Uruguay
Coast
February 2023 • Brazil and Argentina are on the other side of the frontera, so tiny Uruguay keeps its head down, works hard, stays quiet. It's worth visiting for similar reasons—shoulders come down, bags go unwatched, transactions become easier. With only 3 million citizens, the country has income levels and living standards that aren’t as wildly unequal as the neighbors'. NYT Magazine says it's a case study in economic and environmental sustainability. For a better sense of the national character, revisit the story of the Uruguayan rugby players who survived a plane crash in the Andes in 1972. Their two-and-a-half-month ordeal is operatic, a haunting tale of human willpower vs. impossible circumstance. Those who know the story well are quick to point out: The survivors didn’t just wait to be rescued—they made a hellish decision to avoid starvation, then made hats and gloves out of seat upholstery and hiked down from the mountains to save themselves.
