Lazy days in Uruguay

My first evening in Uruguay brought me to Colonia. This small port city was founded by the Portugese and tells most of Uruguays history\ has the most culture. The sun sets across the Rio del Plata, sorta like it's falling into Buenos Aires.
From Colonia, I hopped into a car with a Brazillian man named Gil and my aussie friend Jesse. We cruised to Montevido where the preparation for Carnival was (and still is) taking place. This dancing man was my favourite out of about 50 participants. There was drumming and congotype lines. Sorry, I haven't researched Carnival of Uruguay, so I don't know the proper terms.
These are my new Brazillian friends, Eduardo and Fernando. Also my aussie pal Jesse. I met them all in Colonia and ended up travelling for about a week with Jesse. The other boys headed back to Brazil.
Me, in Montevideo There was no sandy beach (at least we didn't find one) but it was hot and sunny none the less. Montevideo is likely the most calm and laidback capital city in the world. Cars stop for you to cross the street and on Sundays there are none (cars that is).
Between Montevideo and Cabo Polonio I went to La Paloma, and took 0 photos. Now, Cabo Polonio is a very very special place. To get there tourists pay to ride the army like trucks over the sand, and arrive at the most beauitful sandy beaches in Uruguay. The little village has no electricity and running water is very rare. It's all pumped by hand and stored. Jesse and I arrived at about 3:30 pm in the scorching heat. The sand was painfully hot and shade was hard to find (plus neither of us wanted to slurge on an umbrella rental) so we took shelter in the shade of a fishermans boat. Once it has cooled down a bit we hiked to the local hostel (I did it twice, the first time was just to make sure there was room). Walking through the sand dunes was very much like snow drifts. And the cabin\hostell reminded me of the ski hill, except there were piles of sand instead of snow and it was stinking hot.
While Jesse prepared pasta, I took pictures of the sunsetting over the dunes. Then 5 minutes later I turned to the other side of the cabin and shot the moon coming up.

It was truly spectacular! The hammocks were really comfy too. Also, I have never in my life been surrounded by so many house flies. They were everywhere. The frogs jumping around in the living room couldn't seem to keep the population in check. You'll have to flip this one around on your own. It's another shot out of the window at the cabin just as the sun went down and the moon came up. I left the paradise that was Cabo Polonio for the next best thing, Punto del Diablo. My arrival at the Devil's Point was delayed one day due to poor finacing and lack of banks ... with the equivalent of 5 dollars I had to go to Chuy and get more money. Chuy is the border town between Uruguay and Brazil, home to a million cambios and duty free shops. Not that nice but at least I didn't end up with no money (plus my survival food had dwindled down to a bag of dried lentals...my mom has taught me better but I guess I just kinda...ran out?). So, I spent the night in Chuy and then returned to Diablo in the morning. When I arrived at the terminal I met a German couple who invited me to share their bungalow for 2 nights, saving me many a mile to the hostel. And back to the beach afterwards. On Saturday night there was a small parade of people and drums (not uncommon for this part of the world) which I joined in and danced down the street with the hippies of Diablo. It might have just been the highlight of my Uruguay trip.

The morning I was set to leave (yesterday) it was ugggglly. Rain and wind mixed with fog made me glad to be off. It wasn't cold but I could just imagine how horrible a winter in Diablo would be. I took an early bus to Montevideo and hung around for a few hours waiting for the connection to Buenos Aires. I didn't get bored. Montevideo bus terminal is host to a complete shopping mall. You really could live there if you had no home. There was a food court, music stores, internet, clothing stores, heladerias (icecream stores) and supermarket. Plus, the option of storing your luggage while waiting for the bus. It also had a candy store, and being me, I ventured in and saw.....Canadian loonies!?!?You can't even find these in Canada! What are they doing in Uruguay?!

To sum it up... (in the words of the great Raul..and I'm sorry this picture is a tad bit disturbing but he's a wacky drunk Canadian man with an illegal hut in Cabo Polonio so he deserves to be posted..no?)

And now I'm back in the busy city doing the touristy things and hopefully will go enjoy some of the night life in Bs. As. ! Also.... feel free to email me if you don't want to leave a comment! (e_r_i_n_99@hotmail.com)