The kingdom of the gaucho..The estancias

About an hour east of Buenos Aires is San Antonio de Areco in the lush fertile pampas that is the heart of agriculture in Argentina.  Here are large estancias with lush pastures filled with cattle.  This is a posh life for the gaucho compared to the ones on the barren Patagonian plains and in the difficult isolated marshland of the north.  The legend of the gaucho is a lot like the American cowboy.  They have the same sort of lone life on a horse mystic,  hard working and solitary.  Instead of six gun on their hip every gaucho has a huge knife in the back of his belt.  Mostly for cutting meat and work related tasks.  This was our favorite gaucho.  He hobbled along like a character straight out of central casting.
.

San Antonio de Areco is our first stop where we check in to the hotel Patio de Moreno.  Like all towns in Argentina it is built around a plaza with all the important buildings across from the plaza and trees and fountains in the center.

The hotel is another gem with large spacious rooms, comfy beds and big marble bathrooms.  Small boutique hotels are really great for getting the flavor of the area.  A few blocks from the plaza.  We check in the afternoon before our estancia visit so have time for late lunch and helado.
It is warm and ice cream goes down real easy.

There is also time for the necessary duties of travel light.  Rinsy! Rinsy! 

A day at the estancia...perfect weather is one thing we couldn't plan for but were blessed with. The setting is a gracious house , fantastic gardens plus the barns and stables of a working estancia. Riding out through the pastures and the cattle gives a touch of reality to the experience.We are spending the day with lots of other tourists at Estancia La Candelaria del Monte,   Third generation owners who turned to the tourist business to keep the estate going.  We were first arrivals, as most of the people come from BA on day trips, so we got to go out early for a long ride.  Big cushy saddles and nice flat grass lands made rocking along easy.  There was time for naps and drinks under the tree before a generous parilla.  Lots of meat and wine.  The traditional barbecue of  Argentina.

Main house

Gardens

Pastures 

Ceibo is the national flower of Argentina and it grows on a gnarly tree like bush that grows up to 30 ft tall.  It is very fragrant.  The tree is covered with scarlet blooms.  It only blooms for about 3 months so we were lucky to see it in bloom everywhere.

                         The ride

We were concerned that Charlene would bring her gaucho home with her.  She is an accomplished rider and loved every minute of the day.

Jim was our other star rider.

Notice those saddles.  Big cushions with no pommel that are easy chairs on four legs.

While we are off for our ride they are busy in the cook house with the traditional Parilla.  I guess the dog figures he will get the scraps.

Kaye has caught the bug that has been going through the group so slept most of the morning under a tree on a lounge  chair.  She manages to enjoy the lunch and the next day is fine.

A great setting

Gary is interested in the meat but Charlene is checking out that big knife in  his  belt.

She was watching us.  Made us feel a bit guilty.
The Gaucho and his horse.

Amazing trust and training.

Charlene couldn't rest until she rode her gaucho's horse.

This is living proof my children can not trust me.  They made me promise to keep Jon off horses after his rather serious mishap on Bubba the Wonder Horse in the mountains of Idaho.  Oh well, they are thousands of miles away.  They will never know.

              The Ibera wetlands and different estancias.

Puerto Valle is an exquisite spot on the banks of the Parana river in Corrientes
province in far northern Argentina.  There are only six rooms and they are furnished with quiet elegance, comfort and smart style.
The plantation raises tea, mate, seedlings for the lumber industry and caiman for skins and meat.  The hotel is one of the four businesses that are part of this estate.
To reach here we drove to BA, flew to Posadas and drove 40 minutes to hotel.  The group was beginning to wonder where we were going.  How did you find this place is the refrain.

www.hotelpuertovalle.com

Tropical gardens

Rooms

View from our veranda.

Fernando and tea plants

Pine tree seedlings

Caimens.  No happy outcome for them.  They are crawling boots and belts.




Marcus

The quiet and rest of Puerto Valle was interrupted for a trip the Reserva National del Ibera and the Estancia San Juan Poriah.  It has been in Marcus's family since the 1600's and he has turned to tourism to try to keep it afloat.  Part of the holding is one of the Jesuit Missions.  It also includes a huge section of the Ibera wetlands.  They are in the midst of a terrible drought.  Where the water used to lap at the bottom of the hill behind the mission it now is a 15 minute drive to the boat.  The concern was overriding in everything he said.  People who live on the land feel nature so much more profoundly than city dwellers. 

Fantastic bird life

Note Marcus hopping around in the water.  He is yelping as something is biting his feet.  He casually  says it is either a small caiman or piranha.  Excuse me...neither sound good.   Then they show off the toe that the caiman bite off his helper.  Okey dokey!  I don't think we are in Texas here.

Water hyacinth 

Just in case we needed more proof of their existence we go fishing for piranha and we catch a lot of them.  Why would we do that?...to use them as bait for caimans.  Oh that makes sense!  They are so aggressive that he has to stun them to keep them from hopping all over us in the boat and in case you have forgotten they have lots of sharp teeth.  We can hear the loud crunch when this fish snaps off a hunk of the small branch Marcus is holding. 

The fish do their job and attract lots of caimans so finally this one gets the fish bait as a treat.  Just so we don't forget this is wild land he told us he had lost 50 cows to deadly snakes in the last year.  The beauty is deceptive.

In case you wondered how close we got this one came even closer. Jim reached down and petted him.  That grassy area is not land but a floating mass of vegetation forming a mobile island. That was pertinent because, as Jim kept mentioning, the boat was leaking. The water might have only been 4 feet deep but those four feet are filled with nasty fishes and nastier reptiles.

A 4 foot high stork

Late afternoon turns to evening, as the sun descends in the sky it turns the water to liquid silver.  This is how the marshlands earned the name"bright waters" in the native Guarani tribes language.  We follow the shimmering path back to shore.

There are thousands of these capybara all over.  Many are the size of small pigs and  they reproduce like mad. Lots of things eat them when they are young so the survival rate is not great. 

Marcus is fluent in English as well as several other languages.  He reads extensively so he immediately recognized our flag.  For that he got to pose with it.