Moto Adventures: Uruguay

Uruguay, people call it the little Switzerland of South America because it's clean and it's rich. It almost seems criminal when you see the wealth in Uruguay and compare it to Bolivia or Peru, how can this difference be so extreme on one continent? The people if Uruguay are absolutely the most friendly and helpful people we have met so far, we got waves and thumbs up the whole time we were there. They go out of their way to help you, always! Our first stop Colonia del Sacramento, a cute little tourist town. The first thing we noticed were all the old vehicles, some in mint shape some not quite, and a lot that we don't have in Canada. Brian you would have a hay day down here!

The country itself has only about 3.5 million people and a third of those live in the capital, Montevideo a clean and modern city that stretches along the beach front, about 20 km of it to be exact. Farther up the beach is Punto del Este, the who's who place on the beach for people in Uruguay and Northern Argentina, again modern and clean. We didn't take the time to sit and enjoy the beach for to long but walked and walked and rode and rode along it, Uruguay has over 350 kms of beaches. Loads of beach and barely a person on them.

In Punto del Este we stopped in at the Kawasaki dealer to say hi and see how easy it would be to sell the bike in Uruguay, as it turns out is impossible to do. Foreigners can't sell used bikes, so much for that idea. This is where we met Fernando, the owner of the shop, who he set us up with a shipper/broker in Montevideo who can help us ship the bike back to Miami, when we are ready to go. With a few hours notice we met with Maria and she dropped everything and had a quote ready for us, amazingly helpful. We still aren't quite sure what we are doing about returning home but it fells good to know our options.

We headed inland from Montevideo and rode through a few days of farmland. We thought of home as we munched on freshly picked apples and watched as they got ready to harvest grapes. The whole center section of the country is farmland, beautiful rolling fields of cattle and crops, and quaint farming towns. We stayed in an old hotel dating back to 1872 in a little place called Santa Lucia 15 ft ceilings, a footed tub, and a beautiful garden you could just imagine the people sitting in and sipping tea. Again here, met some terrific people who invited us into their home for a beer and to show us some old antiques they had. We would definitely come back to Uruguay!