Chile´s central core

Santiago in style
Well, we made it to the capital, it wasn’t our plan to come here directly from Chiloe but after getting to the bus station and realising we’d have to wait til the next day to get to the Lake district we decided we’d skip it and move on straight to Santiago. What a shame - only the most luxurious buses had tickets left! After a day in Puerto Montt (wouldn’t recommend this as a tourist destination) we found ourselves in a bus resembling a first class airline - very nice. We arrived in Santiago the following morning after a good night’s sleep.

We decided to splurge a bit and upgraded from the hostels we’ve been staying in to a gorgeous little boutique hotel in Providencia (http://www.vilafranca.cl/) - I love having all this wedding money to justify these extravagances! We weren't disappointed - it’s a wonderful place with fantastic, friendly, helpful staff and we've really enjoyed staying there. We were especially chuffed when we found out from another guest that you usually have to book 5 months in advance and we’d only called the day before!

Our first day was spent chilling out, enjoying our hotel and exploring a bit of the city centre. We’d been lead to believe that Santiago didn’t have much to offer so we were surprised to find a city with a large number of beautiful buildings as well as some great bars and restaurants. We climbed to the top of a hill - Cerro Santa Lucia - for a view over the city but unfortunately the smog made it all look a bit grimy. Such a shame as if it weren’t for that it would be an incredibly spectacular setting, surrounded by huge mountains on all sides.

Curry cravings satiated
We've had our eye on a restaurant in the Lonely Planet for a while for our first night in Santiago selling... CURRY! It’s been almost impossible to get any Asian food over here other than the occasional stir-fry so we’ve been craving curry for a while, luckily we weren’t disappointed - it was fab. We came away feeling excessively full - hopefully that will whet the craving for the next 3 months as I don't think we'll find any more decent curry houses once we leave Santiago.

Touring the city
On the second day we took a bus tour of the city. It was great as we don't have that much time here and it gave us a really good feel for the place. We got to see some of the surrounding areas as well as more of the centre and hear some history of the place as well. Santiago seems to have a lot to offer from great shopping malls, an area resembling LA boulevard, a beautiful city centre and good areas for going out.

Two very different cities by the sea - Valparaiso and Vina del Mar
Yesterday we took a tour out to the coast to see Vina del Mar and Valparaiso two cities right next to each other. We took in: the beach at Vina del Mar where all the uber-rich of Santiago have their second homes; the gardens there with flora from around the globe; and we saw a Maui statue - one of only 2 in the world which have been removed from Easter Island. Valparaiso was the highlight though. It’s a great city - from afar it looks like a huge shantytown as the buildings sprawl up the hillsides in no discernable order. When you get close though you find there are rich and poor houses all side by side and all painted in bright colours (supposedly in the past the boats that came in used to give the leftover paint to the locals after painting the hulls of their ships and hence the mishmash of colours on the buildings). It all makes for a great atmosphere. We had lunch overlooking the port area and were amazed to see huge container vessels being parallel parked in an incredibly small spaces by tug boats. After lunch we got driven around the hillside area and went to a museum in Neruda’s old house - a Chilean poet and Nobel laureate.

Today we spent the day wandering around the town through Bellavista - a funky area with brightly coloured houses and lovely shops and cafes. We were aiming to go for a swim in one of the outdoor pools in the main Parque Metropolitano but were disappointed to find that it had closed a few weeks earlier, the end of the summer. There obviously not as hardy as us Brits over here - it’s been hotter today than it ever get's in summer at home! We consoled ourselves with lunch in a beautiful square and wandered around the local markets before heading back to Providencia for dinner and an early night before our early bus to Mendoza tomorrow morning. A good day to end an enjoyable visit to Santiago.

---

---