Uruguay – Maz On The Road

After leaving Cabo Polonio on the jeep in the rain, we arrived back at the visitors centre. Our next stop was only a 15 minute drive north so with the next bus not for a couple of hours we took a taxi to Los Chajá ecolodge, on the edge of the small beachside down of Barra de Valizas. This place was recommended to me by another lodge that I wanted to go to (vegetarian, horses, specified they were “not a dude ranch”) but was closed at the moment. We fell in love with the place as soon as we got there – we had a beautiful thatched roof chalet all to ourselves, one of only two on the property and directly surrounded by twenty horses munching on the marshland.

It was such a stark contrast to the last hostel that the lovely owner, Laura, must have thought I was mad exclaiming “oh wow there is a fridge! And a kettle!”.

This is the sort of place you could come back to for a week, you can cook in your own kitchen and eat on the porch with the dogs (Laura and her partner Mauro just rescued a set of puppies as well as their two older dogs) and horses who will try to steal the breakfast that Laura brings over in the morning.

Most of all we enjoyed making hot chocolate with soya milk in the evenings and quizzing each other on South American mammals (there were no English books in the library!). Turns out I have a weirdly specific knowledge of how many teeth a certain type of anteater has. In order to have a hot shower you had to light the gas hob, turn on the kitchen hot tap, run to the bathroom and turn the hot shower on, then turn off the kitchen tap and hob. These instructions were actually written in the welcome booklet. This made me nervous as I was still mentally scarred from the Cabo Polonio gas leak.

On our way back from buying supplies at the little supermarket, as the sun set car drove up the road towards us, turned around the mini roundabout and stopped. A very friendly smiley couple wound the windows down and offered us a lift, asking if we were staying at the lodge. Not wanting to accept a lift from strangers, we declined and they drove off back the way they came. This felt like a very safe place but why did they drive up then turn around and how did they know where we were staying?!

The next day we went horse riding within the Cabo Polonio national park along the beach. First of all Laura made sure we greeted our horses (Arthur and Brisa) and could control the direction and speed the Gaucho way. No pulling on reins or kicking, just use one hand to gently steer and your voice to go faster or slower.

The beach was absolutely stunning, just us and Thea the dog, and maybe one or two people we passed along the four hour round trip to the Buena Vista viewpoint where we dismounted to climb up.

Making shadows at the top of the viewpoint

Riding through sand dunes, along the beach and through Wild West type desert landscape was incredible. As we led the horses through the steeper parts of the dunes we noticed they also try to step in existing footprints as it’s easier, just like we do. We passed a herd of cows on the beach but the best part was seeing the group of horses who had just popped down from the village to the beach on their own to enjoy the weather. They were just hanging out by the water until our dog Thea had a go and they galloped off into town – I’ve never heard actual thundering hooves before. Vix’s horse almost went with them.

We also loved brushing and feeding the horses – if this place offers a volunteer program I’m there!

We did almost destroy the place though – in the same five minutes, the bottom fell off the sink and water went all over the floor, something happened to the gas heater and the room filled with gas and then the cover fell off the air vent. We opened all the windows and turned everything off before calling Laura, who was out on a ride. When she got back and saw both the bathroom sink and gas no longer worked she looked slightly worried and moved us to the other chalet as the other couple were just leaving. As they waved we realised they were the same nice couple that had kindly offered us the lift last night and they were not in fact after our kidneys.

There is only one bus out of this place per day, at 15.00. With checkout in the morning, and everything closed and deserted for the low season, we wandered down to the beach and made more doggy friends before catching the supermarket before it closed to buy avocados and wraps for our staple meal (thanks Vix!). We did, however, find the only bar open in town and enjoyed a Patricia lager with some locals who welcomed us in and even offered to turn their music down. The owner said we were beautiful like Patricia.

We waited at the bus stop as the daily bus trundled into town, turned around and came back to pick us up on the way out. With no real internet for several days now we hadn’t booked any accommodation nor were we sure if we could make it all the way to Colonia. It was about 5 hours back to the capital city of Montevideo, where we literally jumped off, ran to the ticket office and got ourselves onto the Colonia bus ten minutes later which was full of teenagers going on a night out to a club. We were absolutely starving by the time we arrived and spent the entire 3 hour journey on the bus Wi-Fi trying to find anywhere that would let us check in after midnight – turns out most places expect you before then 🤦🏻‍♀️

We found a hotel that responded just in time and walked the few blocks through the quiet cobbled streets of Colonia – in a huge contrast to Brazil where we couldn’t do that in the daytime! The journey was worth it to wake up in Colonia, as beautiful as I remembered it being ten years ago. The only thing that has changed is that there were loads of old cars, Cuban style, last time I was there which seemed to have gone now aside from a couple outside a restaurant.

Our hotel didn’t have room for us the following night which turned out to be a blessing as we moved just around the corner to an apartment in a the most gorgeous original colonial building. We booked it at 10.50 and arrived at 11.00 to find the lovely Fred, an artist who struggled to hear sometimes over his hearing aid, just finishing preparing the room. To stay in one of these buildings was amazing and we made use of the pretty garden. We had already walked past the door and taken photos of it, before realising that was in fact our new home.

The day was spent wandering around the streets and eating too much fried food in a restaurant on the sea with live music (a man pretending to play guitar and singing “Mi Corazon” with some dramatic gestures in between solar charging his equipment on the table). As well as trying to get cash – my bank card also had to be cancelled as someone had tried to swipe it in Cabo Polonio, possibly by holding a card reader against the locker, so I spent an hour trying to explain to HSBC “the local bank” that no I could not pop into a local branch as I’m in Uruguay, and no I cannot verify a payment if they can’t tell me any details, and locking me out of the banking app “for security” was the least helpful thing they could have done. We withdrew a load of US dollars on Vix’s working card to hopefully avoid needing any more ATMs for the rest of the trip.

We still haven’t found the party – we did find a rock bar with promising art work, but when we asked what’s on tonight they said they have a reggaeton DJ at weekends.

You can easily “see” Colonia in a day but it’s a lovely place to enjoy the atmosphere, walk along the coast and stroll around so you could equally easily spend a week here. But I was really keen to return to Buenos Airies again which fitted in perfectly with the ferry across to Argentina …

After five lazy beach days, we took a cheap flight from the island of Florianopolis, Brazil to the often overlooked capital of Uruguay, Montevideo. I have been to Uruguay once before but only on a day trip from Buenos Airies during my first trip to South America over ten years ago. At the airport in Sao Paolo where we changed planes, we noticed people taking selfies with an older man – naturally we had to get one too, having no clue who it was. He turned out to be Martinho da Vila the 85 year old Brazilian samba star.

In Montevideo we stayed two nights at the Yorki Haus hostel, run by a German man and a French man. We had a prison style room at the very top of the building with a gorgeous rooftop to ourselves.

An annoying family had taken over the kitchen, which I didn’t mind until I spent ages making coffee using our £10 Starbucks ground coffee (literally the only coffee in any supermarket without added sugar) then as soon as I turned my back to spread my £10 peanut butter on my toast The Dad poured the rest of the coffee and took it for himself.

Seeing the capital city at the weekend was great. We found a great little bar just down the road that served veggie sandwiches and cocktails and played Latin rock, and during the day we walked the few kilometres down to the old town along the beach amongst locals jogging and exercising on a Saturday morning. Like much of South America, it doesn’t get going until the afternoon. We browsed the antique shops and had an amazing lunch of grilled vegetables before making our way back via the supermarket to stock up on food for the next few days when we would be “off grid” in the hippy town of Cabo Polonio.

Having looked up rock bars in Montevideo, thinking surely we’d finally find a night out in the capital, we got an Uber across town to the “best rock bar in Uruguay”, the Roxx Bar. When we arrived at a deserted residential looking street, we asked the driver if the place even existed. The driver asked the one man hanging around outside, who explained the that he was also waiting as the owner was a “a bit late opening up”. It was already almost 11pm so after waiting for a while we decided that even if the owner did turn up, it would just be the three of so maybe not that exciting. Luckily we found a friendly welcome and a live punk covers band at Clash City Rockers bar down the road, even though it was cash only so we had just enough money for two beers between us.

Next morning we set off early to the huge and modern Tres Cruces bus terminal to get a 4.5 hour bus northeast up the coast to Cabo Polonio. It’s a scenic journey and we passed a few places we’d have been happy to get off and explore. When you get off at Cabo Polonia bus station, there is a visitors centre where you hang around for a while before a large jeep type vehicle takes you all through the sand dunes to the village, three times a day.

Whilst waiting for the jeep we made our debuts on Uruguayan daytime TV when we were asked for an interview about our visit with host Mario – although half of what we said wasn’t translated, somehow my name was changed to Alice and I have no idea where the “British Girls on a Ride” tag line came from 🤦🏻‍♀️ It’s available on YouTube although I haven’t yet got over the cringe factor enough to watch it (what was the point in asking if we are planning on coming back again when we haven’t been there yet?).

Cabo Polonio is about 9km off the main highway and there are no proper roads there. The driver had to take a run up over one mound and we passed some military looking types that were well and truly stuck in the sand. We finally reached the Lobo Hostel Bar, which we had chosen for its sociable setting and billing as the local bar – seeing as we were there off season and we didn’t want to be totally isolated. We accidentally went to the nice welcoming looking guesthouse next door, with music playing from the restaurant and tables and chairs outside – I later realised they only turn the music on and put the chairs out when the morning jeep arrives with new visitors. I never saw it open again.

Neither of us have particularly high expectations for accommodation. In fact we have pretty low standards. When the woman running the place, Celia (we think that was her name) showed us to our attic room up a ladder with only a rope to hold on to, lockable only by our own padlock, we took it as part of the adventure. We loved the window that opened directly on to the little rooftop that we had to ourselves. We loved the wind turbine next to the roof. We didn’t mind the fact the blanket on the bed was full of leaves, until we got bed bugs. I gave Celia, aka the Hunchback of Cabo Polonia, the benefit of the doubt when she shortchanged us even though another backpacker told us she’d done the same thing to her friend. We tried to cook our pasta on the frankly disgusting stove that stank of a gas leak and made me feel sick everytime I went near it. The only thing the Hunchback really said was how ugly the newer houses were (we thought they were really pretty) and essentially how tourists were ruining the place.

But we drew the line when we went down the ladder to make dinner in the kitchen we had paid to use, to find pieces of cardboard on the floor soaking up an oil spill, a “do not use” sign on the sink though there was nothing wrong with it and the fridge had been unplugged. The Hunchback was from then on referred to by Vix (whose socks were now soaked in oil) as Oil Slick Mcgoo when she tried to blame her other guests for spilling the oil and leaving it. The oil was never cleaned up over the three nights we were there, it just stayed all over the floor next to the open flame (if she’d turn the gas on and lend you a lighter).

There is a very old fashioned supermarket in the village, which weighs fruit and vegetables the old way and is open all day other than around 3-5. The empanadas looked suspiciously like the ones from yesterday, every morning, but we were just glad they took Visa since with one of my cards already lost to cloning and no ATMs in the town we had limited funds. No problem – the shop sold a great selection of wine and anything over £8 they would accept cards for. Win win (until my Visa was also stopped a few days later for a dodgy contactless transaction which was either the shop or the hostel trying their luck).

On our first night we went with another girl to try to see the glowing Bioluminescence, a type of plankton, in the water. This was a total fail but it was fun to walk around the lighthouse at night in the pitch black other than the lighthouse signal itself.

Bone, fossil or rock outside a “new” house

There are certain characters you encounter over again when backpacking. “The Waster” is one of them. They are usually European backpackers who have stayed too long doing nothing or maybe “volunteering” / skiving at a hostel, typically looking horrible and miserable. The man “working” at the hostel was definitely a Waster.

April being low season, it was a total ghost town. The next morning I tried to make us both coffee in the morning but The Hunchback had thrown the cafetière in the bin. I asked The Waster and he reluctantly gave me another from their own fully functioning kitchen. After a lot off faff trying to get it going and avoiding the oil spill and carbon monoxide poisoning, I knocked the whole thing over and was about to spontaneously combust myself when Vix calmed me down and we got the hell out of there. With nowhere open, we found an old man who opened up his tiny cafe to shelter us and two other other desperate tourists from the rain and served us coffee on a little silver tray with shaking hands.

The dogs of Cabo Polonio deserve a mention – friendly and sociable, they each have their own patch. As we walked though the village each day we would meet each one in turn, from the Hostel Dog who hung out on our rooftop and probably gave us fleas, to the Town Dog half way across the village that seemed blind, to the gorgeous blue eyed Lighthouse Dog that accompanied us on our search for the seals.

Improvised wine glass to avoid dirty hostel cup

There is a large area of “new” houses on the other side of the village, but not a single person in sight. One house had what looked like a massive spinal bone out front, one had an old bomb and most had some piece of unique art embedded into the walls.

Having given up on cooking at the hostel, we found the one more expensive restaurant that took Visa and lived it up with a lovely vegetable stir fry. Totally worth it for the view and a comfy place to hang out and drink (we went back every day). Vix even went into the sea and swam with the tiny creatures whose heads we had seen from the shore but never could find out what they were (dolphin / turtle / baby seal depending upon who you asked).

Our rooftop came into it’s own at night- this was the clearest sky I’ve seen in a long time, with the Milky Way visible end to end. I also loved having the chance to switch off from your phone with very limited electricity, and candle light in the evening means you can enjoy the night sky. But we were sitting in darkness in the hostel as the candles in the plastic bottles burned out while The Wasters cooked up a storm in the fully lit up “restaurant” kitchen next door.

Avocado, tomato and bean wraps on the roof – no cooking required

It poured with rain as we left on the jeep a few days later, after making our way back to the Visa restaurant only to find it closed and begging a man there to make us an instant coffee. We only left our stuff in the hostel for an hour, my big bag which was locked and putting our smaller bags in a locker. When we returned from coffee, both combination locks had been tampered with. Our feeling was that The Wasters either tried to get in or just turned the codes to mess with us, something I have never experienced at a hostel before. It’s probably a good thing we did our TV interview before our visit!

Breakfast- miniature bag of cornflakes from our bag of snacks and £3 instant coffee

You’d expect some Filthy Hippies at an off grid community and I love the idea behind Cabo Polonio and self sufficiency but the the place we stayed had no recycling and was just filthy, which goes against the values of an eco town. But the area itself is absolutely stunning with miles of unspoilt coastline and the nature is amazing – definitely worth a visit for a few days if you stay in one of the nice guesthouses. It’s also nice to be there off season when you can enjoy the peace and quiet.

Jeep ride out – only one poor guy was on the inbound jeep as we left

Saying goodbye to Cabo, we continued the off grid theme as we headed to a horse “eco lodge” just a few miles up the coast…

Category: Uruguay

Caballos and Colonia

British Girls on a Ride and The Wasters (Uruguay Part 1)