Uruguay, a jewel in South America

After almost 24 hours on different flights I finally arrived to Saõ Paulo. It is dusk time and the airport looks amazingly quite. My connection flight to Montevideo is very short so I have just a couple of hours to refresh and think about my visit to Uruguay.

My friend Elena is already waiting for me in Montevideo. We planned to rent a car and make our way to Punta del Este, a town situated on the coast, a place to have a relaxing time.

I didn't plan this trip too much as Elena was in charge of it and was her idea to travel to Uruguay. 

I am very open minded when it comes to places and I had the feeling that Uruguay would be a very interesting destination. 

The flight to Montevideo was very fast and pleasant.

After landing I met Elena and I already felt the warm and welcoming personality of the locals as Elena and I have been observing the families greeting their relatives arriving to the airport and she told me how beautiful that moment was, they put a lot of passion in their relatives and that is a very outstanding characteristic of the South American people where family is everything and anything else is superfluous. This makes me feel confortable as I could sense that Uruguayans are very honest to their own traditions and very welcoming with the foreigners. 

We got our car and the drive to Punta del Este would take us an hour and a half through the picturesque highway called the Inter Balnearia.

The lifestyle of the Uruguayans is very relaxing and they love enjoying of the little pleasures life offers. I could see the differences between them and us, Europeans. They live in a paused and relaxed world while we trend to stress ourselves in cities full of noise and traffic jams.

When we arrive to Punta del Este I could feel like at home.

Very much like my home place back in Spain, Punta is a highly developed town where tall apartment towers and luxury restaurants arise in order to satisfy a demanding growing rich population. The peninsula is pretty much like a touristic resort while the outskirts of the town including La Barra are residential areas where big mansions and houses stand out of views. La Barra is the area where we rented our little bungalow, in a posada called La Merced.

When we arrived to La Merced, a nice and smiley manager greeted us. His name is Roberto and he manages the little apartments together with Wilder, Wilma and Paula. They took us to the bungalow and we felt very comfortable. Their attention and kindness was only surpassed by their willingness to provide everything we needed. 

After refreshing from our long trip, we took a better look to the bungalow, a spacious one bedroom apartment-like house with a big living room, a bathroom and a nice swimming pool outside. I must say that so far this was one of the best places I have ever stayed while travelling. But the best part was the staff. They are locals and as such they provided us with valuable information about places to visit and roads to drive.

That evening we decided to take it easy and have a look around the area. I must say that it looked a bit empty but it came at no surprise as the high summer season starts from the middle or the end of December and expands for about two to three months until March. Punta del Este is a small peninsula where the city is extensive and offers everything a tourist needs, from supermarkets and hair salons to souvenir shops, artisan markets, bars and restaurants. We visited the harbor and the marina and we ate something in a bar called Moby Dick, an English style pub very much alive during the nights where they offer live concerts.

After our meal and a visit to the center of the peninsula we decided to rest a bit so we would be fresh in the next morning as we planned to visit different areas along the coast.

The next day we woke up and got ready for a road trip to Faro José Ignacio, a small fishing town situated at barely 60 kilometers from La Barra.

We drove through the number 9 highway that goes along the coast.

The drive is beautiful and also vey interesting. Most of the lands and houses we saw were for sale and managed by either Christies or Sotheby's, a sign of the growing real estate market in the country. It is worth mention that a couple of days later we met a estate agent in Punta del Este who told us that in Uruguay most of the people who come from other countries, specially Argentinians, buy the houses in cash and as an investment to avoid taxes in their home countries so they can save the investments for the future.

Once we arrived to Faro José Ignacio we parked the car and walked around the area. We enjoyed the views to the sea and the lighthouse. After buying a few souvenirs we had lunch in a restaurant on the beach. My impression about that place was of a relaxing sort of hippie or hipster village.

After a few hours in that place we drove back to Punta del Este where we relaxed for the rest of the day.

The next day we decided to visit the National Park of Laguna La Rocha and see the fauna and the surrounding areas. Pretty impressive as we had to cross a long outback road that ended in a lake near the Atlantic Ocean.

Our day was finished once again in the area of La Barra.

We spent the next two days exploring and visiting the area of Faro Polonio, a location where you can see the Sea Lions and other marine fauna.

It is worth visiting the lighthouse as you have a very extensive view of the region and the ocean.

The last days were the busiest ones as we tried to figure out how to compress all the remaining places to visit in just a couple of days.

We visited the south area of Punta del Este and also places such as Casa Pueblo, located in Punta Ballena, a hotel-town created by the artist Carlos Páez Vilaró.

Piriápolis is also a good place to visit with its ocean views and a marina where you can enjoy and relax while having a drink or a coffee.

The last day we decided to stay around La Barra. Wilder, one of the employees in La Merced, had a second job in a five star hotel called L’Auberge and he invited us to try the Belgian Waffles they make. The hospitality was superb and the place is a beautiful rural hotel with a colonial touch. I recommend the hotel restaurant for a nice meal while seating in the garden’s terrace.

Finally our trip came to an end, we enjoyed it and had the opportunity to visit lots of interesting places and we had a very good memory of the country and its culture, an authentic jewel in South America.

                                              © Juan Manuel Abad Fernandez