Uruguay 14 - 24 May

Bs As and Uruguay 14 to 24 May

Sunday 14 May. Collected at Buenos Aires airport (EZE) by the driver who had driven us out there on Thursday. Back to the hostel in about 35 minutes as there's not much traffic. Retrieve our stored luggage and get to our room straight away, even though we're earlier than check in time. Read, do some on line Spanish, have a nap and go for a beer in the garden bar. We have almost no Argentinian cash, and Western Union (with a stonkingly amazing exchange rate compared to getting money from an ATM) offices are shut on Sundays.

The Gibraltar pub, where we had dinner previously, takes Visa cards so we go there for a meal. One of my cards (Starling) plays up, but I'm able to pay with another one. It is odd being in a British pub-type environment and waiting for table service for our drinks instead of ordering and picking up drinks from the bar. I have their delicious Thai Green curry which makes my taste buds very happy. John has steak and chips.   

We talk to an Englishman from Ipswich who is on a sabbatical from his job and travelling on his own until his girlfriend, a teacher, can join him in the UK summer holidays. He has "done" Brazil and Uruguay and loves Buenos Aires. But regrets not learning Spanish before he came to South America - he plans to go to classes once he gets to Columbia, which seems a bit late in the day.

Monday 15 May. Travel today to Uruguay by ferry across the River Plate.    Leave the hostel at 8.30 am in the ropiest Uber I've ever seen. It's a VW 'Gol', a vehicle which, when we first saw them on the road, we thought were Golfs with the 'f' fallen off. Realised eventually there were too many 'Gols' for it to be a faulty 'f', and decided they are a sort of VW Polo. Our Uber has a rear panel missing (actually not MIA, it was in the boot) and we end up with John's day pack in the boot, his rucksack on the front passenger seat, my day pack between us and 15 kgs of my rucksack on my lap. Thankfully it's not too far to the port.

Queue to check in - bizarrely the PA is playing 'God Save the Queen' by the Sex Pistols. Ms Miserable, at check in, points out that we have bought a ticket for today's 10.30 am sailing FROM Colonia in Uruguay TO Buenos Aires which neither of us had noticed on screen or on paper. Cue quiet swearing and pissed off ness, made worse when we're told at the ticket office that the 10.30 am sailing is sold out so we'll have to wait for the 12.50. Buy tickets to go in the right direction and settle down to wait. We have cash for only one round of coffee and the café doesn't take cards. But there's reasonable WiFi so I manage to upload another story to the blog. The slow bits are adding in the pictures and saving the blog at frequent intervals - yesterday I lost an hour's work when the hostel internet had a wobble.

Board the ferry about noon and find a seat - it's only about half full. There are some subdued members of the Club Atletico River Plate football team (they'd lost 2:1 yesterday) near us, with a collection of gold coloured trophy cups. Carrying your trophy in a supermarket shopping bags doesn't quite cut it!

Very smooth and quick crossing which takes just over an hour - the river is so wide here that you can't see either side. The brown smear is Buenas Aires pollution 😟

Colonia hoves into view looking low rise and tranquil. We both get bitten by insects within the first few minutes of disembarking - bienvenido a Uruguay. A 10 minute walk to our hostel, a 'sister' to the one in Buenos Aires, but completely different - the Viajero Hostel Posada B & B. Posada means 'Inn' so its name seems to be covering three options.

There's a courtyard garden and view of the River Plate estuary, rather than party central. But the same level of friendly welcome - albeit a in a noticeably different accent, and in Spanish only. 

Our room is small but has a fridge with water, beer etc, a kettle, cups and saucers and wine glasses. And a bottle of red wine. A check of the price list and we decide to buy and drink supermarket water and wines!

Out to explore the town and go for a late lunch at 'Vintage' restaurant in the old town;  there's a beer on the menu called 'Patricia' which I have to order to drink a toast to my late mother, Pat. 😍

Look around some of the old town - noisy with parakeets in the palm trees - and some of the new. All very clean and pleasant. Call at an ATM for US dollars and for Uruguayan pesos and then to a supermarket for bottled water, crackers and some wine. As we expected prices are definitely more expensive than in Argentina. 

Back to the hostel to nap, read, watch TV and drink wine.

Tuesday 16 May. Have breakfast at the hostel, to the bus terminal to buy tickets for tomorrow, and head out to explore the Barrio Historico. Through the squares

visit the church

stop for a coffee, visit the theatre and its gardens

to the yacht moorings, and wander up the plane tree lined streets - I do like an avenue of plane trees. It is still very warm during the day, 2 or 3 degrees over 20° C even though it's autumn.

Back to the hostel later to read, and study on the Spanish app. John watches a movie about Michael Jordan and Nike.   

In the evening we go out for dinner at a restaurant called Charco. Hot and cold running wait staff - there seems to be a different person every time someone comes to the table. Good food - John has a steak and then a 'volcan' of dulce de leches, I have grilled fish (three pieces) and then lime tart (like a pastry free lemon meringue pie). With a bottle of local wine from 2002 which is very good. Not cheap, but an excellent meal.

Wednesday 17 May. Breakfast, pack and leave our bags at the hostel while we go out for a last wander and coffee in the Barrio Historico. 

Walk 15 minutes to the bus terminal and the bus leaves at 2.00 pm. Gently rolling fields with beef and milk cattle, fairly green though we learn that there has been a drought for some time (as there has been in Argentina). Arrive in Valdense at 3.00 pm and are collected by Miguel from El Galope, the estancia where we're spending three nights. Drive through the town of Nueva Helvecia which was settled by Swiss immigrants in the 1860s. The landscape is definitely not Swiss!

El Galope is a small estancia with four horses, an excited Boxer dog called Thor and a cat, and is run by Miguel and Monica. They are trying to sell the estancia after 30 years here and 18 years running the riding side, but without success so far.

I groom and go for a ride on Jazz, with Miguel. 

It's probably five years, since I was on a horse and Jazz is a bit broad across the back so my legs suffer. She has a smooth trot but a lumpy canter, and is very willing - I don't have to use the crop I've been given at all. 

After an hour I've had enough and dismount to trembling legs and shaking knees - obviously I'm not as fit as I thought. But we've seen lots of birds including burrowing owls, red crested cardinals, grouse and southern lapwing.

Red crested cardinal

We are served dinner in the kitchen area of the guest quarters - John gets meat, I have a very good lentil stew, plus a bottle of (Argentinian) red wine.

Guest kitchen/diner

Thursday 18 May. I didn't sleep well as my legs are aching from the ride. All those muscles that hadn't been used for so long! Nice day which we spend reading, doing Spanish and writing the blog. After lunch two more guests arrive, Matthew and Jonathan, from Vancouver, Canada who are in South America for an 18 day vacation. They are going for a ride, but one has ridden a few times before and the other never. John and I groom three horses and retreat when Miguel starts the lesson.

Matthew and Jonathan enjoy their ride (got to trot, I think) though I'm not sure if they'll do it again. In the evening the four of us share a cheese fondue, some wine, and have a good chat.  

Friday 19 May another quiet day, doing even less than on Thursday.  Comfy sofas!

The weather has changed and it is cloudy and cooler than before at mid to high teens. Miguel takes the Canadians to Valdense to get the mid day bus to Colonia.  John and Thor getting on very well.

Monica says that Miguel and she have to go to Montevideo tomorrow, leaving at 5.00 am, so that Miguel can have some pain killing injections in his lower back. Their daughter, who lives in Montevideo, was going to accompany him but she has flu so can't do so. We have the choice of leaving with them before dawn or getting a taxi to town to get our (already booked on line) bus at noon. We opt for the latter and promise to turn off the gas and the hot water, and not to let the dog escape.

There's some rain at last which sounds loud on the roof. Miguel had said that normally they grow enough grass in the summer to make sufficient hay to sell to other farmers, but this year, because of the drought, they didn't have enough grass to have hay for themselves. The horses are being fed a soy supplement four times a day as there's so little for them to eat.

Have dinner with Monica and Miguel - they're coming to Europe in August and September this year so we might see them in Ireland or London. They'll be staying in a flat in London about half a mile from where we lived in Kensal Green! We agree to send some suggestions for local restaurants and 'must see in London', though it's seven years since we lived there so our 'restaurant' information is not really current.

Saturday 20 May. Wake up 'in charge' of El Galope - Thor the dog, and the cat both seem anxious, and are pleased to see us as are probably not used to both mum and dad heading off and leaving them. 

We pack and have breakfast and at 10.45 say goodbye to the animals and walk down to the main gate.  

Our taxi picks us up at 11.00 am and takes us to the Cot bus stop in Valdense. Bit of a wait (faithful readers may have noticed that yes, we're "travelling", but this can involve a lot of hanging around, waiting for the next step) and then we're off to Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay and, in the wider metropolitan area, home to almost half of Uraguay's population of 3.4 million.  

The journey takes about an hour and three quarters and we arrive around 2.00 pm. The bus seems quite overstaffed with a driver, a luggage loader/ unloader and a 'conductor' who checks our tickets. The luggage chap makes himself useful on the journey when he releases a lady who gets stuck in the on board loo. Cue merriment all round including the lady herself (and no, it wasn't me).

Get a taxi from the bus terminal to our Airbnb in the old quarter. The streets seem very quiet.  

Use the code to get into the building. We'd picked an eccentric looking Airbnb and it doesn't disappoint - the cleaner is there who hands over the keys and gives us a lightening fast tour. There's a three storey glass roofed area shared with other flats (we never saw anyone else) 

and we have a kitchen/ diner, bathroom with washing machine and a bedroom that has a scent of wood smoke, the biggest free standing wardrobe ever and a comfy bed with sheets that are impossible to keep tucked in. The decor is brick n beams with random light switches.

Head out to a local shop to buy supplies - it's quite chilly and we regret not wearing jackets. Buy the makings of dinner and some clothes washing liquid and head back to create dinner, do some laundry and research Montevideo buses.

Sunday 21 May we catch a bus from near our flat to the Plaza de Los Treinta Tres and walk to a Sunday market, the Feria de Tristan Narvaja. It covers a number of streets and seems to sell everything you need - fresh fruit and vegetables, pasta, meat, clothes, joss sticks, marijuana seeds (smoking dope is legal in Uraguay for locals, but not for foreigners), electrical goods, antiques and kitchen products. 

We buy some fruit and vegetables, and call in at a bakery for bread and empanadas. The empanadas come with many different fillings and have pastry numbers on them to identify the fillings eg mine (tuna and olive) is no. 27.

Uruguay is the country where the most yerba mate is consumed per capita in the world. "Mate” is the name of the gourd container in which an infusion of hot water and yerba is made and then sipped through a cane or metal straw.

People carry a gourd and thermos of hot water everywhere in Montevideo, normally tucking the thermos under their arm. Some people have a special carrier that takes the thermos and gourd. 

However drinking mate on the bus is not allowed (elf and safety)

Decide to walk the 3 Kms back to the apartment so that we can pick up a few more items at a supermarket en route. My legs are still aching from riding so it's a bit of a hobble. 

The architecture is interesting but not in the same class as the best bits of Buenas Aires.

Monday 22 May today is a public holiday commemorating the battle of Las Piedras (when 'Uruguayan revolutionaries…. defeated Spanish imperialists') so again the city seems very quiet. We go for a walk along the Ramblas, the streets that follow the shore line, around the old city. Lots of people out fishing and the sea walls are lined with rods. 

We are looking for the Buquebus office that Google maps tells us is on the Rambla 25 de Agosto 1825, so that we can buy a ferry ticket to Buenos Aires. Not hugely surprised to find no such ticket office, but, when we're hanging around the entrance to the dock area we're rescued by a helpful woman who gets us into the dock area and points us to the Buquebus ticket and check in office. 

Buy the tickets for Wednesday morning (going in the right direction) and walk back through the old town, some of which is pedestrianised.  

Tuesday 23 May a pleasant day today at 21C°. We're going to a different area of Montevideo today to visit a lighthouse (the southern most tip of Uraguay) and yacht club. There's no metro or rail system in the city so we again take the bus. There's a complex fare structure and it's more expensive if you pay by cash instead of the bus card. Our bus driver is female, the first we've seen anywhere in South America.  

To the lighthouse, El Faro de Punto Carretas which is a. shut today and b. IMHO not very big or impressive.

The shore here is lined with tall apartment blocks and hotels and it is clearly quite a smart area.

Catch another bus and go to the Yacht Club Uruguayo further north east along the coast. Some definite yachtie types having lunch and we - after accidentally telling the waitress we were going to eat - have a beer and a lemonade and check out the boats moored in the marina. Fortunately John doesn't fall in love with any of them.  

Bit of a faff getting a bus back and we mess around between two bus stops. After more than half an hour we walk away from a bus stop to summon an Uber when our bus appears and we have to jog back. Bus driver clearly underwhelmed when I give him 105 Uruguayan pesos in small change (we're at that stage of a trip when you're scrabbling for the last of the coins and small notes as you don't want to take out any more of that country's cash) for a 2 X 52 Uraguayan pesos fare. I'm not crazy about a 1 peso coin in change either (about 2 UK pence).

On the way back we drive through a Plaza where there are many pictures displayed on A4 sheets of the 'disappeared' - people who were detained and disappeared under the military dictatorship, in 1973-1985.

In the evening we walk to the Montevideo Wine Experience to do some wine tasting, which I'm looking forward to but, sadly, it's shut, as are many of the bars and restaurants we passed yesterday. Go instead to Poolish (it means a type of bread dough), and have an early dinner. At least it's warm enough to sit outside. John has a chivito, a sandwich which is apparently the national dish of Uruguay, and I have a vegetarian lasagna, and we share a bottle of Uraguayan red wine made from Marselan grapes which we like very much.

Wednesday 24 May the thunderstorm that was threatened last night didn't happen but it's overcast today. Up early to pack and leave the flat at 8.30 am to walk to the port which takes about 20 minutes. Check in our luggage, queue for and go through Uruguay passport control and then sit quietly for some time until it's time to queue again, to board the ferry. Definitely raining now. Not that many people on board and it's a bit of a bumpy crossing but wave piercing technology is a wonderful thing. 

Through immigration, and then customs where I hand over an orange and an avocado that I'd carried with me from Montevideo. Duuh. Chaotic in the car park outside the terminal but eventually our Uber turns up. We agree - once we're safely out of the car - that he's a newbie and didn't seem at all confident with his sat nav, especially when changing lanes on a seven (or it might have been eight - I'd shut my eyes at that point ) lane street.

Anyway, safely in the area of Palermo, which is whole lot smarter than where we were staying before in the hostel. We've rented an Airbnb 5th floor flat which has a balcony (it's still 21°C in the day) and most mod cons. Short on hooks to hang bath towels, and on kitchen equipment, and has an inadequate/ dangerous oven where the door is warped and doesn't shut properly but comfy otherwise.

To Western Union for cash and find one that's working at our second attempt, then to a couple of supermarkets for dinner supplies.