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Uruguay
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Uruguay, ***, Monday July 9th-13th, 2007...Maccie Ds in capital of Uruguay Montevideo.
Only spent four days in the whole country of Uruguay so I can´t say that I know a whole lot about the country, but for me, Uruguay is very similar to Argentina in many ways.
In fact, Uruguay could BE Argentina...on paper at least. They drink the Argentine "national drink" Mate; they speak Spanish with the same Porteno accent; they have been dancing Tango for as long as the Argentineans; the tradition of the gaucho (a type of South American cowboy) existed in Uruguay before Argentina; they have just as much graffitti on their buildings AND they have the great beef....Yet Uruguay lacks the Panache and flamboyancy of its neighbour.
Take its capital city Montevideo (Wed July 11th-12th, 2007, ***, Had Maccie Ds, the lot) for example...While it has many of the same Parisian-style colonial buildings, it doesn´t have the wide, stately avenues of Buenos Aires, the people aren´t quite as chic and every once in a while, you spot a man on a horse and trap collecting rubbish from the bins...It just doesn´t, quite simply, have the "oomph" factor of Buenos Aires....
This lack of glitz and glam and, let´s face a lack of tourist pulling natural attractions, probably accounts for the fact that Uruaguay sees substantially less tourists than Argentina. The fact that many people around the world don´t even realise it is a country, despite the fact that it attained independence in 1828, can probably be explained by the fact that Uruguay never had world-famous First ladies or cocaine-addicted footie players to propel it into the world news.
The most visited city in Uruguay is Colonia del Sacramento (Monday July 9th-10th, 2007. ***, No Maccie Ds or the likes. surprisingly enough) which is where we made our first stop.This little city is very popular with Portenos and tourists for day trips from Buenos Aires. It was first founded by the Portuguese settlers from Brazil in 1680 and was an important centre for smuggling British goods across the Rio de la Plata into Spanish coloniees in the 17th Century.
The historical neighbourhood has been declared a Unesco Patrimonial Cultural site. It has a lot of Brazilian architecture but it is very small and after three hours, you are ready to leave. I imagine that it is beautiful in the summer time beside the water, but it doesn´t have the same allure when your hands aren´t ready to fall off with the cold.
The following day, we headed to an estancia nearby where we spent one night (Tuesday July 10th-11th, 2007. ****) An estancia is a farm managed by the afore-mentioned Gaucho. As already stated, Uruguay´s passion for rural life began long before Argentina´s, as far back as 1603 in fact, when the first shipment of cattle and horses were sent to the Banda Oriental. This is why we chose to spend our time on an Estancia in Uruguay rather than Argentina. It also helped that it was considerably cheaper.
While we only did an hour of horse riding cos it was soo bloody damn cold, we got a en-suite room with four beds and an open fire, brekkie and a few cups of hot choc for 17USd. Good going.
We left Montevideo in Uruguay on the Thursday night to head on a 16 hour bus to Florianopolis in Southern Brazil, hoping to catch a few rays of sun before Collins´departure.
And so we said goodbye to yet another country. Uruguay is worth visiting for a few weeks but you´re better off going in summer when you can head to some of the resorts like Punta del Este. .
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