Trips,Travels and Vacations: Uruguay Colonia del Sacramento

We head across the river on the ferry in a torrential downpour. There is a silver lining. As we travel for the next week everyone tells us that the weather had been unseasonably hot and humid until this huge rainstorm blew all across Argentina and cooled things off. Lucky for us. We travel from a city of 13-15 million to a country of 3 million and a little town of 25,000. Old, quaint and charming. The river here is clean and the streets and buildings are draped with tropical flowers and blooming trees. We stay at a lovely old inn with a magical courtyard. Filled with masses of pink hibiscus, scented with thousands of star jasmine and the music of a tinkling fountain. After the energy level of Buenos Aires it seems almost too quiet. The number one attraction is the sunset. Everyone gathers at the point to watch the sun dive into the river.

Hotel

The courtyard is a place a picture does not do justice. No darting hummingbirds or tiny jasmine drifting to the patio. No sun beams dancing on the pink canopy of hibiscus or murmur of people walking by can be caught by the camera.

We struggle with our Spanish but we all have a thought as how to translate this sign. My guess is we are wrong.

All these houses have been beautifully restored.

Time for sunset.

We feel need for an order of frites but somehow it got lost in the translation and we got a plate of fried onions (YUM) and 3 kinds of fried potatoes and fried cheese. Oh well it was delicious.

Oh! Oh! Here comes that thunderstorm we went through earlier on the boat. We barely make it into the restaurant for shelter.

So the photographer whiles away the time taking trick drinking pictures.

To top off the evening we do get a sunset.

It is like Cuba here in that they save and drive every old car that they ever had. New cars have approximately 127% tax. That provides a lot of incentive to preserve old jewels.
Someone called them rolling museums.

Jim is trying to figure out how to save this one.

When all else fails this one is a planter and a bit further up the street one outside a restaurant is a romantic table for two.

Hibiscus and bouganvilla

The next day the sun comes out and we are off to tour Uruguay's largest winery. An hour's drive away through verdant land that is so lightly populated it seems unused.

Jon has found his favorite bottle.

Old cars everywhere.

Into the wine cave for a wonderful tasting. Our hostess is Maria Noel Irurtia, grandaughter of the founder of this winery. Her grandfather came here to dig rocks from the quarry and started making wine for his own use. Today this is the largest winery in Uruguay. Still very much a family operation. Her passion and love for the winery and her family is part and fabric of this unique experience.

She also added plastic glasses so we could have a bottle for ride back to Colonia.

This is a common form of transport. Remember that 127% tax on cars? When our guide, Claudia, picks up her kids after school the horse carts are lined up in the car pool line at school.

We all fell in love with this precious and precocious little girl. She informed us she spoke Italian and English because her father was English and her mom Italian. She also told us they lived on their boat so they lived free,( no schedules, no responsibility). Obviously that reflected the way mom and dad felt. That simple statement has a lot of meaning. It depends on how one looks at it.