DAY 43 Feb 24 - Montevideo, Uruguay

Montevideo is the largest city, the capital and chief port of Uruguay. Montevideo is the only city in the country with a population over a million. According to Mercer Human Resource Consulting, Montevideo provides the highest quality of life in Latin America. Uruguay is a country located in the south eastern part of South America. It is home to 3.5 million people, of whom 1.3 million live in the capital Montevideo and its metropolitan area. An estimated 90% of the population are of mostly European and/or mixed descent.

Uruguay's only land border is with Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil, to the north. To the west lies the Uruguay River, to the south west lies the estuary of Río de la Plata, with Argentina only a short commute across the banks of either of these bodies of water, while to the south east lies the South Atlantic Ocean. Uruguay is the second smallest country in South America, being larger than only Suriname.

In 1776, Spain made Montevideo its main naval base for the South Atlantic, with authority over the Argentine coast, Fernando Po, and the Falklands.

The city fell under heavy British influence from the early 19th century until the early 20th century as a way to circumvent Argentine and Brazilian commercial control. It was briefly occupied by Britain in 1807 and it was repeatedly besieged by Blanco leader Manuel Oribe and Argentine dictator Juan Manuel de Rosas between 1838 and 1851. Between 1878 and 1911, British-owned railway companies built an extensive railway network linking the city and its port to the countryside.

During World War II, a famous incident involving the German pocket battleship Admiral Graf Spee took place in Punta del Este, 120 miles from Montevideo. After the Battle of the River Plate with the Royal Navy and Royal New Zealand Navy on December 13, 1939, the Graf Spee retreated to Montevideo's port, which was considered neutral at the time. To avoid risking the crew in what he thought would be a losing battle, Captain Hans Langsdorff scuttled the ship on December 17. Langsdorff committed suicide two days later.

On 10 February 2006, the eagle figurehead of the Admiral Graf Spee was salvaged. To protect the feelings of those still sensitive to Nazi Germany, the swastika on the figurehead was covered as it was pulled from the water.

Despite the clocks going forward and hour last night I was up and about by 6 o'clock enjoying my first cup of coffee of the day. It was very windy on deck and quite chilly as we slowly headed back down the River Plate towards the lights we could see in the distance.

Soon the sky line of Uruguay's capital could be made out in the distance.

The ship flew an assortment of flags each with its own significance. The yellow one showing it had not cleared local customs, the white and red one indicating that a pilot was on board and the others were the national flags of the country of the ship's regist-ration (Holland) and the country being visited (Uruguay). The HAL house flag was also on show.

It was looking like another lovely day as the sun came up in an almost cloudless blue sky. We were certainly back into the warmer weather which would now last us until we reached Fort Lauderdale in a months time.

The Costa Magica and Splendour of the Seas were already tied up having left BA well in advance of us yesterday evening. The town would be busy today.

Maria slept on this morning although I did twice accid-entally interrupt her sleep as I left and entered the cabin. She even suggested that I take up knitting to keep me quiet!

I had already earlier brought her down juice and coffee and had since returned with further sustenance to await her stirring from slumber-land.

Nothing much was planned for today just a walk round this old historic City that had so much European type architecture to be admired. As the ship docked right down town accessibility would not be a problem. In addition one of the local leather shops was running a half hourly shuttle bus into the main plaza in the centre of town.

As we tied-up along side the quay a smallish freighter was noticed ahead of us. It was the James Cook registered in London. She didn't quite look like she was built for the North and South Atlantic sea passages but nevertheless she was safely docked here in Montevideo!

One consequence of the special event dinner HAL organised in BA the other night, was that many of the people who had attended were discussing how bad the meal had been as apparently nobody ordering meat seemed to have managed to finish their steaks. Not only were they dry and overcooked but because of a lack of the supply of steak knives, most people didn't even mange to cut into the beef, including myself.

Poor HAL, it was hardly their fault. How could one of the City's best hotel restaurants, 'with an internationally acclaimed chef', have made such a faux pas with their food?

No doubt HAL would be seeking redress but the damage was done.

Once I managed to get 'sleeping beauty ' into gear we disembarked the ship at 11.00. We took the Leather Factory shuttle bus up to 'Independence Square', about a 15 minute run.

This impressive area of the city has of course the appropriate monuments commemorating the granting of the country's independence. A small square close by also has a wonderful monument celebrating something we could not quite fathom.

We found an ATM machine and drew out some much needed US$s. Although our gratuities on board had been covered by HAL as part of our package we would be giving additional tips to some of the very hard working crew who have personally looked after us.

From here we ventured down the long avenue called after General Lavelleja, a gentleman who famously, with others he led, returned to Uruguay in1825 to expel invading Brazilians. At the far end is the Legislative Palace building which dominates the sky line.

In all we must have walked 4-5 miles and my poor legs and hip were feeling it. We passed an interesting pub sign with wording I hadn't' seen before.

On our way back to the port we stopped to see the ruins of an old fort that the Spanish Conquerors once uses for the defence of Montevideo.

Nearby we were surprised to see a monument to Garibaldi, the Italian military leader, who became the head of the Navy here in Uruguay in the mid 1800s.

However one thing the city does seem to lack is much historic monuments.

We did however see an old church that was in quite urgent need of refur-bishment. It once must have been a beautiful building.

Our final stop was at the Puerto Market where we found cruise Director Tom and his wife Tina looking for somewhere to eat.

This is a huge area with cafés, restaurants, souvenir shops, speciality leather shops and more and in addition, under an adjacent enclosed area, the famous BBQ eateries.

There must have been at least 20 establish-ments all in compe-tition with each other and basically offering the same fare.

Beef, in all sots of cuts, lamb, pork, ribs, chicken and sea food all available off red hot charcoals. We opted to sit at the counter at one and had a helping of ribs, steak and later a huge cut of lamb, washed down with a bottle of local red wine. Needless to say we were completely stuffed after this. The cost for the two of us was only $50 and could be considered a real food bargain.

It was now time to wind our way home which fortunately was no more than 15 minutes away. Once back on the dear old Prinsendam it was an ice cream then back to the cabin for blog writing and a good nap.

The ship is due to leave tonight at 6.00 heading in a northerly direction towards Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, before which we will be having two days at seas.

Montevideo has, as is the case with many other South American towns, seen better days and in need of some loving tender care. It does however have interesting architecture in places while other parts of the city are a little run down. All in all it looked a reasonably prosperous City.