We left Buenos Aires hoping to find a quiet little beach town to spend a few days and away from the crowds of people, traffic and big buildings. We had heard that Uruguay was just the place from plenty of travellers. We packed up our ever growing backpacks and boarded the short ferry ride that would take us from Buenos Aires to the city of Colonial, just north of Montevideo (the Uruguayan capital). The ferry, which had its own border officials, was perhaps the most civilized thing either of us had seen since we started travelling. It was kinda nice to see some organization!
We only stayed in Colonial long enough to catch a bus to Punta del Este, a few more hours up the coast. As we arrived to Punta del Este all we saw plenty of tall buildings on the horizon which looked like a massive business center, but when we got there, we soon realized all the buildings were high end apartments and vacation properties for the South American elite. GREAT! Another big, expensive city… Not exactly what we were looking for. It was actually a really nice place, but a bit much for us after BA. We stayed 1 night spent some time at the beach and the hostel pool and departed the next day to a much quieter place called Cabo Polonio.
When I say much quieter, I mean much much much quieter, like they don’t have running water or power there quieter!!! It was a nice change. The town is located on a beautiful point surrounded by the ocean on 3 sides. No buses go to this place because there are actually no roads. The only way in is to get off along the highway and take one of the local truck transports in where you sit in benches on the back or on the roof and navigate the 20 minute rough desert pathway to the town. We got there well after dark with no reservations and no idea where we were going. The ride in under the stars was really cool, especially when we were driving towards the town on the beach. The moonlight on the waves was pretty awesome. We thought we were in tough to find a place, until we talked to the other guys on the transfer. They said their friend had a vacation house there and told them they could stay there, but they weren’t sure where it was or what it looked like. Their friend was nice enough to draw them a sketch of the house on a napkin!!! Haha, nice! They were just told to ask around the town for a well-known fisherman named Juan Pablo and he would have the keys and take them to the place. Sounds like fun at 9:30pm in the dark with no lights! Not sure what ever happened to those guys? 
Lucky for us we were able to easily find a place to spend a couple of nights. We stayed at a small place right along the ocean! It wasn’t the nicest place ever, but waking up in the morning and walking out the door and being on the beach was pretty fantastic. Unfortunately the weather wasn’t amazing for us, but it was still a great place to chill out for a couple of days. The one side of the point was rocks where sea lions hung out during the day, and a beautiful light house lit up the night. It was an amazing place to sit in the evening and listen to the waves crash against the rocks with incredible force!
The town was really cool too! No streets, no addresses, just a bunch of small shacks strewn haphazardly across the point with sand trails all over the place weaving between the buildings. It looked like a bit of a hippie/squatter town with no planning. The people we’re very friendly as well and a couple of guys we met even offered to give us a ride to our next destination (they had to go to the bank anyways). It was pretty sweet not having to line up any busses or transportation!! The one guy was living in Vancouver, but visiting his wife’s family who was from Uruguay. They chatted non-stop on the way to Punta del Diablo and dropped us off right in the center of town!!! Perfect!!!
In Punta del Diablo we were pretty excited to have found a really nice room with a private kitchen!! Definitely a first for us so far!!! With the nice new kitchen we figured it would be appropriate to visit the store a pick up some things for dinner. At the checkout a guy from Argentina started talking to us and asked us where we were staying and how much it was. He was amazed when we told him how much we were paying at the hostel (we thought it was a good deal). He invited us to come with him to check out the cabanas where he and his girlfriend were staying. The places were pretty awesome and apparently half the price we were paying at the hostel. He walked us over to a restaurant to meet the guy who owned the place and to check to see if the other units were available, which they were!!! We told the man that we would stay there the next 2 nights, but we going to stay at the hostel the 1st night because we had already paid. To our surprise the guy told us that since the place was empty anyways, we could just stay there the 1st night for free, and he would even drive our baggage from the hostel to his cabanas!! What a great guy!! And what a nice place to stay!!
Punta del Este is another small beach town, which they say used to be like Cabo Polonio, but had grown a lot over the past few years with tourism and as a result had a few more restaurants, shops, and places to stay (and power!) It was a short walk to the beach from our little place and we spent most of our time there. The waves were pretty good so we decided to rent boogie boards from the hostel we had paid for nothing!! Haha!!! Boogie boarding was sooo much fun and we both got the hang of it pretty well by the end of the day. It’s sure a lot easier than surfing!!!
We also had a great time getting to know our new neighbours (Mariano and Sol, the Argentinian couple) during the evenings. We made pizza for them one night and in return they spoiled us with a traditional Argentinian ‘asado’ (bbq). We had a ton of fun learning the proper cooking and fire making techniques, but when it came time to eat we were a little nervous to say the least!! Not because we didn’t think Mariano was a good cook, but because an Argentinian asado consists of many different parts of the cow.
Not sure what everything was, but we know for sure that one part was intestines!! I can’t believe Dawne actually ate it!!! And with a smile and a big “Mmmmm” too!!! Haha. It wasn’t that bad, but definitely not great! Luckily we had some bold red wine to wash it down!! The couple also thought it was pretty funny to watch us eat the new things. The next day we said our good-byes to the beach, the cabana and our new friends and hopped on a bus to the border town of Chuy where we would switch buses and carry on to Brasil.
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