Colorful Valparaiso

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THis guy was great and was entertaining drivers at red lights for tips.

Valparaiso

The next day we again tried unsuccessfully to connect with our couch-surfing connection and decided to go it on our own to the neighboring port city and former capital (or main seat of the government) of Valparaiso. We quickly figured out the metro and we soon walking around the colorful, unique city. Much like the FUN-icular in Santiago...there are many what they call "Ascensors" running up and down the hills of the city. The entire city is squished into the hills that rise out of the sea. We rode a few and explored around. We were interested by (and a little weary of) the fact that these were built around the turn-of-the-century (you know the one over a hundred years ago!!). They didn´t look to have changed much. We enjoyed looking out over the city, the port and the ocean.

We tried to visit the Pablo Naruda house, but had some trouble getting there on time. I was pretty disappointed about that, because I heard it was really interesting. OH WELL! Instead, we made our way to the biggest supermarket we had yet seen in our entire four weeks in this hemispere. It was called JUMBO and we held out hope that it might contain the elusive beans, tortillas and peanut butter that we longed for. SCORE on all three!!! Yes, we are silly, but we were pretty excited.

Back to Viña del Mar for one last night, and one more Mexican food dinner (different place, this time deliscious shrimp fajitas and Chilean wine). The next morning we were on yet another bus and headed back to Mendoza, Argentina.

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Photos

Kitty at the Fruit Stand
You should have seen how many cats were hangin´rond the fish market!!

100+ year old turnstyle
...at one of the Ascensors

workings of the ascensor