Colonia & Montevideo (Uruguay) - Week 27
20th - 23rd March
It was a strange feeling leaving Buenos Aires. We had grown fond of the city and had a really great time there. It was good to unpack the backpacks for 10 days and have our own space after cliquey tw*ts (insert 'i' or 'a' as you feel necessary) making loads of noise in the hostels we have stayed in the big cities. So it was a little sad to leave, but exciting to be going to a new country and soon to be in Brazil!!
We took the Busquebus boat across the Rio Plata Estuary, which was surprisingly wide almost as wide as the English Channel, to Colonia in Uruguay. It was a massive contrast compared to BA as it was so little, quiet and peaceful. We stayed in Hostel EspaƱa, an colonial old house with courtyard, for about 6 quid a night.
Colonia itself it very picturesque, with low colonial style buildings and old churches on a little peninsula out into Rio Plata. It was founded in 1680 by the Portuguese, Colonia was later disputed by the Spanish who settled on the opposite bank of the river at Buenos Aires. The colony kept changing hands from crown to crown ordering punch-up after punch-up, with lots of treaties signed. The British in the early 1800s used it as a base to smuggle items into Buenos Aires, probably packets of Benson & Hedges knowing the Brits!
More disturbing was the Uruguayan traditional school uniform which consisted of a science apron and a crazy Reg Holdsworth blue bow tie. All the kids from 4 to 14 seemed to be wearing it without exception or embarrassment...
As it is only a little place we moved onto Montevideo after a couple of nights. We were looking forward to going to MV as it does have a famous name. It is a good place to hang out and explore for a couple of days but it is quite small, but then Uruguay is the second smallest country in South America and so its capital was never going to be able to compete with fascinating Buenos Aires. The Uruguayan people were very proud though, probably with all the previous to-ing and fro-ing between Spain & Portugal over the years. Their main man, Artigas, (who was pointed out to us by two people the two times we walked past his statue in one of the "picturesque" squares of Montevideo) roused the population to revolution and formed Uruguay.
We found some interesting buildings though, the above being probably the worst and amazingly allowed to be built in their main square! There was the brother of the Palacio Robalo in BA, built at the same time and designed in a very similar style by the same architect. The architect's idea was that the lighthouse at the top of both buildings could be seen from each other, but in reality with the curvature of the earth over 20 odd miles it was not possible to see the light.
Just before we got to Uruguay they played host to George W, which went down as well as expected with the Latin Americans! Chavez went to Buenos Aires at the same time to have a dig at the American Regime, so unsurprisingly we found this welcome graffiti all around the city...
One of the most memorable events in MV was the going to another Tango night. This time singing and no dancing, which pleased James as there was minimum chance of the need to have to get on the dance floor.
The singers were both very passionate, lots of volume and lots of gusto, which probably made up for the obvious lack of outright talent. As we were most likely the only non-locals in there we had the delight of one of their tango singers on their night off coming and talking/singing at us. Interesting chat ensued, more proud Uruguayan passion, and singing (with passion) to Katie, much flirting and completely ignoring James!! Still the evening ended well as we went to the Casino afterwards were Katie with a 10 quid stake (big money on a traveling budget) won big time on the Roulette Wheel!! Well she covered the drinks bill for the night...
The next evening we were due to get the bus into Brazil and so we decided to make sure we had a big lunch, any excuse! The old covered market area was turned into a huge BBQ meat area with more than 30 grill/restaurants packed into the old market. All the locals were in there crowding round the barbeques with their friends sharing big plates of meat and bottles of whiskey. There were lots of men with guitars and groups of friends all over the place were singing passionate tango - it was great! We ate big and smiled lots - the picture below says a thousands words...
1 Comments:
That meat BBQ Place looks the nuts!! Knocks the tits of my local Kebab shop.
2:27 PM GMT
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