Alto Mantagua Resort & Club Concon

Four days left in America de Sur. I crave beach! Pedro and Jorge drop me off at the beach in Concon just north of Vina Del Mar. After an empanada and coffee (this is becoming a ritual) I walk on the beach, meditate, read my book and get a visit by a homeless pup who naps next to me. The sound of the ocean is soothing as I watch a surfer catch some waves ...

Hola Todos!

No school today because it's the Feast of St. Peter and St. Paul. What better way to celebrate this day than to drive along the sea and the Pacific Ocean and eat seafood!!! My entire host family went out to lunch today, and along the way, I was able to witness the most amazing sites! (Probably my favorite part of this trip so far!!!) We (Oscar (papa), Oscar (hijo), Margarita, Antonia, and I) drove ...

... an all-pervading stench of fish, dog, and urine. It was where we also discovered the unfortunate truth about Chilean coffee: all they serve is instant Nescafé. We played good tourists and went up a few of the ascensores, including the one with the cool tunnel, took a little walking tour of the old posh bits to admire the variety of architecture, went on a boat tour of the harbour, ate in a traditional restaurant, went on the old ...

... with tourist maps and information listed. Perhaps this was a sign that this place was overly touristy, and made me wonder as to the quality of the food ... my fears were assuaged when some buns came out, accompanied by butter and ... pate??? A first for me, as pate isn't a common accompaniment for bread in any restaurant I've been to. We chose a Chilean Shiraz for the meal, a first for us once again, The predominant varietal here is Carmenere, and ...

... me... lol.. and yet my nose was freezing and I couldnīt get warm. In all fairness, I also took a shower before bed (as per usual) and went to bed with my hair still wet. I eventually fell into a light sleep in fetal position and woke up halfway through the night to find my hair still damp and not til I woke up in the warm morning sunlight did my hair finally dry off...So note to self- do not go to bed with wet hair here! I realized on the same night that I am not cut out to ...

... saving more pesos and ham-and-cheese heartache. Once again, this is hardly necessary in Asia, where a decent meal in a small eatery not only costs about a buck, not only tastes good, but has even got vegetables. Remember them? Of course if you want to bang the local bimbos (bimbas?), then a hostel's not the place for that. That's probably another reason traveling women are attracted to hostels in free-for-all Asia, where everybody's ...

{please select "view all photos" or "view as slideshow" above, or click on any photo to see the full album} Independence Day: Celebrating the freedom To roast a whole sheep Last week was Fiestas Patrias here in Chile, an almost week long celebration of September 18, 1810 when Chile declared independence from Spain (it's like our July 4th). We arrived in Valparaiso ...

Beunos dias! we arrived in Val, as the locals it, today by bus. We took the condor bus to santiago from Pucon for about 9 hours, when we got there we nipped off to the hostel we stayed at in Santiagio called la casa roja if you remember, because joe had left his mp3 player and camcorder in there, but alas, they were not there :( now when i say "we nipped off" i mean we took a taxi (deathcab of santiago) to the hostel and then back to the una stacion de autobuses ...

... through a couple of tunnels and when we emerged from the final one - we were in the Casablanca Valley. The lush green landscape below us told us that there were grapes on the vine and we were close to the vineyards and tasting rooms! We stopped at a couple different wineries and bought some of the areas finest wines - Carmenere - Pinot Noir (Very good Annie) Sauvignon Blanc - Cab/Syrah Rose (for drinking in the hot afternoon sun) and a very 'yummy ...

... camping prohibited". of course that was right above a small encampment of about 10 tents and 25 people. we asked some girls and they told us that itīs not allowed to camp or to stay overnight, but everyone does anyway. they told us to drive around to the entrance and tell them that we were going to the beach, but not to mention the camping. after a trip to the grocery store we went to the beach and set up our tent ...