La Serena & Santiago

---

(Short but sweet this one!)



After a 19hr bus journey La Serena finally came into sight at 5am. Finally I was back down at sea level and could actually see the sea!! After catching up on some sleep, that afternoon I had a walk around town. Very different to what I had been experiencing since Lima. It was a metropolitan city. Glass office blocks, pedestrianised streets with department stores on, it all felt very strange! But the sun was out and that night fingers were crossed for a nearby observatoty tour…..which was unfortunately clouded out. The next day again was pleasant weather so we rented bikes and cycled all along the beach for a couple of hours stopping for some lunch on the beachside location. Again that night however the clouds came back and the observatory tour was off….that was my last chance to go so basically I now have to come back to Chile some other time to do this! Haha!



Next up was my final destination in Chile, Santiago, the countries capital city. Wandering around the streets here I felt like I was in an American city. It was 34 Degrees, the sun was pounding the pavements and the streets were built up with tower blocks and sidewalks. It all felt very western. It was also my last night with the group which meant we had a good knee´s up out in town until 4am to console ourselves and try and forget our imminent departures. I then just had the following day to explore this city. It was a very nice city and a westerner could easily move here and live here without realizing you are in South America, but for me that was not what I wanted to experience which was fine as I was flying to Buenos Aires first thing the next day to bring in the New Year! Lets hope I meet some nice people over there!

---

Photos

Cycling along the beach
La Serena