Montevideo revisited

December comes and is time to go back home for Christmas. This year is a bit more complicated tho, I am living in a different continent and since easyjet does not work from here everything is a bit more tricky… The aim is not only to get to Madrid but also to do something useful with the miserable two days off I have to take before the end of the year. If possible something based on a place where, instead of the cold I have waiting in Madrid, I can find sun and beaches. Much better if the package inludes caipirinhas and frozen coconuts, even better if portuguesse is the language spoken… do you get the idea? Yeah! It is time to go back to the country where all this trip started: Brazil!

It might sound surprinsing but I found out it was quite cheaper to fly Sao Paulo - Madrid - Buenos Aires than a more boring Buenos Aires - Madrid - Buenos Aires. And the funny thing is that both options were using Aerolineas Argentinas. So I am flying Sao Paulo - Buenos Aires - Madrid on my way there and that happens to be cheaper than doing Buenos Aires - Madrid directly even though the flight is the same. One of this typical very absurd things airlines do but, in this case, it gave me the perfect excuse to spend a few days in Brazil and convince myself I do have holidays, short ones but holidays anyway…

To make things even more complicated, I bought this flight Montevideo - Sao Paulo Florionopolis which was much cheaper than Buenos Aires - Sao Paulo and, more surprisingly, also cheaper than Montevideo - Sao Paulo. I was arriving in Sao Paulo early on Friday morning and, in theory, I would take another plane in the evening to Florionopolis. I had no intention to board that secon flight cause it was much more convinient for me to stay in Sao Paulo. Another stupid airline thing, TAM in this case. Why is it cheaper to fly from Montevideo to Florionopolis via Sao Paulo than just doing Montevideo - Sao Paulo? If they were reasonable I wouldnt need to book flights I have no intention of using. In any case, I believe this was one of my master pieces of trip planning. I spent days and days checking different combinations till I got the good one. Not bad to spend less money than flying diretly and get a brazilian trip at the same time

To conclude, my trip to Madrid would include two countries, three planes and a boat to cross Rio de la Plata to the uruguayan capital. This is a trip you can do with two different companies: Colonia Express or Buquebus. Unfortunately both are more expensive than one could expect. In the end I did it with Colonia Express for 176 pesos one way. The boat crosses the huge brown river to Colonia, already in Uruguay, and, from there, they get you in a bus to Montevideo. In total it takes three hours and a half. The first of them was quite terrible to be honest, the boat goes very fast, jumping over the strong waves, not good for delicates stomaches. Good that I wasnt hangovered…

I arrived in Montevideo at 12 that Thursday. In fact that was my second visit to this city. The first time didnt produce any post in this blog because the truth is, to be honest, that there wasnt much to say. Andres, a good friend from Madrid who was visiting Buenos Aires at that time, and I had a very hardcore party weekend and we didnt manage to see the city during the day. It was two nights going out massively and drinking a lot, with only a big asado and a long siesta in between. So not much interesting stuff to talk about, at least no the sort of stuff to be said here.

What was really remarkable about that weekend is that it produced a good new friend, Diego, the Couchsurfing guy who hosted us. Great dude Diego! First uruguayan captain Flint and soon a backpacker through Europe. I met him again to repeat, if only for a night, that weekend. The thing was not that hardcore this time but still, it implied going out the whole night and heading to the airport right after to catch my flight with no sleep and slightly drunk. Montevideo night is definitely cool. Not that the party area is too big, just a few places around a street called Bartolomé Mitre, next to the old area. The best one among them is definitely the legendary Ponny Pisador, very advisable club always full of all sorts of people: backpackers gringos, young uruguayans, old ladys hunting and a very long etc.. They usually have live music and drinks are acceptable. Food is also good, they serve this sort of hamburguer - sandiwch called chivito. Very tasty stuff! And finally, uruguayan beer, called Pilsen, which I find quite better than the argentinian Quilmes…

Well, second visit to Montevideo and, once again, I only experience the nightlife, hopefully the third one will offer some daylight action too…

Tags: Montevideo