Saturday I set out for a day trip to Valparaiso, a coastal town about an hour and a half from Santiago, with Sean and Juliana (from the UK) and Antonio (Mexican). It was a nice town, a lot dirtier than Santiago but in a beautiful location. This is where many internationals go to study Spanish.

The town is flanked by very steep hills as you can see so they have elevators or àscensores` to get up to the towns that surround it, there a tiny shops and schools in these areas so many will only travel down to the town or market on occassion. It costs 280 pesos (65c AUD) to ride.

They are very old and can give you a bit of a fright with their bumpy and loud ride. We walked up the steep streets for about another 10min and reached the house of Pablo Neruda, a famous write and poet and Nobel Prize winner. We walked through his house which is now a museum and took in the amazing view.

After a long day of steep hills we were more than happy to ride the very comfortable bus back to Santiago and all of us slept the whole way.

Sunday and today I have spent in and around Santiago taking it easy and taking in as much as I can. Tomorrow I am hopefully rock climbing in the Andes and will fill you in ASAP.

Hope you are all doing well, Michael.