October 15, 2010
Route 3
It was yet another grey morning as I cycled along the main shopping street down to the waterfront where I turned right onto a riverside road with a canopy of tall eucalyptus on either side. Except for the occational car there was next to no traffic on this road. It had a smooth paved surface but soon began to get narrow. I's hoping this would be a quiet cycle out of the city to route 3 northbound but it began to look doubtful whether it would continue mush further as soon the pavement finished and it became a bumpy brown dirt road. The worst that could happen would be to have to cycle back into Salto and cycle back out the rough heavy traffic road I'd cycled in on on Sunday.
But I remained optimistic. The road albeit bumpy unpaved was no worst than other tracks I've rode. It no longer followed the riverbank instead swung left and right and up many steep rises. The odd fisherman rode pass on scooters or was stopped by the side. I asked one does this road lead to route 3. He looked at me first in amazement, 'a guy on a bike with all his gear' perhaps went through his head. Then he looked confused and said, 'hmm probably yes yes straight ahead shraight ahead'. He obviously didn't know so I cycle on none the wiser. I knew that eventually though it would meet the approach road for the bridge over the Uruguay river to Argentina. The city on that side of the river, Concordia faces Salto like one big city spanning either riverbank but the only bridge to connect with either city-centres is many kilometres to the North. Why? In other words it's a whole days journey to get from one to the other, a few hundred metres apart.
My optimism and preserverance paid off as pretty soon the road led out onto a paved road which after a short distance led to a roundabout with the route to Argentina on one side and a conecting road to route 3 on the other.
The day continued grey and such days depress me. There is deffinately a connection between sunlight and happyness. People at home that have never been to South America see it with rose tinted specticals as a place where it's always blue skies and warm, it's like the Spanish Costa del Sol where people go on sun seeking holiday itself. The reality is very different. Near the Atlantic coast gets it's fair share of cold overcasts and wet days. And Winter time makes an Irish Winter seen almost timid in conparision.
Nine kilometres from the roundabout I turned onto route 3 and the landscape ahead was perhaps a foretaste of Southern Brazil, big fields full of cattle. Brazil, yeh. Why is it that in Uruguay, Argentina and Chile, all ATMs work with my card no bother, easy, but Brazil has to be different. I've never seen the likes of the machines there. The banks ATMS in small towns don't ask you to put in your pin number instead there's three boxes for three different passwords. In larger places, such as Rio Grande with many different banks none have the link sign. The only way I could get money in the above city was with assistance from a member of staff at an international Bank as even there you need a training coarse to use the ATM.
To further add to the gloomliness of the day, my back wheel which I've to pump up hard at the beginning of each day begins that familar soft wobble boucy feel. I stop and inflate it again and it remains hard for two hours until I've to pump it again. The problem is the tyre. There's something of the tyre's inside sticking into the innertube but it's too small to spot and the hole in the innertube is too small to find in order to patch.
A major negative with Uruguay is that outside of towns and cities there's no services so it's advisable to carry a few days food and water. If there is a village it's often a detour many kilometres of the main route. One such village with a grand welcome sign along the main road and a turn-off which I took as I wanted a bottle of coke and more water. I cycled along the access road with fields of cows on either side thinking it wouldn't be far, that over the next rise I'd see some houses. But over that rise there was no sign of anything but more fields of cows. There was though lots of traffic back and forth so I's thinking it couldn't be far. Eventually after cycling eight kilometres I see some houses and a school with a garden full of blooming flowers and colourfully painted swings and slides out the front but as yet no sign of a shop.
There was a woman walking with a little girl from school that I asked. 'Yes a shop over there' she answered pointing to a house I'd just past. There was nothing outside to say this was a shop, it just looked like another house. The door was open so I entered. There was no one behind the counter and I looked back through another door into the living room. Three times I called out 'buenos tardes' louder each time. After the third time a nice old woman came out with pastries in a tray saying she was sorry but she was busy in the kitchen. I bough coke, pastries and bananas then had a belated afternoon stop on the grass outside before cycling back to the main road to find a place to camp.
Today's ride: 82 km (51 miles)
Total: 3,856 km (2,395 miles)
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