Nearly Arrested On The Border

Trip Start Sep 29, 2007
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Trip End Ongoing


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Flag of Chile  ,
Friday, March 14, 2008

We ended up staying for an extra day in Mendoza just taking it easy and cruising around with the mendocinos eating ice-ream (helado). The residents seem to eat  ice-cream everyday and there's a store on every corner making for good competition and lots of eclectic flavours. We took the chance to buy some top quality sports equipment like a basketball, soccerball and tennis balls and little packets of glitter for the kids we will be visiting in the community near Santiago.

Another observation, there are more mullets on the streets of Chilean cities than when Billy Ray Cyrus's "Achey Breaky Heart" topped the charts,  rat's tail optional.

Last night we gave in to temptation and went for dinner again. Attempted robbery number three occurred as we sat at a sidewalk table. A suspicious character had spied my daypack bag under the table at my feet and at the same time, our waiter spied him just about to snatch it. The guy disappeared and the police summoned from up the street. In 30 seconds they were on his tail and a car joined chase, i am guessing they caught the offender and moved him on. I had the bag looped under the table leg so he never would have succeeded anyway. This is one of the first places we have visited where the thieves target tourists a bit more.

We took a "Cata" bus from Mendoza to Santiago and met a rare specimen indeed, the first friendly male bus attendant who went out of his way to amke the journey easy. The guy was a shorter version of the actor "Joaquin Phoenix" and when i got another passenger to translate this fact to him, he immediately presented all the gringos on the bus with handfuls of the dulce de leche (caramel) filled cookies called manjars in appreciation of the comment and extra coffee. The bus snaked it's way through magnificent snow-capped Andes scenery, through large tunnels built through the mountains and up and down high cliffs. We passed random towns, shrines, many horses and we noticed alot of people keep bees.

Checked into the delightful Hostel de Sammy, will leave some of the contents of our bags here and take off to Valparaiso for the weekend to avoid the smog and crush of 5 million people in the city. 
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