A Day in Colonia, Uruguay

A short ride by high-speed ferry sipping mimosas and peering out of a window onto the Roi Plato, that is how our morning began yesterday. We were on our way to Colonia, a small city located in Uruguay. Arriving after 58 minutes of smooth sailing, we disembarked to a quaint old village. We rented a couple of scooters and spent that day tooling around the village. A short drive up the coast, a small lunch in a side café, and a little "Zoom Zoom" all the way.

San Telmo Antique Market

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On Sundays, a small square in a quaint neighborhood adjacent to downtown
is transformed into an outdoor antique market overrun with tourist and
local buyers. You can find almost anything there from old locks to old
gaucho equipment to old hats and dolls. Wherever there is a crowd,
there are the trinket sellers and, in BA, the tango dancers. It is a
bright, calm, cool Sunday morning here. A nice day to visit San Telmo.

Sunny Saturday in Ba

The rain has ended. The sun is shining. The frenzied weekday energy has faded and BA is relaxing.

City of Death

... you can also tell a lot about a people by the way they treat their
dead. For instance, if there was ever any wonder whether Buenos Aires
is a wealthy city, the question is quickly answered the minute you set
foot inside the Cementerio de la Recoleta. The monuments are
spectacular and substantial and each had to cost a small fortune. I
told Clint that the density of art alone was staggering. Every tomb was
a work of art, most with statues or reliefs, some with stained glass,
almost all with crosses. That is the other fact confirmed by a walk
among the dead of BA. Argentines are a very religious people, not in
the let-me-hit-you-over-the-head-with-it way of some Americans, and not
by saturation as in parts of Mexico, but they believe deeply. And it
seems, as with most peoples, they believe even more deeply in, or near,
death. At lunch today, in the Recoleta, one of the poshest parts of
town, the restaurant had a picture of Pope John Paul II on their window.

Desde la esquina (From the corner)

It's almost 10 AM here. I am waiting on a friend of Gabriel's who will
give me a walking Spanish lesson. I wanted to pass along a few pictures
taken from the table in the first photo which is at the corner next to
the apartment. I ate breakfast there today. It is amazing what you see
from one corner.

Rainy Day in BA

Our first full day in BA has so far been filled with rain and shopping.
The apartment owner arranged a car to take us to the Leather Fabricator
where we spent the day trying on leather jackets and deciding the deign
we wanted. The sales people were very helpful and friendly and we spent
way too much money, even though the prices are relatively good here. Ed
took laundry to a small lavanderia where no one spoke a lick of English
and we think he arranged for the cleaning to be back tomorrow with the
pants ironed. Of course he could have told them to bleach everything
and throw them away. We never know for sure. Clint has spent much of
the day on the computer working, but if you have to work, working from
BA isn't bad.

We are off for massages, since the rain is keeping us from seeing the
sights. We'll touch base later.