¡Hola Chile!

I'M IN SOUTH AMERICA, WOOHOO! Sorry about that, I'm a bit excited by that (and rather jetlagged seeing as I didn't sleep on the plane as I watched eleven episodes of Prison Break instead! The flight was great, I was really impressed with Lan Airlines, especially as I ate everything for both meals and we had really cutlery! Once at the airport, it was back to the old ways of trying to jostle through the taxi touts and to try my first bit of Spanish. Luckily, I found a chap who spoke English who directed me to an ATM, although he'd added a zero onto the conversion of the peso and nearly took my for a ride, literally, and an expensive one that that! However, I knew that all I needed to do was catch the Centropuerto bus into the city centre and my hostel was but a few blocks away. Soon, I'd boarded and within the hour I was in the centre of Santiago!

I'd been a little concerned about my choice of accommodation, La Casa Roja, as I'd booked it by mistake and was expecting a loud, party hostel, but once I'd checked in, I was really impressed with the dorms and staff. Plus, I soon met my new roommates and was back to the ways of Oz - bending the ears of them all with my stories and asking questions about their experiences in South America. I'd missed that in NZ, I just didn't get chatting to people in the same way there. Anyway, it was great to get info and advice from Betty (Austria), Taya (Australia) and Jackie (USA).

I awoke on Monday morning to loud banging, scraping and noisy chatter. I wasn't impressed, seeing as some of us were trying to sleep. I prised open an eye and saw a cleaner moving the lockers in the dorm around so she could sweep underneath them. How rude, I was not impressed... until I looked at my watch and realised that I had slept in until 12.30pm! Guess I needed the sleep! I eventually managed to leave the hostel and have a little wander around the city centre, but I was so tired that just a couple of hours was enough! That night, however, I just couldn't sleep and it was probably around 3am before I nodded off. I was so glad that everyone in the dorm decided to get up early the next morning and rustle their bags and whip their zips as loudly as possible!

Frozen Yoghurt at Patio Bellavista

However, Tuesday was a good day in the end as Jackie and I went to the Museum of Contemporary Art (where most of the exhibits just confused me) and she showed me a little frozen yoghurt stall that she'd found the previous day. now, I haven't touched yoghurt since the mid-Eighties, but I gave it a go and had a medium sized cup blended with pineapple and mango. I wasn't disappointed, in fact it was so delicious, I went back for seconds, this time replacing the mango with strawberries! Jackie then headed back to the hostel, and despite being really tired again, I decided to make my way up Cerro San Cristobal. I was hoping to just walk to the top, despite it being quite a climb, but I couldn't find the path, so I took the funicular instead, indeed it was a miracle that I managed to purchase a return ticket as my Spanish was so bad!

Once at the top, I was glad I'd taken the easy way as the climb may just have finished me off! I visited the chapel and statue and then headed into the park to find some caches! That took a bit of trial and error as I couldn't tell if pedestrians were allowed on all the trails and at one point, I think I nearly entered a substation, but eventually, two boxes were found and I headed back home.

View of Santiago

It took fifty minutes to make my way from the bottom of the hill back to the hostel, and so I was ready for a bit of a rest in my dorm. When I opened the door, the lights were off and some new guests were sleeping, who'd probably just arrived from Auckland. The shaft of light that shone through the crack in the door illuminated the face of a girl in the top bunk opposite me. She looked exactly like my friend Lucy who I met in the Cameron Highlands in Malaysia. I didn't want to disturb anyone, so I crept out and went on the Internet for a bit. I checked Lucy's profile on Facebook to see if she had mentioned anything about South America on there, but alas not.

Anyway, once I'd spent a stupidly long amount of time uploading only a few photos, I went back to the dorm and the lights were on. Imagine my joy as I was faced with Lucy and here friend Rachel, who I'd also met in Malaysia! So it was hugs and giggles all round as we talked about it being a small world, etc etc. Lucy had said to Rachel that she was sure she "could have sworn that Emma came into the dorm earlier!" That evening, I chilled out by the pool with them and had a large portion of home cooked spaghetti!

This morning, I was supposed to be up at 8am to pack ready for my flight to Easter Island. However, the alarm was promptly switched off but luckily I woke up again at 10! I still had time, but I rushed a shower and breakfast, and packed just a daysack for the trip. Well, for three nights it doesn't seem worth taking my entire backpack on a 5,000 mile round trip! So, I'm just about ready to leave on my way back to the airport. I should be at the airport very early, but I've heard stories about overbooking... and this is one flight I do not want to miss...