Costa Havin Fun

So one visitor to my blog was asking how much it costs to travel around down here- expenses for a visitor- well the answer to that is very subjective. On bikes as you can guess it can be very cheap as many nights are spent camping out in the bush so not much is spent in the way of hotels, and meals when riding between towns are simple consisting of either deli meat sandwiches or pasta and canned fish cooke don the old camp stove. Yesterday had a can of corned beef (ya the kind with the key to open it) mixed with itialian spices and Chimichirri sauce then spread on crackers like a pate´. My dog would have loved it. Met other travelers also spending a lot of time hiking in national parks living quite cheaply.

But here's a run down of costs that most tourists can expect in Canadian Dollars (keep in mind Argentina is experiencing 12% per anum inflation).

A three star hotel in Buenos Aries will cost about $60 - 80 per night while elsewhere in the country about $25 - 30 which gets you a clean room, a TV often with english speaking movies, sometimes a pool, and always a good breakfast.

Lunch such as a steak sandwich with cheese egg tomatoes fries (the call it a Lomito) is $3 - $5 including a drink.

A good espresso coffee served in china with acompanying soda water and cookies (the traditional way) costs about 75 cents to a dollar.

A great steak dinner for 2 (new york cut) with bread, olives, tomato and onion salad, mashed potatoes, a good bottle of local wine, soda water (no greens - havent seen em for a while) will set you back no more than $20 ($10 per person). You could spend maybe another$10 if you bought a top rate reserva wine.

The accurate indicator of expenses is beer .... here it is a huge bargun. A 1 litre bottle of Quilmes or Andes beer (thats the common size down here) sets you back about $1 from a sore and $1.5 from a restaurant.

Airfares are also reasonable but this is where you start to enter the two tier pricing system. For some idolistisic reason the government has mandated that only Argentine residents can get preferred rates for domestic air travel even on privately owned airlines such as Lan Argentina. One oway flights to most cities in the north and middle of the country cost a visitor about $90 (San Luis) to $120 (Mendoza and Iguazu Falls). To fly to Ushuaia at the bottom of the world costs about $200.

Electronoics are another story, wow pricey. My cheap little digital camera bought at home for about $290 is over $600 here even at a Carrfore (french version of Walmart) store. Flash memory cards, MP3 players, etc., are over twice as expensive.

We´re told that cars are also expensive except for the FIATs (Fix It Again Tonys) and Boxey Renaults that are built here.

The Argentine government just announced a 12 month price freeze on beef so that should keep most people here happy!!!!