Rest of the 'guay

So....back to Uruguay. What else happened? Henry and I didn't have a ton of time before his conference started, so we decided to take one of our free days and go Colonia. Colonia is a historic town about 2.5 hours from the capitol, Montevideo. It's also on the coast. While we were there, we climbed a lighthouse and could look out and see Argentina. It was recommended to us that we go with a tour company. After seeing what happens when a Thimm gets behind the wheel in a foreign country (ask Larry about the train tracks in zurich), we thought this was a right good idea. No random car rentals for us. Besides, since neither of us speak spanish, we wanted to minimize the number of things we would have to sign without understanding.

So we went with a tour, that was 10 parts Spanish to every 1 part English. That's just enough English to understand what is happening after it already happened. Case in point: we didn't realize the tour would be making stops on the way to Colonia. We pull up to a lovely place in the country, and everyone starts emptying out of the bus. We walk into a building, and find ourselves in this room:

What are all these key chains?

Everyone is looking around, listening to the tour guide intently, and nodding in understanding. I still can't figure out what I'm looking at. We walk into the next room, and it's pretty much the same cases, only filled with pencils. It is finally explained to us that the owner of this establishment holds the Guinness World Record for largest key chain collection and largest pencil collection. Okay....but why am I looking at it? Apparently he has turned his collection into a museum and this is the most interesting thing between Montevideo and Colonia. The collection included many other pieces (of note: a Crystal Pepsi can) and was interesting, once I knew what was going on. The owner/collector also has a business making jam. As any good tour does, this one ended in the gift shop. You could try a bunch of his jams, and of course they were for sale.

Need to find the dolche de leche again...

 Colonia is famous for it's bullring, home of 8 fights before it was outlawed.

Now the other tourists can't figure out what they are looking at...

In Colonia, our tour guide provided some information about the oldest area of town. This particular street has remained unchanged in hundreds of years.

Old.

We enjoyed a lovely meal outside. In Uruguay, no meal is complete without meat. So of course we had meat. We had seen others eating these weird fried balls, and we were determined to try them. They ended up being pretty tasty potato balls. They also served lemon with everything. I have never squeezed lemon on so many different dishes.

Papas Noisettes!

Back in Montevideo, Henry's conference began. That meant I was on my own. I did some work myself, went to a prison-turned-mall, and visited a museum. We did get to meet up with some of his coworkers for a spicy time in the ice bar in our hotel.

jello!

 Other notable moments:

This "sandwhich" was ridiculous, and apparently one of the national dishes of Uruguay. From top to bottom - red peppers, olives, unidentified white vegetable, eggs, ham, steak, french fries, potato salad, lettuce, tomatoes, beets, and carrots.

Lots o' food

We also joined a coworker of Henry's for a nice dinner out. We had some crepes filled with dolche de leche for dessert. They were so, so tasty.

More crepes!

Also, I had more clothes put in the bidet. Pants in the bidet once, shame on you. Pants in the bidet twice, shame on me. I just couldn't remember that the maid comes at 9 o'clock at night to sweep anything left on the floor into the bidet. I thought I was in the clear, but alas, it was not to be.

This I will never understand.

At one of our meals Henry also tried gizzard. It was a brave attempt, but better left to others. Of course, it too came with lemon.

Sweetbread = not tasty

Up to a month before going, I had no idea that South America was in my near future, least of all Uruguay. It was a really fun place to visit, and forced me to learn about a culture and country that probably wouldn't have crossed my mind otherwise. Between that and all the meat, the trip was a win.