Our trip began in Buenos Aires. Home base was my daughter´s apartment in Palermo, a neighborhood in that city. I saw my first Argentina birds from the window of her apartment and at a city park just a few minutes´walk from her place. An unexpected pleasure for us was enjoying the music of a young man as he sang Spanish songs and played his guitar for a constantly changing audience of park walkers. We dropped a few pesos into the basket he had set on the grass.

Diego Gallegos, our birding guide and a biologist, took us to Costanera Sur Ecological Reserve and to Vicente Lopez Preserve (next to the Rio de La Plata) during our Buenos Aires stay.

From Buenos Aires we flew to Bariloche, which overlooks Nahuel Huapi Lake and Nahuel Huapi National Park. Our guide there was Lorenzo Sympson, an expert on the Andes Condor.

We returned to Buenos Aires on a double decker bus equipped with expanded windows and very comfortable seats that converted into camas, or beds. I cannot begin to describe the experience Maria and I had as we passed through miles and miles of incredibly beautiful scenery, from northern Pategonia to the Pampas regions and, finally, to Buenos Aires-14 hours or so of traveling, but I´d do it again without hesitation!