Tuesday, February 08, 2005

Uru - who?

Solving a geography question that (let's face it) many of us have asked ourselves, I traveled to Uruguay this weekend, thereby discovering where it is. It is actually just a brief ferry ride away from Buenos Aires, on a very nice ferry with restaurants and duty-free shopping and pinball machines. I spent the ride there basking in the sun on the top deck, and the ride back sniffling and blowing my nose from the cold I got, probably from the cold-hot-cold-rain-sun dance the weather was doing last week.

I went to Colonia, which is a small town of about 22,000 people, with tree-lined streets and lots of little shops and restaurants. It was a nice break from the traffic and noise of the big city. I borrowed a bike (a one-speed mountain bike a bit too small for me, so my knees practically hit my wrists as I rode) from the hostel where I stayed, and rode along the river for a while. When I say river, I mean the Rio de la Plata, which is actually extremely wide (you can´t see across to Argentina) and very brown and ugly. It´s very unfortunate, because "Rio de la Plata" sounds like a very pretty thing. They actually translate it as "River Plate" which is really not a good name, but it´s better than "Ugly Brown Polluted Mess" which would be more accurate. My opinion sunk even further when I was bitten by a very nasty ant while sitting on the river bank.

Anyway, I am now back, enjoying my last 5 days here, taking more Spanish classes, and meeting more people-everyone I know now in the hostel is either French- or Spanish-speaking, so my language skills are being given a good workout. Look for more photos to come in the next couple of days. Plus if you´re good, maybe I´ll post some pictures of me taking tango lessons (i started yesterday, and let me just say that I don´t have the gift).