Buena Vista Apart Hotel Las Condes

Bill and I went to see the virgin of the tallest mountain yesterday--had to ride the funicular straight up the mountain. <everything is closed because of the holidays, so we are enjoying fiestas in the parks with locals. <tried pisco sours first time, and moreno huesillo deserts. <tomorrow easter island

... on this plane (primarily full of Chilenos) was talking with some other passenger. People were turned around and talking to the people behind them, helping each other load things into the compartments, and there was no silence until the pilot began to give his regular run down. Even then I'm pretty sure I heard some jokes being told around the cabin.

 That still didn't seem to make me comprehend what was happening. Sure, I realized I was flying to Chile to live in ...

... an 18 hr bus journey from looking at the map. It was in fact a 36 HOUR BUS!!! This is because (we think from our poor Spanish self-translation!) the Andes are so snowed over at this time of year that the only way of driving up Chile is by driving all the way to the other side of the continent and driving up the Atlantic coast of Argentina, then trans'continent back into Chile!!! Please look at a map just to appreciate the ridiculousness of this ...

... he becomes the target for bullying for all the other children. You would think that most one-year olds aren't aware enough socially to begin fighting and bullying, but with these kids they are used to biting, pushing and shoving if it means getting 10 seconds of extra attention, be it good or bad. This poor kid is the only one in the entire hogar that doesn't fight back, and as a result is covered in bite marks ...

... couldn´t have been further from my imagination. There is a massive grunge scene here and after an (admittedly fairly half-hearted) attempt to find anything other than a dingy bar, we gave up and went into the first one that wasn´t playing the music so loud it made your ears bleed. So it was that that afternoon was spent in a graffited, dark, heavy metal bar inhabited by students sporting too much eyeliner... Unperturbed by my shattered illusions and actually ...

... attending a going-away party for his friend, then going to a club to hear another friend perform. He also said that he lived right in the middle of the best part of downtown, and that I was assured to have a blast. I checked out the website of his performing friend-- a well known sexy jazz singer named Mocha who had quite a following. Francisco was the man with the plan. I took a taxi to his place in the early afternoon, and immediately loved ...

... of London. But take a look at the photos and you'll see that no matter which direction you turn you are surrounded by mountains. I understand that in the winter they are snow capped and I can only imagine the beauty of that. At the top of the mount I found salvation. next episode cross country travel.

So I made it to Santiago at 01:30Am on Friday. LAN paid 132 reciprocity visa fee for one night. I also was given accommodations for FREE at the Holiday Inn which is directly across street from the Santiago Airport. I was able to get to sleep at 03:30 and had to wake up at 07:00 for my 9:40 flight.

... that it would be enough for us, seeing as we weren´t all that hungry, and we'd be having dinner too far long from now. ¨No, it´s only intended for 2 people." Uh ... so how exactly can you say it feeds 3, then? Because of this, we also ordered an antipasto platter. We hobbled back to the hotel because in fact, that platter of pasta could feed three people. An Aussie dude told us that Monica had ...

... in English and the restaurant would clap like we were special guests, it was a little embarrassing since none of us were really drinking that night, its quite possible we could have been the butt of some jokes, but we were oblivious. Morgan one of our fellow travellers didn't know what they were saying either but laughed hysterically and he'd caught the eye of the performers. Much to his embarrassment Morgan was called up to take part in a dancing competition, although tried to get out ...