South America Blog
About this blog
Wayne Bernhardson is the author of Moon Handbooks to Buenos Aires, Chile, Argentina, and Patagonia. Here he shares his vast knowledge of South America and its people.
Recent Posts
- The Papal Cumbia
- The Uruguayan Sacraments: Tango & Mate
- Taxing the Tourist: Argentina's AFIP Aims Low
- Fortress Falklands: A Book Review
- Pope Argentinus I, The Musical: Ragtime Meets Tango
- Credit Where Credit Is Undue?
- ¿Adios Hugo?
- When "No" Is A Positive
- Chile and Its "Crazies"
- The Oscars: A Post Mortem, So to Speak
- Sacrificing the Atacama? A Chilean View of Dakar
- Chilean Oscar Faceoff? "No" v. "Kon-Tiki"
- Friday Digest: Southern Cone Nuggets
- Dancing in the Mud? The Andean Aftermath
- Floods & Mud: Summer Storms Hit the Andes
Argentine Peso Plunge Persists
Not so long ago, I wrote a post about the exchange rate breach between Argentina’s official peso and the US dollar which, when I left Buenos Aires in mid-December, was selling for about 6.30 pesos on the “parallel market.” The official rate was then, and still is, slightly below five pesos but, on Friday, the skyrocketing dollar rose briefly above eight pesos before dropping slightly below at day's end. more >>
Queen of the Argentines: Máxima of Orange
According to her harshest critics, Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner often acts as if she were royalty but, in about three months, her “subjects” will have their own legitimate queen, of a sort, to fawn over. At the end of April, Holland’s Queen Beatrix will abdicate her throne, paving the way for her son Willem-Alexander, Prince of Orange, to become king. As it happens, Willem-Alexander’s wife is Argentine-born Máxima Zorreguieta Cerruti, who will simultaneously become Queen Máxima. more >>
On the Road: Kerouac In Patagonia?
Every summer, more decades past than I care to recall, my parents would use their vacation to drive from our home in Tacoma, Washington, to Moorhead, Minnesota – the figurative birthplace of A Prairie Home Companion – where my grandparents lived. As they alternated behind the wheel – I was far too young to drive - we crossed the steppes of Eastern Washington, the mountains of Idaho and western Montana, and the prairies of eastern Montana and North Dakota before bridging the Red River to arrive at Moorhead at the end of a non-stop road trip. more >>
Misfortune for Patagonia; Plus, the Dollar-Peso Breach
After more than two decades as a guidebook writer, my style of travel has changed from the days when I first strapped on a backpack and took the train south from Mexicali, bound for Tierra del Fuego (a trip on which, however, I got no farther than Ecuador). These days, I rarely set out for new destinations, but rather revisit places that I’ve gotten to know in the process of writing and updating my Moon Handbooks for Argentina, Buenos Aires, Chile and Patagonia. more >>
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