Uruguay: Colonia del Sacramento & Montevideo

Colonia

Our first stop in Uruguay was the beautiful (but very cold) UNESCO heritage site of Colonia, a small town across the river from Buenos Aires. After a bumpy 1hr ferry ride we made it to Colonia just to stay a night. We wandered around the small town soaking up the pastel coloured buildings, autumn colours of the trees and the river-side setting. Beautiful place but after an hour or so we were ready to move on! A few hours on the bus to Montevideo...

 



Montevideo

Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay, was our second visit in Uruguay. Our first full day, we met some friends we'd met in Mendoza form the walking tour. The tour was around the old town and was really interesting. Uruguay's last president legalised same-sex marriage, abortion and marijuana pretty much all in the same year which makes the country stand out from its relatively conservative neighbours.

When we met our friends in Indepencia Square, it happened to be Artega's birthday (the leader to gained independence for Uruguay) so there were bands and military etc all around the square below the huge statue of Artega. Also, we noticed a huge amount of elder people being handed out tablets (computer tablets) - apparently it was a government initiative to give all elderly tablets (especially made for them to be easy to use) so they could get up-to-date with technology. Also, we learned that all kids in Uruguay have laptops and all the parks etc have free WiFi so they'd all have access to the internet. I thought that was pretty cool.

 

Indepencia Square

 

Joanna (from Germany), Etienne (from Holland), Paul & Me along the promenade.

 

The beach at Montevideo, situated on the Plata River

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Indepencia Square

 

View from the hill in which Montevideo was thought to be named. Fortaleza (the military base/museum).

 

As above. Paul looks like a giant.

 

Me at the bus stop.

We had a very interesting experience catching the bus out to Fortaleza, after researching to catch one bus we were told buy the bus driver to catch the next, the next bus telling us again to catch the next one and after that the last one told us to catch the first! However we got on anyway to get closer and half the bus were helping us out telling us where/how we should get there. People were very friendly and helpful!

 

We were originally planning on spending some more time in Uruguay but it was so cold we decided it was time to head north to Brazil!