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Published: January 24th 2006
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View of Las Condes
View of Las Condes from the apartment in Santiago. Santiago ¡Hola amigos!
We arrived in smoggy Santiago last Tuesday and within ten minutes of departing the airport we had our first (so far) and best rip off experience when we paid about $90 AUD for the taxi fare across the city. Totally my fault for getting my mental conversion completely wrong but I blame it on the 12 hour flight and jetlag. An expensive lesson to be ready for leaving the airport building and probably a good idea to just chill out for five minutes and watch who is doing what and it would be easy to see the scammers.
Once we made it to our firends´ apartment in Las Condes it was all too easy. The doorman must have been expecting to see two gringos with a surfboard as he handed us the keys and opened the door without us saying a word. We then relaxed for a few days and recovered from the jetlag venturing into the big city (about 4 million people) of Santiago. There are swarms of people everywhere and thousends of yellow buses. The metro system is a really good, cheap way to get in and out of the city centre. Being perhaps
View of los cordillera
View of surrounding mountain range from apartment when the smog was not too bad. the only person in the city with blonde curly hair and blue eyes, it was difficult to not draw attetion to the fact we were tourist so we did not take any photos in the city as we did not want to draw any further attention to ourselves. I´m sure it would have been pretty safe most of the time but with so many people it pays to be cautious, particularly on the metro. I then got the cold for a few days so was very glad to take it easy in the apartment.
Using our very basic Español we (Bec) managed to buy a couple of bus tickets to Pichilemu, about 3.5 hrs south-west of Santiago on the coast. We bought tickets from the bus company Pullman del Sur departing the station Terminal de Buses Alameda in Santiago for 4000 pesos one way (about $10 AUD, cheap!). It is still summer holidays here and there was a crush of people in the bus station so we had to be on high alert for bag watch and from the time the bus pulled into it´s departure gate (5) we almost missed our bus in the few minutes it took
La playa
Holiday crowds on the beach. us to make our way through the crush so it pays to be ready to jump on as soon as it opens the doors. Anyway, the buses are surprisingly comfortable with no smoking.
Pichilemu We arrived in Pichilemu on Saturday morning and it was packed with Chilean tourists, mostly down from Santiago for the weekend, so we were not sure if we find anywhere to stay. We found a place on the corner of Av Urriola and Av Anibal Pinto and booked into a room for 20000 pesos (about $50 AUD). It would be too flattering to call this place (or at least the room we got) anything but totally digusting. It looked like a great place to pick up some crabs or some nasty skin rash from the bed. Even the cockroaches could survive no longer and squashed themselves into the carpet. When we first arrived we found a ball of human hair the size of an orange inside the ´bathroom´(I use the term loosely). Later that night we heard a strange noise emanating from the bathroom only to discover that if anyone else on our floor was a having shower then our shower filled up with foetid
Nuestro cabaña
Our sweet little cabin! water. And the sink wouldn´t drain. Skin crawling, we climbed into bed without a shower and tried to think happy thoughts of the following day when we would check into a wonderful cabaña high up on the hill with sweeping views of the ocean - for the same price. However, we didn´t sleep too well. Chilenos really know how to party and, lucky for us, the circus was in town so everyone took the opportunity to party until dawn.
So, here we are, staying at Cabañas de William in our glorious 2 bedroom cabin up on the hill with our own bathroom and kitchen. We even have two crazy (but friendly) dogs to keep us company. We´ve also enrolled in Spanish classes at the Pichilemu Institute of Language Studies (owned by Chris and Val Wilcox
www.pichilemulanguage.com). They´re really great people and we can´t recommend them enough.
I (Murray) finally made it into the surf on Monday afternoon and to say it was freezing would not be half the truth. This water is direct from Antarctica (the Humbolt current) and has only warmed up to about 15C by the time it arrives here, even in mid summer. A nasty
Inside the cabaña
The view from the sitting room. surprise for someone used to the warm waters of Queensland, Australia. This current has a huge effect on this region, it makes the days quite pleasant here with air temp of about 20C while just inland it is about 30C. It also does not allow any large clouds to build so it is very dry this time of year. The heavy fog that hangs over the ocean in the mornings is also a feature of the cold water. Anyway, luckily my wetsuit and booties are up to the job and I did not get too cold however I would not want to duck-dive too many waves in a row as the ice cream headaches are quite painful. The wave looks amazing as it sweeps down the point for about 600m but it is still a lot of work as there is a fairly strong current and it was quite difficult to pick the correct spot for the take off. However, I´m told by the locals that it can line up perfectly sometimes. There can be 10 people in the lineup and you may not see anyone for the whole surf as it is so long. I only got a few
Juliette y Oscar
Dogs belonging to William who owns the cabañas. Oscar has a sore foot that he shouldn´t lick, hence the collar - which Juliette loves to chew. waves yesterday but enough to see that it could be very good fun. While freezing, the water is also quite dirty with rubbish in the water and much more on the beach.
We are planning to stay here in Pichilemu for about another week or so and continue with our spanish lessons and hopefully get some more waves.
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Glynis
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Wish I was with you!
Looks lovely in the cabin! My ceiling caved in at the shop with quite a bit of water damage. Engineers here to brace it up. Life is such a challenge! I will be watching your travels with great interest....and jeaslousy. G/mum