When the weather is beachy and you're in the mood for a half-day trip from big-city Buenos Aires, ok, fine, I can see the appeal. When you feel like walking along cobblestone streets and looking at big streetmaps that highlight names that are merely there for making the map seem more important, that's fair, too -- I'll give you that. Any other situation leaves me completely befuddled.I got the bus from Montevideo to Colonia and it was expected to take just under 3 hours. I thought it was a fortunate thing when the bus pulled in clocking in at two and a half hours. Turned out that I was wrong. Why? Well, that meant I would have more of the day to figure out what to do with. (Note: If you are planning to use this entry to procrastinate in any way, you will not get very far in your quest; I am just telling you now.)
When it took the taxi under two minutes to get from the bus station to the house where I was staying (and that house is not in the city center), I should have begun to wonder how long it would take to wander around the city. After I dropped my bags off and settled in, I walked the 15 minutes or so into town and found a restaurant to have lunch. Once I finished my sandwich (that they cut into rectangles -- aww), I kept going into the old city. I walked in and out of probably every little street on my map and when I saw something that looked important, I did it. For example, I saw a lighthouse, so I climbed up it (there were just over 100 steps -- 116 I think?). At the top, I met some Brazilians, which was fun because then I could just slip right back into Portuguese and not have to concentrate on transitioning into Spanish. After the lighthouse, I walked through Plaza Mayor (not so big), around the port area, and by and through the city gates. As I was doing so, probably the funniest encounter of the day (and this says a lot) occurred. A mime who is usually stationed in front of the city gates was taking a smoke break, and as I was passing by, a woman was driving a motorbike with a kid in front and a kid in back. At the exact moment that the bike passed by, and Mimey saw the kids, the mime hid the cigarette behind his back and started waving at the kids. When the bike was gone and he saw me laughing at him, he gave me a funny mime face as if to say, ´´Gotta do it for the kids´´ and went back to his cigarette.
After that, I went into the Basilica (not so impressive) and then walked right out, wandering around old city for another 15 minutes or so before calling it a day and walking back to the house. When I got there, though, it was still early yet, so I decided to go back out (the best part of that mini-excursion was the ice cream I got). To make a short story shorter, I ended up walking the whole town about 2-3 times in about 3 hours. And to think I had originally planned to maybe spend three days in Colonia? Ha! And *this* is where I´m glad that Uruguay was one of the places I had decided to play by ear and not make plans for.
I thus resolved to leave the next morning (today -- Wednesday) for Buenos Aires via ferry. So, I went to the port, got my ticket, and hightailed it out of Colonia, leaving the rain behind (well, actually, it accompanied the boat).
In Spain, when something is cool, people use the word guay. What I have to say to Uruguay, though, is, ´´U? R *U* guay?´´ As if you even had to ask...
have a good rest of the week,
missy
http://andsmilestogobeforeisleep.blogspot.com
No comments:
Post a Comment