La Paloma... and a tantrum

I apologise to all Australian tourists in future who encounter the La Paloma Tourist information desk at the bus station. I fear that our reputation as mild tourists is shattered. There was tone, pitch and foot stamping. From me. I´m not proud, not one of my finer moments. It happens like Halley´s comet, once every 76 years ,but it´s a cracker. I think only 5 people reading this blog have ever seen it before. What made it worse was how nice they were to me after that. I now have a tent, with a mattress - no less -and proper sheets, out the back of the dodgarama beachside hostel at La Balconada - which I have to admit is actually pretty cool - and three nights accommodation in Punta del Este - next stop.

Kel - the only thing I can think of is that it was incredibly-low-blood-sugar-Kathryn -and if I could insert a semi-colon-dash-open bracket on this foreign keyboard, I would!

I´m too embarrassed to even go into the details, however once I´d pulled myself together, I got chatting to the guy - who was the spitting image of Martin Wagener, my cousin - who was rocking out to very loud Rolling Stones. His favourite band, no less, and his band for which he plays harmonica consider them their greatest influence. I tried to explain in broken Spanish my tortured musical upbringing - tortured by repeats of the Rolling Stones, which I now like a great deal - and he asked me my favourite song. Before I could think to pick another song, ¨you can´t always get what you want¨ was out of my mouth. With irony, I went very red and said, ¨well, actually, apparently you can¨. And he laughed. At me.

After all that, once the tent was erected - which I didn´t have to do, mind, and for the amount I´m paying for a tent I´m pretty sure there should be harems of scantily clad men and peeling of grapes included, as well as a transfer on a Cleopatra type device - La Paloma is a great, great, place. I´m the only Australian in town it seems - and for that, the rest of Australia should be truly thankful. It´s a tiny place, dirt roads, but the absolute biggest waves I´ve ever seen - on both sides of the point. No sooner than I got in, I had to get out.... It was amazing, but very scary. Worse than Narooma surf beach at it´s best - you´d lose your real teeth, not just your false ones. Not the place for a surf lesson. Not the place to swim without a wetsuit.

All the people at the hostel are great - they´re all South American - so lots of opportunities to practice my broken Spanish.

So, lots of beer tonight to try and then I really must try and repair Australia´s reputation tomorrow....