Uruguay to Tucuman

Our campsite at sunset. Outside Dolores, Uruguay

We rode half way to Mercedes and camped in a beautiful spot off the side of the road with the setting sun and tall grasses. We were eaten alive by ants but the mosquitos weren´t too bad.

It turned out that the warm up was a good idea. During Critical Mass in Buenos Aires, in our last few days there, we met a French couple living in BA for their daughter who wanted to learn Spanish. She had already learned French, English, and Chinese so Spanish was the next logical choice. They invited us over to a home made lasagna dinner and fantastically suggested that we ride to the next bridge in Fray Bentos instead of taking the ferry to Uruguay. We changed the idea but took it to heart. After 4 months of almost no bike riding, being dropped off at the foot of the Andes seemed a little daunting. So we did take the ferry but we biked north to the bridge in order to cross back. The bus from Rosario is over $100 US cheaper than the one from BA, and we didn´t have to pay for the ferry back.

Uruguay was beautiful, mostly flat with easy rolling hills. Farmland. Even so we were riding directly into the brutal, relentless wind and having small muscles to start, we averaged about 8 mph. Fortunately the people there are the friendliest people we´ve ever met. Always time for a chat, a tour, directions, offering help.

In Dolores, Roberto gave us a tour and invited us into his home for lunch - explained that he was poor for having 5 sons, but let us use 2 of his 3 computers with speedy internet and offered up his play station on one of his 2 TVs. We had run into him coming into town. He was waiting to pay his internet bill. We compaired prices of internet in the US and Uruguay. Still a little cheaper there.

In Mercedes Orlando helped us happily when we told him we lost our stove back at our campsite. He drove Chris back 15 km to look for it while Courtney waited with the bikes. When they returned he gleefully shouted out the window ¨NO ENCONTRAMOS!! NO ENCONTRAMOS!!¨ we didn´t find it. But he called Chris ¨Che¨ lovingly and we all got besos. Three 10 year old boys joined us in the plaza, played Courtney´s Ukulele until they broke a string, and sang us songs. They watched Chris make a new stove and all lined up for besos from Courtney and strong Norte Americano handshakes from Chris.

We were told that the Estancias of Uruguay were free to stay at and they give you food. So the night after we siesta´d in Mercedes, we went looking for an Estancia. We turned off the route onto a dirt road and biked for 6 miles into the hills and back out deciding that if there was an estancia down there, who knows how far it could be. We camped under the roof of a slightly abandoned house - well kept but empty. Good thing too, because the rain was incredible that night. The lightning was like a strobe light.

Our estancia. Outside Mercedes, Uruguay

Unfortunately Fray Bentos´s bridge has been closed in protest of the paper plant by the Argentinians for about 4 years. We talked with many Uruguayans about the conflict. There were troubles with tourism (people now having to drive 100 km north just to get home), troubles with cost of goods (it´s harder to transport goods over the boarder to Uruguay, raising the price), troubles with jobs (the commuters trying to get from Uruguay to there posts in Argentina lost their jobs. There are fewer positions available in Uruguay, something that after 4 years many people have not recovered from), not to mention the fact that the general relationship between Argentina and Uruguay has suffered. Argentina, as we now learned, has bitter relationships with Chile AND Uruguay.

The paper plant outside of Fray Bentos, Uruguay

Despite the closure, many Uruguayans suggested that we give the bridge a try. We are not Uruguayan and the closure is symbolic, so we may not have any trouble. It was worth the shot since the next bridge north was Paysandu: 100km farther north, into the wind.

We didn´t even get the chance to talk/bribe our way through the boarder. The Uruguayans stopped us first. No bikes on the bridge. But the bus to Paysandu was only $70 Uy and that´s about $3 US so we took our chances. To get the bikes on (despite the obvious amount of room) we had to argue, sweet talk, and eventually cry to get them on. The police and both drivers were ushured over. Driver no 1 said no, finally driver no 2 said, if they fit, why not? Yes, why not? So having fit bikes into much tighter spots, we were victorious and made it to Paysandu. We were not looking forward to our bus trip from Rosario to Tucuman. Turns out there´s an easier way.

The main avenue in Paysandu on Saturday Night, Argentina

As far as we were concerned, Paysandu was like Tokyo. The second largest city in Uruguay, (100,000 ppl) and lit up amazingly on Saturday Night. A vast difference when compaired with the other pueblos. We were showed the bootleg clothes and black market and directed to the free camping on the beach. ¨but it´s all underwater, so good luck¨ It was underwater. Several feet of water. But we camped up higher with the parrillas with no trouble.

In the morning we crossed the bridge without any problems at all and made it to Colon where we stocked up on supplies and headed south (winds at our backs). Argentina is building a second lane to make Route 14 a divided hwy but it´s not done yet. We had the pleasure of a whole 2 lane hwy to ourselves. Que fortuna. We made it to Caseros for the night when Courtney realized that she had left her wallet behind - we had just been to the bank so this was a huge blow. Thinking we were going to have to bike (possibly 25 miles) back to look for it, Courtney went to see if anyone could do anything to help. More than just anything, the employee of the gas station called the police and had them come to pick Courtney up. The police, for no reason at all, helped us. Courtney was driven to the last two rest spots (the second one was indeed 25 miles away) just to look for it, and THERE IT WAS! waiting for our return on the side of the new hwy. The color of dirt at this point so no one had spotted it. What luck. The police teased Courtney that her esposo wasn´t going to leave her now that she found it.

We left Caseros in high spirits but were lazy all day. We made it about 30 miles down the road, having stopped a few times (the wind had returned now that we were heading west) and eventually came to the realization that we needed to get to Tucuman to start the tour. Some how realizing this made it happen. After about 30 min of hitch hiking we were picked up by a family going to Rosario (a 3.5 hour drive away) who threw our bikes in the back of the truck and off we went. We were intertained by Juan, the youngest, and his stories about Wall-e and Lela´s (the older sister) love of Betty Boop. We made note of the fact that, if we had riden this distance, we would have been able to cross the bridge over the Parana river - there are paths on every bridge the whole 60 km between Victoria and Rosario. We also saw that those 60 km are completely flooded with water. El Niño has taken it´s toll here as well.

Our new friends who drove us all the way from Basavilbaso to Rosario, Argentina

We thought we would spend a day in Rosario but it was overwhelmingly cityish and so we just caught the 11pm bus out. The easier way to get the bikes on, bribe them. This made the cost of the bus no less cheaper than the ferry back to BA would have been, but no regrets.

Now we´re in Tucuman getting ready for ¨tour propper.¨ Today we head up the mountain dispite the pouring rain and thunderstorm the weather forcast has promised.

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