August 20, 2024

Overnight Bus Trip from Posadas to Buenos Aires

By In Daily Travel Blogging, Trip Reports

Disaster! Our first 24 hours in Argentina are 24 hours I’d prefer to forget. In other words, they were a prime example of Murphy’s Law: what can go wrong will go wrong. J/k, not really. Plenty of other stuff could have gone wrong, and that would have been far worse. But I made our situation worse by having hyped up Argentina so much to my husband before arriving because I enjoyed Buenos Aires when I interned here in 2010.

But let’s back up. Our first 16 or so hours in Argentina were spent traveling from the Paraguayan border to the Posadas bus station and then 13 hours on an overnight bus from Posadas to Buenos Aires. We were exhausted – and I was upset – by the time we got to the main attraction, Buenos Aires. So what went wrong? Let’s go over what happened.

Posadas Bus Station Argentina
Long-distance buses in Argentina are nice, but not for light sleepers.

It Started in Posadas

Before arriving in Buenos Aires, we had issues in Posadas. (Read our blog post about traveling from Paraguay to Posadas here.) After exiting the train station and border crossing from Paraguay – it is the same building – we had to get to the bus station to catch our 13-hour bus to Buenos Aires. As Uber is ubiquitous in South America, I planned to find a WiFi signal and then call for an Uber. I didn’t think not having cash would be an issue, but I was wrong.

But first, we had to find WiFi. I knew that this weekend was a national holiday in Argentina to remember the death of General José de San Martín (he was an independence fighter). However, I didn’t realize how much Posadas shut down for the holiday weekend. Even though it was a Saturday, most businesses were closed, and the City felt pretty dead. Therefore, finding a WiFi signal was a lot harder than I predicted.

We walked and walked and walked, and it was pretty hot and humid: the heat index was in the 90s. Also, remember that we had all our luggage and backpacks with us, adding weight and drag.

The coloring of this photo of the Posadas skyline is a good representation of how it felt walking there.

After walking for probably a mile, we found an open pharmacy. I went inside and asked if I could use the WiFi, but they said they didn’t have it. I asked if I could buy a SIM card to get data access, and they said they didn’t sell SIM cards. Striking out on both accounts, I bought a Powerade drink so Kevin and I could cool down.

As we drank the Powerade in the shade outside the pharmacy, I tried seeing if I could pick up a WiFi signal on my phone. By sheer luck, we found ourselves across the street from a hospital, and they had free public WiFi. Success! Although the signal was not great, I requested an Uber. Within six minutes, we’d be out of the heat and relaxing in the back of motorized transportation—I can’t wait!

The Cash-Only Uber

After a few minutes, our Uber finally arrived, and the driver got out to open the trunk. At this moment, we got our first taste of the current state of the Argentine economy. When the driver opened the trunk, he asked me for cash. I was so confused, especially since he was babbling quickly in Spanish. After asking him to slow down, he explained that he needed money today but that Uber wouldn’t pay him for two more weeks. Therefore, he was going to cancel the Uber ride (claim he couldn’t find us), but he would still drive us to the bus station, and we’d pay him directly in cash.

Photo of 10,000 and 2,000 Argentina pesos bills. // Foto de las billetes de diez mil y de dos mil pesos argentinos
Cold, hard cash. With Argetina’s inflation rate, these bills will probably be worthless by the time you read this blog post. But for reference, in August 2024, 2,000 pesos equaled around US$1.67 and 10,000 pesos equaled around US$8.33.

I told him we just arrived in Argentina and I had no cash, which is mostly true. We carried some U.S. dollars, which he probably would have more than gladly accepted, but the whole thing was awkward. I also didn’t want to make a side deal outside of Uber – who knows who this person is? – so I kept telling him I had no cash and we had just arrived. After some squabbling back and forth, he closed the trunk, canceled the ride, and took off.

Kevin and I were standing on the side of the road, in the sunny heat, with no cash, no cell phone signal, and, most importantly, no ride. I was also confused at what had just happened. (Also, fortunately, Kevin knew not to load the bags in the car until after the guy was done talking—what if we had loaded the bags and then the driver took off?)

The quiet streets of Posadas.

We fired up Uber again and tried to find another driver. It was harder to find a driver, but finally, someone accepted our ride. Kevin and I also started strategizing about what would happen if the second driver asked for the same deal. We hadn’t seen an ATM on the walk to the pharmacy, although we had not tried looking that hard. Would we give someone U.S. dollars? Or would we try bargaining in Paraguayan guaraníes? Or would we try a third driver? Could we walk to the bus station?

Without a solid game plan in place, the second Uber arrived. Ironically, the Uber driver was a taxi driver. Yes, it was a real taxi driver in his City-licensed taxi, but he was using the Uber app to generate additional side income. What a great idea! (Side note: I’m generally impressed at how entrepreneurial Latin Americans are – informal businesses are a way of life for many Latin Americans.)

This time, there was no pushback and no negotiating – phew! We loaded our bags and were finally on our way to the bus station.

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Bus Station Blues

We finally arrived at the Posadas long-distance bus station with a couple of hours to spare before our bus to Buenos Aires (you can read our guide to Argentine bus trips here). I felt relieved that we got to the bus station and relaxed because we had plenty of time to regroup and eat before boarding the bus. But, of course, reality had different plans for us.

The Posadas bus station.

The first thing at the bus station was to look around for food. While there were several fast-food-type places, this is Argentina, so they sold empanadas and milanesas (breaded meat patties). For two gluten-free eaters, this didn’t work for us.

Our next plan was to get WiFi at the bus station to look at Google Maps and find a restaurant near the bus station. But of course, the bus station didn’t have public WiFi. No problem, we thought: we could go to our bus company’s lounge and use the WiFi. So we went upstairs to the lounge and put our stuff down on the leather chairs – what a relief to get that weight off our backs – and then I went to the desk to ask for the WiFi code. And while there was WiFi, the person told me it didn’t work. Ugh!!!!

With no food and WiFi, plan C was to try again buying a SIM card at the bus station. With a SIM card, we’d have mobile data and didn’t need to rely on WiFi. I asked the two cell phone shops at the bus station, and this is where I admit I made a mistake. The two shops told me they could sell me a Claro SIM card but not a Tuenti SIM card. I planned to buy a Tuenti SIM card because 1) it was a lot cheaper online than Claro, and 2) Kevin and I have Tuenti cell phone service in Ecuador, which we love. So instead of just getting the Claro SIM card – because, really, what difference does it make? – I stuck to my guns and doubled down on Tuenti or nothing. In hindsight, I should have just bought the Claro SIM card.

Maybe the bunnies were too cute?

Our final Plan D was to walk onto the main street and see if we could find an open restaurant serving something other than wheat-covered meat. We gathered our bags and stepped onto the main street searching for food. (Side note: we found an ATM on this walk, but it had a long line, which we found puzzling. As we discovered the next day, getting cash out of an ATM in Argentina is not as easy as one would think.)

No sooner than we left the bus station and turned the corner than we found a McDonald’s. Yes! People who travel can relate to that feeling of relief when finding food after tiring travel in an unknown and foreign land. You just want to shed tears of joy knowing you can eat, relax, and regroup. And this McDonald’s had a surprise for Kevin and me: gluten-free buns! (Another surprise was that each small water bottle cost US$2.50 at this McDonald’s.)

Our McDonald’s meal in Posadas, complete with gluten-free buns and Chill Day drinks – drinks we most certainly needed!

The Overnight Bus Trip

There is a daily non-stop flight between Posadas and Buenos Aires, which I could have easily booked. The flight takes just under two hours and lands at Aeroparque, the most convenient airport to central Buenos Aires, instead of Ezeiza out in suburbia. It leaves around 7pm, so it’s perfect timing considering the time crossing the Paraguayan border. And the cost was barely US$100 per person. In other words, the perfect and ideal way to travel from Posadas to Buenos Aires.

But instead, I decided that taking a 13-hour overnight bus trip was the better way to go. I am not sure what exactly I was thinking. Part of me was reminiscing about an overnight bus trip I took during a university trip to Brazil and how easy and relaxed it was. Perhaps I felt that the low cost of the bus tickets plus not having to pay for a room that night was a win-win for the budget. Or that I was enamored with The Motorcycle Diaries aspect of traveling through South America by road, even though I am in my late 30s and not my early 20s.

It seemed like a good idea at the time of purchase…

Regardless of what motivated me to choose the bus over a smooth two-hour plane ride, romantic it was not. The main problem is that I thought the lie-flat seats I booked on the bus would rock me to sleep, much like I remember falling asleep in the car when I was younger. But that didn’t happen. Instead, the bus startled me awake whenever we drove over a pothole. The stopping and starting of the bus at every bus stop throughout the night woke me up to wonder what was happening. To summarize, I didn’t get much sleep at all. (Kevin says he got plenty of sleep, so that’s good for him.)

By the time we got to Buenos Aires, around 8am the following day, I was exhausted. Instead of a relaxing bus ride through the Argentina pampas, sleeping like a baby, it brought back memories of a disastrous overnight train ride Kevin and I took from Paris to Nice in 2015. We couldn’t get the window shade to close in our cabin, so we spent all night awake due to the loud whistling sounds and the lights going by outside. We vowed never to take that train ride again overnight – I should have remembered that train ride harder before booking this bus ride.

Buenos Aires At Last?

Tired and sleepy, we arrived in Buenos Aires around 8:30am. Pulling into the bus station, I realized another mistake we made. Posadas was hot and humid, with a heat index in the 90s. Kevin and I wore short-sleeve shirts and shorts without any problem. Unfortunately, Buenos Aires was chilly, with an arrival temperature near 40 degrees – Fahrenheit, not Celsius. That means we’d have to stand outside the bus waiting for our bags in 40-degree weather, wearing only a shirt and shorts. (Our jackets and pants were in our luggage stored in the bus’s cargo hold.) Although this could have been manageable, I am very cranky when tired, so feeling the chill through the window instantly depressed me.

We arrived! (This mural was painted inside the Puma store in Buenos Aires, hence the drawings of shoes and a puma.)

I told Kevin we should be the last ones off the bus so we could stay inside the warm bus as long as possible and allow others to get their bags first. While I thought this was a good idea, it only prolonged the wait outside. The porters were excruciatingly slow in retrieving bags, primarily because in Argentina, they have to match their luggage tag to your luggage tag before releasing the bag. And, as I had learned the night before in Posadas, the porters expect a cash tip before you leave, which also takes time.

Shivering outside, exhausted from not getting enough sleep, and upset about the whole situation, I definitely questioned my decision-making. I also was upset with myself because I knew better. I knew better than to book an overnight bus journey compared to a quick 90-minute flight. I knew better than to save a few dollars by not getting the Claro SIM chip at the Posadas bus station. And how could I have not thought about wearing a jacket when we knew the weather in Buenos Aires was going to be frigid?

In Conclusion

What actually went wrong is quite mild in terms of what could go wrong. I am definitely being dramatic. But it also wasn’t easy, and in hindsight, I would have chosen to go by plane. The trip was a bit too rough and raw for me, and for us, there was no need since we could have easily afforded the plane tickets to Buenos Aires.

I also made a couple of mistakes during the trip, the primary one not paying for the SIM card at the Posadas bus station. That error would have saved us from a much bigger error when we got to Buenos Aires, which I detail in our next blog post. Stay tuned!

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1 Comment
  1. DA October 14, 2024

    What a nightmare! I can feel it, as I’m reading this blog. There is no way I could’ve done any of that without sleep. If I don’t sleep long enough, or I don’t get to sleep when I’m tired, I’m just a wreck. I can’t function at all. So reading what you went through, resonates with me. I’m so sorry this happened, but now you know for next time. It was really a learning experience, and you wouldn’t have known all this if it didn’t happen………I look at it that way. Also, having cash for too many things would’ve been a disaster for me. I’m not a cash-person. I’m really glad things smoothed out in the end for you two. I’m assuming it took a couple of days to recover from it all. As I said, what a nightmare. Thank god that hospital was there for your Wi-Fi. I’m learning that the “overnight bus trips” aren’t all that great!

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