Colonia del Sacramento, Uruguay

It was an early start by Argentinian standards although not by mine, yet given we have been sleeping in until 8am it was early even for us.

We walked to the Subte and had one change of train to get the road that would take us to the Buquebus terminal. After a couple of wrong turns we found the correct street and with a bit of walking we arrived at the Buquebus terminal where we were to take the ferry from. It took a little while to go through immigration. Like Europe they did both Argentina and then Uruguay in the same booth. We now have another country’s stamp in our passports.

We were on a fast ferry, which was a bit like the one that used to go between Wellington and Picton. An hour later we were in Colonia del Sacramento. The Rio de la Plata is fresh water despite it being more like a lake or perhaps an estuary. It is very brown and muddy, but apparently it is safe to swim in.

The package we had bought for Colonia included food, water, a bus tour and a walking tour. We were the only ones on the bus as all the other passengers spoke Spanish and went on a different bus, so had a very personalised tour. Colonia we learnt had been fought over by the Spainish and Portuguese and it was pummeled into the ground several times by each side. The convent, the church and a few other important buildings were the target, and only the church was rebuilt. Eventually peace was brokered by the British and agreement reached that neither country would claim it and Uruguay would be independent or something like that. I think that at the same time the colonial yoke was also being thrown off by the Brazil and Argentina.

Beach Colonia

We saw a lot of very expensive houses opposite some quite nice beaches. Apparently these are the holiday homes of the Buenos Aires residents with a bit of money. One of the more interesting parts was an early attempt at having a holiday resort. At the turn of the 20^th century a wealthy Montevideo resident built a resort with a hotel, a bullring and a horse racetrack. Neither the hotel or the bullring are functional. Apparently in the 1920s bull fighting was outlawed on the grounds of animal cruelty.

Original gate to the city

The walking tour was very interesting. The Portuguese and Spanish architecture styles sit uneasily side by side. Even in the church the contrasting building methods are apparent. The Spanish used bricks and had flat rooves while the Portuguese had sloped roofs with half tiles to deal with the rain. Even the colours of the buildings were different.

Portuguese street - drains in the middle of street

We were told that the Uruguayan economy was good and that there was little corruption. It has free education from primary through to tertiary and health care is free as well. Certainly it felt safe. The people looked prosperous and the town was well maintained.

After the tour we had lunch at a nice little restaurant by the river. As it was quite warm it was nice to spend it in the shade although we did have a drink of Tannat, a grape specific to Uruguay that I had read about as making some very good wines. It was good and interesting to try.

We found a place later to have a coffee which was Ok. Then it was time to go back to the boat. Rather than take a bus we walked the half kilometre to the nice new terminal.

We went to Sullivans for a drink and having no energy to do much else we had some tapas there. It was not bad for pub food.