We made a quick detour into Uruguay – literally we spent three days in its capital city, Montevideo – to see what it was like. We took the ferry from Buenos Aires to Colonia, and then a bus to Montevideo.
Once we arrived, we took the public bus into the city and walked to our hostel (which was not great – unclean and generally pretty noisy. Thankfully it was the only really tough part of days in Uruguay). This experience helped highlight a couple of things we experienced in Uruguay (click on any of the photos to see more):
- People are super-nice here. As in, the older man whom we asked for directions actually got off the bus with us, found our street, told us which direction to go, and made sure we were all set before he got back on a bus to continue on his way.
- Everyone drinks mate. And they have this special way of carrying the mate stuff (cup, thermos, metal straw/spoon, and ground mate):
- They have a really cool monument to one of their great generals, Jose Artigas. It’s underground in the central plaza, so during the intense summer heat (temps here were in the high 80s every day), it’s a great place to cool off for a few minutes.
- They do parilla al legno (barbeque on a wood fire) here; in Buenos Aires it’s all parilla al carbon (barbeque on charcoal). I like al legno better.
Oh, check out the photos above to find the following:
- An ice-skating pengiun
- Some amazing ocean-side sunsets
- The Teatro Solis, one of the most accoustically-perfect theaters in the world
