Argentina and on



Colonia

 This first picture comes from Colonia in Uruguay. Technically, it should have come from Buenos Aires as first port of call. However, it is fitting that the honour of the first picture should not go to that city in view of the shock  horror one of its citizens delivered to me ripping a gold necklace from my neck in a street full of pedestrians. My feelings of Argentina being a safe country have evaporated. It will join the list of other South American countries as being inheritantly dodgy to display anything of any value. My advice to other travellers for Asia and most of S America now extends to Argentina. Wear no jewellery, shove everything into security packs, either down your front under your top or inside your trousers in a money belt, bags lashed onto your body. Chile now ranks as my sole safe destination, though maybe taking any chances at all on any part of the continent may now apply! A sad observation.

A good drop it was too!

  

   Well - back to Colonia, a perfectly lovely quaint town many buildings preserved in much the same style that they were in the 17th and 18th centuries, or certainly reproduced to match the style. And safe, swarming with tourists, of course, mostly other S Americans, a lot from Brazil - just over the border. Uruguay once was part of Brazil, getting its independence in 1825 from that country and previously in 1814 from the Spanish. After the compulsory three course lunch, which even my healthy appetite was unable to conquer. (the steak was to die for - beef is Uruguay's major export) a walking tour with my guide was both informative and delightful. The  discovery of our mutual love of another old town the other side of the Atlantic, viz Rye in England, sealed a friendship. The town is small, with tree lined main streets and many smaller onessurfaced similar to the picture - the original paving. Colourful houses and bouganvillia abounded. I was transported to Monte Video by late afternoon to my very central Radisson hotel in the Plaza Independencia. You may well say 'wot's a beer doing 'ere?' For those who knew my mother, here's  to you, Patricia.



Palazo Salvo in Plaza Indepedencia

As was Buenos Aires, Monte Video (and the normal commercial aspect of Colonia) was shut. In South America New Year's Eve is a public holiday which has made all three days of my time here, Saturday and Sunday - shut. It was ironical that I was robbed in the only street that was open, for most of the streets in Monte Video have been eerily deserted.

 
     Sunday morning saw me on a bus tour. Overcast and with a faint intermittent drizzle, photography was not of the best. Monte Video is a pleasant city and it abounds with beachs.  Uruguay is situated on a peninsular and the country has the lion's share of beaches on the Rio del Plata. Buenos Aires on the other side of the widest river in the world has none. As the morning wore on, the sun appeared, dispelled the misty air and the rest of the day was spent in sunshine. We had a wizz round various buildings of importance and viewed the beaches and upmarket residential areas but the was the amazing statues which took my fancy.

Monuments to gauchos in the days of settlement, monuments to the native inhabitants, monuments to famous persons and people responsible for the making of Uruguay into the place it is today. Artworks in themselves, cast in bronze. Artworks that truly appeal to me.

     First stop after my return to my hotel was down to the Mercado del Puerto. Once a produce and provisions market, it is now filled with eating places, for the most part of the style of the S American B-B-Q, ie. meat, meat and more meat, barbecued over wood flames. Steaks the size of side plates, usually served with French Fries. I resorted to a 'pecenia' one and came away feeling just satisfied, replete with beautiful steak, fries, a glass of red and rounded off with an excellent coffee. Taking advantage of the sun, I explored as much as I dared in the deserted streets and returned to the hotel and a swim in the pool. Oh what a life! It's back to B A tomorrow.