Thursday, January 26, 2012

Uruguay: Garzon

The eponymous Argentine restaurant in this silent, baking small town in the countryside might have been a mirage in the midday heat. We were cutting it fine with the pesos and the gas after three days' living "off-grid". Salt-encrusted like the sea-bass served at Francis Millman's establishment, we were glad to take refuge in the shade of the grapevines here.  

There are a number of places, easy like Sunday morning, where I've been tempted to linger. Maybe not to live, but certainly to linger. Flagstaff AZ, Aswan in Egypt spring to mind. Garzon makes the grade. There's not much more than the central square, but the surrounding countryside seems almost familiar. And I would gladly eat this rustic, fire-baked cuisine for the rest of my days. And Flo is already conjuring up a plan for a Garzon "Festival de Imagine" of Photo and Cinema. There's more than a bit of the Basque about it, which it seems historically is no accident. Ironic that we travel half way around the world to find ourselves in a place so reminiscent in places of Les Landes in France or the Spanish Basque Country. 



Arriving and departing we caught sight of gauchos wrangling their cows, and in one instance a gaucho and his young son rustling up a stray horse and pony. A striking sight against this expansive landscape. 



Along the way we stopped for directions, petrol and fruit in Rocha, an archetypical frontier town, with its low, multicoloured buildings. Uruguayans seem to enjoy giving elaborate, highly detailed directions. "Don't listen to anyone else, they will lead you astray!" says an older man after a War & Peace description of a two-block detour. 




 Almost surreal to find a jazz station offering string quartet renditions of Zeppelin's No Quarter and AC/DC's Givin' the Dog a Bone. And good cruising music from Gotan Project, Yo La Tengo. And cruise we did... 

Old rusting hulks of Ford trucks and schoolbuses litter the countryside like milestones. Somehow every village also seems to feature a well-restored Willys Jeep. Misha, no pussymobiles in this part of world, this is Hilux country. Couldn't help noticing that Toyota Hilux is the vehicle of choice in the South America Dakkar rally.  





I'm amazed at the quality of the roads, and everything so well tended, spotless. "Colabore, No Tire Basura" implore the roadsigns. Everything is couched in language of colaboration, not interdiction. We remark on the immaculate roadsides, the beaches to locals we meet: "thank you", goes the reply", but it could still be so much better. 




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