We painfully slid out of our beds thanks to our chiming alarm clock. Waking up at 9am back home never seemed like much of a chore. However, when you spend your time in BA awake from 1pm to 7am the change becomes somewhat difficult on the senses. Martin called us a taxi just before he headed out the door. As his huge clown hair bobbed down the stairs he smiled and shouted, “Don’t snort cocaine in Peru.” His advice will prove to be ever so helpful I’m sure. I almost threw up in our cab as it flew like a jet across the city to port. We arrived at the ferry terminal and wondered why we had to get in three separate lines simply to buy a ticket and check our baggage. We paid a little extra for the faster ferry which gets you from Buenos Aires to the docks of Colonia in 50 minutes. Once in motion the ferry blasts itself across the ocean strait at lightening speed. The ferry is beautiful with red staircases leading up to the executive first class deck. We lined up at the cafeteria and danced ourselves silly to Shakira’s Hips Don’t Lie, as other passengers glared at us annoyingly. We sat down for a few minutes and snacked on lemon almond cake and agua con gas. I walked through the fully stocked on board duty free with much excitement. I found Prada and DG sunglasses for 150 pesos. I also found Jean Paul Gautier Cologne for 56 pesos (18 dollars). I was incredibly excited to run back to Sarah and announce the cheapest duty free in the history of all things decent. We rushed back to the duty free, moments later and I fell into the depths of despair. I soon found out all of the price tags were in US dollars. How horrid! Here I was standing on a boat jetting between Argentina and Uruguay and I was staring at American Dollar price tags.
The world is in trouble.
We debarked in Colonia, grabbed our bags and walked over to the Thrifty Rental building a few steps from the dock. We spent the next five hours scooting around the city in our very own turbo golf cart. Colonia is a quintessential tourist town as people visiting BA take the ferry for the day so they can see a quiet little colonial town just a stones throw away. The city is full of tourists on golf karts, mopeds and vespas. We paid 30 dollars to drive our golf kart around the city for the day, dirt cheap and well worth it. We hopped on our kart and hysterically laughed as we sped onto the cities main street. Take some winding, cobbled streets, add an intriguing history and put them on a gorgeous point overlooking the Rio de la Plata and you’ve found yourself in Colonia. Founded by Portugal in 1680, the town was colonized to smuggle goods into Buenos Aires. A rather vicious rivalry lasted over a hundred years between the Spanish in Argentina and the Portuguese in Uruguay, right in this little town. It is full of antique cars and two story, brightly coloured colonial apartment buildings. We drove to the old town and saw the old smugglers port surrounded by canons and stone wall fortresses with a huge draw bridge at the entrance. We walked around winding cobbled streets to the lighthouse which overlooks the downtown to the left and beach districts to the right. As we walked back to the golf kart we saw two cats mating, that was a highlight for
Sarah as she is an animal lover.
We found an excellent place to eat lunch called El Torreon. The restaurant is located in an old windmill tower directly overlooking the islands dotted along the Rio de la Plata. The sun was shining so we sat outside on the patio and enjoyed the breeze. I ordered a traditional meal called Chivitos which consists of sirloin steak topped with bacon, ham, cheese, fried egg and tomato. I also ordered a liter jug of Sangria which would later prove to be a bit much at two in the afternoon. We ate and sipped and ate. Sarah continued to nag me to finish my Sangria and I have to say it was somewhat of a challenge. I left the restaurant (after Sarah knocked over her entire glass of courtesy Sangria) with somewhat of a wobble in my gate.
Sarah was clearly driving at this point as I sobered up. A funny little lady stopped us at an intersection to tell us that she was a cook and would like to make us a meal. That was a first. Perhaps I should try to do that on Bloore Street when I get home. We drove all around the old town stopping at a pier and park which had bright red autumnal vines crawling up the side of rock wall. We were fortunate to visit the city during the end of the Fall season as the streets are lined with huge sycamore trees which create a tunnel of autumn colours overhead. I grabbed the wheel and started to show our golf kart what Canadians are made of. I sped us through a park and did doughnuts as local kids playing football stared at us in disbelief. I don’t think I have ever laughed so hard, and felt so naughty, in my entire life. We finally reached the end of town and got on the coastal highway. My face splits a grin as I try to remember the terrifying feeling of merging my little golf kart with full fledged traffic. Sarah and I were in hysterics for most of the time as we hugged the side of the highway and watched the cars and motorcycles fly past us.
We got off the highway for a bit to putter around a really nice residential area. An interesting tidbit about the houses here: the majority of residents here seem to own horses. Instead of seeing a dog tied up at the front of someone’s house you will find two or three horses tied up to the front door or fence. We drove another twenty minutes up the coast and declared ourselves Bonnie and Clyde for the day as we recklessly sped on gravel roads on beach front hill tops. We drove all the way down to the ritzy Sheraton Hotel right on the water and drove north.
We stopped our kart at a dilapidated coliseum. It appeared to be fenced off as it was clearly a dangerous spot, but, we saw a Chinese tourist walking over a low part of the fence so we thought we could blame him if we got in trouble. The arena was rusty, run down and basically falling apart. We watched our step and made it to the top of the coliseum so we could look down at the grassy arena center and out across the rural outskirts of town which seem to be filled with farms and a large oval racetrack. As we walked down a flight of stares we noticed that one of the platforms looked like a paper thin slice of Swiss cheese. We avoided the holes as much as possible and rushed down the steps to safety. We drove back to the center of town as our faces and fingers were freezing. We drove the golf kart through a outdoor BBQ filled camp area and onto a wide sidewalk overlooking the ocean to the right. We parked the kart quickly and took some pictures at a proper lookout. A local man came up to me and I had no clue what he was saying. I simply continued to say “English” and pointed at my heart. I yelled at Sarah in the distance and she asked him what he wanted. The man turned into a crazy psychotic mad man pointing his finger at our golf kart. Sarah looked shocked and I was a bit mortified. After the man finished his tantrum we watched him cross the street and get into his car. Apparently he had stopped his car on the highway with the sole purpose of screaming at us. Sarah told me he had told her that driving our golf kart onto the grass was a grave mistake and very disrespectful. He told us “we are not Indians, you Gringos cannot have our land.” He finished his episode by telling us to, “eat shit.” I am ever so glad we got to meet such a lovely fellow. We dropped our kart off at the rental spot, walked to the bus station and boarded a 7pm bus to Montevideo. The drive to the capital lasted two and a half hours. We both passed out as we had had a very long day. I opened my eyes an hour before we arrived and was stunned to realize how our bus lurched and bounded down the highway. Never had I sped down a highway with such gusto. I braced myself, gulped and readied myself for another adventure.
