November 10th

We made breakfast and stayed at the campsite to let our laundry dry.  Then we enjoyed one last (cold) shower since we have no idea when our next one will be.  We hit the road again.  It took us 5 hours to get to Tacuarembo.  We stopped in Melo for lunch.  It must have been some sort of gathering of all the local d-bags and their crotch rockets.  It was impossible to enjoy our ham and cheese hot dogs with all the loud bikes driving past every 10 seconds.  We downed our food and water and took off.  When we arrived at our destination we looked and looked for this brewery.  We even waited until it supposedly opened at 7 PM, but it was not meant to be.  We settled on a pizzeria and were happy we did so.  The pizza was really good and cheap and the beer was cold.  In the dark we drove a small dusty road way back in a park where we camped for the night.  The temperature has been getting warmer and warmer making sleeping more and more miserable.

November 11th

We tried to make breakfast, but the stove was broken.  We will have to try to buy a new one.  We packed up and headed towards Salto, Uruguay's 2nd largest city.  We stopped at a local market on the way out of town.  We bought a whole cooked chicken and ate it in the car for breakfast and lunch.  It took us 4 hours to get to Salto.  We drove for over 2 hours without seeing a car, person, or building.  There were loads of cows, sheep, horses, ostriches, and even a deer.  As we neared Argentina we started to notice the fields being used for crops instead of only pasture.  We went to Burger King for dinner.  You have to get nostalgic food when you find it.  We found a massive park where tons of people were hanging out.  There were a lot of food trucks as well.  It wasn't a great spot as there were cars driving by all night long.

We took Mascha to Castillos at 7:15 AM.  She was so sweet and gave us homemade olive oil, peanut butter, and passion fruit juice for our trip as a parting gift.  We will miss our time with her and her two dogs.  Toni liked us from the start and Tootie was just starting to like us.  Then we drove to Trenta y Trace, which took us about 3 hours.  We found a place to have lunch, but it wasn't open yet.  We walked around town for a while.  It is a nice town, but definitely not a tourist town.  Lunch was a let down, but it filled us up.  I had bolagnesa and Bart had a burger.  We walked past a homemade pasta shop and bought raviolis and sauce for dinner.  Then we went to a local park to talk about our plan for the day.  We decided to hit the road since we couldn't find a good or safe place to park for the night.  After driving down the longest dirt road we arrived at the natural preserve called Quebrada de Los Cuervo.  We headed out to do the day hike.  It only took us an hour, but it was really beautiful.  The views were great and the terrain was technical.  There was a river that was super clean.  Bart spotted a ring in the water and I went in after it.  It was junk.  All the fish swarmed around my legs as I stood there, which was really neat to see.  When we arrived back at the camping area we set up camp, showered, did laundry, and made dinner.  It was nice to have the place to ourselves.  We enjoyed all the huge lizards that came to visit as we ate dinner.  A good day back on the road with all four tires attached.

November 4th

After breakfast we set out to go to Santa Teresa Park.  It was about 45 minutes away.  We walked/drove around the park for an hour.  There were animals, a nice beach where locals were surfing, and a camping area.  Then we left and went to Punta del Diablo, a tourist town on the coast.  We ate a lunch of empanadas , buneulos de alga, beer and some tasty passion fruit drinks.  Although it was touristy, the town had a fun vibe and we enjoyed it.  We headed north after that.  We found a great area to camp overlooking the ocean.  We made dinner and enjoyed the evening.
 
November 5th

We woke early to head to Chuy, Brazil.  Before we left Bart went fishing and I read a book.  We arrived in Chuy around 8:30.  We filled up with gas, which is much cheaper than Uruguay.  Then we went to the supermarket and a duty free store.  They do not allow Uruguayans to buy food or supplies from here because they do not want them importing things from other countries.  We even had to show our passports to buy groceries.  After that we drove back to the farm.  We worked a bit, ate dinner, and went to bed.

November 6-8th

 Not much to note about these 3 days.  We continued to weed the olive trees, mow, clean and pain the roof, etc.  Mascha was kind enough to make tenderloin for our last dinner.  It has been a great experience overall with this work-away.  We have learned  a lot about olive farming and living off the grid.