Punta del Este: The Hamptons of Argentina

The Hamptons are to crazed Manhattanites what Punta del Este is for vacationing Argentinians. The crowded streets of Buenos Aires empty out during the summer months of December through February, and the porteños (the people of BA) flock to Punta del Este, a luxurious beach resort located on the southern tip of Uruguay.

Punta, which has a local population of only 7,000, hosts over 150,000 tourists between December and March. The week surrounding New Year’s Eve draws thousands of elite tourista; bankers, models and jet-setters crowd into house parties with $200 cover fees, unless you’re on the list. The flight to Punta del Este from Buenos Aires, Jorge Newberry airport is 45 minutes and cost me $287 US dollars. A cheaper route is to take the BuqueBus, which includes a 2-hour ferry ride to Montevideo or Colonia and then a 3-hour bus ride to Punta del Este, for a total cost of about $150.

When I arrived in Punta del Este, I took in the clear blue skies and was surprised by how familiar it all seemed. As we drove past shoddy beach shops selling pool chairs and cheap liquor stores it reminded me of the drive to Dewey Beach. When we passed the rolling beach dunes, Punta looked like Martha’s Vineyard, but with palm trees and sexy Latinas.

The Brava and Mansa are the two types of coasts in Punta, with the end of the Rio de la Plata (Silver River) on one side and the beginning of the Atlantic Ocean on the other. Downtown Punta is built up with high rises, casinos and nightclubs. But as you drive along the coast you pass through several areas of Punta all with their own flavor: La Barra with posh restaurants and windsurfing lessons, El Tesoro, Montoya Beach, Bikini beach with the most beautiful bodies I’ve ever seen in my life and Manantiales beach on the Brava side with rough, big waves, perfect for surfing.

Punta del Este has all of the stores that you would find in Soho, like a glass boxed Converse store with a painted chain link fence on it and several trendy furniture design stores. There is even a MundoMac store where you can buy a power cord for your MacBook for the equivalent of $300 US dollars, about $225 dollars more than in the States. In one of the farthest parts of town, Jose Ignacio, you will find a beautiful seaside restaurant, La Huella, that doubles as a Lacoste store alongside the historic Punta del Este lighthouse.

As familiar as it may have looked, it was just as unfamiliar at the same time. I felt like how a child must feel, looking at road signs with blinking, dumb eyes, listening to people converse in Spanish, and straining to make out simple sentence constructions. When unseen, everything is so beautiful and inspiring. The entire land is covered in dark, violet Morning Glories. Grecian like mansions, thatched churches, and red pueblos line the coast. Dogs of the universe roam the golden sandy beaches along the cold, Atlantic Ocean.

In New York City’s harsh winter, the light fails early. But in Punta del Este, the light is so radiant it can be confusing. “Is it 8pm yet?” I asked my friend. “No, it is 10pm, and it is almost dinnertime,” she smiled.

Visitors can expect New York City prices. The first night I went out to dinner, we ate shrimp and cheese baked in a large winter squash for 1,100 Uruguayan Peos, about $56 American dollars. No where else in the developing country of Uruguay, will you pay $15 American dollars for a drink, like you will for a delicious Pisco Sour at Sipan, one of Punta’s newest spots, a trendy Peruvian restaurant located in Manantiales, where it is a sin to eat rice with ceviche. A Pisco Sour is similar to a whiskey sour but with a hint of key lime pie. It is a Peruvian cocktail (although the Chileans claim it as their own too) containing pisco liquor, lemon juice, egg whites, simple syrup and a splash of bitters. The drink dates back to the 17^th Century when the King of Spain banned wine, forcing locals to experiment and concoct a different kind of alcohol from grapes. National Pisco Sour Day is celebrated on the first Saturday of February in Peru.

On our second night out, we went to Baby Gouda, a lovely restaurant in La Barra. We dined under Moroccan lamps and sat on velvet couches near the beach. A couple sat across from us but they did not speak to each other. I imagined their names to be Maria and Jose and if I didn’t know any better I would assume they had just stepped out for a night in Atlantic City. Maria was short and thick with tanned, leathery skin. She wore a visor and thick gold jewelry like her husband. Jose wore a light blue tank top and loose gym shorts. He chowed down on his heavily Parmesaned pasta in silence. She placed her giant Coach purse between them. She ate her steak and potatoes and drank something blue that matched her heavy eyeliner. He rubbed elbows and laughed with the man next to him. They clinked glasses. But the couple never looked at each other. They only spoke when they agreed to get the check.

How could they not see all the beauty that surrounded them? How does frustration with love harden into such boredom, like a stone wall around their minds?

I drove a car in Punta del Este, and that car was a 1966 blue Ford Falcon devoid of power steering, an exhaust system, seatbelts and reliable brakes. The car is not a car—it is a beast! It was like driving a boat, or how I would imagine riding a buffalo might feel. When I changed gears it screamed and shook. Merely turning it on is a gamble. But I only stalled once.

I had a close encounter of the sexy kind when I pulled into the only gas station in town. “Gas, per favore?” I asked in my Italian accent.

“Si, full?” the station attendant asked.

“Si gracias,” I answered. I was sweating like a melting stick of butter in the sun. The leather car seats burned my bum.

I looked out my window and saw a beautiful, 1980s Italian motorbike with a dark grey Louis Vuitton helmet placed on the seat. The owner of the bike caught me snapping a photo of the beauty, and well, ladies and gentleman; let’s just say I had snapped a photo of the lesser beauty. The bike’s owner had shaggy black hair and a good, strong face with stubble and deep brown eyes. Javier approached my car slowly, put his hand the roof, leaned in and said, “Hola.”

“Hola,” I answered coyly in my grossly obvious American accent.

Javier then said something, that I assume was along the lines of “How are you cutie?” But, my Spanish is so terrible that I was unable to understand or answer him. I just kind of sat there with a dopey smile on my face, shrugged my shoulders and giggled. He seemed to acknowledge my naïveté, so he pulled out his wallet, and withdrew his business card.

Javier Amobura

Web Design and Animation

www.skirdesign.com

Punta del Este

I smiled, took his business card with my left hand and said, “Ah, a designer! Como cool!” I waved goodbye, and cranked the old beast into first gear. I drove off going the wrong way down a one-way street. So como no cool.

South Americans must have swum very quickly in the gene pool. The men have the most unbelievably chiseled bodies. The women have perfect, thin arms and round, luscious buttocks that hang out of the sides of their thong bikini bottoms.

I found a purple crab on the beach one day, and it entertained me like it would a small child. Traveling has a way of doing this to us, because everything is new and we are surrounded by things we cannot understand. But then, there are also things we find we can understand better than our own cultures. In Spanish, an umbrella is a para agua, which makes so much sense to me—for water! Much like a para sol—is an umbrella for the sun. Where did we get the word umbrella anyway?

The day I left Punta, a tremendous storm had passed leaving a clean beach, placid water, and the air was colored light lavender. The ocean is magnetic. One cannot help but feel drawn to it and walk towards it like it’s calling you. But then like all things and people in life, you must leave it at some point, knowing that it will always be there.