El Silencio Estancia
26th March 2009
We saw two ostriches (or Rhea) yesterday, while we were on horseback, I had forgotten. Today nothing happened until el patron came back from Montevideo around 10am, with another member of staff, or a friend. We then went off to survey his land by ute, thus going further than on horseback, which I’m kind of glad about as my lower back is quite sore, aching. I think extensive horse riding has got to be good for some with back posture issues, like myself! We went to his ostrich farm first off! Yes really. Twenty or more of them roaming around the fields freely. I remember the ostrich farm in North Korea. These didn’t seem quite so big, but we didn’t get quite as close. For sure these ostriches, like the citizens of Uruguay, are much freer. But these ones ran away from us – probably because they could! We stopped down by the river (I forget the name, but it borders Flores e Durazno province) which is so tranquil e peaceful and no crocodiles apparently! He keeps Holland cows as well as Hereford / Hertfordshire? and more and they are all castrated apparently. Perhaps that’s why they cry and not because they have horrible eye infections (at least a couple of them anyway). I’m at a cross-roads, they seem to live a pretty organic and happy life, for it’s a massive estate with that much livestock per acre, but the animals are scared. That’s natural I guess, but the ones with bad eyes, it turns my stomach. You don’t eat the eye do you. And I can imagine Aunty Anne producing a lovely rare rib-eye (no pun intended) on a Sunday and me feigning not to want any – yeah right! Let alone what my Dad would think, vegetarianism is not for me. There are plenty of sheep grazing on the same land, I believe they are five or six years old so I wonder what their purpose is, surely too old to eat? Mutton? Surely there is a higher price for lamb and less time looking after? Well, I’m no farmer.
We then passed a dis-used but not in too bad a shape cottage e barn (on his estate, near the river, about one mile from the main house) and it got me dreaming, living there .. it had power, it once had a lovely garden, great potential. There was a large iguana (lagoda?) which wandered across and into the barn, adding to the abandoned but surreal feel of the place. To live on his land, to renovate the house, make it into a sellable plot, or a tourist estancia. Even advertise for help (builders, plasterers, carpenters), even film it for tv. Live on the main site (early stages at least), get to horse-ride in the afternoon in return to their work in morning, or something. Mountain biking, canoeing, horse-riding, cattle-herding, etc. etc. Only dreams though. As I said before, I’m no farmer! It could work if I had a live-in 21 year old Spanish teacher though!
So that was all in the morning and I’m glad I wrote it up after lunch as loads more adventures to remember in the afternoon. We went on horseback along the dirt road with Juan the gaucho, as well as el Patron and trotted the whole way down the road and some, further than I’d been before and I wondered why we were going so far on horseback. It was quite hard work as well, my stirrups weren’t quite right, probably because I don’t have proper gaucho boots and my shoes are not ideal to say the least. My shins are getting a bit sore from the stirrups. But more worryingly, my shoes keep falling out of the stirrups as we canter along.
