Santiago and Valparaiso

The bus ride to the airport was about 90 minutes.  While I slept, Harry looked out the window and saw large solar and wind farms and concluded more about the vehicle fleet - Chile is far better off than Bolivia - transport reflects the economic state of the country - road conditions, signage, requirement to use seat belts, age of vehicles etc.

It was with a touch of irony that we sat at Calamena airport waiting for our aeroplane to arrive from Santiago.  Fog.  We had seen 2 clouds in the last 3 weeks (yes they are so rare this holiday I decided to count them) and then along came a bank of fog/smog- no where near us, just near the planes.

Harry sat looking outside at an empty runway.  Except for two little Cessna type planes there were no others.  The crowd got bigger inside and most of us slept or played on our phones, until the fog lifted two hours away and the planes began to land.

We flew over the Andes - snow capped mountains with a strip of water and green at their feet.  The fog was still around, but we could see the sun finally breaking through.  

Arriving in Santiago I must admit I was saddened to see all the American icons eg Burger King, Starbucks, Dunking Donuts, McD's and Subway.  I felt we had left South America behind at least in spirit.  But after a good sleep we woke up to a modern and what appears to be a thriving city.  There was nothing organised for the day and so after a leisurely IBIS type breakfast we walked along the river and through a leafy suburb with large detached houses up to the gondola.  We tried the self service ticket machine and selected English as our preferred language - that worked well, until we put our card in and then it all reverted to Spanish.  We gave up and went to a real person, who gave us a discount for being grey haired.

The gondola appears to be built for the tourist, and possibly for those visiting for religious reasons.  On the top of the hill stands a very large virgin Mary with lots of wooden seats for people to sit and watch (like an amphitheathre).  There was a religious ceremony in Spanish over the loud speaker but not many people seemed to be paying attention.

We slowly made our way down the hill, noting the mountain bikers coming up (it is a mountain bikers heaven here) and the number of runners and walkers.  The information boards were all in Spanish but we figured out that you could find foxes, condors, hummingbirds and snakes in the gardens if you were lucky - we didn't see any.  

After an icecream and taking a number of photos of the city below where 8 million people live we found our way slowly back to the hotel.  There was quite a bit of congestion and of course we had to take photos of the few road cones we did see!!

The next day we took an overnight stop to Valparaiso - a coastal port.  It is known for its street art and steep funiculars (of which there are a number) that take passengers up and down the cliff face. In the morning the sea fog hung heavily over the square and port.  After a leisurely breakfast we decided to forgo the planned walking tour and do our own thing.  We climbed the steep stairs to the top and found a number of walking tours that we could have quietly joined if we had wanted to - but we decided we were on the right path and moved on.  The street art was something else and there were a number of cafes.  We stopped at one which was less crowded (not on the walking group route me thinks).  While drinking our tea, someone looked through the window and asked if they could take of photo of us "because we looked so cute" - how could we say no!!