Activity Summary
Tuesday 2nd January - Day 455
Day trip to Colonia del Sacramento, Uruguay
Coffee at Serrano Café
Drinks at Charco Bistro
Summary
Colonia
A nice small colonial town. We didn’t expect much at all coming here and enjoyed our time.
There really is very little to do and even doing a day trip is more time than is needed to complete Colonia, but we wanted to tick off visiting Uruguay.
It is quite expensive to ferry across and is about UK prices for food in the town.
As for the rest of Uruguay, given the cost and also the lack of standout fun things to do in places like Montevideo, we opted only for the day trip.
Transport
Colonia
Out:
Metro to Buquebus ferry terminal
Check in (2 hours early due to queues)
Argentina and Uruguay Passport control in Buenos Aires terminal
Ferry to Colonia del Sacramento
Return:
Walk to ferry terminal
Check in
Uruguay passport control
Ferry to Buenos Aires
Bus to Airbnb
Diary
Tuesday 2nd January - Day 455
We were really on the fence about going to Uruguay. Research and chats with friends who had been hadn’t really given us much inspiration to spend much time here and therefore had settled for a day trip from Buenos Aires to Colonia del Sacramento. This would mean sacking off places like Montevideo and some beach places along the coast but given the price and we are coming to the end of our trip, we didn’t have much appetite for it.
The decision to go to Colonia was only confirmed the day before, Luke making the call that we should do it and get away from the mosquito infested Buenos Aires. Plus it had felt like we hadn’t achieved much over the last week so having a big day would be good for us. Leaving it so last minute was a bit squeaky bum time but we managed to get a ferry at 12.15pm out and a return at 8.45pm.
As was becoming the standard, we stocked up on food provisions from Pertutti. Now post new years, the place was properly stocked and it was some monster chicken pies for £2.50 that would make Nicola very happy and well fed. The standard cheap pastries, especially sugary croissants with heaps of Dulce de leche, kept us sustained all day.
We got the metro to the ferry terminal a good 1.5hrs early. There was a long queue in order to check in (or drop bags if required) hence the early arrival.
Passport control for both Argentina and Uruguay was done in the Buenos Aires terminal and we were through with plenty of time to spare.
The queue to board the ferry was a bit nutty, almost all deciding to join the weaving snake after a number of people started the panic. They would end up standing there for a good 20 minutes before any movement and we just waited it out on the comfy sofas. We still found seats on the ferry easily enough.
It took about 1.5hrs to cross with minimal drama. Once disembarked from the ferry we started our self guided walk around Colonia del Sacramento.
Estacion Colonia
Walled city drawbridge
San Miguel Bastion
Calle de los Suspiros - big slippery stones really suitable for Nicola
Really nice river / seafront
Cobblestone streets
Carbe diem - Nicola’s much preferred version to the Carpe Diem her pessimism doesn’t appreciate-Aka eat carbs all day
Plaza Mayor
Colonia del Sacramento Lighthouse
Ruínas das Casa dos Governadores Portugueses
Basilica of the Blessed Sacrament with the weirdest basement figurine set up.
Standard memorial to San Martin, the independence saviour of Uruguay, Argentina and Chile.
Colonia pier
It was pretty warm and Colonia is pretty tiny so only after a few hours of slow sauntering we were kind of done. We had a coffee stop at Serrano Café which had a nice rooftop view over the river.
We spent the rest of the afternoon revisiting various places and a few others for the shits and gigs.
Paseo del Arte
Beaches do exist
To end the day we had drinks at Charco Bistro which had a lovely outdoor seating area with a reasonably priced pint for Uruguay.
At around 7pm we checked in at the ferry port which ended up being infinitely quicker than Buenos. This side however only stamped us out of Uruguay.
The only tickets available on the 8.45pm ferry to Buenos Aires was business class and apart from the spacious private room with no drama, it didn’t appear like there would be many perks. On exit however, we were the first off the ship and this meant we could blitz through the painfully slow Argentina border control. The girl who was passing us through could not have given a fuck about speed, her face like a baboons ass and totally did not want to be there. Expectations were the rest of the ship would take an age to get through passport control.
We did have to wait a while for a bus to turn up and for some reason Luke’s SUBE card wasn’t working. It was 11pm at night and thankfully the driver waived the 8p fee…
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