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| Long-legged South American sea bird. At the beach! Just like me! |
I like to go to the beach, but for only one day a year. That's enough beach for me. Laying in the sand. Baking in the sun. It's nice to do every so often. And then it gets boring. Because even if you take a book to read, you can't anything that requires any sort of concentration or focus since there are all sorts of distractions at the beach. Even if you're the only one at the beach. (I'm not talking about beautiful, or not-so beautiful bodies; I'm talking about "time to turn so you won't burn" time, sweat gets in your eyes, being sand flea food, or, weirdly today for some reason, those St. Etienne songs that kept running through my mind for who know what reason).
So once a year is the perfect amount of beach for me nowadays. And we're 10 1/2 months into 2013 and I hadn't yet gone. And I'm in the middle of a two-night visit to beach town on the Atlantic Coast of Uruguay. Well, I guess today is the day.
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| Take a walk a few blocks down Avenida Apolo |
My hotel is not right on the beach, but it's close enough.
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| Maybe I could take the boat out to La Isla De La Tuna, about 100 feet off shore |
And there's the ocean.
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| The boat scene doesn't look quite so post-apocalyptic when you focus on the boat |
And there's the beach.
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| The beach is curved. Just like Copacabana in Rio! |
I could've stayed at the Hotel La Tuna (three-story building on the left). I would've had a room right on the beach. Assuming it's open. It's still the off season and lot is closed in this town. Including even, get this, the casino! What sort of casino closes for anything ever? Oops. See. I just got to the beach and already I'm distracted. That's why you can't read a decent book when you're on the beach.
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| Here's where I stowed my surfboard. Well. Would've. If I had a surfboard. And knew how to surf. |
I decided to walk the entire beach, from one end to the other.
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| Walking the beach |
What else could I do on the beach? According to this sign, my options were limited.
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| So many restrictions, man |
No fishing. No dogs. No horses. No dune buggies (dang). No campfires. No camping (or maybe just no pitching tents -- never a good idea at the beach ever). Apparently my options were limited to swimming and throwing away trash. And the beach was clean. So there wasn't even any trash to throw away.
So I kept on walking. I maybe about three-quarters down the length of the beach. Then I hit this sign.
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| No pasar |
And I can't walk any further. Naval base. Uruguay's major naval base. Right on this small beach in a small beach town. It's just like being in the Norfolk/Virginia Beach area, with the naval base in town. (I assume the Uruguayan navy is more like a coast guard than a military navy, but I wasn't about to trespass and find out.)
So I walk back to the center of the beach and lay down. And think of St. Etienne songs.
So what did I wear to the beach, you may ask. This not being Brazil, I can post the picture I took in my beach attire. I'm guessing this is the first time a Minnesota Twins cap hit the beach in La Paloma.
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| I'm too sexy for my shirt / Too sexy for my shirt / So sexy but I'm still leaving it on |
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