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Japan overview

This wasn't our first time in Japan, but we were again impressed by the Japanese who seem to do so many things so very well - food, accommodation, tourism, and, definitely, toilets. Their pride in their work seemed to shine through in whatever they did. Ironically, however, we felt more alienated in Japan then anywhere else in our travels through the Americas. But perhaps that's not a bad thing at all - the main point of traveling is to see something new after all. So we'll definitely be back again, as long as there's new stuff to see, new stuff to eat, and as long as the Japanese haven't fished the oceans dry.

Highlights

Food 

Service

Toilets

Catching up with friends E, J, and A

Overnight stay in Kinosaki

Lowlights

Language barrier

High prices

Complicated transport network

Recommendations and shout-outs

Morizuya - our ryokan in Kinosaki

JR West Wide Area Pass - great value for traveling on trains

Half-price sashimi/sushi at department stores/supermarkets near closing time

Hyperdia - useful website for figuring out public transport options

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Orderly Japan

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Kibune

We had a most unique lunch here - nagashi somen where the noodles are flowed down bamboo troughs. Customers have to deftly grab the somen as they pass by or risk going hungry. The restaurant is set on a wooden platform that sits above a cool river that serves as an elegant counter to the summer heat.

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Arashiyama

Checked out some nature here - monkeys, bamboo groves, and fishermen demonstrating the use of birds (cormorants) to fish.

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Kyoto

The beautiful ex-capital of Japan is filled with temples, shrines, and tourists. One temple that particularly impressed us was the Sanjusangendo Temple, which housed an army of deity statues dating back to the 12th and 13th century.

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Osaka

There's probably lots to do in Osaka, but our focus was on pigging out as much as possible. We did manage to hit the Osaka castle and the Musuem of Housing and Living.

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Tenjin Matsuri

The summer festival in Osaka, Tenjin Matsuri, was quite the sensory overload. Lots of people, more people, food, games, fireworks, and even more people. Met up with our old friend J (serendipitously on a short work stint in Kyoto), who was nice enough to show us around the Kansai region.

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Nara

We made a day trip to Nara, which has a ton of temples, shrines, deers, and one giant Buddha housed in the world's largest wooden structure.

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Shigisan

Due to logistical reasons and to avoid the crowds, we decided to go for a temple stay at Shigisan instead of the more popular Koyasan. We got what we wanted - there was only one other Japanese guest. The downside was that nobody there really spoke any english so much of what went on (during dinner, prayers, etc.) was lost on us.

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Kinosaki

Kinosaki is a charming Japanese town famous for its seven public onsens. We stayed in Morizuya ryokan (which served an exceptional dinner and breakfast) and went around trying out as many different onsens as we could (we hit 6 of them). 

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Shirahama beach

Finally free from winter in the southern hemisphere, our first stop in the Kansai region of Japan was the Shirahama beach. Most interesting thing about it is probably the outdoor onsen by the sea. There are spots where you can soak in the warm onsen water while waves will periodically bring in sea water to cool you down.

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Argentina Summary

We will always remember Argentina fondly for providing some of the most incredibly delicious yet cheap meals of our lives. And of course the beautiful country is so much more than just a meat-lover's paradise. The week and a half there were barely enough to give us a glimpse of what Argentina has to offer. Like in Chile, Patagonia beckoned, but we decided to leave the southern end of South America for a warmer trip. It's a bit of pity, but perhaps it's not such a bad thing to have a good excuse to revisit Argentina and its parillas in the future.

Highlights:

Meat - the sheer amount of steak we consumed is testimony to the deliciousness and affordability of Argentinean beef

Incredible dinners at La Cabrera and Aramburu

Iguazu Falls

Blue dollar market - really helped lower the cost of our Argentinean leg

Wine tours by bike in Mendoza

Buses - though somewhat expensive, bus trips can be pretty awesome. where else are you going to get served champagne and steak in the comfort of your almost fully reclining seat?

Nightlife - we're not really big into nightlife in general, but just how late it runs in Argentina was really something to experience

Buenos Aires - a lively city with something for everyone

Argentine tango

Lowlights

Argentinian accent - we thought Chile was bad, but the way español is spoken in Argentina was even harder for us to understand

Carnivorous cuisine - X really missed her vegetables

Graffiti everywhere - and not of the street art variety

Recommendations and shout-outs

Lina's Tango Guesthouse - we spent every night but one in this beautiful guesthouse in San Telmo which had surprisingly affordable private rooms. Lina was also a great host and very accommodating.

La Cabrera - perfectly cooked steaks. Half-priced happy hour is an unbelievable deal.

Aramburu - absolutely fantastic 12-course tasting menu. One of our best meals ever. 

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A taste of Argentine tango

It's unclear to us just how common it is for the locals to actually dance the Argentine tango, but it's certainly a popular activity for tourists in Buenos Aires. Instead of going to one of the much advertised tango + dinner spectaculars, we chose to take a mass introductory Argentine tango lesson at a very popular local milonga called La Viruta. While there were far too many people for us to receive any meaningful instruction, we did get a taste of this very intimate dance. Following the lesson was a milonga where couples could tango the night away.

The lesson began at 11pm, which gives you an idea on just how late Argentinean nightlife begins. Or actually it doesn't, because the crowd doesn't really get going till way later. There was a short tango show by several couples at around 1am. Then at 230am a fantastic tango orchestra played some live tango music (much more enjoyable than we would have expected). The subways had stopped running by then, so we decided to just stay at the tango club till 5am when the subway started up again. Even at that ungodly hour, people continued arriving at the club. Those that entered as we were leaving at 5pm were actually having breakfast there! 

The following week, we had dinner at a small restaurant called Los Laureles with live tango music and a cozy dance floor. It was a much more intimate experience and a great place to sit back, enjoy a meal, and take in a more local tango scene. The food and service was pretty good, although there was a creepy old guy at the next table constantly sneaking photos of the waitresses. Although Los Laureles was a little out of the way from our guesthouse in San Telmo, taxis got us there and back easily enough - they are pretty cheap and go by the meter. We'd recommend visiting for an authentic Argentinian milonga without hordes of dancers and other tourists. 

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Buenos Aires: the city that never sleeps

We spent a whole week in Buenos Aires, so we did quite a bit in the city. Yet there's nothing much that really stands out that seems to warrant individual posts. There's a whole bunch of things we did that were we certainly enjoyed and/or found interesting but nothing that really stood out as truly super memorable. But we did like Buenos Aires, so it must somehow be that the sum of our experiences were greater than the parts. We suspect it's related to how we feel like Buenos Aires would be a really interesting city to live in - perhaps livable cities are distinct from cities that are great tourist destinations. Or maybe we're just getting lazy towards the end of our trip and want to minimize the posts we still have to write. In any case, here's a synopsis of some things we did in Buenos Aires:

Bike tour: We went on a guided bike tour around the northern,more aristocratic, part of Buenos Aires. It was interesting at times and the guide, who was local, was very knowledgable, but not always very entertaining. Highlight was the visit to the La Recoleta Cemetary, a fascinating above-ground cemetary where some of Argentina's richest and most famous are buried in some beautiful vaults.

Gaucho market: Every Sunday, there's a Gaucho market called Feria de Mataderos on the outskirts of Buenos Aires. It's a rather local market due to its location, which is significantly far enough from the main tourist areas to deter most tourists. There's lots of food, handmade goods, and live music. We were also lucky enough to catch some horse shows, which aren't available every week. The shows consist of horse-riding gauchos who carry a small skewer with which they attempt to pass through a tiny ring while going at full speed on their horses. We assure you that this is more awesome than it sounds.

Ecological nature reserve: There's a natural reserve located within Buenos Aires, along its eastern coast. We rented a bike and went round the park one afternoon. It was pretty but not particularly great or memorable. While we had the bike, we also went to check out El Ateneo Grand Splendid, a bookstore housed within a converted theatre. It's stunning and definitely worth a visit if you're in the area.

Adentro Dinner Club: An asado is typical local experience where friends and/or family gather in someone's house and spend hours grilling (lots of beef usually), socializing, and stuffing themselves with all kinds of delicious barbecued food. Most tourists won't have access to such events, except perhaps through Adentro Dinner Club, one of many closed-door restaurants (unofficial restaurants chefs set up, often in their own homes) in Buenos Aires. Available just once a week on Wednesdays, the chef and his girlfriend host a small group in their home in the Palermo neighborhood. It was rather expensive, but the food was excellent and it's hard to place a price on a unique experience like this.

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Last supper at Aramburu

After the incredible steaks we had at La Cabrera, we were considering canceling our reservation at Aramburu for another happy hour meal at La Cabrera. Good thing we didn't, because the tasting menu at Aramburu turned out to probably be the best we've ever had.

The meal consisted of 12 courses and every single one was well-cooked and spiced perfectly. From we what had read, we were expecting lots of molecular gastronomy type dishes, which we were concerned might mean weird dishes that favor innovation over taste. Happily, our concerns were unfounded. The dishes were indeed innovative, but did not sacrific on taste in any way. The flavors really suited our palate and it's probably the first time we enjoyed every single course on a tasting menu.

The cost? Just 390 pesos (~49 USD) each for the tasting. Ok, so that's not exactly dirt cheap, especially by Argentinian standards. But it was truly exceptional value for the amazing meal we got. Besides the fantastic dishes, service and ambiance at Aramburu were also top-notch. No other fine dining experience in the past had come even close to Aramburu for quality-to-price ratio. And if you pay in cash, they even give you a 10% discount. 

It was the perfect place to have our last dinner in South America - hard to imagine another meal topping the one we had at Aramburu.

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Holy cow!

Argentinean steaks are ubiquitous and cheap (especially if you get your pesos through the blue market). So we ended up having steaks almost everyday in Argentina since the steaks are also bloody delicious. They are typically huge so it's often common to share a full portion (some restaurants will actually suggest sharing). It took a bit of trial and error since we had read and were told contradictory information from different sources, but we think we finally understand how to order steaks like we like them in Argentina. Here's what we learned:

Cuts

Sirloin - Bife de chorizo

Rib eye - Ojo de bife

Tenderloin - Bife de lomo

Doneness

Rare - Blue (similar to how you would ask for a rare steak in French.)

Medium rare - Jugoso

Somewhere between medium and medium rare - Antes de punto

Medium - A punto (the default if they don't understand what you want)

Medium well - Pasado de punto

Well done - Why would you do this to the cow?

We're not sure if it's a faux pas in Argentina (probably not), but we always asked for some chimichurri sauce on the side whenever we have steaks. It's a delicious combination of parsley, garlic, peppers, oil (probably olive), and maybe some other spices (probably crack).

The best steak we had was at one of the best parillas (or so we've been told) in Buenos Aires - La Cabrera. It's also one of the most expensive and touristy parillas in town. Thankfully, they have a happy hour every day from 7-8pm where everything on the menu is 50% off (note: we had read that the happy hour is only on weekdays but that's either outdated or simply untrue - it's definitely everyday when we checked on 18 July '13). Don't get there later than 7, since tables fill up really quickly (mostly with tourists - the locals wouldn't be caught dead eating dinner that early). With the happy hour discount, we ended up having a 400g rib eye for ~9 USD, and 400g of dry-aged sirloin for ~12 USD. More importantly, these were some of the best steaks we've ever had in our lives (perhaps second only to this one divine Matsuzaka steak we had in Japan). They also came with a variety of delicious sides and the service at the restaurant was excellent (quite a rarity from our dining experiences in Argentina). Our only regret was that we checked out La Cabrera too late in our trip to have another meal (or ten) there.

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Close encounter with the Iguazu falls

Our enjoyment of any place seems to be proportional to the awesomeness of the place and inversely proportional to the number of other tourists there. The Iguazu falls in the north of Argentina, straddling the border between Brazil and Argentina, is one example of an incredibly beautiful place we that was marred by the hordes of other tourists. The bus ride to Iguazu from Buenos Aires took 18 hours, which is an awfully long time even if the buses were very comfortable. So it was a pity that we couldn't also check out the falls from Brazil since we didn't have a visa (necessary for Singaporeans). 

Having visited the Niagara falls previously, we weren't sure how impressed we were going to be with the Iguazu falls. So it was a relief to find that the Iguazu falls were as spectacular as touted and that the Niagara falls did indeed pale in comparison. Hopefully, our pictures convey a little of just how majestic and impressive the Iguazu falls were. But waterfalls are one of those things which have to be seen in person to be fully appreciated - the raw power of the falls, the dampness in the air, and the constant rumble of falling water cannot be conveyed through still images.

We caught a closer glimpse of the falls on a speed boat ride that brought us close enough to the falls that we ended up completely drenched. It cost 180 pesos per person, which was quite a bit for a 12 minute ride, but it was fun and there's not much else to do at the falls anyway. There were a couple of trails that we went on that took quite a bit more time than they should have because of the incredible amounts of human traffic - it often felt more like Disneyland than a national park. That said, they are probably still worth doing as there are lots of viewpoints along the way to catch the falls from various perspectives. 

If possible, our recommendation would be to get to the falls as early as possible. The trails were significantly clearer when we first arrived in the morning (around 930am) and we wished we had gotten there even earlier to avoid the crowds.