South American Gays Organize Own Gay Cruise!
Buenos Aires waterfront from Puerto Madero © Randall Shirley
If you’ve been to Argentina, you know Buenos Aires has become one helluva gay-friendly town. (And was it just me…or were an unusually high proportion of the men there very, very easy on the eyes?)
I digress. Just as we’ve recently seen happen in Europe, we now see gay South Americans organizing their own gay cruise. Their cruise is called EGO, and it will sail from Buenos Aires to only 2 points in Uruguay (gay-popular Punta del Este and the capital city, Montevideo). I personally think this is a great way for them to test the waters, and frankly a longer South America cruise might be financially out of reach for some Argentinians (their economy has never really come back from its collapse in 2000).
The cruise ship MSC Opera (Photo Courtesy MSC Crociere)
I’ve been able to find one English language website selling this cruise, and rates start around US $1,150, which is VERY steep for a five-night cruise, even an all-gay one, especially since they’re not really promoting it with any additional gay entertainment. The organizers have a Spanish language Facebook page here.
If you have not traveled in South America, it’s worth noting that the most Argentinos do not speak much English (nor should they be expected to). Traveling there will require every bit of Spanish you’ve ever learned, and the dialect spoken in Buenos Aires is nothing like the Mexican Spanish most North Americans are familiar with (they call it Castillano). But you get used to it.
The ship is the MSC Opera, an Italian company little-known to most North American cruisers. (If you’ve sailed them, I’d love to hear about the experience). The ship looks gorgeous.
The ship sails December 12, 2011. Booking available via this link.
Scott Smith is discussing.
Scott Smith 9:57 pm on May 12, 2011 Permalink |
In 2006 we docked next to the MSC Lyrica and had a chance to talk to some of the psgrs. They all liked it a lot and seemed to be very Italian in spirit and LOTS more formal than ours which was the Celebrity Constellation.