Rusty Rest Day

 

Camping El Sauce, Paso de Los Toros, Uruguay

I wore Rusty out and the way I knew it was that my dog  took a prolonged lie-in yesterday not getting up until 2:15. I got up at eight and  I left him on the bed while I  went to  check out the shower block reputed to offer hot showers. They looked promising.

When you see a bench placed like this you take the hint and  don’t use those stalls. Just because there’s not a sign doesn’t mean you can use them…

I then walked across this vast campground to the admin building, remembering to take my passport to check but inconveniently forgetting to take cash. The admin building is the yellow block near the orange used car lot on the horizon. 

So then I turned around after I filled in the camping form, my vehicle is a RAM 3500 motorhome and never mind the Promaster. It’s easier to just use the numbers as across Latin America the concept of a truck labeled 1500, 2500 etc is very familiar. So I got my camping tag on a promise to return with cash. 

I got back to GANNET2 and Rusty  hadn’t moved so I picked up my wallet, turned around shrugged back across the campground to pay the 400 pesos for the night, $10. 

Picnic tables and barbecue grills are practically a requirement in municipal campgrounds in Argentina and Uruguay. The light poles have electrical outlets too but afternoon sunshine recharged the batteries just fine without 220 volt intervention.

I’m guessing the place is around 30 acres as it goes under the bridge and around the corner as well. 

One more trudge up to the admin building also brought me in sight of the bull at the entrance to the city at the end of the bridge over the Rio Negro Black River.

El Sauce in Spanish is pronounced “sow-say” and means willow tree. Also, Nogales means walnut to remind us that not everything was named by the Spanish for a saint on the Catholic calendar.

Across the street is the namesake of the town Paso de Los Toros, Bulls’ Crossing.

In the summer months I imagine the day use park and campground must be hopping as there are food trucks a convenience store and a restaurant on the premises.

And I did spot on my walks a cyclist about to get eaten by a triffid. 

I saw a couple of local dogs probably not strays wandering through as usual so I gave them some lunch much to Rusty’s disgust. They weren’t very hungry but I always carry extra food for street dogs and I knew we would meet some in the more impoverished northern part of Paraguay. 

And so we passed a quiet rest day on the sauce as it were.

Solo In Uruguay

I would not wish to imply that I am traveling alone without my dog because Rusty is with me every step of the way but Layne is away for a couple of weeks. 

As you can see the weather in Uruguay yesterday improved quite considerably after Layne got on a plane to San Francisco. It was around 70 degrees and sunny in the afternoon with a cool breeze to make conditions close to perfect. For a while my 860 watts of solar panels were putting out a full 50 amps, so I was happy with that. 

We spent Tuesday night wild camping in a wooded park about ten minutes from Montevideo’s Carrasco Airport so it was easy to get up and drive. 

The original entry described the site as a dark forest and advised against camping alone. The forest is thick so we parked by the sports fields to have a clear sky for our Starlink, but we found nothing menacing about the place. There were no trash cans but the forest was spotlessly clean and free of robbers. 

Two locals camped close by as we discovered in the morning. Most overlanders fly out of Buenos Aires to save some money but we found Montevideo was a lovely small airport built similar to Key West though much larger but it’s very laid back and easy to use. The more we travel the more we value simplicity and ease of use. 

Layne said passengers were allowed to bring the inevitable maté thermos flasks on board through security. Try doing that in the land of the free. 

I retreated to the F. D.  Roosevelt Park to make tea and let Rusty finish his morning nap. 

Uruguay is full of parks where you can just pull over and spend the day or the night. It’s not as good as  the vast public lands in the States but I like the freedom in this small expensive country. We got on the road around ten: 

The plan was to cross Uruguay up the middle from Montevideo to the Brazilian border at Rivera a part of the country rarely visited by travelers.

You could drive it in one long day especially as the main roads are good. I took the secondary route avoiding the toll road but even so I was able to drive between 50 and 60 all day on excellent pavement.

It was a mixture of small towns, back roads and highway connectors all day. This three lane with more cyclists was north of Montevideo everyone was very polite to the pain in the ass.

I had loaded the fridge with cooked goods from the supermarket before Layne left so other than buying gas at $8.45 a gallon the only reason to stop was to let Rusty stretch his legs  and I did that often enough he seemed quite happy.

Rain is in the forecast on and off all week which is annoying for me but flooding along the Uruguay River has displaced a couple hundred people in the west of the country. The spring this year has been weird, cold and wet here and snowy and windy in the Andes Mountains closing the border between Argentina and Chile. I got a burst of rain yesterday and not being on a sailboat I turned on the windshield wipers and cabin heater and pressed on.

The countryside is what you might call flat but is actually rolling farm and ranch land with some patches of woodland, farmhouses and occasional villages. It’s not picturesque in the way Peru or Bolivia are but it is relaxing after years of coping with crappy roads and less than stellar facilities. Uruguay feels like a vacation.

Hardly any traffic all day. 

My plan was to get to a peculiarly named town about half way, Paso de Los Toros, Bulls’ Crossing a name whose significance is lost to history. The town was founded in 1889 as a terminus of the Uruguay Midland Railroad that ran across the country clear to the Argentine border at Salto and Fray Bentos.  Cattle ranching was big business with meat and hides being exported from the ports on the River Plate so I expect bulls’ crossing relates to cattle round up’s or similar but I could find no information. 

Typical Uruguayan village seen en route. No spectacular architecture, no stray dogs, no traffic chaos. 

A familiar face: 

Bless his heart…sticking to the shoulder. 

The town has a population of 13,000 roughly making it one of the larger communities in the area.

According to iOverlander the municipal campground is open year round with hot showers but they only charge in the summer between December and March. I first went to the rivers edge and parked by the water to enjoy the afternoon sun and a reputedly excellent sunset.

I was ready to spend the night there but the day use park closed at ten and I got moved along.

So I drove half a mile to the official campground and checked in with the night guard. 

Legal for the night!