On Monday 9th September George, Gerard and I bid farewell to our hostel friends who we felt we had spent months with and I took the ferry across to Colonia in Uruguay. It only took 1 hour and cost 300 pesos with Seacats.

Colonia is a really cute town to wonder around and a great place to recuperate, relaxing in the sun (28 degree heat) on the hostels rooftop, grabbing lunch in a cute cafe with some live music, climbing 130 steps to reach the top of the lighthouse, attempting to jog along the uneven cobbled streets and of course we could not resist watching the sunset on the peer with a few beers! It has a nice little sandy beach close to the main centre too. I think all three of us could have easily got sucked into the very easy and relaxing lifestyle Colonia had to offer. We even extended our stay a little longer and didn't leave for Montevideo until Wednesday afternoon. The bus was only 2 and a half hours so I had 2 hours of listening to Georges Spanish audio CD whilst laughing at the nodding dog (Gerard) who was falling asleep. There was not much to see on the way apart from a few residential areas which were full of houses made of rubble. So this is how the poor people live here...

Montevideo is much bigger than I expected but not as interesting or as beautiful as I had imagined. I'm not sure why I pictured something very different, but here it's just another town...with more buildings, more cars (some very old and some like back home), and lots of people. There really isn't too much here so we have wondered around the city, chilled in the hostel, learnt more Spanish and booked the bus up to Posadas (just 300 pesos, 15 hour bus journey on EGA bus). Unfortunately the Saturday bus was fully booked so we have to stay around here until Wednesday now which is a little frustrating but we will just travel east and visit Punta del Este for a couple of days to see what that city has to offer. Regarding the travel scene, it's pretty damn quiet in the hostels, most dorm rooms are empty and most people are from South America travelling for just a week or so. It has been really nice travelling with George and Gerard so far. They are both sound lads, full of banter and really chilled, i think we work well as a group so glad they have let me join them for a bit!