U R Guay
Trip Start
Sep 07, 2011
1
179
289
Trip End
Sep 06, 2012
Where I stayed
Colonia del Sacramento, Uruguay
Saturday, May 12, 2012
We were both like 2 sulky kids as we were pretty hungry and tired. Not a great start. Luckily, the sun was shining so the day should not be ruined by rain!
The ferry ride took about 1 1/2 hours to get across and was pretty smooth. Both of us fell asleep which was a good thing to take our minds off of food.
Colonial is a very small historic town on the south coast of Uruguay and is around 40 kms North East East from Buenos Aires.
When we arrived at the port, we were greeted by a odd looking lady who was going to take us on our walking tour for approx 1 hour. Her English was very good but she was very monotone and spoke so slowly. A little like the walking tour itself. We were walking so slow, we may as well have stopped. We soon worked out why we were walking so slow as it would take you about 30 minutes to walk around the whole old town of Colonia. She told us all about the history of the town and that it had been invaded by the Spanish and Portuguese 7 times over the course of it's history. I wonder if they kept changing languages as well???
It really did have a old town Spanish feel about it with the old buildings and cobbled streets. It was very picturesque and very sleepy. Made us feel quite sleepy too!
After the walking tour, we went off on our own and looked in all the little quirky shops and stalls. We then headed off to have our free lunch which was actually in the new town of Colonia. We stayed in the cafe for about 2 hours just to kill time as our ferry back wasn't until 7 pm.
The rest of the afternoon we just walked around really slowly and sat and watched the world go by. To be honest, it was a nice way to spend my last day in BA, even if I wasn't in BA!
Oh, I also found out that in Uruguay, there is a town called Fray Bentos. I wish I could go there was I want to know if they sell the Steak and Kidney pies out of the tin!!!
That evening, we decided to go out to the Milonga (Tango Dancing), which is what we should have done 2 nights ago. We knocked back a bottle of Malbec before we went out as we were pretty tired and the Milonga didn't start until 11 pm!!
Now, I am not sure what I expected from the Milonga, but it wasn't what we witnessed. When we arrived (about 11.30 pm) we walked upstairs into what looked like a British Legion, with probably, 1920's Tango music being played and a hall filled with mostly empty tables, otherwise mainly older couples staring at the dance floor.
Now, I thought I would be watching people stomping up and down a dance floor showing us how to Tango, but this was hilarious. Me and Emma obviously had to keep a straight face as people were serious, but it was nothing that I expected. The good thing about being here though was that a bottle of wine was so cheap. Some people got up to dance and were busting some moves on the dance floor and we just sat and watched and got merry.
It was such a strange and surreal night, but fun at the same time. It was a nice way to spend my final evening and I had such lovely company with Emma being there.
We finally left around 1.30 pm after the live band finished playing (who only played for about 30 minutes) and went off in search of Empanadas and more red wine. We did find some and took them back to the hostel, not that we needed any more to drink.
I think we got to bed around 4 am. Great, another long day tomorrow as I leave Buenos Aires and fly to Puerto Iguazu. Ah well, I'm sure I can either sleep on the plane or when I get to the next hostel!
