Final stage, 'La Costa' and farewell

Back in Vicente López, we get bored after a few days. Plus, it keeps raining. We decide to rent a car again for a week and take public transportation to EZE. After over 2 hours of travel, we receive our Chevy Onix on Sunday evening. Nice car, spacious, and potentially suitable for overnight stays if necessary.

On Monday, we head south. First, we stop by Leandro's uncle in Lavalle. Super nice and chatty. Unfortunately, we didn't take a selfie.

We stay in La Lucila, a lively, friendly, but not yet touristy place. The charming small hotel is called 'La' or 'Le Maison', depending on whether you look at the sign on the street or at the entrance. Clean, friendly, acceptable breakfast, rooms with morning sun and a small balcony, and the price (Ar$ 1600/night) is right.

We spend a lot of time at the beach, including getting sunburned, walking several kilometers to 'Aguas Verdes' (also very nice), driving by car to 'Mar de Ajó' (ugly), and Pinamar (even uglier).

We stop at Punta Médano. There's an old lighthouse there, but we don't visit it. What we find more interesting is that on this huge and probably kilometer-long dream beach, there is only 'homemade' infrastructure (e.g., a small snack cart with a backup generator to make 'liquados' and cool beer), and some 'permanent campers' enjoying the summer here in converted and colorful painted travel buses. We also saw a few, probably passing through, in 'casas rodantes'.

After three relaxing days, we head back. Google says it takes 5 to 6 hours. That's too much for us. We look for a stopover: Punta Indio or Chascomús? We choose Punta (del) Indio, a kind of summer resort about 100 km before Buenos Aires on the Río.

On our way there, we meet an elderly man at a small kiosk who (we later found out) is heading south. Super interesting conversation, 'Maximo Justo' cracks jokes about his name, lives in Buenos Aires, has a vacation home in Santa Teresita, which he regularly uses, and is currently on his way there. Like us, he drives an 'Onix' and is 82 years old.

Punta Indio may have been the worse decision, but as the only guests, we find accommodation for Ar$ 1000 in a small holiday home complex. Clean, with solar hot water and fly screens. Okay, the shower only provided hot water in a thin stream, and the kettle is scaly and unusable, so the next morning we have to invest our last few pesos in 2 'comun' café con leche.

We also briefly stop in La Plata, the provincial capital of Buenos Aires. Pretty ugly despite the strictly symmetrical street layout. But we're only looking for an ATM. Since we're here, we also visit the cathedral. After about 100 years of construction, the towers were opened in 1999. We take the elevator up, but even from above, the city is not much prettier.

Now that we're back 'home', it's time to pack our suitcases. We stroll around. Sunday gets tight. We have 'almuerzo' again with Pau, Leandro, and the little one. Then quickly throw everything into the suitcases. The things that stay behind go into a big bag that we leave at Daniel and Isabel's place. That's where Norbert's unused small backpack also goes, unfortunately, we only realize at the airport that our front door key is in the backpack.

Never mind, we're going home. Super good seats with the most luxurious legroom. Unfortunately, the flight didn't get any shorter.

We arrive well shortly before midnight, are lovingly picked up, and bonus the next day greeted with pleasant weather (15 C and sunny).

What more could you want?