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Steve and Emma's Travel Tales

Day Trip to Uruguay

URUGUAY | Friday, 20 July 2012 | Views [548]

We awoke before the alarm despite it being set alarmingly early (!) as we had to get to the ferry terminal for our boat to Uruguay.  Now you know Steve loves to add to that list of countries so there was no way he was going to look past the opportunity to sneak another one onto the list!  We’d specifically chosen a weekday to go as we’d heard the ferry gets mobbed of a weekend but little did we know we would be landing in Argentina for the school holidays!  So yes the terminal was packed and once again immigration proved to be less than efficient.  We eventually got through but there were lines of people behind us so we knew the ferry wouldn’t be leaving on time.  Against the odds it was only 30mins late in departing.

We’d gone for the 3-hour slow boat as; a) it was a lot cheaper & b) we thought it would be nice to sit out on deck and take in the views.  Hmm….. what views?  As we left port we got great views of the city but as soon as the city as disappeared into the layer of haze hanging over the city we couldn’t see a thing.  Well that’s not quite true there was lots of sky and water.  It turns out that the River Plate boasts the widest river delta in the world and we’re not going to argue with them.  We kept having to remind ourselves that we were just crossing a river as it really did feel like we were way out at sea.  After a couple of hours we started to spy land again as near the Uruguayan side there are islands dotted along the coast. 

I still haven’t explained what had tempted us to pop over the water.  We landed in Colonia del Sacramento which is not only a nice, quiet town in its own right but boasts an old walled city that has been awarded UNESCO heritage status.  All the queuing and going through the hassle of immigration again so soon proved to be worth it.  Colonia is all old world, squat cottages, prominent lighthouse, cobbled traffic free streets and claims the oldest church in Uruguay.  The weather was glorious again and we thoroughly enjoyed pottering around.  We decided to treat ourselves to a meal out and found a traditional, alfresco style café with tables scattered under the trees, parakeets fluttering about and the sun beaming down keeping us nice and warm.  The food was very tasty and we just couldn’t resist washing it down with a glass of the local vino blanco.  All very refined and not something the year out budget will allow us to do very often this trip.  I reckon I deserved after working hard for the last 7 years!

 

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