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Published: November 5th 2010
Tuesday 12th October 2010 23 hours on a bus later we arrived in Montevideo. Hunting out the plainest, ugliest building around we checked in (it was the closest hotel to the bus terminal). It took all of 2 seconds to hit a language barrier again, facing a large, old, scary looking woman. However, ‘Una noche’ & ‘¿Cuánto cuesta?’ just about got us through. Dumping our bags we headed into town to stretch our legs and make the most of our lone day.
Montevideo has one long main road which connects the new and old town with an obvious cafe culture. It ends at a port to the sea with shipbuilding on one side & pathway to the beach on the other. After wandering around the town for a while we headed to the beaches, but the 1st was a complete write-off surrounded by busy roads and facing a murky sea. We continued to the main beach but were both starving by the time we reached it as we hadn’t eaten all day so we found a lovely old styled cafe where they made chicken free paella just for Joanne and then took in the last of the days sun
on the beach before catching a bus back to our 5* accommodations for a cat nap.
Heading back into town later that night we were running dangerously low on deneiro, so we searched around for a cambio to exchange some £, ending at the only place that was still open - The Casino. We bowled in and to our surprise, after changing our currency, we were able to start playing - no dress code, no ID, no nothing! Flirting with Roulette we tried red/black but the minimum bet was U$1000 (~ £30) so as we had high stakes of about £7 we opted for single numbers. Joanne chose her lucky number ‘3’ using 1 chip - her 1st ever bet in a real casino - and BAM, she won! 35x our 70p bet and we were rocking (although Joanne cursed herself for not putting it all on :o).
A few turns later Joanne won AGAIN! But this time only 9x her chip as it was on a 4 corner... with 2 wins under her belt, Joanne didn’t want to push her luck so we moved onto Blackjack with U$500 stashed away as winnings, and U$300 left to play
with giving 3 potential turns ‘if’ she didn’t win. But she did, the money kept growing, then disappeared, grew again and disappeared some more - no wonder gambling’s addictive... when it was all but gone 2 hours later, Joanne cashed in her U$550, and we had to fight the urge to celebrate her 150% winning streak with champagne and a 5* hotel, It was, after all, less than £20.
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