Fishing is one of Montevideanos' favorite hobbies - here the port in the old town
Uruguayans, like Argentinians understand how to live a good life. Montevideo is only 3 hours from Buenos Aires by ferry boat, right across the Rio de la Plata, and there are many similarities between the two people, although they like to focus on their differences. One of those differences is just the matter of size: Uruguay is only 3 million inhabitants when the greater Buenos Aires alone is 13 million. This is palpable in Montevideo, which feels more like a town than a city (I went out with a local friend, Mateo, and he knew people everywhere we went). Because life is not as crazy as it is in Buenos Aires - but the weather is similarly good - uruguayos favor outdoor activities (sports, fishing, suntanning...) when they are not partying (Thursday is the best night out, I heard) or enjoying local cuisine, which most famous representative is the Chivito: a local hamburger composed of a flattened steak, bacon, ham, peppers, mushrooms, tomato, lettuce, olives, onions and a local type of mayonnaise (Note: it is delicious but one of the hardest things to eat granted the overwhelming amount of ingredients and the fact that my front teeth were not engineered to cleanly cut through steak).
Uruguay would have deserved more than 3 days, but I constantly have to balance between staying in cool places and discovering some new ones. I barely had time to lay my towel on the beaches of Punta del Este, enjoyed Chaja (a desert made of meringue and ice cream) at the terrasse of a cafe in Montevideo and visited the charming colonial town of Colonia that I am already in the ferry back to Buenos Aires. I will come back - who knows, maybe for retirement...
Punta del Este, South America's playground for the rich and famous
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