Buenos Aires audiotours

Buenos Aires was founded in February 1536 by Pedro de Mendoza and abandoned six years later after constant conflict with the Querandies. Juan de Garay refounded it permanently on June 11, 1580, on the south bank of the Rio de la Plata, the world's widest river. The settlement grew into a trading city, then the capital of the Viceroyalty of the Rio de la Plata, then the capital of the Republic of Argentina from 1880. The Portenos, the people of the port, absorbed waves of Italian, Spanish, Jewish, and later other immigration from 1880 to 1930, and became something distinct from both Europe and the rest of Argentina.

The 9 de Julio Avenue is the widest avenue in the world, fourteen lanes of traffic divided by planted medians, with the Obelisco, a 67-metre concrete needle from 1936, at its main intersection.

The Obelisco was built in thirty-one days for the city's fourth centenary and has been controversial, beloved, graffitied, lit in various colours for national events, and occasionally used as a measuring device for crowd estimates ever since. Teatro Colon, the opera house that opened in 1908, is considered one of the finest in the world for acoustic quality and is worth walking past even if you cannot get inside.