Ola everyone - sorry haven't updated for a while! So here goes trying to remember what we've been doing!

Wednesday 2nd Feb

Today we laid in till about 11 then I sent the boys out to go for brunch as I just wanted to chill (was feeling quite homesick today :-( but seeing a msg from Jake and Megan cheered me up!) The boys returned (they'd been to McDonalds!) and I spent about 3 hours trying to upload the pics to this - nightmare especially when computer is in Spanish!

We spent the afternoon chilling or as Joe says 'Chile-ing'! Then we we met Norman and Julie at an Irish bar called Flannigans. We all had an amazing steak with wedges, salad and onion rings - delicious the portions were huge and so much cheaper than home! Norman and Julie wouldn't let us pay (they have been so lovely to us) so we agreed to go for drinks that's we'd return the favour and pay so we headed to a local bar for a few 'cervez's (beers!) Julie wanted to do karaoke and put a request in for Madonna and persuaded me to do it with her but we didn't get a chance to sing as the boys said we can't sing!! We went for a few more drinks - happy hour so it was time for cocktails - Mojitos! (thought of you Louise!) then we all headed back to Norman and Julie's till the very early hours!

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Thursday 3rd Feb

As we got in quite late (or early!) we spent almost all day doing nothing! We didn't get out of bed till about 1.30pm then we lay on the terrace outside our room sunbathing - we only ventured out to get some fruit from a shop 4 doors down!

At about 5.30 we popped round to Norman and Julie's as I was using their shower (the one in the hostel was awful!) Norman was at work so we decided to order a pizza - Julie had a menu so we chose what to have and instead of trying to order it in Spanish over the phone (Julie doesn't speak Spanish) Julie said it was round the corner so me, Joe and Craig said we'd go and get it.... We walked for about an hour looking for the pizza place and eventually gave up and went back - Julie phoned Norman and he said it was across the road so the boys went off in search again. Then Norman came home, Julie had sent the boys the wrong way again so she went to look for them. I eventually spotted them from the balcony I called them back and got 2 fingers from Joe! He was raging but he was starving! After all that Nirman said the pizza place was right next to his apartment block and the place we'd been looking for had shut down! So after 4 hours we finally got our pizza's! Haha!! We then headed back to the hostel!

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Friday 4th Feb

Today we checked out the hostel (packing our bags again was a nightmare!!) we had bags ready for the mountains but just as we'd finished packing Norman msged to say the lodges in the mountains were fully booked! We were gutted and had no way of letting Vicky and Abbey know as they had left at 8am to get a bus to meet us! So we dropped our bags to Norman's and went for breakfast (well more lunch!) I had a hotdog with avacado, tomato and mayonnaise - a popular food in Chile and yummy! Then we just wondered around waiting for Vicky and Abbey to arrive! We sat waiting almost 2 hours for them to arrive (they ended up missing their bus!) when they arrived it was lovely to see them but they were excited for our trip to the mountains (I had to break the bad news :-() We were having a nightmare trying to find a hostel for that night so we went to meet Norman after work and he phoned around a few places (all full) so they offered to put all 5 of us up in their 2 bed apartment and we booked another hostel for the Saturday.

We went for a few drinks and some dinner and headed back to Norm and Julie's to catch up. We ended up staying up nearly all night drinking! It was a squash but we are very grateful to Norman and Julie!!

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Saturday 5th Feb

We all woke up a little worse for wear today and starving so me and Vicky offered to walk and get everyone a McDonalds! It was hilarious, we had to order 7 meals in Spanish (or Spanglish as we now call it) and ended up with 6 bags of food and drink and had to get a taxi back - we all stuffed our faces then felt worse as we couldn't move after! Eventually we got a taxi to our new hostel - Casa Rioja it was amazing! So big and had a pool (we didn't go in it tho!) we spent the rest of the evening playing cards and catching up!

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Sunday 6th Feb

Today we had to check out the new hostel as Vicky and Abbey were booked into the hostel we were in last week, we also managed to get back in and they put us all in a room together.Then we headed up to the mountains for the day - Norman and Julie were going to come but decided not to as Norm had some work to catch up on - so we got the metro (underground) for an hour then a collectivo (taxi) for 40 mins and we were there! The boys had made it just in time to do the White water rafting ( I opted out!) so me, Vicky and Abbey went to lay around the pool. Me and Vicky had some lunch and managed to get wifi (in the mountains!!) and saw Liverpool had beaten Chelsea!

Once the boys had finished rafting Joe was very happy to hear the score! Especially as Torres was playing! The boys really enjoyed the rafting, they said it was cold and the views were amazing! Getting back from the mountains wasn't as easy as not many collectivo's run on a Sunday - after waiting almost an hour we decided to get the local bus back to the metro! when we got on the bus was packed! We had to stand - each time the bus stopped to let someone off another 4 or 5 people would get on! The bus seated 29 but we reckon there were 50-60 people on it! We stood on this for an hour! We then got the metro back to Santiago, shattered we showered and changed and went for dinner, it was quite expensive but the only place that was open on a Sunday! We then neaded back to the hosel for some zzz!

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Monday 7th Feb

Today we got up and went to get some breakfast, (all this eating out has to stop as our budget is disapperaring very quickly!) We then went on an open top bus tour of Santiago, It was good, We got off at the centeral market to stop for a drink and walked through the fish market.. It was rank! Fish heads everywhere and loads of flies and it stank! We walked through a market lookin for somewhere to grab a drink and Craig and Joe had an old lady shout ´Hey Gringoes!´haha. We eventually found somewhere had a quick drink then headed back to get back on the bus.

We got off next at an amazing shopping mall! It was huge and had designer outlets too! We were looking for a sim card (didn´t happen as the guy couldn´t understand me) and an i pod charger (Mum-did Joe leave his in the jitchen plug?!) I was gutted we couldn´t look round the shops and buy stuff easpecially as all the shops had sales too :-( (As i´m sure most of you can imagine) So we grabbed some doughnuts and headed back on the bus to the hostel!

We all went back to get showered and changed - Vicky and Abbey were very excited to straighten their hair (I wish i´d never bought the straightners - Who persuaded me..Laura?!) So we straightened our hair and headed to meet Norman and Julie from work, we had a few drinks then headed for dinner, we then walked back to the hostel and finished the night playing cards.