No Regrets!

It was just after midnight when we landed in BA. Our taxi took us to the address Warren had given us. Huge condominium. Walked into the lobby, signed in with the security guard, and headed up to the 21st floor.

Warren welcomed us with a big smile and led us to the balcony, where three attractive, dressed up young women were sitting and laughing and drinking. By the look of the empty wine bottles, it looked like they had been at it for a little while.

WTF? A moment to elaborate on our surprise. Warren is a nice guy who likes to have a good time, but he’s never been known to have women draped all over him. Now here he was, in a penthouse in Buenos Aires, with three attractive girls sitting on his balcony and getting drunk. Was this another hookeria?

Warren dragged us inside and gave us a quick tour of his enormous, ridiculous, four-bedroom penthouse. The 21st floor IS Warren’s place. Fully furnished, with giant couches, huge flat panel TVs, wood floors IN the showers, huge windows all around with a 360° view of Buenos Aires.

Warren is my hero.

Gog and I were wearing stinky Patagonia clothes and flip-flops, so we flipped a coin for bedroom choice (I won), cleaned up a bit, and joined everyone on the balcony. We sipped wine and chatted, with the red blinking lights of the Buenos Aires skyline all around us.

A couple of more people showed up. One, a local named Diego, offered to take us all out to one of his favorite clubs, Esperanto. So at 3am, we headed over.

People were pushing to get in, bouncers were screaming at people and each other. We arrived at Esperanto in two groups, and there was a bit of drama getting us all in, but we made it.

The place was raging inside. We walked upstairs to the main dance floor, which was packed. We drank, we danced. Why didn’t Gog and I discover places like this our first time through Buenos Aires? Why aren’t places like this in any of our travel guides?

And the girls… I was ready to concede that the women of Argentina were nothing special until we got here. THIS is where all the attractive women in Argentina were. Amazing. Diego told us to just grab them by the hand and start talking or dancing with them. I don’t do either very well, so I couldn’t hold any girl’s interest for more than a few seconds. You gotta speak the language.

We emerged from the club at 6:15am, with the sun blazing. The street was a mix of early risers and people stumbling out of clubs. What a night. I feel like Gog and I didn’t give BA a fair shake our first time through. We’ve only scratched the surface.

Back at Warren’s, we took a short nap and relaxed. After watching the sun come up on the balcony, Gog and I took a proper tour of the place:

Warren has moved down to BA for “business” reasons. He’ll be down here for a few months, and he’s graciously offering his place for anyone who wants to come down. There’s a chance I might take him up on that. In fact, our visit with Warren has given me the familiar tingle that I need to live abroad. After seeing how easily Warren picked up and came down here, that tingle is perhaps stronger now than it has even been.

Warren, Gog, and I went back to La Cabrera to grab one more meal before heading home. Again, it was amazing.

After lunch, the restaurant closes for a few hours before opening up again for dinner. While we sat there, one of the workers sat down for lunch. The waiters brought her plate after plate of perfectly cooked steak, followed by plate after plate of gourmet desserts. The amount of food they were serving her was ridiculous, but she was packing it all away. We watched her and playfully teased her, culminating in a photo commemorating the moment.

And then it was time to head home.

Gog and I packed our bags, thanked Warren, hailed a taxi, and headed to the airport. Before going inside, we stood by the door, basking in our last rays of sunshine and taking a last, deep breath of warm South American air.

At the gate, we let everyone else push their way in line to board. Gog and I were the last ones on the plane. Part of it was that we are fed up with the pushing, but part of it was that we really didn’t want to go.

We’re probably somewhere over Brazil now. I’m going to try to sleep.