Road trip to Balcarce

Driving to Balcarce

With the two hour time change, we just didn’t want to get out of bed.  But we had to.  After breakfast, we checked out around 0830 and took a taxi to Localiza Rental Cars in Barrio Norte.  Uber no longer picks up at our hotel requiring us to go to a street corner nearby; not the best in case of the pick-up getting held-up when we’re without wifi.

We got to the Localiza office about 10 minutes before their opening time of 0900.  The security guard patrolling the row of shops checked our intention and also of another person waiting for the neighbouring property.  This was a posh neighbourhood an security is taken seriously.

Quite surprising Localiza let us in 5 minutes before their opening and we were assigned a Fiat Palio which turned out to be a horrible unrefined and thirsty car.  Not all small cars are like that.  At the end of the trip we realised that it was thirstier than our 3 litre Toyota Mark X!

The drive to Balcarce was meant to be about 4h30 but with a rest break it took over 5h of easy driving for Kim.  The journey was largely straight and flat, similar to New Zealand’s Canterbury plains and it was a beautiful sunny day with clear blue skies.  It was uneventful except for the stop by a traffic cop.

We were stopped but we didn’t know what for.  It appeared to have something to do with our headlights.  Then he kept mentioning the word multa.  I put it through Google Translate (it means “penalty/fine”) and he pointed to a chart that had around ARS5000 (USD180).  I said in Spanish “Now, I understand … sorry”.   He gestured that we could go.  Then he gestured for some food, which I meant a little bit of coffee money for him.  ARS50 (USD2) seemed to do the trick and we got away.

It was the first time ever in all my travels that I had to pay a bribe.  But I won’t count it as such as it was for Kim.  Honestly I’m not sure if the cop knew what he was looking for when he pulled us over and he might have made it up after we stopped for him.  Kim had his headlights on low and the required setting on high (rather than beam) didn’t look distinguishable in daylight.

Along the way I thought about how Argentina’s currency had kept sliding and how prices have doubled in peso terms since two years ago.  We had booked the car in pesos months ago; we had the option of booking through another site in USD.  In USD terms, our choice had turned out cheaper now due to the slide of the peso.  Well done!

The Fangio Museum & Track

Balcarce was a pleasant small town with a big square made up of four smaller grassed areas, being traversed by a crossroad in the middle.  The Hotel Balcarce was old but nice.  It was pricey but we weren’t charged considerably less than the quoted price at check-out, it was still more than our lace in Buenos Aires.  Most importantly, it as handy to the Fangio Museum and had free public parking outside.

It was around 1500 when we walked to the nearby Fangio Museum.  This is a collection of cars and trophies of the man considered by some as the greatest ever race driver.  I had no interest in anything here but it was a very special visit for Kim.  Since all captions were in Spanish, I tried to take some interest in the audioguide.  But all the numbers were wrong and didn’t match up to the displays.  There was no rhyme or reason to it so even Kim gave up.

We finished around 1700 and there was time to check out the race track where Fangio first learnt to race.  It was on the edge of town partially on the foot of a hill.  We drove around it twice before continuing to a food (sweets, cakes, dessert) fair in the area joined to the local Carrefour.

Since we weren’t hungry, we rested briefly in our room till around 1930.  Kim wanted to eat at the Fangio Cafe nearby as it had a good set meal.  Strangely, all they had when we arrived was sandwiches.  Their kitchen closes at 2000 and at around 1945 they considered it too late to place an order.  I found it really strange as they close at 0200 and this country has a “late dinner” culture.

Anyway, the local diet had made us full for days and we felt that the ham and cheese sandwiches could sustain us till the morning.