We arrived with the sun at Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay, a formerly begrudged buffer zone between the two giants of South America, Argentina and Brazil. After a brief tour of Montevideo it was off to the Pampas, the Southern Hemisphere grassland, and the heart of Uruguay. Our destination, La Estancia Rábida, would stun anyone with its beauty and diversity: streams and ponds, forests and pastures, sprinkled with cattle and sheep, and above, chimango caracara soaring between us and distant white streaks, brush strokes of high cirrus clouds across a warm blue sky.
At the center of the Estancia we were greeted by our hosts, and observed the legendary gauchos and a squadron of cooks capering about a huge iron grill. La Rábida is a working ranch with over a thousand head of dairy cattle on three-and-a-half thousand acres, a medium-small estancia for Uruguay. For us, it made for a full and active day with horses and riding, wagons with soft seats of hay, hiking, birding, cow milking, sheep shearing, and some energetic dancing by the gauchos and gauchitas. All of this contributed to particularly impressive appetites remedied by an equally impressive barbecue pictured here with the gauchos taking a well deserved break and a bit of maté in the background. As for the insert, not only does it depict one of our number on horseback, as many chose to explore the Estancia, but also the "tree" behind the rider is the only native tree of the Pampas, the Ombú. Every other tree here, the hundreds upon hundreds, had been planted! The Ombú, by the way, is not really a tree but more of an oversized, no, make that a gigantic shrub related to the pokeweed, a much smaller plant known to many in the southern United States as the source of poke salad.
And for a finale? A painted sky with more shades and hues of red, orange, and blue then I ever remember seeing as the Caledonian Star entered the night and set course for tomorrow.
