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So the landslide somewhat threw away our plans. We were going to arrive at 8pm and spend the evening planning my next move, finalising Harriets travel details and then enjoying a nice meal and having a couple of drinks. The reality was we got in at 2am, got conned by a taxi driver into paying 15pd for a journey that should have cost 5pd and then found that the hostel had no bar, and that the petrol station nearby didn´t serve alcohol after 1am. Sadly, the peach juice and packet of ready salted crisps didn't quite seem fitting! Anyway I stayed up until 3.30am and at 4am Harriet was picked up by a taxi (at the right fare) to take her to the airport ready for her trip to Bolivia where she meets up with Lee, Marc and Marso from Christmas and New Year.
Harriet i would like to say thank you, it has been an awesome trip so far and i wish you happy travels for the next leg (p.s. you can still stay 5 months really!).
So the next day i woke like a lost lamb in a slaughter house and went down for a very lonely breakfast. When i asked to stay another night i found out the hostel was fully booked, so i was now friendless and homeless in Santiago, brilliant. Still i wasted an hour looking at hostels and then booked one slightly more central, a short taxi ride later i checked in and dumped my bags. In reception there was 2 Finnish girls, Heidi and Heidi who also had to wait until check in and they kindly asked if i wanted to have breakfast with them, which i accepted. After i went for a brief stroll into Santiago to find the metro stop and checked in at 1.30pm. I got chatting to some people in the computer room, and from here on i had friends once more (even if they are more temporary). A few of us (Kristen - Oz, Mike - NZ and Alex - GER) went on the free walking tour with Phillipe the guide. It was really informative and fun and after 4 hours i had learnt more about Chile than i had in the rest of my life. We also picked up a friend in Victor (Swiss) who had also climbed Aconcagua a few days previously. We learnt about the Coffee with legs shops, which are coffee shops with attractive ladies as the waitresses and for 1 minute a day the doors are shut and it turns into a striptease for all those locked inside!
After the tour we all grabbed a beer and agreed to meet up at 10pm to watch the Chile v Senegal football match on tele. Kristen had previously met one of the players for Senegal and insisted that we all watch her "future husband" play. Fortunately, for everyone else Chile won so the atmosphere in the pub was great and it was soon clear she was the only person supporting Senegal as the taunts came tumbling across the room, but all in good nature. After we accidently went to a Karaoke bar but didnt sing, instead did the British thing and played drinking games before heading to a club with a live band at the end of the night. Day one travelling alone survived, touch wood its plain sailing from here onwards!
I woke at 10.40am to find i had missed breakfast by 10 minutes. However, my mood was lifted when Mike and Alex eventually emerged from their rooms and were clearly a little worse for wear. I shouldn't take amusement from this but i'm sorry your faces were brilliant, hangover central!
At midday Victor, Mike, Alex and I started to walk up the largest moutain in Santiago to take in the view of the city. We had got around 10 minutes into the hour walk when Alex decided he had to immediately sprint down the mountain to relieve himself, so we arranged to meet him at the top instead.
20 minutes later and Mike decided he also had taken a turn for the worse and needed to do a grog bog (beeriod, or whatever you want to call it). However, with a little persuasion we managed to talk him to the top to find the loo there instead. At the top there was a small cafe where i tried a Mote Y Huesillo, which is basically a pint glass half filled with corn/oats then filled to the top with mote (their version of tea) and with a whole peach chopped up and placed on top. Its like a meal and drink in one and was very filling and strangely refreshing. A little further up was Alex waiting for us and looking somewhat more happy with himself. The view from the top was really good and you can take in the scale of the city. Unfortunately, pollution is a problem though and you can really see the smog sitting above the skyscrapers as the Andes disasppeared in the background.
On the descent Mike left us to go for a siesta after the hangover was taking him through round 2 so the 3 of us left walked around the mountain to find the 2 public swimming pools on top of the mountain. After a 30 minute diversion which had accidently taking us in a circle we found the first pool after a further 30 minutes. It looked amazing, but the 10pd price tag for a swim put us off so we headed for home. Victor was telling me about his previous travels on the way which included trips to Sudan and Iran. Next on the list was North Korea, but apparently it is expensive as you have to pay for 2 armed guards to travel with you at all times to keep you in check. Made my south america adventure seem somewhat tame in comparison!
At the hostel we collected Mike once more and headed downtown to the fish market. We had been told on the tour that the fish market was all owned by one guy and that the chefs rotated between each restaurant inside. Thus, the food was the same in each restaurant but the price varied depending on how glitzy the furtinture was. How true this is, im not sure but i certainly dont have grounds to think otherwise. We found the cheapest looking restaurant possible and the food was awesome! I had a seafood soup that contained crab claws, clams, scallops, oysters and the biggest mussel i have ever seen, it was about 6 inches long! We stopped briefly at the fruit market for a smoothie and hit the ice cream parlour. I sampled some chocolate and pepper ice cream but settled for oragne and cinginger. When we eventually got back to the hostel i worked out we had clocked up 19km that day!
That evening we ha da couple of beers and went out for a drink with 5 argentinians despite the tiredness that was kicking in. We ended up at a karaoke bar and then a gay bar. There was an angry German amongst the group who lasted about 10 minutes in the gay bar before claiming the gay bar was too gay for him and he couldn´t handle it so he stormed off on his own to the entertainment of everyone else. Apparantly, the transexuals had a thing for him and the second ass pinch was one too many! We headed home at 4.30am for some much needed sleep.
Next morning Alex, Mike and I headed to the bus station around midday and caught the bus for 2.5 hours to the coastal town of Valparaiso. I hadn´t expected much of Santiago but enjoyed my time there, and survived the first city travelling alone!
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Marian and Huw Thanks for keeping Tom company Harriet. Hope he didn't get you in too many scrapes! Good luck for the rest of your travels. We look forward to seeing you on your return sometime.