CABO POLONIA, Uruguay -- The sand dunes rose just past the tall pine trees, near the end of a snaking, bumpy path cleared for jeeps and horses.
I took in the view, gazing past protected greenery toward the sea lion colony on the rocky shoreline, though my knuckles were white from gripping my seat and I was praying not to topple off the half-century-old jeep I shared with some Argentine beachgoers.
Despite a four-year economic recession, most of Uruguay's roadways are modern and palm-lined. But this 5½-mile-long sandy path is intentionally impassable, except by cattle and a fleet of four-wheel-drive vehicles that rumble along, skirting the water's edge as they approach this isolated Atlantic beach.
Splendidly absent on the waterfront, and in the ramshackle fishing village, are the high-rise condominiums and gaudy casinos of Punta del Este, the famed Uruguayan Riviera where we had just spent several days serenaded by lounge singers and rubbing shoulders with some of Latin America's elite. The view alone, of a glistening ocean interrupted by a solitary town building, a lighthouse crowned in red and white, merited the long bus ride and off-road odyssey to Cabo Polonia.
As North Americans fleeing a snowy winter streamed into Argentina in February, we followed the annual Argentine exodus to its little eastern neighbor, where low crime, stable politics, and toasty Atlantic waters have created a tourist haven practically unknown in the United States.
''It's important Americans begin to understand that Latin America is more than just Mexico," Martin J. Silverstein, the US ambassador to Uruguay, said in an interview.
Punta del Este, the Argentines' favored spot, is more South Beach than South America. But trips just westerly to Montevideo, Uruguay's riverside capital, to ocean beaches, and to a sprawling rural spa revealed a country perfect for travelers seeking lively Latin American culture untainted by tourist hordes or developing-world discomforts.
