Punta del Este edition
Wednesday, Aug. 26, 2026 · updated 1:40 p.m.
The beach today
The flags came down on April 5. They go back up on Nov. 14.
No lifeguards are posted, no flags are flown, and the Intendencia’s beach log records nothing between those dates — we checked, and it is genuinely empty, not merely unpublished. So this page changes shape for the winter rather than showing you a stale flag from April.
Guards return
Nov. 14
In 83 days. 337 guards across 91 posts.
Sea temperature
About 11°C
52°F. People still swim. There is no ban and no guard.
Population, roughly
A tenth
Of what it holds in January. The town is a different place.
What is actually open in winter
Supermarkets and pharmacies
Open
Restaurants on the peninsula
A handful
La Barra
Largely shut
Banks and public offices
Normal hours
Buses to Montevideo
Reduced but frequent
Beach services and guards
None until Nov. 14
The honest summary: the peninsula is quiet, La Barra is quieter, and most of what stays open through the winter is in Maldonado city and San Carlos rather than in Punta itself.
The local press we read
This coast has two working newsrooms — Correo de Punta del Este and Maldonado Noticias, both in Spanish — plus the Intendencia de Maldonado’s own notices. We sweep all three for every edition; when something from here matters, it runs in the daily brief on the front page, linked and summarized in English, rather than being rewritten into this page.
Why this page is thinner than the Montevideo one
Maldonado runs no open-data program. The national catalog lists 154 datasets for Montevideo and none for this department, so there is no live bus count, no water-outage feed and no municipal API to read. What we do have is the Intendencia’s own lifeguard flag log, the meteorological service’s Punta del Este zone, and two local newsrooms — and in winter, the first of those three is asleep.
We would rather tell you that than pad the page out.
Punta del Este today
Air13° / 7°C · 55° / 45°F
WindSW 35 km/h · 22 mph
SeaAbout 11°C · 52°F
Sunset6:12 p.m.
Inumet treats Punta del Este as its own forecast zone, measured from the station by the lighthouse.
To Montevideo
First departure4:45 a.m.
Last departure9:30 p.m.
Journey2h 10m – 2h 40m
OperatorsCOT, COPSA, Núñez
From the transport ministry’s intercity timetable, which is updated twice a year. There is no live departure data for this route.
Last season, in numbers
Flag readings logged7,129
Season length143 days
Peak-quarter visitorsSee Q1 report
Low-quarter visitorsSee the MINTUR report
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Flags from the Intendencia de Maldonado’s lifeguard mapping service. Weather from Inumet’s Punta del Este zone. Local reporting from Correo de Punta del Este and Maldonado Noticias. Visitor figures from the Ministerio de Turismo. Beach flags concern safety and sea state, not water quality.