Antarctica - Day #4

Buenos Aires skyline

Lounging on this plush leather couch in Uruguay

Bucket List - antiquing in Uruguay -- check.

Golf carting around Catalonia, Uruguay

Old Bull Ring

Tree-lined streets

Nice ride

A group of us overlooking the ocean in Uruguay

Wednesday, February 23rd

Early wake-up call today at 6:30am. Felt alot better. Illness is behind me. We all met down for breakfast at 7am. We then walked over to our ferry boat connection for an 8:45am departure to Uruguay.

Many people on our tour group joined along. The water shuttle took us to the city of Catalonia, Uruguay. It was a 1 hour boat ride. The time is 1 hour ahead, so we arrived around 10:45am. Our return trip to Buenos Aires was 7:00pm - so we had the day to check out the city.

Since we're only a few days out from the marathon, none of us wanted to walk too much and be on our feet for hours. We decided to rent a couple golf carts and tour the sites. It was really a fun day. It was overcast and rainy much of the time, but we had a good time nonetheless.

We drove down along the beaches and through the main city center. The streets were lined with trees and had a pretty good feel. We ate lunch at this pizza place in town. Then we drove down and saw the historic Plaza de Toro (the old bull ring from many years past).

We next decided to drive further along the beach and worked our way over to the Sheraton Hotel - probably the fanciest place in the city (outside pool, beach, golf course -- very nice). We proceeded to take a couple hour relaxation period and grabbed some hot tea while lounging on this plush leather couch (see pic).

We did some souvenoir shopping in town and headed back to the boat. We left Catalonia at 7pm and arrived in Buenos Aires at 7pm - very nice. We then walked along the waterfront to one of the most famous steakhouses in the world -- La Cabana. Most of us had these lomo medallions, which may have been the best steak I've ever eaten in my life. Argentina is huge on beef. That, along with the tango, are it's claim to fame.

I'm now just getting back to the hotel room at 11:30pm. We have a 7:40am flight tomorrow morning from Buenos Aires to Ushuaia. We have to leave the hotel at 5:40am. Wake-up call is set for 4:45am and we're meeting folks at 5am for breakfast. Needless to say, I don't have a ton of time to be very elaborate today. I did want to check in because I'm not certain if I will be able to blog again until March 6th. Tomorrow we board the ship to Antarctica. We will set sail tomorrow afternoon at 4pm. Everyone is doing fine and we're positioning ourselves to make miracles happen.

I hope to be coming to you live crossing the Drake Passage on the southern tip of the world tomorrow night. If I can't, no worries -- we'll be strong. I just watched the movie "Secretariat" on the plane ride to BA the other day. It's about the greatest racehorse that ever lived. Want to know why he was the best - he had a bigger heart than anybody else. I'll be thinking about his Belmont run in 1973 while on the backstretch of the marathon in a few days ------- the heart of a champion is not something that is easily broken.