice to get out of town for a few days. Puerto Iguazu reminded me a lot of Tofino actually, without the surfing. It was a quant little village with only a few main streets. The people were friendly, the food was good, and there were less bars on the windows and graffiti than here in Palermo Soho in Buenos Aires. The WiFi in my apartment (which is shared between about six suites) has been really dodgy lately, so I've moved over to a little coffee/pizza shop across the street. The photo pictured ...

I started an Iguazu Falls posting last night, but it's undoubtedly going to be a large post and will take me a while longer to put together. Look for it tomorrow or Wednesday night sometime. According to my little iPhone widget, I only have 37 days left in Buenos Aires. Obviously that's not much time, and it means that I've already been here almost 50 days or so. I'm heading to Ushuaia for St. Patrick's Day, which means I only have four other weekends to do some more exploring within Buenos Aires. My current landlord has $1,100 USD of damage deposit, and I'll be looking forward to getting that ...

Last night a few of us went down to check out a little party on a boat docked in Puerto Madero. Puerto Madero is the area on the east of Buenos Aires that is one of the newest, trendiest (also, more expensive) areas within Buenos Aires, and is home to a lot of skyscrapers, one of which houses Microsoft's offices here. It was the first time I hazarded to take my DSLR out in public, and I'm really glad I did. Truthfully, it's been great getting back into photography, since I essentially took a few years off when I was in Chilliwack. Here are a few shots. ...

One of the biggest questions people always ask me about Buenos Aires is whether or not it is a safe city. Buenos Aires has an international reputation (at least lately) of being riddled with petty crime. Prior to coming here, I did quite a few scans on the internet and there is no shortage of sites talking about people's personal experiences with crime in Buenos Aires. In fact, many of the locals talk about it like getting something stolen is almost a rite of passage in this city. Upon landing in the city for the first time, you're immediately bombarded with stores covered in iron bars and graffiti ...

I shot a quick video showing the Buenos Aires Obelisk the other day. Check it out. And here's a photo I snapped from the distance. ...

So, I've been in Buenos Aires a little over three weeks now. This last week was pretty uneventful, as I've been working quite a bit and also spending six hours a week in Spanish lessons. Truthfully, I'm probably going to scale the lessons back here shortly, as I'm finding it pretty hard to fit them in and still have time to get out and enjoy the city. So I may scale back to two nights a week, or possibly even one. I also hadn't explicitly budgeted for Spanish lessons, so I don't want to use up all my travel money with lessons, especially since I have quite a few books around here as well as events ...

Here's a little video update from Buenos Aires using Photobooth. Not entirely sure why I was doing the Stevie Wonder while it was going on, but whatever. I also said my Spanish lessons are $90/month, when they are more like $90/week. But, enjoy! If people like these kind of updates I'll try and do more of them. Video Update: Day 16 in Buenos Aires from Duane Storey on Vimeo. ...

I've managed to do a weekly update on the past two Fridays of the month, so I think going forward that's going to by my goal for the rest of the trip. First off, I've been here a little over two weeks now. The total length of my time in Buenos Aires is about 12 weeks, so that means I have around 10 left I think. My first week here was a bit challenging, mostly for the language barrier. I spent a bit of time brushing up on my spanish, and week 2 definitely was a bit easier. Spanish This week I finally found a private spanish teacher and have been meeting her for two hours a night on Monday, Wednesday ...

The country of Uruguay is just a short ferry ride away from Buenos Aires. It's always been on my list of things to see while I'm down in Argentina, but I didn't have any definite plans in my mind for when I would go over. Usually people go over to Colonia del Sacramento in Uruguay, since it's just a short ferry ride away. However, an even greater adventure is the city of Montevideo, which is at least a 2.5 hour ferry ride away from Buenos Aires (if you take the fast ferry, longer if you take the slow ferry). So this weekend I've decided to head over to Montevideo with Gus and Russ. We've paid ...

This last weekend I had the opportunity to visit the world renowned Japanese Gardens in Buenos Aires. Outside of Japan, they are some of the largest Japanese Gardens in the world, and I have been looking forward to visiting them ever since I arrived. The Japanese Gardens are located in Buenos Aires, just north of the Palermo area and the Buenos Aires zoo. I walked there from my apartment near Paraguay and Gurrachuga, and it took me about 30 minutes or so to get there. This was the first real trip I had done in Buenos Aires where I decided to take my digital SLR along with me. At the advice of ...