Welcome to Buenos Aires! UPDATED!

We spent the night on a plane and made it to Buenos Aires around 5am (1am Pacific Time).  We went through customs and immigration (no forms required...weird!) and a car was waiting to pick us up at the airport.

To enter Argentina, Americans have to pay something called a Reciprocity Fee.  It's a fee we have to pay basically because we charge them a fee to enter The U.S.  So, it's kinda like payback.  It's $160/person and you only have to pay once every 10 years.  You have to make sure you do it online before you leave for your trip because you can't do it once you get here.  They won't even let you on the plane without proof.

Then we drove to our apartment (about 40 minutes), where we met our contact, Mauricio.  Props to Mauricio for waking up super early on a Sunday morning to meet us and show us around the apartment.  We arrive and get the tour around 7am.  First impressions of Buenos Aires:  it's cold (about 45 degrees at 6am) and it's a big city (kinda reminded us of San Francisco).  We didn't get to see too much because it was still pretty dark.  We did take some pictures of our apartment though.  We're on the 4th floor, so you have to get in one of those old-timey elevators where you shut the doors manually.

Check out our old castle keys:

Our building is old, but the apartment is the perfect size for the two of us.

Mauricio gave us the run-down and some cash because we haven't exchanged our money yet.  Super nice guy!  Then we walked to a bakery on our block because we were starving and everything looked amazing:

We ended up getting some savory tarts.  I got ham, cheese, egg and tomato:

Aaron got chicken:

We got some change.

These are Argentine Pesos.  You can get about 9 pesos for $1 at the ATM or a normal money exchange.  The economy in Argentina is shit, so you can wipe your ass with this and you wouldn't be missing much.  Coming from America and having American money gives you a great advantage when visiting Argentina because they REALLY want dollars here and there's nowhere to get them.  The government has basically banned Argentine residents from purchasing dollars, in order to get people to use the Peso and get their economy out of the crapper.  This has started what's called "The Blue Market."  The blue market is technically illegal, but LOTS of people do it and the cops just look the other way.  Since dollars are so coveted in Argentina and hard to come by, Argentinians in the blue market will trade you 12-13 pesos per dollar, which is a lot when you consider you're getting maybe 9 from the ATM.  Since when you trade, you're trading more than a few bucks, that really adds up!  Let's say I trade $10.  I'll get 90 Pesos at an ATM and about 130 Pesos on the blue market.  Let's say I trade $100.  I'm getting about 900 Pesos at the ATM and about 1300 on the blue market.  Now you're starting to see a real difference.  You're getting WAY more for you money and it makes things relatively cheap.  We've been hitting the ATM pretty regularly for the past few weeks in Costa Rica, so we've got a nice stack of U.S. dollars to trade.  Don't forget to bring all the cash you intend to spend when visiting Argentina.  

On the flip side, you have to be careful for counterfeit bills.  I've heard from multiple travelers that it's a non-issue, but I'd be aware just in case.  It's also sketchy because you're carrying lots of cash with you and that can be scary.  For the amount of money you're saving though, I'd say it's totally worth doing.

Anyway, we got home, ate, watched a little TV (there are about 7 English channels playing the most random movies), showered and slept for hours.  For the next couple days, we'll be focused on getting unpacked, buying groceries, exchanging our money and getting the lay of the land.

We're finally here!  Whew!

UPDATE:
Aaron sent me pics he took of Buenos Aires from the plane:

It's huge! 

So, we went out to hunt for a grocery store and ended up finding one maybe 10 steps from our house...SWEET!  We got a few supplies:

They had a bunch of good stuff, but no fresh meat or veggies.  We went to a separate produce market nearby, but have yet to find a meat market.  Keep in mind, it's about 8pm on a Sunday night, so most stuff is closed.  I did take some pictures around town, but they're not very good, so bare with me.

All this was within about 5 minutes from our house.  We're definitely not in Costa Rica anymore.  I'll try to take better pictures during the day.  Oh yea, I took this in honor of Aaron's hometown:

I think it was a cafe.  Now we're just kicking back at home, watching TV.  Tomorrow we're going to change some money and go shopping for warm clothes because it's rather cold here and we only have tank tops and T-shirts.  Nighty night!