Uruguay was never big on our hit list of countries to discover in South America. We didn't know much about it other than it being the home country of that dirty biting swine Louis Suarez. However thanks to the flight we had just made to Florianapolis the week before, it seemed logical to continue down the East coast of the continent, through some of the unknown (at least to us) places along the Uruguayan coast on our way to Argentina.


We only stopped at most places for one night so this post will quickly sum up a few places. The journey itself to Uruguay was a long one. It was our first experience of an overnight coach on this trip (6 hours on one coach followed by 12 on the next) and to be honest it wasn't all that bad, they served us food, we had nice big comfy seats and we saved on a night's accomodation!


Punta Del Este


Our first stop in Uruguay.
This is Uruguay's version of a party town. Lots of bars, a nice golden beach and very geared up for Argentine holiday makers in the summer. Apparently celebrity's and footballers are often spotted in the clubs of Punta Del Este. Unfortunately when we were there it was cold, windy and midweek, so there was no partying and definitely no beach time to be had.

There was plenty of time though for David to practice his Spanish! Since the South of India David has been pretty much addicted to an IPhone app/game called Duolingo that teaches Spanish. So for the last few weeks David has been very excited about using his new found Spanish phrases and he has been busy preparing himself to seemlessly blend into conversations with all the Spanish speaking natives of the South American countries we plan to visit. Claire could sit back and relax now, confident that David's fluent Spanish would easily ensure that travelling for the next 6 months would be simple and hassle free.

So for the first language test, after checking into the hostel (in English) we made our way to the shops as we, well Claire, needed some bronzer (make-up). Now this would normally be a difficult task anyway for David, even in a shop in England, but in Spanish it was much harder. It is now clear that David's actual knowledge of Spanish is way less than the level he has been claiming to possess. That is unless it is correct Spanish to simply shout "BRONZER" in a ridiculous accent whilst tapping your face in the motion of putting make up on.

We are determined though to learn a lot of the language as we continue with our travels so we will keep you updated on out progress but for now it is a definite fail!

The most interesting thing we saw in Punta Del Este was the 'Big Hand' sculpture that comes out of the sand on the main beach. Apart than that and watching a few of the shivering surfers in the ocean that's all we really saw of the town. We're sure it's much livelier in the Summer or at weekends.


Barra De Valizas.


This is a small beach town that again gets really busy in the summer (3 months away). The town has a gorgeous seemingly endless white sandy beach with sand dunes that rise steeply just inland, quirky little wooden houses and shacks on dusty quiet lanes. There's isn't really that much to do once you've had a quick wander around the streets and along the beach, apart from relax and just absorb the Uruguayan countryside.

A sweet old lady ran the hostel. Well, she was sweet until the morning Claire had a shower. The lady pulled open the shower curtain to start a full blown conversation in Spanish to a very naked very startled Claire. It proved very difficult to explain that this was not normal for us and for some reason we don't think its likely to be very normal for the rest of Uruguay either.


Cabo Polonio


Cabo Polonio is one of Uruguay's wildest areas and is definitely one of the most interesting places we have visited.

Cabo Polonio is a 'hamlet' located on the eastern coast with a population of 95 residents. It definitely has a 'hippie' community type feel where the residents have refused any type of development for the last 50 years or so and therefore it has no roads or sewerage, no electricity or fresh running water, and wind power and a few generators are used to power some of the posadas and grocery store. The few hundred houses which are dotted along the beach and nestled within the dunes are mainly wooden shacks where the residents obtain water from nearby water wells or collect rainwater and at night live by candlelight. There is just one shop that sells fruit, veg and some meat, a couple of small restaurants, a few hostels/hotels and a lighthouse.

There are no roads leading to it from the main highway so we had to climb aboard a huge 4x4 truck that took us 7km across the sand dunes to get to the coastal village.

The big attraction, other than the collection of somewhat quirky residents is the natural reserve of one of the largest sea-lion colonies in South America. The seals have made the rocks and boulders that lie at the tip of the peninsula underneath the lighthouse their home and there are literally hundreds of sea lions and fur seals swimming in the ocean or basking on the rocks. It was incredible! We attempted to get quite close to a baby one to see if we could pick it for a quick cuddle or even bring it home with us, but as we got near some rangers came over and explained quite quickly that sea-lion cuddling or stealing isn't encouraged. We think this is appalling. You would think that rangers are there to help and protect the animals. The baby that we approached clearly wanted to be cuddled and brought back to the UK, but those rangers deprived it. We will be writing a formal complaint to the appropriate authorities.


Following a day of wildlife watching, sitting around on the beach and witnessing one of the most spectacular sunsets we have ever seen we were invited to join another group of travellers who were having a few beers around a campfire. All in all it was a pretty good day!


Montevideo

The capital of Uruguay which is described as a vibrant and eclectic city that has a rich cultural life. To us it was all about steak and bank cards.

We simply had to eat at the Mercado Puerto. It is a famous market near the river which has a selection of awesome parillas (BBQ restaurants). We ordered a mixed grill which was pretty much a whole cow of steaks that we didn't even realise existed between the two of us. Of course we ate the lot.

We didn't do much else or see much else of the city. It seemed very much the same as any other city. We used it as a bit of a chance to catch up on washing and jobs etc.

We (David) also chose this city to be the one in which we (David) lost our one and only bank card! The problem is in Uruguay that the ATMs give you the cash first, then the card, whereas we (David) are much more used to getting the card first and then the cash. And so when drawing our some money we (David) took out the cash in the wallet and walked away forgetting the bank card and leaving it to be swallowed by the machine.

Interestingly, on our last big trip 6 years ago in Thailand we (David) managed to do the exact same thing two days in a row. There will be none of that this time though because we only had one card this time so there's no chance we (David) can do it again.

The good news about this situation is that it gave us another chance to use his awesome Spanish. He managed to correctly explain to the bank that we (David) lost it in the card machine the day before, and he was also able to understand that there was nothing the bank could do as all lost cards are destroyed. The fact that we understood all that information really shows our Spanish is coming along, so it's actually a good thing that we (David) lost our one and only bank card and thus are now unable to access our cash! Well done us (David)!


Colonia Del Sacramento


This was the last stop on our whistle stop tour of Uruguay and by the far the prettiest place we visited in the country. Colonia was originally founded by the Portuguese in 1680 and evokes old Lisbon with its Portuguese influence. It was mainly used for smuggling in illegal treats like wine, fine foods and no doubt slaves. It is filled with cobbled streets, old picturesque colonial buildings and lots of really pretty restaurants line the colourful cobbled courtyards overlooking the river. There's a big lighthouse, a nice beach and a craft market. Its just a very very pretty and perfect town for a quiet day wandering round in the sunshine. That, and bumping into school friends with whom you haven't seen or spoken to for 16 years!

Alison Howarth is an old school friend of David's. Thanks to the wonders of Facebook we had seen that Alison was in South America for the last month or two and a while back we had suggested meeting up if we cross paths. Which is literally what we did as we reached a street crossing on our wander around Colonia. It took no time at all to decide that a beer was needed to have proper catch up. Alison has spent the last two months travelling down from Ecuador and when we met her, her other half Sam had just met up with her for the last two weeks of her trip. It was quite surreal to have a mini reunion in an old colonial town on the other side of the world and it was great to hear all about the amazing things she's done on her trip that we can now simply copy! We will definitely have to meet up for another beer when get back in the much less surreal Barrowford.

So that's pretty much our trip around Uruguay. It's been nice and pleasant with some spots of interest. There's nothing really that stands out as an amazing site or anything, but the general feel of the country and the friendliness of the people make up for that. It's definitely a nice way to get from Brazil to Argentina and no ugly footballers bit us which was nice.

And now we head to Argentina.


Things we have learned
1 Selling eggs singularly is the way forward
2 Showering with no locked door can be dangerous
3 The cash comes out before the card in Uruguay

Things Claire has said
"That looks like the Italian flag."
Immediately followed by
"What is the Italian flag?"


Planes used - 11
Buses/coaches used - 44 (+10)
Trains used - 24
Metros/subways used - 39
Cars used - 9
Minivans - 10
Russian Campervans used -1
Horses used - 1
Camels used - 1
Taxis used - 13
Cable cars used - 1
Bicycles used- 2
Tuk tuks/autorickshaw used - 31
Scooters used - 6
Elephants used - 0
Ferrys used - 4
CycleRickshaw - 1
Bamboo HouseBoat - 1
Tour Boat - 1
Combi Van - 2
Huge 4x4 Truck Thingys - 2 NE