Daniel and I went to the beach this morning at Playa RamÃrez, which is in Barrio Parque Rodó. Teresa stayed back to relax at the hotel, not wanting to brave the wind. It turned out to be breezy, but not too bad. I got sand-blasted a couple times when it briefly picked up, but there are some places that will charge you for that privilege, and I got it for free!
The tide was out, though, so it would have been a long walk to actually swim. The sand is very, very fine. We basically napped in the sun for a couple hours. (I took pictures of Playa RamÃrez yesterday, so no additional pictures of sand today.) They have a very cool sign along La Rambla in front of the beach that’s basically a sundial showing how strong the UV rays are right now. More All beaches should have those.
Noa Noa, Take Two
Once we’d baked in the sun long enough, we walked to Noa Noa, where we’d tried to get in yesterday when it was closed for a private party. No issues today. Had a nice table with a view of the water. I thought I was ordering a light lunch when I ordered an appetizer of fish bites and a side dish of grilled vegetables. It turned out to be a ton of food, and I was absolutely stuffed! The grilled veggies came in a bowl with crumbled goat cheese, almonds, olive oil, and mint leaves. It was very refreshing. The fish bites were nuggets of white fish, lightly breaded and fried, served with lemon wedges and tartar sauce. Delicious!
International Women’s Day March
In the evening, Teresa and I went to get food, then headed to Plaza Independencia to watch the beginning of the march. The march had already begun, but there were plenty of women staging in the plaza, waiting to continue down the main avenue. (This march would go 20 blocks, total.) It’s been said that this is the largest International Women’s Day March in the world, with some estimates as high as 300,000, and I believe it. It was massive!
Before walking alongside the marchers to try to get closer to the beginning, I was trying to get a higher vantage point to get some photos, so I climbed up the side of an embankment under a tree. I was leaning out as far as I could when I slipped and fell down the embankment. Oof! I ended up with about a 3 inch scrape on my forearm, an abrasion closer to my elbow, and a nice one right on the tip of the elbow (which is the worst place to try to bandage, lol). The blood sacrifice was worth it, though. Anything for the shot!
After a short trip back to the hotel to patch me up with what few band-aids we had in our bags, we tried again to reach the front of the march. Once again we failed. We walked as far as Plaza Libertad, but we could see no end in sight. I’m pretty sure the front of the march had already reached Tristan Narvaja by that point. So, we stayed at the plaza and took photos and videos as more marchers went by. As we eventually walked backwards along the march route, we looked for a farmacia that was open on Sundays and eventually found one, where we picked up more suitable bandages.
At the tail-end of the march there were several city buses lined up side-by-side, blocking vehicles from driving into the marchers, and behind the buses were two motorcycle police following along. They were the only police we saw the entire time, despite the absolute throng of people. Such a refreshing change of attitudes towards marches and protests.
Videos From the March
This final video was taken by Daniel Schoorl, posted with permission:
Daily step total: 15,562
Me encanta 🫂🇺🇾