We flew into Chile last wednesday, managing to arrive 3 hours before we left New Zealand, despite an 11 hour flight, after crossing the international date line! Since then we have stayed 9 nights in Santiago, with trips out of the cty to see a little more of Chile.

We've had a few days sightseeing in Santiago itself. Walking the streets we've seen the Catedral de Santiago, which was very beautiful inside, climbed up Santa Lucia Hill, taken a funicular ride up to the top of San Cristobal Hill, luckily on a clear day and so we were able to see the mountains around the city. We have also visied the Precolombian Museum, which had loads of information and artefacts to do with the civilisations of South America pre-conquest. Also the National Historical Museum and the Salvador Allende Museum, which would have been more interesting had they had translations... We've also seen a lot of the day to day life in the city, including a busy street market on sunday and many other artesan stalls and the changing of the guard outside the Presidential Palace, which stopped traffic this morning with a large brass band.

On friday we took a daytrip for a walk in the mountains in the Cajon del Maipo national park area, which was a fairly easy hike in knee deep snow! It was a long and bumpy ride out to the mountains but we were able to see some more traditional Chilean towns and lots of views of snow capped mountains, as well as trying our first 'empanadas', a Chilean speciality of various fillings in a pastry triangle.

We have been quite lucky with the weather, since it has been quite warm and sunny for daytrips to the coast. We visited the small seaside town of Vina del Mar, where we wrapped up warm and sat on the beach and visited the parks and gardens. We also took a trip to la Isla Negra, the house of a famous Chilean poet, Pablo Neruda, where we had a guided tour to learn about his life and many collections, as well as admiring the amazing sea view. Finally we visited the port of Valparaiso yesterday, the 'cultural capital' of Chile. Here we took a funicular to the top of one of the many hills that surround the town to see the colourful houses and crafty stalls that are typical of the place. Wandering the streets we also saw other grand buildings, statues and churches.

Tomorrow we fly to La Paz in Bolivia, where we start our 3 week trip through Peru, very excited! ...........