Uruguay It Is!

Hello again friends,

We had been in Buenos Aires for just over one week, and that was enough of the big city for us. We ended up finding a great deal on a private Spanish tutor named Silvana. She had an apartment around the corner from our hostel where she did private lessons. It was cheap and she did not speak English very well, which definitely helped us learn Spanish! We still feel ill-equipped to carry on a regular conversation in Spanish but at least have something to go on now. Other than doing two hours of Spanish lessons a day (and another one or two hours of studying or summarizing notes) we did a lot of walking and eating. We ate some phenomenal empanadas at a restaurant called Pizza Golden (thanks for the suggestion Nikki) and saved cash by cooking up delicious meals in the kitchen of our wonderful hostel (Puerto Limon... if any of you go to BsAs... stay there). The hostel was home to a great blend of people from all over the world and provided us with a great place to nest for the last nine days. We also did a few excursions in the city, such as visiting an area called La Boca which is composed of bright coloured old buildings, and spending an afternoon at a Latin American art gallery and museum called Malba. La Boca was neat to see but a bit too overrun by tourists-who-only-know-how-to see-the-world-through-a-digital-camera-screen-not-with-their-eyes for my liking. On the other hand, the gallery was wonderful. It was inspiring and stimulating and thoroughly worth the time. We also enjoyed an urban nature reserve that gave us much needed respite from the city bustle.

We are now writing you from a wonderful town called Colonia in Uruguay. We arrived here by ferry yesterday afternoon. We spent the day wandering the cobblestone streets of this great Portugese Colonial town, enjoying the beach for a few hours, reading the books on various benches around town, and eating inexpensive fruit from the local fruit shop. Tomorrow we are continuing east along the Atlantic coast of Uruguay to a beach town called La Paloma. We plan on staying there for just over a week if we like it, with our next fixed date being February second when we join up with a Canadian connection (named Mike and Carolyn and family...) in Maldonado.

Thanks for your thoughts and your prayers and for caring about our lives! We would love to hear about you all are doing, so please do send us an email if you have a chance. Tidbits from home are always appreciated.

Big love,
Chloe (and Nathan)