We arrived in Montevideo, Uruguay at 8:00 am after a night of slight rolling of the ship due to the choppy waters. Montevideo is located just across the Rio de la Plata (a tributary of the Uruguay River) from Buenos Aires. Our tour guide explained that the name Montevideo means Six Mountains from East to West – Monte (mountain), VI (six from the Roman numeral), De (from), Este (east), Oeste (west).
Uruguay has a total population of around 3.5 million of which 1.4 million live in Montevideo. Like Buenos Aires there is a very strong European influence in the inhabitants compared to the other South African countries with indigenous people. It is the second smallest country (next to Suriname) in South America.
The forecast called for rain in the morning. Fortunately, the ship provided everyone with a red umbrella along with bottled waters (more of Viking’s freebies). There wasn’t much to see that Trini and I have not already seen when we first visited in 2014. Also, the rain pretty much kept us inside the bus. At least our tour guide, Vicente, was very interesting and had a great sense of humor. We learned a lot of trivia from him! It was nice to know that in Uruguay, a wife can divorce her husband without any grounds! We also learned that the Uruguayans eat a lot of meat – average of 200 pounds a year per individual! And that the country’s name comes from Uruguay River which means “River of the Painted Bird”.
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