We had a winner time in Santiago.

Everything went perfectly not to plan, like it couldn’t have been planned better. And has continued to go the same way.

Day 1.
Jo and I rose. Semi-late after having slept very little. Jo, couldn’t sleep for jet-lag, I for having been awake 24hours the night prior. There was a lot to catch up on. We ate in the hotel, feeling like young rich kids.

We hit the metro and found the bohemian part of town, Bellavista. In search of a cosy cafe, which was hard to find, we eventually stumbled upon a great accidental vegetarian food place (not so common this end of the world) and I raved about the delicious crepes. We then found the cosy cafe and had to enter. Here we found the joys of ‘Chirimoya’ juice and a lovely woman. We managed to entertain ourselves with stories rather well.

Oh and then we met with Mariana and Ignacio, the kids of John’s colleague. They took us about for good ol tourist activities which they, neither had done.

We ate at home that night, making a yummy stir fry.

Day 2
We thought a hike up the Cerro would be good. And so it was. Santiago is flat, surrounded by the Andes. It’s incredible. We walked up to the Virgin on top and ate an icecream. As one does when it’s cold. We came down the hill on the Funicular, leaving us in just a good spot in Bellavista for some lunch and a scoot to Pablo Neruda’s house. I managed to eat mainly at Mexican restaurants my first few days in Chile. Most unintentional.

Pablo’s house was cool. It reminded me I do like modern history. When it’s brought alive. I’ve decided to try reading some of his poetry too. He was a hoarder which I kind of liked. It was also rather intriguing because he was linked with all these Mexicans.

Day 3
Was a winner. We headed for Valparaiso. Arriving we had no idea what to do, and so decided to go to Viña del Mar first. And we ate in a quaint(convinced it was Hungarian) little local restaurant. We thoroughly enjoyed the greenness of the chairs. With little time to spare, we wanted to go up one of the ascendedors of Valparaiso.

By far my favourite, Valparaiso’s living parts are all reached by these old lift/elevator/train things. They’re heritage listed. I love things like that, old and traditional and still in use. Valparaiso is amazing. I feel in love with that town and would love to live there one day. The colours. The lifts. So cool.

We bussed back to Santiago and rewent to ‘Como Agua Para Chocolate’ for dinner, where we’d eaten the day before. We went with John and his colleagues family. Mariana took us out afterward to this student pub which my main memory of is cold.

Day 4.
We met up with Jo’s friend, Emma and hit the town. We woke up to late. It resulted in me running downstairs in my pyjamas to get breakfast. A business man came up and said ‘pelo almohada’ (pillow hair). I couldn’t quite comprehend that he was saying that, and rather embarrased I returned upstairs with a tray.

We walked a Cerro and went to Bellas Artes. There was a really interesting exhibtion about the Desaparecidos in the mueso by Carlos Altamirano. We finished off by seeing Harry Potter which made me thoroughly happy. I liked it.

A las 12, we caught the bus to Temuco for the next part of our journey. I slept bad. But the bus assistant was amazing. He never stopped cleaning.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 17th, 2007 at 11:53 pm.