Eccentric Valparaiso, Chile

---

10 dias!!! That´s how long we stayed in this unique and eccentric city. Valparaiso is the 2nd largest city in Chile and boasts a diverse group of locals.

We found a great hostel (huge house) International Hostelling Valparasio that was only 5-10min walk to various shopping districts, restaurants, etc. During our time at this hostel we read multiple books, watched about 8 movies, and took Spanish classes.

At this point in the trip it became imperative that we take a Spanish class!! In the beginning it was comical when trying to communicate with someone who did not speak any English... and we could only understand 1 in 10 words... but the humor has worn off and we´ve decided to get serious!! We signed up for 5 days of 1.5hrs of private lessons with a private tutor (Alonzo) at a local language school. It was very helpful... and we continue to wear out our Spanish-to-English, English-to-Spanish dictionaries.

Later we switched hostels and found a place called Hospedaje Blanco... where we met the owner who had the most difficult dialect to understand. Honestly during our entire stay we could not understand him a single bit!! It was serious cave man sign language communication!! One evening around 11:30pm our key to the outside door did not work (and trust me, we tried)... so we had to ring him over the intercom. John and I do believe he told us off and then met us at the 2nd floor door in a towel still telling us off!! After that evening... everytime he saw us he made sure we felt bad about the whole key situation by ¨signing¨ the use of a key and repeating llave!! He was pretty cool overall... he def made us laugh.

During our time in Valparasio we rode little track cars called ¨ascensores¨, which are everywhere, up the hills for an excellent view of the bay and all the colorful neighborhoods. After the fact we found out that a few of these little cars/tracks were built in the late 1800s... no wonder it was so creaky!! Some of our favorite sights were watching the giant cargo ships leave the bay, a Yugoslovian Museum (maybe previously an Embassy) which was incredbily ornate and looked out over the city, the colorful houses that covered the hillsides, and the graffiti which was all over the city.

OHHH... and there was a beautiful square right outside of H. Blanco where MANY things occured. There were various merchants selling trinkets, food, renting out tricycles to children and adults. Two of our most memorable were: 1. Some crazy clown guy who pestered cars and people crossing the street (gathered quite a crowd); 2. A guy (we´ll name him Crazy) trying to stab w/ kitchen knife another guy (Victim) in the complete daylight in front of Victim´s wife and children!! John and I were watching these 10 or so kids doing skateboarding tricks when out of the blue... there was a scuffle!! The victim ran out into traffic and threw up his shirt to see if he´d been cut while a man was slashing at him with a steak knife..and then Crazy decided to ´expose´ himself while yelling obsenities at the man and his family!!! Neither John or I moved/said a word because it was all so surreal!!! No one called the cops or attacked Crazy... but John and I slowly made our way to the Other side of the park. So, John and I have concluded that shaking your ¨willy¨ at someone is apparently the most degrading thing you can do to someone else in public!! Haha!!

We spent one day at Renaca beach which was just outside of the nearby town of Vina Del Mar. It was a warm day but a little breezy so after a couple hours in the sun we walked to a restaruant across the street and shared the biggest seafood entré on the menu. We were really looking forward to it, but when it arrived we found that none of the food was cooked...ha...so it goes, we had to eat it though since it was also the most expensive thing on the menu! 😊 We hung out that afternoon watching a soccer tournment on the beach and made our way back via a local bus for about $.50!

---