Hola All,
Sitting on the docks at Buenos aires we looked across the bay and thought - lets just pop into another country for another stamp in the passport (stamp collectors?). So we did. Dumped our winter gear in the storage room of the hostel and book our ferry tickets.
Next day jumped aboard the ferry to Colonia, Uruguay, and settled in for the 3hr trip and arrived in ... 1hr. Oh yes. Should have paid a little more attention to the lonely planet. First problem was no camping ground so we were both lugging our big packs for no particular reason other than the love of carring weight for nothing. Yes we did our research. The guidebook was written in 2008 and the camping ground closed in 2006 - think they need to do some research.
Had to check into a hostel. Wasn´t too bad. Was an old spanish mansion with lots of space to relax. Was about 30 deg C.
Went to get some urugauyan peso from the ATM and found that our card was not being accepted. Doh. Luckily had a couple of hundred US so changed them to get out of trouble.
Wandered around the old UNESCO town. Was origionally a portuguese settlement before the spanish wrecked it. Lovely cobbled streets and even has it´s own moat minus the water. Pretty small area and we had finished looking in about 2hrs.
Uruguay is so much more laid back than Argentina. Shorts, t-shirts and thongs are fairly common rather than the fashion outfits worn in Buenos aries. They also seem to like their food a lot :-)
The thermos under the arm and mate (mar-tay) in hard is almost a signature item of the men in the town. Some ladies as well. It is the equivalent of a cup of tea but has a siver perferated straw and sounds like a bong being smoked when drunk.
Scooters are the prefered transport in town. Local all over the place riding them drinking their mates.
Good news. Ran into another australian, living in london, who had vegemite, finishing her trip, was going to throw it out and she gave it to us. Vanessa sniffed it out (and sniffed it) by asking whether you buy vegemite in the UK as ours had run out. Good work.
Went looking for a supermarket and eventually found one about 1km away. Later found one about 20m from the hostel. Doh. Uruguay is cheap. We bought ourselves a big box of chocolates (US$3.5), some lemonade (US$1.5) and a BIG steak that flopped over the sides of a regular plate costing (US$1.5), some healthy vegetable for Vanessa and bread. Even a bottle of wine for (160 uruguayan pesos or US$6). Yes the last of the big spenders...
Watched a magic sunset that lasted forever. Well not quite but as it set over Buenes aires there was plenty of smog to make the sunset spectacular.
Sat in the main square of the town, drinking wine, listening to a jazz band playing in a restuarant. Full moon, no wind, nice and warm, lighthouse blinking away silently. The band even played blue moon. Two glasses of red and it was all oven for me. Out of practice.
Today. Caught the bus to Montevideo. 2.5 hrs. Buggers locked the toilet on the bus. Vanessa said I could have asked them to unlock it. Uncivilised.
Have looked around Montevideo and can safely say that it is well.... yet another boring city. Bad luck Montevideo we have been to Buenos Aires. Only interesting bits, other than the australian like hick locals, are the misspelt plaques on the fountain in one of the plaza´s and the old architecture. Especially the palacio salva on the plaza indepencia.
Not much to hold us here other than the cheap and BIG steaks.
We will be leaving tomorrow and heading back to Buenos aires on bus.
Adios,
David & Vanessa
