Uruguay

With the heat and humidity of Buenos Aires pressing in against our senses, we decided that an early departure for the beaches of Uruguay was in order. Fortunately for us, the border is just across the Rio Plata and was easily reached by small ferry boat. It was an interesting crossing as there was a serious chop on the river that created noisy impacts, causing some passengers to shriek, and also started water leaks along the windows causing us to change seats.

After a quick breeze through Customs, we stepped out into Colonial, a beautiful old town that changed hands between the Spanish and Portuguese as one fought their way north from Argentina and the other fought their way south from Brasil. As a result, the area is dotted with construction from both countries. We were greeted by cobblestone streets, small beaches, nice restaurants and a fine view from the old lighthouse. In the morning we woke up early for a jog along the river.

After spending one day and night in Colonial, we quickly moved on to spend a night in Montevideo where we had arranged to pick up a rental car to make our move to the amazing surf beaches further north. Although we only had one day in Montevideo, we were incredibly impressed by the friendly people and their love of ridiculously big sandwiches, the mix of modern and older buildings and especially by the beaches surrounding the city. Ben even managed to string together a few hilarious Spanish words to talk our way into a 2 on 2 beach volleyball game against some locals. Our opponents were definitely out of our league but were classy enough to let us score a few points.

As we drove away from Montevideo the next day, we felt a surge of excitement for the beginning of another fantastic road trip adventure. We had our sights set on three different beach towns that each had their own appeal and decided to start furthest north in Punta del Diablo. Little did we know as we pulled into the campground that we would spend the entire eight nights in this fantastic location. Over the course of our stay, we came to appreciate how amazing our accommodations were. Where else would you get a hippie-style covered outdoor kitchen complete with fridge (cold beers!), shelves for all of your cooking stuff, a firepit and outdoor grille setup and nice clean bathrooms and showers. We love you Flor de Pez!

But it’s the people that make a place and here we got incredibly lucky. Over the course of our stay we became quite close with the ladies of Argentina – Mili, Anna, Pipi and Caro. We also got to spend time with Santiago (Santi), our new Uruguayan friend who works like the rest of us, but spends the whole summer in Punta teaching surfing. Nice life!

Patricia clicked instantly with these fantastic ladies and was soon speaking excellent Spanish including a few words we learned from the girls that cannot be written down!

Everyone was on exactly the same page during our stay as we moved from late breakfasts to the beach, surfing, listening to music, drinking wine and beer and making some of the most amazing meals of our trip. These ladies can cook over a fire better than any caveman could ever dream of. Homemade pizza on the fire, vegetables, pasta, fish – you name it, they grill it. The parilla (firepit cooking) is a serious pastime in Argentina and it was great to get the full experience.

We also were able to partake in the very popular Argentian and Uruguayan tradition of sharing the mate yerba, everywhere from the campground to the beach. It is an aquired taste and by the end we were big fans!

Below is a picture of some typical mate cups, which are usually made out of a calabaza (gourd), but we also found ones made out of cows feet!

Our very favorite activity was renting a surfboard and heading to the beach to enjoy the waves and the sunshine. Persistence paid off and by the end we were both much improved and looking forward to other opportunities to surf during our trip (yes, that is Ben surfing!).

With such a perfect combination of people and place we enjoyed every minute of our stay in Punta del Diablo and left the rest of the Uruguayan coastline for next time.