La Paloma is 60 miles east of Punta del Este, Uruguay’s largest and most sophisticated beach resort. It’s 150 miles east of Uruguay’s capital, Montevideo. And it’s 90-miles west of the Uruguay/Brazil border.
La Paloma is in Uruguay’s Department of Rocha. (A department is like a small state or province.) It’s a mostly rural department with more than 100 miles of coastline fronting the Atlantic Ocean.
La Paloma’s centro is on the Cape of Santa Maria. The main avenue, Nicolás Solarí, is lined with stores, restaurants, and hotels.
At the end of the cape is a lighthouse (built in 1874) and a large bay with a sand beach called Bahía Grande. A small bay, called Bahía Chica, is notched out of the larger bay. Just off the entrance of the smaller bay is Isla la Tuna (Tuna Island).
If you drive west of La Paloma’s centro on the coastal road, you’ll see beach neighborhoods developed with hotels, single-family homes, and low-rise apartment buildings. These include the communities of Balconada, El Cabito, Los Botes, Anaconda, and Solarí.
If you go east along the coast from La Paloma’s centro, you pass Bahía Grande, large campgrounds, and the Port of La Paloma. East of the port you come to the coastal communities of La Aguada, Costa Azul, Antoniópolis, and Arachania.