Although one purpose of my Latin America journey was to visit friends, I didn’t know anyone in Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay. I’d booked a hotel there for one night because:

All the flights to Buenos Aires, Argentina seemed to have layovers of eight hours or more, often in more than one city.
My Argentine friend Carlos told me Montevideo is charming and recommended a day there.
Montevideo and Buenos Aires are both on the Rio de la Plata, and taking a ferry boat down the widest river in the world sounded like fun!