Colonia and Montevideo

Ok, so I am a few posts behind, but am going to try to get all caught up.

Monday morning I was heading to Colonia de Sacramento, in Uruguay, Colonia for short. TO get there I was taking BuqueBus, which is an hour boat ride across from B.A. to Colonia. I arrive at the port and proceed to get my tickets, barely making the 11:15 boat.

On the boat I meet Ed and Tom, two guys from England and decide to chill with them. Like everyone else I´ve met, they have been traveling for an extended period of time. Umm, I am starting to like this idea of traveling for six months. Anyway, the one hour trip is short and we get off the boat and walk to the hostel. The town is so small you can actually walk around. Unlike most other towns, I usually have to navigate the bus, metro or taxi system to get where I need to go, but finally I get to use my feet. The hostel we are staying in, Hotel Colonia, is only about 6 blocks away from the port.
We get there and check in. It´s actually nice today, the sun is shining and it´s a perfect day for walking around the old city. We actually decide to break for lunch before we head out to walk around. Colonia is the cutest little town I´ve seen, it almost reminds me of some of the towns in Eastern Europe.
The fog starts toroll in as we head out on our walking tour. Once you enter the old city, the streets all turn into cobblestone. There are artesians shops everwhere trying you to purchase their wares. I wish you guys could see some of the photos, because I got some great shots. We see the walls of the city, the convent, the light house, etc... We head back to the hostel and decide to pick up some wine. Well it turns into a night of drinking. Mike had told me the one place I had to go was El Drugstore, a resteraunt that is amazing.

After the drinking game ended, Ed and I headed out to find the Drugstore, some how we stumbled upon it and began to feast. We did a meal for 2 and was about 25 dollars, which included a bottle of wine. It was great. Made it back to the hostel and straight to bed.

The next day (Tuesday) I was headed to Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay. First I decided to walk around some more before heading out. It was really foggy that morning and at 11 am the streets were dead. It was kind of eerie, but also pretty cool. I walked around a bit more and then headed back to the hostel to say goodbye to Tom and Ed. Off to my bus for Montevideo.

At the bus station I met Britta, a girl from Germany. We started talking and realized that we were going to be staying at the same hostel. We made it to Montevideo and headed to our hostel. It was pretty cool. Again we were both hungry, so we went straight to lunch and then walked around. It´s a big city, but also has an old city, which at night can be a bit dodgy. We headed back to the hostel and decided to watch a movie. Oddly enough we chose Hostel, the Quintin Tarintino horror flick about staying in a hostel, that ends up as a torture chamber. It´s pretty bad and I don´t recommend it.

Wednesday, we slept late, realizing that there really wasn´t a whole lot to do. Britta and I decided to go to Ciudad Viejo (old city) and walk around there. It was pretty cool, they have this mausleum for one of their generals, who won a bunch of battles, not quite sure from who. So we walked for a bunch, saw some of the landmarks and then had a churro. Now these aren´t like the churros in the states, oh no, they stuff them with either Chocolate, or Dulce de Leche. Now, dulce de leche is amazing and I am talking a stockpile back with me, so everyone can try it. These churros were insane, I think after eating it, I was in a sugar coma. Wednesday night I was getting my 12 hour bus to Porto Alegre, Brazil.

Thursday and Friday, I arrived in Porto Alegre, got a hostel, that´s more like a hotel, no one speaks English, and I don´t speak Portugese, so it is a bug crappy. It´s also raining, which sucks even more, because there isn´t a whole lot to do. So basically I´ve been reading and sleeping and walking around the city, trying to kill some time. I have seen some of the old stuff, the Mercado, some nice church, etc. The usual. I leave tomorrow for Rio and can´t wait. It´s going to be 80 and I am going to lie on a beach and drink Capriniha.