Chillin' in Chile

Next stop on our trip was Chile. We took a 2+ hour flight from Asunsion, Paraguay to Santiago, Chile. It was a clear day and you could see the flat green lands of Argentina before arriving at the Andes mountains. I considered telling the pilots to ascend a bit more because I thought the plane would scrape its belly on those towering Andes.


Spent one night in Santiago at a classic 70s style hotel. It was on Avenida Libertador which was like Chicago's Michigan Ave or NY City's Broadway. The hotel has no apparent parking so I had to dash in and get directions for a garage. It was all quite challenging, but Tom and Dan told me to calm down, we're on vacation, reminding me that this little glitch wasn't the end of the world. Soon we were in the Bellavista neighborhood eating dinner at an Argentine steak house.

Santiago is quite a big city and we weren't expecting that. And what made it extra challenging was that the street names change even though you never made a turn. One street we traveled changed names 5 times!! Somehow, though, we navigated our way out of the city and into the Andes mountains for our next night.


Stayed at a beautiful resort in a little cabin about 1.5 hours outside of Santiago. The Andes are some of the highest mountains in the world soaring as high as 22,000 feet! You can click on these photos for a closer look. The snow capped mountains were wonderful.





Here is Tom in front of our cabin in the moutains. We loved this stop on our trip.








Hike to a waterfall in the Andes.









Here is Dan on the zip line crossing from one side of the Maipo River to the other.








The next day we drove out of the mountains and down through the Central Valley which is the country's main agicultural region. We saw large-scale farms raising corn, grapes, veggies, etc. Somehow we passed by numerous Chilean wineries and didn't even stop! After 3+ hours we arrived at Pichilemu, a surfing town on the black sand coast. This area is renowned for its great surfing. The water temperature was a crisp 55 degrees.



Dan and I signed up for surfing lessons. We didn't know it but our teacher, Ramon Navarro, is the number 1 professional surfer in the entire country!!! I googled him and sure enough there he was being interviewed on You.tube and surfing in the very area we visited!! We had to wear full wet suits to go surfing. The mere act of putting on and taking off a wet suit is eventful enough, and that doesn't even include the surfing!



Here is Dan with Ramon. Dan did a lot better than I did. I asked Dan what he and Ramon talked about when they were having their lesson. Dan said that he talked about how to get up on the board and balance yourself. Ramon mostly talked to me about how I shouldn't worry, that I was safe with him, and that I should relax and have fun. Hum.




Dan the surfer dude.