Circumnavigation of Uruguay

By Jamie Douglas

Most of my readers no doubt are aware that Uruguay is an autonomous country lodged between the butt cheeks of Argentina and Brazil. But many of you may not realize that the country is literally surrounded by water. There is 660 km of coastline along the Atlantic Ocean and the Río de la Plata estuary, and thence up the Río Uruguay to Brazil, and from there heading southeast along the Brazilian border to Chuy and Barra del Chuy on the Atlantic Ocean coastline.

Along the Brazilian border there are miles upon miles of rivers separating the two nations, with the major towns from west to east being Bella Unión, Artigas, Rivera, Río Branco and, after the border passes through Laguna Merín, you finally end up in Chuy, 985 km from the Argentina-Brazil-Uruguay triple border.

Should you feel adventurous, you can circumnavigate the entire country on mostly good roads. (Please invite me along!)

You might first visit the well-preserved historic old town of Colonia del Sacramento, and after a couple of days of marveling at the beauty of this lovely UNESCO Heritage Site, head north through Mercedes, Paysandú and Salto, where you can relax in hot springs that have existed for centuries.

After your soak, head west to Artigas, where you are likely to run into some of the finest amethyst the world has to offer. Now comes the relatively uninhabited stretch to Rivera, then down to Vichadero and onto a dirt road to Melo. A disclosure here: My editor/wife and I were in Tacuarembó , which is in the interior of the country south of Rivera, a couple of years ago; and when we mentioned that we were going to book passage to Melo, people looked at us very strangely and wanted to know why we wanted to go there. They stated that there was nothing there, nothing to do, and the road was terrible. We believed them and returned to Montevideo, instead – the road from Paysandú to Tacuarembó was bad enough! After settling in La Paloma, we made new friends with our neighbors who had just moved from Melo. They assured us that it was not worth the time or energy to visit.

If you are truly adventurous, you can go from Melo to the border-crossing town of Río Branco and then head to Treinta y Tres, the city named after Uruguay’s 33 Founding Fathers, before making your way on backroads to Chuy. Alternatively, you could go straight to Treinta y Tres via highway. You will be well off the beaten path, either way.

The Beaches of Rocha

The department of Rocha reaches along the Atlantic Coast from the Brazilian border all the way to the department of Maldonado, almost to Punta del Este, the “Miami Beach” of Uruguay. It is a 200-mile stretch of uninterrupted sandy beaches, lagoons and rather primitive villages with inexpensive cabins right on the beach. After Barra del Chuy, you will come to a string of charming little place: La Coronilla, Santa Theresa National Park, Punta del Diablo, Aguas Dulces, Punta Castillos, Punta Aguada and Cabo Polonio National Park, where you have to park your car and take a giant WWII-era six-wheel-drive monster truck out to the cape.

Cabo Polonio has recently been designated a national park, and new construction is prohibited. But there is an abundance of illegally built houses (?) covering the sand dunes, some of them very rustic, ramshackle huts, while others are quite nice. Accommodations even in the high season (December through early March) are easy to get and are relatively economical. There is no electricity except for the lighthouse, and water has to be trucked in, so it is very limited.

There are several decent restaurants and a “supermarket” for your convenience, stocking everything you might need to cook your own food. An overabundant choice of wine and beer is also available in mass quantities.

Further south is a real town – with paved roads and all. La Pedrera is famous for its carnival and is a favorite with the young crowd, while La Paloma a few kilometers farther to the south has a little more of a family vibe.

La Paloma is a small city with about 3,000 year-round inhabitants (including us!), paved streets, running water and really expensive electricity. We have untold numbers of restaurants during the season and about a half dozen or so that stay open out of season.

During the high season, La Paloma serves as a vacation destination for about 30,000 people, and the beaches get quite crowded. Our Argentinean friends drive on residential streets as if they are on the highway – they are reckless and arrogant, just like they drive in Argentina.

Between La Paloma and Punta del Este, you have to briefly return to the main highway (Route 9) for a few kilometers until you come to a turnoff about 20 km from Rocha that will take you to the coastal highway to Punta José Ignacio, Punta Manantiales, La Barra and finally to Punta del Este. From there, many small roads branch off that follow the coast back to Montevideo that will take you along the brown, muddy waters of the Río de la Plata – or, you can take the Ruta Interbalnearia, the “inter-resort” toll road.

Enjoy the ride, and remember that the entire Atlantic coastline is one giant sand dune that is ecologically very sensitive. Tread lightly please!

Jamie Douglas

At large in Uruguay

I encourage you to write me at cruzansailor [at] gmail [dot] com with any questions or suggestions you may have. Disclaimer: I am not in any travel-related business. My advice is based on my own experiences and is free of charge (Donations welcome). It is always my pleasure to act as a beneficial counselor to those who are seekers of the next adventure.

News from Around the Hemisphere, Jan 15, 2014 (reposted from original location)

article from January 15, 2014
By Jamie Douglas

First off, an apology to my readers: I have not been writing as often as I would like, as I am not well... but not ill enough to refrain from occasionally spouting my opinions and pointing out interesting facts.

Mexico’s continuing problems

Poor Mexico! After the recent elections, there was hope that the violence would subside somewhat, but it is only getting worse in the states that have been flashpoints in the unfortunate war on drugs, which has cost over 100,000 lives over the past few years – one of which is the state of Michoacán, where I used to reside until I went to buy the newspaper for my morning coffee at Pátzcuaro restaurant where expats, artists and criminals alike would mingle.

Since that morning eight years ago, when I was shocked to see photos of 22 mutilated corpses on the back pages of La Voz de Michoacán, things have gotten progressively worse. In a recent article in Proceso [spanish], it is revealed that the Knights Templar, successors to the Zeta crime syndicate, have now entered politics on behalf of the PRI, the hyper-corrupt Mexican political party that bled the country dry for generations. After a brief respite, the PRI is back in power, with a little help from their usual election fraud along with the Knights Templar, who have become an economic force to contend with, as they have made hundreds of millions of dollars running the port of Lázaro Cárdenas and illegally mining iron ore.

As a result of long-standing collusion between the local, state and federal government and the cartels, Michoacán has come close to being an ungovernable failed state, and the neighboring states up and down the Pacific coast may follow.

When will the powers that be realize that the unfortunate war on drugs had the same results as the prohibition in the United States did? It enabled criminal elements to take over the country with diluted and dangerous unregulated alcohol, corrupting most major police forces by flooding them with money.

Panama and Nicaragua race for a wider canal across the isthmus

In 2006, Panama’s then-president Martin Torrijos announced a plan to expand the Panama Canal so it could accommodate today’s VLCCs. He boldly stated that this project would turn Panama into a first-world country. Perhaps he did not anticipate all of the corruption that would inevitably follow this proposal. Perhaps he underestimated the larceny of the Martinelli administration. But one thing is glaringly obvious: The conglomerate that bid on the work grossly underestimated the cost and time for building this ambitious project – and therein lies the current problem. The Panama Canal Authority is refusing to pay for the cost overruns and has threatened to take over the project by force mejeure.

Regardless of what will happen in this chapter of Panama Canal history, Panama will not be a first-world nation until it rids itself of all the scams that are at home there, including the banking and real estate sectors, much of which is run by American and Canadian expats, con men and women and convicted criminals trying to sell anything they can think of.

Meanwhile, a Chinese investor has put together a consortium of wealthy business people from China to build a canal clear across the isthmus in Nicaragua. This project is slated to begin in December of this year; and if successfully completed, it will be quite a thorn in the side of the Panama Canal Authority. But with the enormous nature of the project, one should not hold their breath. China may be riding high at the moment, but nothing lasts forever. The Chinese economy is already feeling the pain of the costs of their armed forces and high-speed rail networks.

I wonder why Mexico has not pursued the logical choice of building a trans-isthmus canal from Tehuantepec to the Caribbean. Perhaps the cost and logistics are too prohibitive, along with the opposition of the indigenous people.

Venezuela and crime

Venezuela’s sweetheart, actress and former Miss Universe Monica Spear, and her husband, Thomas Berry, were brutally murdered a few days ago when their car broke down. Their little 5-year-old daughter was also shot but survived.

Venezuela is a spectacular nation, blessed with abundant natural resources and stunning beauty. From Angel Falls to the Caribbean islands, nature has blessed this nation with abundant and fertile lands, not to mention the crude oil reserves in Lake Maracaibo and the gold in the ground.

Unfortunately, the riches of the nation have been distributed unequally to the point of forcing many into a life of serious crime. The homicide rate is near the top of world statistics, and the prisons are overflowing. The staggering amount and wide distribution of serious crimes is affecting everyone from the very poor to the very rich. Ironically, Monica Spear and her family moved to Miami out of fear for their safety. Nearing the end of a holiday vacation, fate caught up with them.

If there is one good thing that can be said about it, it is the fact that thousands of people came to her funeral and thousands more protested the senseless violence the Bolivarian nation is confronting.

And now the weather

After an early spring followed by another cold front, the Southern Cone countries of Brazil, Uruguay and Argentina have been hit with several waves of severe weather, which included some of the most intense lightning and thunder this observer has ever witnessed.

Torrential rains in Brazil took their toll in human lives, and Uruguay also had several casualties, including a police officer who was killed in downtown Montevideo when hit by a swinging door he was trying to secure during one of the storms, which packed winds of up to 100 km/h.

Argentina also suffered one of the worst heat waves in their recorded history that was compounded by the failure of the electric grid in Buenos Aires, causing brownouts, blackouts and several heat-related casualties. The worst incident happened in the small beach town of Villa Gesell, where four youngsters were killed on the beach by lightning and another 22 injured. The tragedy happened so quickly that the victims never had a chance to escape.

I will not opine on the cause of all this severe weather, from the polar vortex to the unseasonably severe cold in Antarctica that caused an Australian tour boat to get stuck in the pack ice, forcing other important scientific programs to be interrupted when several additional ships had to be sent to their rescue. The Australian organizer of the trip defended his expedition as having valid scientific value by explaining that the lay observers on the ship were qualified to make observations of the current conditions in the region.

Antarctica, being the last frontier on this planet, has been exploited for high-end tourism for several years, and this latest problem is no different from any other for-profit organized tour.

Jamie Douglas

At large in Uruguay

I encourage you to write me at cruzansailor [at] gmail [dot] com with any questions or suggestions you may have. Disclaimer: I am not in any travel-related business. My advice is based on my own experiences and is free of charge (Donations welcome). It is always my pleasure to act as a beneficial counselor to those who are seekers of the next adventure.

About Those Plans to Become an Expatriate... (reposted from original location)

article from January 2, 2014
By Jamie Douglas

As we enter another new year, many people in the Northern Hemisphere are taking stock of their lives, looking to better their situation and location, and in the deep freeze of winter they are dreaming of the easy life on a tropical beach with coconuts, pineapples and bananas.

But wait – there is much more to that equation. All of us who have successfully migrated out of our nest-countries have had to make sacrifices we did not plan on. Some of those are what are referred to as “comfort items,” like foods. You will not be able to find a Waffle House or bagel shops, and there is probably no Marmite, fish ‘n’ chips or instant gravy mixes in any flavor you like.

When you first start your inquiries at consulates about residency, you will be overwhelmed at the amount of hurdles you have to clear in order to get that cherished residency in Parador. And when you finally do and arrive in your dream destination, which you have hopefully spent some months getting to know, you might not be too charmed by all the bureaucracy and graft to outright corruption and extortion you might encounter, depending on where you go.

Of course, if you chose a country like Uruguay, the process is, as Mark Mercer at Uruguay Expat Life puts it, a comprehensible, fair, attainable process (they have more great articles about Uruguay residency and other such technicalities, too).

There are some things you must however be prepared to leave behind: first and foremost are your friends and relatives. The further away you are, the more difficult it will be, and making friends in a new place is not easy. You will always be looked upon as the strangers, even long after you live in a place.

Getting a job is not always easy, even if you have great IT skills, as the locals have acquired them as well, and they are doing the work at a fraction of the cost and are, of course, perfectly fluent in their native tongue as well as the computer languages required to write code.

If your wealth allows you to maintain a standard of living such as what you had back home, you will be the envy of your neighbors, so make sure you live in a neighborhood that you blend into to reduce your chances of being victims of crimes. The best deterrent is to try to be modest in your display of wealth.

If you have kids going to school, they will make friends quickly and get acclimatized to the culture faster than the adults do. And it is normal to see expats dragging their kids along to translate for them.

Primarily, you should keep in mind that you left your familiar surroundings to be exposed to a new and adventurous life.

I have been an expat on and off for over 50 years, changing countries and continents frequently, never getting bogged down by property ownership. Having spent years in adventurous nations where property ownership may change from revolution to revolution, I have never had to abandon it all because of civil unrest or a coup d’état.

I have had to rush out of a few locales with one or two suitcases, leaving behind my appliances and a few personal items. (How I remember those adventures in Fiji, New Caledonia, Bolivia, Guatemala, Papua New Guinea, South Africa etc...) I never had to go back and fight military juntas to get my property back; but I got some great stories, from climbing off the back of a truck into an idling Braniff DC-8 on the takeoff runway in La Paz, Bolivia, to rafting from the Isle of Pines to New Caledonia on the South Equatorial Current (watch for these to come!).

It has certainly been an exciting ride, which was made all the easier by my lack of attachments to just about anything with the exception of exposed film. I actually do not recommend some of my wild times to most people; but in these unsettled times, we never know what tomorrow’s headlines bring: Todos yanquis fuera de Parador!

Jamie Douglas
La Paloma, Uruguay

I encourage you to write me at cruzansailor [at] gmail [dot] com with any questions or suggestions you may have. Disclaimer: I am not in any travel-related business. My advice is based on my own experiences and is free of charge (Donations welcome). It is always my pleasure to act as a beneficial counselor to those who are seekers of the next adventure.

The New Allure of Uruguay: Legalization of Marijuana (reposted from original location)

article from December 28, 2013
By Jamie Douglas

The month of December has seen this little country, lodged between the butt cheeks of its giant neighbors Brazil and Argentina, take a leap of faith by legalizing the cultivation and purchase of cannabis legal (consumption was already legal).

Deliberations have been ongoing since President José “Pepe” Mujica asked for legalization of marijuana in 2012, and this in spite of neither him nor his wife, Senator Lucía Topolansky, being smokers of the weed.

And so it was that on December 10, 2013, the Senate voted 16 to 13 to create a legal marketplace for marijuana. On December 23, 2013, the president signed the bill, also declaring that from that moment, Uruguayan citizens were free to cultivate up to six plants per household.

Within 120 days, the nation’s drug control agency will have to write and implement regulations governing the cultivation, sale, and all aspects thereof. It is already understood that all participants will have to be licensed residents or citizens of the nation, with 40 grams allotted per legal person per month.

The opposition parties of course immediately decried the new law, using age-old clichés regarding  the easy access children will now have to this “dangerous gateway drug” – the same tired argument that has been used in the US´s failed War on Drugs which has cost hundreds of thousands of lives, ruined millions of others and created an organized crime monster that operates their own fleet of jet aircraft, ships and submarines, reaping billions in profits and, in the US´s own neighbor, Mexico, killing any opposing gangs by the thousands in the most gruesome manner imaginable.

Marijuana is nothing new to Uruguay. Paraguay, one of the member states of the faltering MERCOSUR alliance, has been one of the world´s largest cultivators of cannabis for quite a while now, and what it lacks in quality (everything) it makes up in quantity. Unfortunately, it is compressed with massive hydraulic machines and impregnated with everything from cow urine to odor-masking chemicals, which end up in consumers´ lungs.

It is the adulteration of the weed that causes harm, not the product itself. So one might deduce that the legalization of the sale and consumption of cannabis in South America will result in a healthier experience for the user.

Amsterdam-like narco-tourism

In my opinion, the pseudo-legalization of cannabis in Amsterdam was a total failure because the social experiment was never properly codified, drawing losers from around the planet like a magnet. Looking the other way not only meant that cannabis was tolerated, but along with it, every other conceivable form of drug, from heroin to methamphetamine. Having cafés dispense hashish and marijuana also provided adequate fodder for drug syndicates to establish a foothold, something the Dutch citizens were not prepared for. But in the 40 plus years since the social experiment began, it has virtually become the genie that got out of the bottle.

The suggested laws governing the sale and consumption to foreigners will limit their participation in the Uruguayan cannabis subculture to what tourist already do now: buy from strangers on the street, in all likelihood ending up with the dark brown cow-piss-stained garbage they have been getting by way of Paraguay. The lush, green local nuggets will be reserved for legitimate license holders, some of whom, no doubt, will try to cash in on selling it at premium prices on the black market.

If you are considering a trip to get high, I recommend states like Colorado, where you not only have legal weed, but also incredible scenery to enjoy while you have your smoke and fall into a dream. With the high airfare to get to Montevideo from North America, you can get to Colorado and buy a bunch of really good weed for that “Rocky Mountain High!”

Cannabis legalization in Uruguay did not become a reality to boost tourism. That sector is doing quite well, in spite of the fact that there is rather little to see and do, other than bathing in freezing waters and enjoying the sand dunes along the Atlantic coast from the Miami Beach of South America, Punta del Este, to the Brazilian Border in Chuy.

Jamie Douglas

[Image via Wikipedia]

I encourage you to write me at cruzansailor [at] gmail [dot] com with any questions or suggestions you may have. Disclaimer: I am not in any travel-related business. My advice is based on my own experiences and is free of charge (Donations welcome). It is always my pleasure to act as a beneficial counselor to those who are seekers of the next adventure.

Parada en Paysandú, Uruguay

article from July 23, 2012

by Julie R Butler

After driving for five days (at a leisurely pace) from San Rafael, Mendoza, to the Cataratas de Iguazú in the northeastern reaches of Argentina, then selling our car and riding the overnight bus to Colón to be dropped off on the side of a four-lane divided highway at the first light of dawn on a chilly Sunday morning, we took a taxi through the border crossing into Uruguay and on into the center of Paysandú, landing at the lovely Hotel El Jardín, where a warming fire, a fresh pot of coffee, and a serviceable staff made us feel comfortable and happy to be back to lil’ ol’ Uruguay once again.

The day was cloudy and gray and the mess of a big construction project on the main street of the city dampened the mood a little (they are installing fiber optics and putting all of the utilities under the sidewalks, which were greatly in need of repair, anyway). But after walking about and getting oriented, we found ourselves in a noisy pizza place that was full of soccer fans watching the World Cup qualifying match between Uruguay’s beloved team – known as La Celeste, the sky-blue color in the first flags of Uruguay and the team uniforms – and Peru. The pizza was great, plus we caught the dramatic, game-clinching goal and were a part of the thunderous celebration that it elicited. It was not a bad way to start things off.

Over the next few days, the weather brightened up as we explored the city. Happily, even though we didn’t know what exactly the Monument a Perpetuidad might entail, we wandered into this beautiful historic cemetery that features exquisite sculpture on par with what can be found in the famous Recoleta Cemetery in Buenos Aires except that this memorial garden is much less crowded and very tranquil. The remains of the scientists and philanthropists, the housewives, children, and common men “who forged the Paysandú of today” rest peacefully here, and their memories are honored with amazing marble artwork by Italian masters of the day.

The third-largest city in Uruguay, Paysandú is a commercial and industrial center as well as a tourist destination, with attractive beaches and plenty of open park space on the Uruguay River along with the nearby thermal springs. The city is known for the weeklong beer festival that is held during the Easter holidays (it’s officially called Semana Turismo in Uruguay) and its Carnival season celebrations.

Paysandú has rich historical significance for the Eastern Republic, having begun as an attempt at becoming one of the Jesuit missions (known as reducciones de indios) that were set up throughout the Río de la Plata Basin beginning in the seventeenth century. It was located at a cattle crossing of the Uruguay River and soon became established as a port known for its leatherworks and beef jerky plant. The jerky was once popular with the Portuguese as inexpensive sustenance for their African slaves, while the leather from Paysandú is still prized to this day. The wool fabrics produced here are also prized, and the other main industries are forestry products, citrus, cement, and beer. Paysandú is probably most famous within Uruguay for the heroic defense of its outnumbered inhabitants against Brazilian invaders in 1865 – a common theme in this tiny country.

We learned all kinds of interesting information in the modest history museum, and everywhere we went in the city, people were proud to point out the many historical buildings and monuments.

Photos by Jamie Douglas and Julie R Butler:

Julie R Butler is a writer, journalist, editor, and author of several books, including Nine Months in Uruguay and No Stranger To Strange Lands (click here for more info). She is a contributor to Speakout at Truthout.org, and her current blog is Connectively Speaking.

email: julierbutler [at] yahoo [dot] com, Twitter: @JulieRButler

Our Trip to Minas, Uruguay, Part Two

article from July 9, 2012

By Jamie Douglas

Minas, a charming town located in the sierras of Uruguay, has held an attraction for us for some time now, and we recently went there in search of housing for the near future – in vain, unfortunately.

Nevertheless, I highly recommend a visit to this small city in the “mountains” of Uruguay. There are various direct bus services from Montevideo, Piriápolis and Punta del Este. The ride is about one and a half hours from any of those places. If you are coming from the central or northern Atlantic coast, there is a shortcut by taking the bus to Pan de Azúcar and walking a block to the COOM “office,” a stale, rundown bar inhabited by strange creatures at all hours of the day. A bus leaves from there at noon. This bus schedule information website offers the details on most services available in the country in English.

So we took the ride from the stinking bar up to Minas, an incredibly clean town with 25,000 mostly friendly people and clean air that is surrounded by lovely rolling hillsides. The town itself features just about anything your heart might desire: well-stocked stores, restaurants and confiterías featuring world-class coffee and a great assortment of pastries, as well as several very nice hotels. Our favorite is the Posada Verdún, located at 715 Washington Beltran, just a couple of blocks from the bus station, in the heart of town. The posada features its own dining room, which serves world-class food at very affordable prices, and the chef’s pride is his bread. Judging by his waistline, he eats there, as well. All the rooms are well appointed and heated/air conditioned. We have been to this particular location several times, and they really do treat us like family. Their motto is “Su casa en Minas.”

Walking around town, we were constantly amazed at how clean everything was, how many smiling faces we encountered and, even late at night, how safe we felt. The little city just does not give off the aura of fear and crime that you encounter in so many other Latin American cities.

Another thing that was very pleasing to the eye was the architecture. With a couple of newer exceptions, all the buildings are no more than two stories, with many polychromatic fronts. The entranceways are tall and feature very ornate doors, most lacking iron grates.

The town features several well-groomed parks, the largest of which is right in the center of town, with a large statue of General Lavalleja sitting on his horse (with the occasional pigeon pooping on his chapeau). There are several vacation parks just outside of town, the best known of which is probably the Parque Salus, the source of the mineral water of the region as well as the local beer, Patricia, which recently got gobbled up by the Belgian multinational Ambev, then Inbev, the company that bought out Anheuser-Busch and Corona Modelo and is looking to become the world beer monopoly.

It is nevertheless a very nice excursion to go there. An ancient bus takes you the 10 kilometers from the Minas bus station to the nature park, where you will enjoy an abundance of eucalyptus and pine trees.

Other local attractions include the retreat village of Villa Serrana, 25 km northeast of Minas; Parque Artiguas, with its huge statue of the Uruguayan national hero, José Gervasio Artigas, on his horse; and many nature attractions in the surrounding mountains that offer outdoor activities such as fishing, camping and hiking.

Overall, Minas is a lovely destination for a few days or a weekend, but if you want to move there, there really is not much available in rentals. There are plenty of properties for sale, of course, whether you want to be in town or on the outskirts. So if you are in this neck of the woods, by all means, stop by in Minas and enjoy the easygoing town in the sierras, 500 feet above sea level, one of the higher places in Uruguay.

see also: Uruguay's "Secret": Minas and Our Trip to Minas, Uruguy: Part One

Jamie Douglas

About to be homeless (again) in Uruguay

[All photos by Jamie Douglas]

I encourage you to write me at cruzansailor [at] gmail [dot] com with any questions or suggestions you may have. Disclaimer: I am not in any travel-related business. My advice is based on my own experiences and is free of charge (Donations welcome). It is always my pleasure to act as a beneficial counselor to those who are seekers of the next adventure.

Our Trip to Minas, Uruguay: Part One

article from July 7, 2012

By Jamie Douglas

We have crisscrossed this small nation in search of affordable housing, and unfortunately had to discount our first choice, Colonia del Sacramento, clearly our favorite. Unfortunately, it has become way too costly to rent a place there, so we looked at several other options while burning up our financial resources (see the PayPal donation button to help!) and ended up back in La Paloma on the Atlantic coast, about two and a half hours from the Brazilian border and about four hours from Montevideo, all by bus, of course.

While we were in Argentina, La Paloma suffered through some of the worst tourist-seasons in its history. Many of the vacation houses that normally rent out for megabucks stayed empty as the rich Argentineans just did not come. We saw the first signs of that develop when we left Uruguay in February of 2010. Many of the owners of the seasonal rentals were sitting on their front porches of their homes waiting for the visitors, who never showed. The restaurant owners were also complaining that nobody came to eat; the tourists who did come cooked their meals in their rentals.

So we are back to the ghost town La Paloma is during the off-season, having contacted our friendly landlady from Montevideo. Once we arrived in Rocha to visit with her, we were shocked to learn that our little cave by the beach had quintupled in price. But we had no other choice than to cough up the sum, hoping we would find something more affordable away from the tourist zone that would be good for the whole year, instead of turning us into economic fugitives when the season starts again in December. So we made a plan to go to Minas, a very charming and very clean town in the sierras that serves as the capital of the department of Lavalleja.

Our timing was impeccable: We arrived during a two-day rainy period, which also came with very cold winds, but we had a beautiful third day, although it was also very cold. We looked and asked around, but in the end, we had to go see real estate vultures. We found that in order to rent, they require you to own property that you could put up as collateral plus five month’s rent for a deposit as well as first and last month’s rent – in all, seven months up front to get a one year lease, during which the parasitic real estate agents would hold your money, with uncertain guarantees that you would get your money back, or that they would even be around when the time came to get your money back. We have heard a good amount of horror stories of renters getting completely screwed out of their money, and we did not want to try that route, never mind that we would not have had any money left to put toward buying furniture and appliances.

So we had to satisfy ourselves with having a nice trip to one of our favorite towns in the country, staying at the lovely Posada Verdún , located a mere two blocks from the bus station and two blocks from the center of town. It features the fastest Wi-Fi I have ever experienced in a public location outside of Asia. The in-house restaurant is superb, featuring international cuisine, and we felt very welcomed by the friendly and caring staff. I will elaborate more about our visit to Minas in my next article, which will feature more photos as well.

All photos by Jamie Douglas

see also: Uruguay's "Secret": Minas and Our Trip to Minas, Uruguy: Part Two

Jamie Douglas

Waiting for Summer to Return to Uruguay

I encourage you to write me at cruzansailor [at] gmail [dot] com with any questions or suggestions you may have. Disclaimer: I am not in any travel-related business. My advice is based on my own experiences and is free of charge (Donations welcome). It is always my pleasure to act as a beneficial counselor to those who are seekers of the next adventure.

So What Happened? The Nomadic Expat Hits the Road Again

article from June 24, 2012

By Jamie Douglas

Those of you who have followed my writings may have noticed my silence for the past few weeks. No, I did not get arrested for sedition against the Argentinean turkey-necked vulture Presidenta Cristina Fernández de Kirchner. I was detained for a few hours, but that was much later.

What happened was that I took a Three-Stooges-like fall in our house in Mendoza a few weeks ago. I have absolutely no recollection of what happened or why. It was my Andrew Breitbart moment – without all the cocaine and alcohol. I crashed headfirst into a cement wall, landing on a carafe that we used as a doorstop and crunching my sternum. I was also suffering from loss of eyesight in my right eye, loss of motor skills, balance, etc. A scan done at our local hospital lead to study by the experts, which revealed that further study by more experts was needed.

At the same time, our living arrangements underwent a slight metamorphosis. Also, I had begun to feel the same way about Argentina as I once did about the USA, and we, that is, my wife Julie R and I, decided to once again migrate. We already knew that we could not leave the country with our Renault 12 from the last millennium, due to the Argentinean bureaucracy that prohibits foreigners from taking an Argentinean vehicle out of the country. Taking rentals is permissible. Makes sense, right? In Argentina, it does. So pretty much exactly a month ago, we made a no-brainer decision to use the car to go to the northeastern reaches of Argentina, Iguazu Falls, recently voted as one of the "New 7 Wonders of Nature.”

The cross-country trip was boring as can be, and gasoline had about doubled in price, when we could find it. Some of the cities we had to drive through were absolute chaos. Because of my vision problems, we always found an inn to spend the night at by late afternoon, where we met some wonderful people in really out-of-the-way places. After five days of driving, we stopped 40 km south of Iguazu Falls in a small town named Wanda. That was on Friday. The weather forecast called for rain and fog for the next couple of days, so we stayed in our cozy cabin, which we filled up with all of our belongings.

A couple of hundred yards up the road, we were told, was a lovely Swiss restaurant. We went there with a German couple who are bicycling across South America. We all ordered what would be considered filet mignon, including my until-recently red-meat-abstaining wife. We all agreed that it was the best beef we had ever had. The food was so good that we ate there every day, sometimes twice a day. Prices were below what one would expect to pay for such fantastic gourmet meals.

On Tuesday, we finally went to the most spectacular falls in the world. There is simply nothing to compare to its immenseness. Not even the price of admission, which is a steep Ar$130 plus $30 for parking, could dampen the experience. So for the two of us, it was $290, or, with the regularly falling Argentinean peso, about US$90 - worth every worthless peso we spent.

I have spent almost a month filming at Victoria Falls in Africa, much of it by helicopter, and been to Niagara Falls and various other earthly spectacles, but this filled my bucket list to overflowing. Julie has promised to write more about the falls as well as our travels through parts of Uruguay, so look for that soon. The poor thing is very ill right now, but she’ll be back soon. And I am getting ready to build myself a new computer from two super-motherboards and processors so that we can work independently again.

But back to Iguazu: We decided to stay an extra day with our gracious hosts in Wanda to repack properly. We had hopes to sell our Renault in some larger city down the road for whatever we could get, or failing that, we would drive it to the Uruguayan border and just take a taxi across the border, abandoning a vehicle that has many more kilometers to go. We packed everything neatly, loaded the roof rack with our suitcases and went to say our goodbyes, casually mentioning our plans for the car – at which point our hostess, Marta, stopped us cold. She told us that her husband’s brother was looking for a car. It turned out he did not have the money right then; however, another man did! Later that night, we had dinner at the Swiss restaurant again and related our good fortune to the innkeeper, who lamented his bad luck at not knowing we wanted to sell the car, because he, too, would have bought it from us.

Returned to the cabañas, we unpacked the car and waited for the guy to show up on Friday morning to go to the notary to transfer ownership. When he did not show at the appointed time in the morning, I became worried. But he showed about one hour later, so we went to the notary and – ¡que milagro! – it was more or less a done deal. After jumping through a series of bureaucratic hoops, we were free to go back to Uruguay with a few grand more than we expected. We gave all the household goods that we were not quite ready to part with when we left Mendoza to the housekeeper, and I traded my printer for three days stay at the cabañas and made arrangements to take a bus south on Saturday night to the border town of Colón, across the river from Paysandú, Uruguay.

This is where things got a little complicated. The bus we took, a Singer Line bus, was the most luxurious ever (though the food sucked, as always), but they decided that since we were the only two passengers getting off at this town, which was 16 km from the highway, they would just drop us off on the shoulder of the freeway in the dark, from where we had to climb over four sets of guard rails with all our belongings and hike to a Shell station. We had coffee and croissants, and they called us a taxi, which took us to the Colón bus station.

It being early Sunday morning, there was no bus to Paysandú until about 9 pm. So, after short deliberations, we decided to take a taxi across the border. Our driver, a surly woman sucking on her mate, was none too happy about all that luggage, explaining that her car was brand new. When we got to the border checkpoint, she was even less happy when they sent her to a holding area while we were interrogated for an hour or so. After a few hundred pesos changed ownership, however, we were finally allowed to leave the country, and we reentered Uruguay precisely three years to the day after we first entered in 2009.

The adventure called Argentina is over for us, but the continuing drama of the circular history of that poor country continues. Corruption and ineptitude must have been written into their constitution. The current president is even less capable that Juan Peron’s second wife was – much dumber; but having surrounded herself with a bunch of crony yes-men who are currently slowly working on having the constitution changed to allow her to run again, a Supreme Court that is stacked and both the upper and lower house majority, she can run roughshod over the population ...but more on all that in future personal attacks on the imbecile woman.

We have ended up back at our beloved beach house under the lighthouse in La Paloma where, as I write this, I listen to the gentle waves lapping at the shore while a small fire is keeping me warm. Our canine friends Vito and Luna where very happy to see us back, recognizing us even after two and a half years. I was amazed at how excited they were when they saw us. And two human friends we had left behind here just recently moved back, as well.

For those of you who were considering whether to move to Santiago, Buenos Aires, Asuncion or Montevideo/Punta del Este (yes you A.L.), they had a coup d’état in Paraguay a few days ago, and there is a new guerilla army that is growing by the day. I forecast changes for Chile as well. Some of you might remember my predicting, many months ago, that Angela Merkel’s lapdog, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, would be defeated in the French presidential elections, which started a shit storm from Francophiles. Well I am sorry to tell them, but “I told you so.” We are living in very unsettled times, and changes are coming at us with blinding speed. Latin America is still the evolving child of the old Spanish Empire. Uruguay, at present, is a good place to be. Will it stay that way? Only the shadow knows!

Jamie Douglas

No more Malbec Wine. It’s back to Tannat.

[All photos by Jamie Douglas and Julie R Butler]

I encourage you to write me at cruzansailor [at] gmail [dot] com with any questions or suggestions you may have. Disclaimer: I am not in any travel-related business. My advice is based on my own experiences and is free of charge (Donations welcome). It is always my pleasure to act as a beneficial counselor to those who are seekers of the next adventure.