Food Food and More Food

The ferry to Uruguay only took 1.5 hours and then we were in Colonia, a small colonial town on the Rio de la Plata estuary. We had 4 hours there and as soon as we walked out of the terminal we saw a place to hire golf buggies, so of course that’s what we did. We were told there was a giant Colonia sign at he end of the town that was worth seeing…umm we would argue against that having driven there. What we came across was a small white sign, which we climbed all over and then took inappropriate photos with #colon. We drove all over Colonia checking out the sights, inc an old bull fighting ring and then returned the buggy and took to exploring by foot.

It is a very small town and the beautiful old part was only a few streets, but they were lined with giant trees and cobbled stones and randomly lots of old abandoned cars, which only added to its charm.

We had read that the best thing to eat in Uruguay was something called ‘asado’ which is a giant plate of mixed meat and ‘chivito’ which is a giant steak sandwich. We finally found a place that sold asado and it was a buffet – so we thought we were on to a winner. Turns out we don’t really like asado, it was weird cuts of meat, all a little bit burnt and it all tasted the same. In hindsight I think we made the error going to an all you can eat buffet place. The hunt will continue at dinnertime.

At 3pm we have seen every inch of Colonia and so jumped on to a local bus to drive to the capital, Montevideo through the lush green countryside. The drive should of taken 3 hours but the bus broke down and we were stuck at the side of the road for ages, so it was more like 4 hours.

So our first impressions of Montevideo was it was dirty, felt unsafe and we didn’t like it. It also didn’t help that we found a giant cockroach in our bathroom, so that had me questioning if spending 48 hours in Uruguay was really worth it just because I wanted another stamp in my passport and Lynden another shotglass??? Well after the appalling dinner we had I decided no it had not been worth it.

After a good night sleep we walked around Montevideo with fresh eyes and actually it wasn’t too bad. Definitely not our favourite place but the city has some beautiful parks and impressive architecture. We headed to the main square after breakfast and joined a free walking tour of the city. Once again we retained very little information about the history of Uruguay other than that Jose Artigas (a national hero in Uruguay) has his ashes buried under the Plaza de Independence and they are guarded by 2 soldiers at all times.

We finished the tour at a great foodie market, where we made our second attempt at trying a local delicacy and this time we had success!! Lynden managed to get a ridiculously large chivito, which he devoured. The restaurant also served ‘medio y medio’ which basically means half half – its sparkling wine mixed with white wine – it was super sweet – so we ordered a bottle! I don’t know why we then decided to order dessert, but it was another local dish that we NEEDED to try called ‘chaja’, which is sweet sponge cake, meringue and a ton of cream. It was definitely worth it!

After lunch we stupidly listened to our guide and went to see the ‘giant RAINBOW’ Montevideo sign, which was a 10 min taxi ride across the city. Well guess what, it was not giant and it was not rainbow! It was white and the same bloody size as the Colonia one. So after 1 photo we found ourselves searching around for something else to do in the area, but apart from walk along beach there was nothing else to do.

We eventually found our way back to the harbour to take the ferry back to Buenos Aires. We had business class tickets (as it was only $20 more) which really only bought us access to a lounge (which was packed - clearly everyone did the upgrade) and a glass of sparkling wine, everything else was the same as economy…so we got exactly what we paid for. Also all passengers had wear shoe protectors during the crossing, at first we thought maybe because the carpet was new, but it was filthy and old. Not a single person questioned this madness, everyone just put them on and we all walked around the ferry looking like idiots together!

Next stop an early morning flight to visit Iguazu Falls for the day and to travel into Brazil!