Montevideo, Uruguay, Mile 810

Map  http://www.odysseyatlas.com/trip/8j2#

I have arrived in Uruguay´s capital of Montevideo after a 65 mile ride today in from Piriapolis.  I rode out of Piriapolis towards the east on Route 10 about 10 miles to the little town of Solis, where 10 ended and I got on the InterBalnearia at KM 83.  The highway into Montevideo was now a four lane divided highway, with, happily for me, a wide shoulder which I rode while cars went whizzing past me at 80MPH.  A few miles after getting on the IB, I crossed a little river, rode through a toll plaza and passed out of Maldonado Departamento and into Canelones.  25 miles later, The same thing happened, another river, another toll plaza, and I was in the Uruguay´s smallest, but most populated, departamento-Montevideo.

After this second toll plaza, I had the choice to continue west a bit more on the highway, or to follow the coast in.  I chose the coast, and for the last 20 miles of the ride, past the Naval Academy, the Carrasco Casino, and the very nice neighborhood of Pocitos, I always had the water (the River Plate, specifically) on my left.

Montevideo is laid out much like Punta del Este (albeit on a much larger scale) with a little finger of land sticking out into the river at its southern extreme.  This is "Kilometer Zero", all highway and rail distances are measured from this point.  To the east of it (where I was today) is almost all residential; the last ten miles into the city were past and endless array of 10 to 15 story apartment and condo buildings.  To the west of it are the Port facilities, Naval headquarters, the (abandoned) train station, and then an industrial wasteland stretching off another ten miles or so out of the city.

Coming into the city I was struck by the utter absence of taxi cabs.  Then I saw a newspaper.  They are on strike.  Sunday morning, someone killed a cab driver, then stuffed his body into his cab and set it on fire.  This not the first time this has happened, the police are useless, and it is illegal for the cabbies to carry weapons for self defense, so they are, very justifiably, not happy.  What is apparantly happening is that ¨children¨ will run out in to the street and lie down in front of a car, forcing it to stop.  Then their friends come out and assault it.  As I will be running around in a rent a car in a few days, (albeit not in the neighborhoods where this kind of activity is common), I will keep that in mind and treat anyone who tries that on me as a portable speed bump.  In the meantime, no cabs.  I hope they are working by Wednesday night when I go to the airport to pick up my car...

Tomorrow, it is supposed to rain, but I am not going anywhere anyway, so that does not matter.  I have a few pieces of business to attend to, and if I can I will get in a ride in the afternoon.  On Wednesday, a friend of mine graciously invited me to his family´s farm, so I will be out in the country all day.

I updated the online map, by the way, to remove some of the multiple waypoints, and also just drew one straight line from Foz do Iguacu to Santa Victoria do Palmar to represent my bus trip.