Santiago

March 04, 2023

Santiago

Off to Santiago 7th Feb

Final packing in the morning then off to the airport in good time so no panicking and last-minute hassles. Fight with LATAN was fine just long - 11 hours. We arrived before we left in the afternoon in Santiago. Minor stress getting a taxi, then off to our BnB in Barrio Italia, Providencia, Santiago, Metropolitan Region. The city was very smoky from wildfires which we saw on flight over.

Wild fires in Chile view from our plane

BnB proved to be in a great location - good host Nicola there to meet us. Walk in the evening to get an ice-cream and some cash at the ATM.

Santiago 8th Feb

Slept in to 10 am!

Walking in Santiago looking around local area nice, but quite hot 35 degrees. Trip to the local supermarket to get supplies is aways a bit of a challenge when you can’t read what’s on the packets and can’t speak to anyone. After brekky managed to walk to a modern mall and acquire some SIM cards for the cell phone. Not much English spoken but with hand motions/pointing etc. we managed to get it done.

Taxi back to BnB (got ripped off) but will be able to use Uber now with our SIM cards.

Long day with a big walk and very hot. Bit jet lagged not eating much. Quite good for us.

Santiago 9th Feb

Up a bit earlier but we both didn’t sleep that well as it was very hot at night. Once again a self-organized walking tour to the Fine Arts Museum, the Markets and the Museum of Memories. All good and worth a visit. The Museum of Memories was about the people that disappeared during the dictatorship of the 1970s and 1980s. The political history here is reasonably interesting and most of it quite tragic. Link here to some info on you tube.

Santiago 10th Feb

We decided on a quieter day today and wandered around the local area and enjoyed the mostly tree lined avenues, bearing in mind it hasn’t rained here for quite some time – I think the average rain fall is 12 days a year. Lots of very nice shops and café and eateries. A couple of streets have some furniture recyclers and traders. Still very hot. Our host Nicola has been very generous with her time chatting about Chile, its history and other countries she has lived in which is a few –it is always helpful to get local knowledge.