Across the river to Uruguay!

I had another great weekend down here, although not in Argentina, but in Uruguay. It’s just a 3 hour boat ride across the river and then there you are, in another country all together. My first night I spent in Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay. For being the city with 70% of the country’s population, it appeared to be a bit of a ghost town from what I saw. I stayed in the historic part of the city, I guess that might have had something to do with it. The hostel where I spent the night was two thumbs up for sure. Friendly staff and a cool building. I met people there from all over the world, and it seems that a lot of people just decide to travel. They’ve got rough plans and go til they’re broke. That night at the hostel there was a big BBQ on the roof. About 10 of us sat around chatting, eating meat and sharing travel stories. The next day I wandered around a bit more in Montevideo, but it was Sunday so it really was a ghost town. We did find a big market in the middle of the city to wander in, but nothing out of the usual market merchandise.

I hopped a bus that evening back to Colonia, where I came in from the boat. Found another hostel, and wandered a bit there. Colonia is a much quieter, quainter and definitely smaller than Montevideo. I loved it. Again the hostel was in the historic neighborhood of the town. Cobblestone streets, tall trees lined the streets and antique lanterns lighted the way. I have decided I’m retiring in Colonia. Monday the rest of the group showed up, so I met up with about 40 students from the program. We took a short bus ride out to the house of the program director and honestly my jaw dropped. This house was incredible. Absolutely amazing. Giant gardens, pool, pond, silly dogs, vine covered house. (I’ll post some pictures.) I had another BBQ, and ate probably way too much. After lunch we walked down to the beach, proved to be a bit longer of a walk, but it was worth it. the water of course was a little brown…it is a river after all. But the beach was abandoned and practically perfect. As we walked down the street, all the neighbor’s dogs came out and followed us down there. We tried not to get in their way when they shook off from jumping in. Uruguay over all was very relaxing, and again like my beach weekend last weekend, it was nice to get out of the city and see some new stuff. I think I’ll be wandering about Buenos Aires this week with some of the people I met from the hostels, maybe sharing a maté or checking out a museum. I gotta get my city legs back…do those exist?

Anyway, besides traveling…school is going. It’s nice to only have 3 classes. I’m about halfway done with the program, that’s hard to believe. But it’s even weirder to think that my peeps at Lake Forest are graduating in 2-3 weeks! Que raro.

I send my love from the south!

Until next time…

Semana Santa

It is difficult to get back into a routine of schoolwork. Last week I only had one day of class, and then we got a long weekend for Easter. Gery, a friend from Bolivia, came here to BsAs. It had been two years since I saw her, time flies. It was a lot of fun to hang out with her again, she of course was traveling with her time off too. After a day with Gery, I migrated south of Buenos Aires to two different towns. The first stop I made was in Pinamar, a very laid back and family fun sort of beach town. The beach there lacked the crowds, was very clean, and great for long walks on the beach. I tagged along with my buddy Sam and 6 other girls I had met once before. We squeezed 8 into a 5 person room, poor Sam being the only boy. Well maybe lucky Sam for being the only boy.

From there I went down to met up with my friend Liz in Mar del Plata, a bigger city with less impressive beaches. The people however were still pretty laid back and the vacation mentality was obvious. Easter weekend is practically the last weekend of summer for these Argentines so everyone hit the beach. In Mar del Plata the beaches were crowded and sprinkled with trash, not my favorite. However I didn’t spend much time on the beach, we wandered around the city a bit and ended up at the port. A big tourist attraction there are the sea lions, los lobos marinos. Big, stinky and hilarious is how I would describe los lobos. Our last day there we tried to take surfing lessons, but turns out they were done. We drove in the ocean anyway even though it was a cold fall day and we were the only ones on the beach, the complete opposite from the day before. The bus system here in Argentina is very impressive. (I’d say better than the airlines.) I had a comfortable seat and they even served some food. It was stellar.

I’m back now in Buenos Aires, doing Spanish language exercises. Not quite as fun as the beach. I’ve got plans to head to Colonia, Uruguay this up coming weekend. Sin parar, digamos. (We call that non-stop.) Life is good here in Argentina. It’s becoming fall, and people are breaking out the jackets, I’m still sporting a t-shirt, but I’m sure I’ll adjust to the “cold” soon.

Until next time…