Its been a few days, not sure where to start with this, and I am sure to have forgotten loads. The past few days has been our trip to Uruguay. It was all a bit weird...

The weirdness started on Tuesday when we went out to dinner. I had been talking to a french guy in the hostel, and he told me that there was a new tram system running along the docks which would bring us straight to the port for our ferry to Colonia de Sacremento in Uruguay... nice one we wouldnt have to take the subway. Anyway off we trotted to dinner, back to Desnivel (best steak in BA), since I hadnt had a proper one there yet. The steak was undoubtedly lovely, but the weird part was, midway towards the end of our meal, the guy sitting next to us asked if would like to share some of his wine. He could tell we spoke english, since he could hear us, so thought he would ask... he was alone. He was an australian guy, and proceeded to ask if we were english, with a cheeky smile on his face. Baring the details of the entire conversation, he more or less spent the night taking the piss out of us (in a nice enough way), and offering us some of his wine. In the end though we stayed in the restaurant too late and dididnt get a chance to go check out the tram so decided we would just take the subway (sad faces all round).

For the benefit of those who care mostly about us, I will keep the next bit brief and start by saying it all worked out for the best.... We woke up the next morning, Wednesday for those keeping count, and headed off towards the subway nicely on time. Got down to our station, and it wasnt overly busy. THe first train on the other hand was, it was jammers. Regina managed to squeeze on but I simply couldnt fit, so I told her I would try the next carriage.... unfortunately for the morning, I couldnt get on that one either, and even more unfortunately I couldnt get back to tell Regina either, and she couldnt see me. See where this is going??? The next two hours played out like some kind of black and white comedy with people going in one door and out another and all sorts of running around the place in a frenzy with some mad demented music playing in the background... needless to say it was horrible for both of us. I jumped on the next train, and went on to the change over station, no regina. I walked to the next train we needed to take, no regina. I went back, no regina. At this stage I am s***ting myself. I think I must have ran from train to train 4 times before getting on a train backwards (I really didnt want to do that). As I am writing this, I know what happened to Regina so for the sake of some sort of timeline here is her next part (like an episode of 24..). Regina, on her first train, and not knowing where she was going, because I did and therefore she didnt need to... got off at the wrong station, one too many. She waited there for about 15 minutes expecting me to arrive along, then she went backwards, and couldnt find me there either. In the mix up she tried to get back forwards again but left the station and couldnt get back in, I had all the money of course. Since by now she was well flustered someone managed to get her back in the system. She took the wrong direction and waited at the wrong station for a bit (none of this is blame on my behalf, she really didnt know where she was going, and thats my fault). By now, I had managed to find someone who spoke english and got a message in spanish out on the tanoi for a "haygeena", I couldnt even understand what they were saying.... After waiting at that station for a while, and realising there was no way Regina would have heard the announcment, I headed back to the last station we were meant to go to. Regina, at this stage had found someone to tell her how to get to the docks, she remembered I had said it was the B line, and after going in the wrong direction once more, made it as far as the last station and asked for directions to the port. I am speculating here, but since I arrived to the port about 10 minutes after her, and was waiting in the last station for about 10 minutes, we must have been at the station at the same time... very frustrating, and people helping me could tell. I had about 4 people with me helping, one translater and 3 ticket people. I had given them the description of regina, pointing to her hair I said Rojo (red), her face Blanco (white), her rucksack Azul (blue), and with dots on her face (freckles). One of the ticket ladies, asked a cleaner if he had seen anyone like that, and he said yes, he saw a girl with red hair and shorts and dots on her face head out the exit. The lady ran out checking if she might be outside. When she came back she told me that a man at a news agent stand had seen her, she asked for directions. I knew this had to be her, there is only one person in South America matching her description. I ran out the station, and the 5 blocks down the docks to the ferry port. I got to the front door and there she was waiting inside crying her eyes out, with joy and relief and sadness and worry. Ahhhh happy endings, phew, we both genuinely thought we would never see each other again. Our boat was to be at half nine, we entered the subway at about half seven, I arrived at the port a minute too late....

Moving on, we changed our tickets and for an extra 50euro between us got the fast ferry and arrived an hour later, shaken, but not stirred... we were laughing about it by the time we reached Uruguay. As we then walked up to the gates of the old town of Colonia (world heritage site), we overhead some Irish accents, got to talking, and offloaded our story on them. Turned out one of them was from the same street as me in Kilkenny, I dont know her though, she was only a baby of 24... We strolled around for a bit by ourselves (Paraty is a way better kept version of a colonial town). I am sure there is plenty of significance to the town, I wasnt overly impressed however. We went up a light house and an American guy told us we should rent golf buggies and drive up the road to the beach.... intriguing idea I thought... but surely we cant afford it!!!!! We walked around a bit more, and bumped into Mags and her sister who were suprised not to have seen us on the boat... we offloaded our story again, at this stage it is a problem quartered. We let them be and off we walked in search of something to do. Passing by a rental place, we saw dune buggies and golf carts outside... we had to ask.... 15 euro an hour..... vroom vroom vroom!!! All they wanted was a driving license and a credit card as insurance and off we went, tearing around a colonial town in a a golf buggy. This was almost the highlight of the trip so far apart from the morning we had had. We flew around town and off down towards the beach, then back to town and in and around the cobble stoned streets... deadly buzz!!!! At half six we got the bus to Montevideo with Mags and her sister, and again we say our goodbyes (this is the third time we have said goodbye to Mags I think). Off to our hostel to check in, and after a chat with the girl looking after the place, we head for a nearby chipper restaurant to sample the Uruguayan invention of the Chivito (like a burger, but greasier, and bigger, and with s*** loads of stuff on it, and cooked to order in front of you). Back to the hostel and we chat with a few people and get our first taste of the south american tea addiction drink called matte. It tastes like an amsterdam street smells (ive been there, thats how I know). Its a bit bitter, but nice enough. When someone offers it to you, you have to finish it and make a noise at the end, a bubbles noise to show its finished.

The next day we take the bus into town, and go to the old part of town. Nothing special to be honest, we walk around a bit... at this stage it is about 15 degrees and kind of chilly (this is when I buy and write my Uruguay postcard to my Mam btw). We got bored of the old town pretty quickly and headed back to the hostel for some replanning, and decide to walk down the beach to a park. The beach is nice, but covered in dead fish. Montevideo is nice I am sure, just not really the place for sight seeing. The people seemed quite friendly, however some were staring at Regina when she took her fleece off, we had tshirts and shorts and they had jackets and hats. In the afternoon it got much warmer, after the postcard was already written. We stolled around for a while and headed back to the hostel to chill out for the evening. We got bored of chilling out pretty quickly and went to a shopping centre nearby which used to be a prison but was converted, you couldnt really tell from it. Just inside the door was a shop called T.I.T.S (without the dots.. dont ask), amusing to say the least, I think we could have been kicked out for giggling so much (they sell clothes by the way). That evening then we took a walk down to the beach and sat with all the other people looking out to sea. There were loads of people drinking matte, they bring a flask of hot water, their special cup for it, the matte itself, and the silver spoon they use to drink it with. As the sun set, the sky changed from orange to blue and apart from the ships skirting the horizon you couldnt tell where the sea stopped and the sky began.

On friday, our last day in Uruguay, we had more or less seen what needed to be seen in town (nothing really), so headed to the football stadium for a look. It is where the first ever World Cup was held, and Uruguay won it. It is massive, and fits 100,000 people. The guy from the museum asked where we were from and when we told him his three word for us were, St. Patrick, Potatoes and Drink (ok four words if you count st and patrick seperately). He brought us around a bit, and reminded us smilingly that Trappatoni was our manager now?!?!?! and asked if we would like to see the pitch, out we went for a look, epic stuff!!! I think even Regina was impressed.... Back in the museum again we looked at the trophy room, with a replica of the Jules Rimet trophy for the world cup, and off we go again with a final wish of good luck and a curse for the french who cheated us with the "bad hand" of Henry!!!! After the stadium we went down towards the bus station to wait for the bus. We went to a restaurant for dinner, and tried to order steak chips and salad for 2 from the menu, but the waiter wouldnt let us (in spanish), he made us order the steak for 2 with chips and salad for one. I tried to insist but he was having none of it. He was right in the end, even if I could have finished the full one Im sure. The steak was a thin slice of tenderloin, cooked on a parilla (barbeque grill open fire thing), cheese, ham and a fried egg on top (savage). If I ever read this back I may realise that none of that was weird, it definately seemed weird at the time... Regina might fill in some blanks if I have left them (I havent changed the password yet)

Got the ferry back, the slow one this time. We even got a chance to go up on deck to watch the sunset... I watched the sunset with Regina in my arms, Regina watched a child chase a penguin (it was actually a pigeon) around the deck... soooooo rosemantic!!!!! As it was setting, I said jokingly that I would start clapping when it set, and wouldnt you know it, just as the sun set, everyone clapped and me and Regina bust ourselves laughing.... what did they expect would happen????? Well done sun!!! Back in BA, we get the best computer game taxi ride ever, along 5 lane wide streets, through the lanes, around cars, over cars, under lorries, in, out, over, around. Regina was so pale she was see through, I thought it was great fun... so much control over the car!!! And thats the end of that story.... Off to Peru tomorrow, today we are going back to the rose park thing. To save time in Peru I wont describe it later, its a park, with lots of roses.... LOTS of roses, you can all use your imaginations from there..... Til we read again, byeeeee