Southern Summer, Argentina, Chile and Y Wladfa Gymreig 7th Jan

From this perspective the last 36 hours don't seem so bad. We are sitting on the balcony of our subpenthouse apartment, drinks in hand, snacking and really enjoying the bright 30 ° sunshine. More of this apartment later.

Long haul flights are always arduous and this one was no exception. Two and a half hours saw us from Heathrow to Rome and after less than an hour wait and two lengthy bus rides (but no ferries) we walk through G4 for BuenosAires.

We had done our best to select decent seats with the check in girl but she wouldn't give a free upgrade to business. The seating configuration on these planes is 3-4-3 so we went for window and middle so the size of the passenger on the aisle is quite critical as is there toleration to being woken by one or other of us for ablution purposes. He was a very large German chap (Helen thought him to be a Jack Whitehall doppleganger) who was going climbing in the Andes and he put his large backpack and boots between his legs for safekeeping. Thank god he didn't have his ropes and ice axe there as well. As it was he presented a barrier about as insurmountable as the Andes. This was compounded by the built in obstruction under the seat in front of Helen which forced her to jam her legs into my slot as well. In fact the German was very obliging but we didn't really get much kip during the fourteen and a half hours of this flight. 

A couple of ariel shots of BA. Our apartment is roughly level with the leading edge of the wing, centre picture. Immigration was painless although webcam mugshot was taken along with electronic thumbprint. Also proof of accommodation was required, no problem with smartphone and your.booking.com 

There was the man with the Duce sign and we taxied to the front door of our apartment. It turned out to be really excellent. First of all security. The front entrance is controlled by electronic thumbprint and our apartment by electronic card . The subpenthouse is longer than a cricket pitch with another 3 metres for the balcony.  Have a look at some pictures. 

Note the bidet and loo with solid gold fittings  (this is South America remember). All in all it is very well appointed large flat screen TV, desk and office area, huge double bed plus a spare one to banish Nigel to. Oh, and the balcony sunshade has a handset to control it, nice! Now the only problem is where shall we choose to eat that steak tonight?