Day 31 - February 3, 2008 - at sea, on river, in Buenos Aires

Buenos Aires photos
Sounds like a busy day! We all planned to sleep in and have a late Sunday breakfast. Plan all you want... Clay was up and on the treadmill when we almost pingponged off Uruguay into the Rio de la Plata. Then we started slaloming up the channel. Debbie and Margie tried to ignore it as they were tossed from one edge of the bed to the other, then gave it up and hoped not to be tossed out of their showers. So, we all got a pretty early start anyway. Breakfast still didn't start in Compass Rose until 8am. We were there shortly after it opened. The special today was Champagne with Eggs Florentine and Salmon caviar. Debbie had Champagne with plain Eggs Benedict. Clay ordered the special and got one Egg Florentine. Margie got plain Eggs Benedict. No one was offered the pastries tray this morning. The entire dining room staff was still in an uproar over the crowds last night. Don't know if we mentioned that it was VERY busy in Compass Rose last night. Rommel and Ludovic said they had to seat people in Latitudes last night and serve them off the Compass Rose menu. Ludovic said they served 550 people at Compass Rose last night. That only 40 some people were in Latitudes or Signatures last night. He thought it was because of the Compass Rose menu with caviar, foie gras, crab legs/claws, lobster and Kobe beef. If we'd known we would have gone to Signatures last night! We did dine in Compass Rose but it was because of the Chocolate Souffle filled raspberry chocolate ganache with Tahitian vanilla sauce! Debbie and Margie did both order the Kobe beef, but they ordered it without the lobster tail. It also came with a single ravioli filled with oxtail, that was really good. Anyway, Kobe beef, what is the deal with it? It was very tender but it doesn't have a real familiar beef flavor. Clay tasted Debbie's and agreed with her that it just tasted strange, what had the cow been fed? Then Clay tasted Margie's and it tasted completely different. Again, not a familiar beefy flavor, but something lean, tender and different as well as completely different flavor than Debbie's piece. Different cows? Debbie said she thought Kobe beef had a unique diet and also that they got a massage every day to make them so tender. Margie and Clay scoffed at the daily massage concept. Margie thought it was because the cows' feet never touched dirt. No one believed that either. No one could answer the question. When Ludovic thought the reason Compass Rose was overwhelmed was because of the number of orders of Kobe beef w/Lobster tail, Debbie asked him what is the story on Kobe beef. Ludovic didn't understand. Debbie asked him tell us the life story of a Kobe beef cow. Ludovic cracked himself up by saying cow over and over like an American. Oh, man! It must be a French thing. After Ludovic left no one could think of the French word for cow. We would have asked Ludovic later but he made a hit and run with some Internet printouts on Kobe beef. How he found Debbie and Margie at the jigsaw puzzle is a mystery that will remain unsolved. So, Kobe beef is technically refered to as Tajima beef from a cattle called "kuroge Wagyu" or black haired Japanese cattle. Today they are raised on only 262 small farms, most of which pasture fewer than 5 cows and the largest has only 10-15 cows. Their diets are strictly controlled and they are fed hefty quantities of sake and beer mash. Each animal does get a daily massage with the believe that mellow, relaxed cows make tender beef. So, there you go. Their feet do touch the ground every day! On the subject, of passenger counts. The next segment is still believed to only have about 540 passengers, so many more leaving than joining. That will be good news for the crew and for those of us on for the next segment to have a break from the crowds.
Debbie and Margie did attend the show last night. PGT's "Broadway in Concert". Margie had actually already been to this show and had walked out before the dancers came on. They sat all the way through. Debbie thought it was only all right, Margie still did not really like it at all.
After breakfast this morning and some time at the jigsaw puzzle, we all attended Terry Breen's lecture on Buenos Aires and tango. We are all now looking forward to our Tango show ashore this early evening. After the lecture, Debbie managed to get in a question at the Travel Concierge Desk which was overwhelmed with people either getting off here or wanting to sign up for excursion since they are staying on. Debbie only wanted to give them one last chance to provide a concrete answer to when and where do we meet our private tour guide. Finally an answer, 9am somewhere in the vicinity of the Terminal Building and look for someone holding a sign with our name on it. Evidently, you cannot walk in the port and there will be a continuous (?) shuttle running between the ship and the Terminal Building/Port Entrance/Exit. We did not get an answer to the question of what is the dress for the Tango show. The high today is forecast to be around 86-88F and sunny. Tomorrow too! It may get uncomfortable now. After laundry yesterday, we all packed back up our cold weather gear and we were not displeased that we did not need all of it.
Before lunch Debbie and Margie went back up to work on the jigsaw puzzle. Clay found them there for lunch and together we finished it off. It was missing one piece. Oh, yesterday we stopped by and asked Nessim of H. Stern jewelers if he made it out to Volunteer Point to see the King Penguins at Port Stanley. Did he ever?! He had his laptop out looking at his photos and videos of the Kings. They were amazing! Don't let anyone tell you that you don't have time to do this! Debbie had been told by a number of private guides that 1) our stop was too short 2) that they were busy with the ships that day. Nessim said he had to ask more than 15 private guides before he found one that would agree to take him, but then the morning we saw him he could get on a tender as an independent until after 8am and was worried that he really wouldn't have time. Nessim said it was fine. His experience looked a lot more amazing than our Sparrow Cove experience. Debbie is really kicking herself now for being so easily dissuaded from her original goal of seeing the Kings! Well, you just never know.
This afternoon, Debbie went to the Big Screen Popcorn Movie, "The Bourne Ultimatum". During the movie, we finally arrived at Buenos Aires. It is a long, rough sail up this river. We turned in between 6:30 and 7am and arrived at about 3:30pm. We are docked on the port side. We can see the Norwegian Dream from our balcony. It is a big working container port and under the flight path of the airport as well, so it is very, very loud and noisy. Expect we'll be wishing we'd docked starboard side by morning. We'll see how it goes. We have our excursion shortly. In the absence of any dress instructions for the Tango Tango, we've decided to all wear whatever we want, except Clay wants to wear shorts. Margie and Debbie agree that since it is a 2.5 hour excursion that the ship's evening code would apply and that is Country Club Casual. No shorts. We'll see. About 4:15pm, the ship was cleared for guests to go ashore. The good news is that there were about 6 buses waiting by that time to ferry people to the Terminal. It was 12 minutes before the first bus returned after all those left. Not sure what that means for us except that we cannot see the Terminal Building from here! Guess we will allow about 15 minutes to get to the Terminal from the ship.
We really enjoyed the Tango Tango show that was our RSSC excursion this evening. We were on the first bus and it left early. We got a quick drive around the downtown area with an amusing woman guide. Since we were in the first bus, our seats at the show were right in front of the stage. They seated us at longtables with 4 to a side and served us water and red and white wine. They did bring around 2 little plates of sweets and then 2 little plates of fish spread and cheese spread on crackers to each table. The show was very good though. There was one set of musicians with 4 pairs of tango dancers. Then a number of Evita. Then some Andean musicians, Then a dancing gaucho twirling boleros. Scary. Then a quartet of accordion players with 3 violinists, a bass and piano player. They were just awesome. There were also a male and female singer and the tango dancers again. At the end they were all on the stage together for on final number. We really enjoyed it. They drove us straight back to the port terminal and we had dinner in LaVeranda again from the Argentine Steakhouse menu.
Tonight they are showing the Superbowl Football game in the Constellation Theater. We are going to bed early to rest up for our long day tomorrow. There is a shuttle bus here from the ship to the Port Terminal building. As well, there is a complimentary shuttle running about every 30 minutes from the Port Terminal building to the Marriott Hotel on Plaza San Martin today from 4:30pm to 10pm and tomorrow from 9am to 6pm.
There is a turnover of passengers as well as ship's personnel here in BA. We will get a new Captain, new F&B and Asst., new Fitness Instructor, etc.
Buenos Aires photos