to jump onto the ferry and enter the Tango Capital of the world –
Buenos Aires.
I arrived in BA at 11 pm after a rocky and expensive boat ride and
began looking for a place to sleep. Every hotel and hostel I arrived
at was full. It was the worst.
Finally at 1am I found a cheap motel, and got a room for the night. The small space reeked of
cigarette smoke and cheap perfume. When I turned the radio on,
Adele’s “Hello,” came on. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
The next morning I managed to find another hotel near the Casa Rosada
and began playing tourist. I visited all of the touristy locations,
ate extremely well, and fell in love with this lively capital that
makes one feel as if they are in Europe. That is until a pickpocket
stole my iPhone and reminded me I need to keep my wits about me!
While walking down a busy street market one late afternoon, the thief
snatched the phone from my right pocket without me even noticing it.
When I rushed back to the hotel to check if my photos were backed up
onto my iCloud, they weren’t. All 30,000 plus images from my journey
gone. I was heart broken.
I decided it was time to leave BA and since I was waiting for the
Solanet family to give me the green light to head to their ranch, I
drove to Lujan.
The touristy town is known for its stunning cathedral, and is where Mancha
and Gato, who were stuffed after their deaths, were put on display. At the
Museum of Transportation, squished between the popemobile and a large
sail boat that sailed around the world, I met my four legged heroes
for the first time. I spent an hour simply analyzing their paint and
buckskin fur. They were just like Tschiffely had described them in his
book and how I had spent a lifetime imagining them to be. My criollo
héroes right in front of me. What a feeling!
From Lujan I drove to Ayacucho, only 40 kms from El Cardal, the ranch
belonging to the Solanet family.
the statue of Mancha, Gato, and Aime Tschiffely in the town square. I
told bronze Tschiffely about my own ride, how the Brazilians had also
raised a monument of my horses and I, and how I wished that I could
have met him. I felt inspired.
That night, Don Carlos Solanet invited me to visit him at the infamous
El Cardal ranch the next morning. I would finally get to meet the
Criollos I would ride to Patagonia. Criollos with the same origin as
Mancha and Gato. Raised in the same pastures those two majestic
animals were retired in… I felt like I was dreaming.
