Friday night in Posadas

Fri, 18:50. Came out about half an hour ago from my sole occupancy dormitory (!) to Costanera where some bars are by the river front. Fairly dead right now. Was going to eat again but first bar I tried had overpriced pizzas and a few sandwiches and nothing else. So I will have a drink here then move on later.
Went back to hostel about 2pm, not exactly tired but my feet were killing. Charged up phone while surfing the web. I was laying on the bed at the time and did have to be a bit careful not to fall asleep. I now have a massive locker which I can fit both bags in, so that's all OK in a sense.
I just applied some aerosol spray against insects I bought this afternoon (this place too is overrun with chemists once you hit the right area, though nearly all were shut for lunch for about 2-3h, seriously) yet I keep feeling 'tickly' movements. I haven't felt a bite but I am not sure I ever have. The stuff doesn't say it contains DEET but I figured I'd have to take a chance on it containing the same stuff just not under a trademarked name. It is made by 'SC Johnson' which has a vaguely familiar ring so I might hope it's not completely disreputable crap.
No doubt my phone's plastic will start to dissolve from writing this with spray-covered fingers.
Oh, I found another internet cafe. This time the woman behind the counter claimed not to be able to read from a USB stick. So I still haven't got a DVD burned.
The weather is pleasantish although at least here by the river there is a slightly overly cool breeze. I'm never satisfied.
Feeling a bit lost and not sure what to do. I am forming a vague plan not to bother with the day trip to Paraguay tomorrow, I don't know what I will do tomorrow instead (my guide book makes no mention of those ruins on cursory examination, though maybe they fall under another town). I am thinking I will go up to Puerto Iguazu on Sunday as planned, stay a couple of nights then cross into Paraguay from there and make my way across the southern bit back to here. I might (I believe there is such a thing) see a different aspect of the falls from the Paraguayan side, and although I know of no particularly impressive sights in southern Paraguay, I don't anywhere round here either. I'd then probably head over towards Uruguay and complete a sort of figure 8 circuit back at Buenos Aires via Montevideo. This seems a little superficial, but I guess apart from Iguazu Falls and BA I had and have no 'must see' things in Argentina (well, the Perito Moreno glacier, but that was kind of a 'cool incide
ntal' item in practice, it probably should have been on my mental list of key things to see but it wasn't). If I wasn't feeling slightly listless lately then I'd probably think this was quite cool, just sort of 'seeing what places are like' and maybe stumbling across something interesting rather than having to leg it round to visit interesting but annoyingly 'must do' (or at least 'would very much like to do') places. There's been a lot of that so far - the Patagonia stuff, San Pedro de Atacama, Lake Titicaca, the Nazca lines, Easter Island. While it is a 'big ticket' item in its own right, I came across the Salar de Uyuni stuff (fascinating and the trip was novel) by accident while in San Pedro de Atacama, which was quite a cool way to come upon it. My visits to Potosi (the mines were definitely an experience) and La Paz (a lot more fun than I expected) were also sort of cool 'incidental experiences' to getting around from San Pedro to Lake Titicaca.
I just wish I could summon up more enthusiasm and sense that something obscurely great might be lurking round the corner on this projected Paraguay-Argentina-Uruguay circuit that I can right now. Maybe I'm just a bit tired. I can't help thinking these pleasant but slightly dull towns (Santa Fe and Posadas) are infecting me with a certain sense of boredom. (Maybe I'm being unfair, I only saw Santa Fe midweek and while I don't think I can really stay out late here, I am perhaps prejudging Posadas based on my wanderings during the day today.) It's cool to see them and they have their points (especially the view over the river here) but they are neither immensely interesting nor immensely fun.
I am kind of looking forward to Iguazu Falls as everyone says they are fantastic, although I hope this isn't largely hype and people feeling obliged to wax lyrical. Still, some places (e.g. Torres del Paine) have lived up to their hype, so fingers crossed.
Maybe I need to accept the 'tranquility' of these small places rather than trying to go out so much in them. On the other hand, it would grate to let Friday and Saturday night go past without making some kind of effort.
In any case I need to sketch out a rough timetable and see if that figure 8 route is feasible without having to hare it round unduly.
It does feel I'm skimping Argentina as a whole with this plan. I had originally planned 4 weeks here, then it got knocked down to about 3 so I could see a bit of Uruguay and now I'm probably squeezing another week off to sneak Paraguay in. I gather Mendoza and the surrounding area are pretty interesting, but unless I end up with a big chunk of time free (I don't actually know how long it would take to get there from, say, BA) I don't feel inclined to waste a big chunk of time or money (bus or plane) going nearly back as far west as Santiago having been there already. This is a bit irrational, but I can imagine visiting Santiago again in the relatively near future and I could then take time out from there to visit Mendoza.
I'm sure there's interesting stuff in southern Argentina, it is a big country, but as I've kind of done Chilean Patagonia fairly thoroughly I don't think spending the time or money to push into the southern parts is a smart use of my limited time on this trip.
If the figure 8 plan does come off, that will make three countries (Peru, Paraguay and Uruguay) that I will have spent only about a week in. Not a problem as such I suppose, and better to leave myself wanting to come back for more.
Musing over the difficulty of getting some DVDs burned here, especially as it occurs to me in lieu of anything else I could maybe take advantage of going to the bus terminal tomorrow to buy my ticket to get a bus over to the ruins (although I am not sure one would go from there, though logically it would), and if so that further reduces the chances of me battling through the commercial slackness of the net cafes here. But I now recall I have a nearly empty 4GB card in my e-book which won't work in my camera (it doesn't do SDHC), but which I could shunt files onto using the laptop in lieu of burning them onto a DVD to give me a bit more breathing room. I assume I will want plenty of space to take as many pictures as I like at the falls (and I don't want to have to assume I will have a 'free' day there before I visit the falls to get DVDs burned), but after that I will probably be taking maybe 20 or 30 a day (I reckon that's about what I'm taking here and in Santa Fe, just snapping ran
dom slightly interesting stuff) for a while as I meander around.
20:45. Just paid, might as well see if somewhere else is livelier or has a better menu, though to be honest I'm not that hungry and maybe won't eat again anyway. (Then again, if - although I am dubious - the ruin trip pans out tomorrow, I may not be eating til lateish tomorrow.) ARS12 for a litre of Budweiser, I paid 15 as I needed change for a hundred and also couldn't bring myself to be quite so tight as to say 14, even though even that's over my usual 10%.
21:00. Wandered over to Cristobal, another bar on the river, as being just slightly livelier. Pizzas here seem nearly as expensive but I will have a small one as a compromise between not eating at all and stuffing myself.
The breeze seems to have died down, at the other place too. The view over the river at night is quite cool of course, I have taken a picture or three but doubt they will come out too well. Of course in some strange way, day or night, the view is irrationally more appealing because you're looking across the river (which looks pretty wide) *into another country*.
I note in passing there are quite a few cats here. Most seem quite timid but a black one did let me stroke it through some garden railing earlier. (There was also a white cat, which I'd seen the previous night, at Kusturica during my hasty sullen litre last night which was reasonably friendly.)
They have Quilmes stout here, which I had seen advertised today. I think I will try it but I am not sure stout is a good accompaniment to pizza so I am contenting myself with a diet Pepsi - sorry, a Pepsi Light - in the meantime.
I don't know why, but I intermittently get the feeling I am in Brazil. Maybe it's because I equate nervousness with Brazil :-) (although, at least until I go to bed, the tropical jitters are subsiding nicely) or (perhaps more likely) 'tropical' with Brazil. But slightly dull though it may be - and although it's quiet at this bar, it's busy enough to have a pleasantly quiet ambience - it's nowhere near as generally unpleasant as being in Brazil. :-) Unfair and exaggerated comment I know, but I couldn't resist.
21:40. Not a bad pizza, the size was about right. It had hard boiled egg on though - I did know this in advance, but had never really tried a pizza with so much before. I don't think it works too well.
I generally don't pine too much for the food at home, but among the odd desire for fish & chips and curry (which has been intermittently available, though I've never taken it up) I do also miss proper (it's fun to irk the purists) deep pan pizza.
I'm no connosieur (I can't even spell it) but the Quilmes Stout while being quite pleasantly rich (perhaps a touch overly fruity, at the risk of doing a Jilly Goulden), is moderately carbonated. You can feel it on your tongue like a fizzy soft drink (it's not quite that sharp, but that's the best comparison I can draw), I think a lot more so than even a fizzy keg lager (imagine me donning my Arran sweater at this point. :-) ) Maybe I just lack experience but I find that a bit odd in a stout. It's not unpleasant by any means but to me a bit weird.
It's probably in part the J K Jerome effect, but I'm starting to feel a bit more mellow. It's quite cool on this pleasantly busy terrace looking over the river (albeit with an intervening road). I am slightly concerned about getting back to the hostel as there are a few guard-ish dogs in the odd yard. It's about a five minute walk but I may get a cab back. I am a bit tired, not too surprising after minimal sleep on the bus, but I'm also not too inclined to rush back. In terms of getting in I think I am perfectly justified in turning up at 11 or 11:30.
"Another Brick In The Wall, part 2" playing (quietlyish) now.
Ah, they've struck a rich vein of slightly naff English-language music that suits my mood right now. Black's "Wonderful Life" now. Cheesy but still...
22:40. Just ordered a third and last beer. Popped off to the bog and two blokes have bagged my table. I suppose you can't entirely blame them (it was one with a relatively good view, if not the best, and superficially unoccupied) but in this table-service culture I didn't think it would happen. Otherwise I'd have waited til I had a beer on the table. I suspect this is going to require a bit of hassle to get my beer now. Just collared a waitress (yes, this is most definitely *not* Citi in Sant Fe) and clarified the situation, albeit ungrammatically (yes, this is most definitely *not* Brazil), and she at least says it's OK .Still no sign of my beer though. Ah, just turned up. If I'm lucky the other guys will get billed for my earlier drinks and pizza :-), though I doubt it.
Only slightly annoyingly, I have now mentally constructed what I believe a perfectly grammatical sentence I could have used to explain the situation to the waitress. "Mientras estaba en el baño, unos hombres tomaron mi mesa." Classic imperfect and preterit working together, textbook stuff. But no harm done, the meaning got over and it's also nice to be able to do that even after the fact. Normally when I flounder I suspect the correct sentence is outside my abilities even given a few minutes to think. :-)
That reminds me of a phrase that always sticks in my head - "se fue la luz", ie "the lights went out". Somehow the Spanish version of that has an almost onomatopeic quality, probably because all the words are so short and capture that instant change from light to dark.
23:25. Got a cab back to the hostel no problem, ARS6 with tip, arguably a bit steep for the distance but you can't put a price of peace of mind. I told the cab driver I was worried about dogs, he said there are robbers as well, although I am not sure I believe him. Besides, that doesn't bother me as much - they only want my cash and plastic, a dog might want my blood. :-)
Street door was open when I got here, owner chap hanging around but not seen anyone else so I don't think there's much of a party going on that I'm not invited to :-). May surf a little but will try not to be up too late, I am tired and even if I'm not too fussed about trying for those ruins tomorrow it would be good to have the day to wander around and/or try to rough out a plan for the rest of the time before I fly to Panama. Definitely feeling more chirpy than I did earlier, although I did feel pretty relaxed after my lunchtime steak and beer. Anyway, to the web/bed.