Montevideo

Monday 30th January 2012

We've been really lucky with the weather for this trip, and today was no exception. 1555 kindly agreed to keep our cases overnight as we are only staying in Monte for one night, which helped. We duly turned up at the ferry port, Buquebus, to find a splendid ship a la cross channel ferries, with good duty free shop, cafes etc.

Note the contrast between the BA dockscape and the Montevideo port – complete with HSBC ad-yacht.  

As Facebook pals will know, we had the greatest difficulty finding the hotel. It was only a short walk from the port to the right street, clearly named, but when we got to the number on the confirmation form, there was no external sign to show it was a hotel, the building was very old, dirty grey and falling apart. All the shutters were closed, and the only sign anyone might be in was a shiny red motor bike.

We walked on the length of of the street looing for the Laperez Hotel - to no avail. So we retraced our steps and stood scrathing our heads outside 1851, and to our surprise an ancient old man from across the street shuffled over with a key and told us to go on in. This is what we found: 

The lovely Maria settled us in, then we set off to explore Montevideo. On the way out we found on the main door the only sign that this was indeed the La Perez Hotel:

Within a hundred yards a bystander told us to put our cameras away - this in a populated street in broad daylight, so a bit disconcerting. We took extra care but were admonished twice more by strangers, well-meaning, I'm sure, but a bit alarming when there are no apparent signs  of any threats. In fact later than evening some young yahoos tried a bit of pick-pocketing, but we saw them off! That can happen in any city of course, but it left a sour taste on an otherwise enjoyable 24 hours in Uruguay.

The town itself has some spectacular buildings and wonderfully crumbling old houses (like the Laperez!), good food, cobbled streets, a great antiques market in a leafy square

Also a very interesting exhibition in the old Government House on the lives of previous Presidents and Governors together with artifacts of the times

We loved the atmosphere in the town - the arts and crafts are more bold and native Indian influenced, colourful and eye-catching. Each street had its own character, some splendid bookshops and cafes, and friendly people everywhere. It's a lot less sophisticated than BA but charming and endearing.

We walked around for hours, came back for siesta, then went down the road for a fine supper. No musicians tonight, but we enjoyed ourselves anyway.

Next day we loafed about the hotel till it was time to catch the ferry back; it was a good inclusion to the itinerary, but there's still much to be done.......