Trabajando es jugando (work=play)

First rule of Pucón: weather rules everything. When it rains/hails all day, there is really not much to do but huddle up next to a fire or under blankets and wait for the weather to pass. That is how I spent the day yesterday. I had brief moments of hope, when I would think maybe it was clearing up enough to go for a run. But then the downpour would resume, and I would settle in with another cup of tea. Not much to write about there, except I skyped with Rael (made me very very happy), and I found out Gatito's name is Runa.
This morning I went to the next door hostel to see if those folks wanted to ski today. They instead hoped to go to Huilo Huilo, a national park with entrances in both Chile and Argentina, and with many waterfalls and "magical tree-houses". While deciding whether the long trip would be possible, I got a call from Gloria asking me to return to Paradise. Duty finally called! Gloria was very nice, friendly, eager to have me around, and knew exactly what to do with me. There were 2 German girls who had arrived and were figuring out what to do with their days in Pucón. I translated between Gloria (little English) and the Germans (little Spanish), and realized that I could also try to organize the folks next door. Because of long distances and bad weather, most national parks were out for the day. Gloria suggested we go to another lake nearby that has waterfalls and beautiful rivers. She said we could take a bus or ride horses, but that it was about a 1 1/2 hour mountain bike ride. ¡Perfecto! The Germans also wanted to go into town to reserve their ascent of the volcano tomorrow, but I ran to the hostel next door and rallied the troops for mountain biking before accompanying the Germans.
We rented bikes across the street from the volcano tour company and were on our way, just as the mid-day volcano alarm went off. Lauchlan/Locky (one of the Australians next door) had already walked some of the road we were to take, so he served as our leader, although we all semi-jokingly talked about me now being an official guide. We knew that we could pass the waterfalls and get to the lake by taking either a dirt side road, or the main paved road, or do a loop. Locky took us on the more rugged route, partly to pass a Mapuche reservation. Gorgeous scenery, pretty gnarly terrain. The combination of volcanic gravel, a too big bike, and Mike (other Australian) running me off the road led to a few spills but nothing major.




Uh-oh. Just realized Runa ate through the cable that charges my camera. Not good at all. Must go to camera store ASAP.

So mountain biking. We would stop briefly at the top of some of the steeper hills, but we pretty much just kept going. Lauchlan insisted that the lake was very close for maybe about 2 hours. We eventually got to Ojos del Caburgua, a turn off that leads to an amazing river with waterfalls and lush forests. So incredible.


We hiked around for a while, then hopped back on bikes and kept going. We ended up at the paved road, where we realized that we were 5 km from the lake in one direction and 19 km from Pucón in the other direction, and we had about an hour before we were supposed to return our rented bikes.

We sped down the highway, with the smoking volcano as a constant point of reference for how close we were to town. We arrived at the rental place with 4 minutes to spare before our deadline of 5 o'clock.
I showed the Germans where the supermarket is, and had a shocking realization. I thought Pucón was a ghost town out of (Jewish) cultural ignorance. I happened to wander the town on a Sunday during church time. Duh. At this time, the streets were bustling with school children, shoppers, store-owners, adventure companies, and adventure seekers. Much better. Back to Paradise Pucón, then back to the Volcano tour office to be fitted for all of our gear. We depart tomorrow at 7am, crampons and ice pick at the ready.

First days in Pucón

Okay, so I might have pumped up the powder prematurely.
Yesterday I drove with the folks from the hostel next door up to the volcano with very high expectations of the perfect day. After piling 7 people into a truck, we arrived and only one lift was going to open because of bad visibility higher up the mountain. We bought tickets anyways and made the most of it. Four of the guys were going to trek up the volcano and then come all the way down using some of the coolest gear I have ever seen. Two had skis with telemark-esque bindings, and two had snowboards that split down the middle to create two wide skis with bindings in both directions. Each one also uses a "skin," based on seal skin, with hair going in one direction. You stick the skin to the bottom of your skis, then when you hike uphill, the grain of the hair prevents you from sliding backwards. Genius.
Chantelle, old Canadian, younger Aussie, and I were just taking the lift to hit the slopes.

Conditions: dust on crust, and sunny but very cold. Yes, there was a lot of snow, but it was wind-buffed, inconsistent, sticky. Also, with only the one lift open, there wasn't much terrain to tackle. We found some of the famous lava-chute natural half-pipes/gullies, but mostly people were stuck with short corduroy runs. They eventually opened a couple T-bars, but most of the mountain was still shut down. We wanted steeper, deeper, ungroomed, and unpacked. We kept hoping they would "pop the top" and let us go on some other chairs, but as the afternoon wore on the visibility got worse instead of better and it started to snow.
All that being said, Chantelle and I still had a blast.



Canadian was a bit of a pain in the ass, criticizing our choice of runs for a lack of turns and telling endless stories about his mountain in British Columbia and many other things that I eventually tuned out. Aussie was only snowboarding for the second time ever, so he went off on his own.
We piled back into the truck, headed back to our hostels, then 5 of us grabbed beer and bathing suits to take to some amazing hot springs. A half-hour drive through double-rainbows, rivers, pastures, forests, and mountains, then relaxation. These hot springs were right next to a raging river, and there were probably 8 pools of varying sizes and temperatures, all bordered by rocks with sand on the bottom. Amazing. We were there for hours, playing marco polo, watching the stars come out, and talking about living life to the fullest.
By the end of the night, I wasn't sure that everyone was committed to going back to the mountain today, so I didn't force myself to wake up early today. I thought I would mosey over to next door and see what they were thinking, but I just missed them. Instead, I walked into the center of Pucón to get a feel for things and get groceries for myself. It was a bit of a ghost town, to be honest. Most shops were shut down and very few people were around. I knew that winter season is their secondary season while December is their peak summer season, but this didn't really seem like a season at all.
After the supermarket, I headed back to Paradise Pucón. I am beginning to wonder whether there is much for me to do here. Gloria is coming back Tuesday morning, and she is the one I am supposed to talk to about my job. But my job is based on there being other guests at the hostel, and right now there is only one woman who is leaving tomorrow. My mindset is this: I will still do what they ask of me in order to keep my free lodging, but I don't really see why they want/need me here. I hope that Gloria is okay to have me here, even without other guests for me to welcome/inform of activities/lead on activities. I also shouldn't judge my 2 months here based on 2 days here, but of course I think about everything too much and without much to do I dwell on the potential for loneliness. Today it was freezing out, so when I got back to Paradise I huddled up in bed with my gatito and hung out with Jericho on Skype for the first time. Very very nice to see his face. I'm hoping Rael will be on later, too. And maybe some day Yarrow will actually be on when it says he is on. Gatito likes to stand on the keyboard and almost just deleted this whole post, but I really like her company. I should learn her name though.


Tomorrow, I might go on a day trip with the folks next door to Huilo Huilo, a national park/biological reserve.
The town alarm system just went off, followed by many sirens. I hope the volcano didn't just erupt. Yikes.

(Post-Script: volcano didn't erupt. I'm fine.)

Hola, Pucón

Right now I am listening to the pouring rain while in bed at Paradise Pucón, the hostel I'll be working at. Rain on the bottom means snow on the top! Tomorrow is supposed to be an epic day of powder. It has been dumping nonstop all day and will continue all night, with the sun coming out tomorrow morning in time for a day on the slopes. Amazing.
The journey from Chillan was relatively smooth. Chantelle found me, we killed time walking around, then 5 hours of talking about boys, skiing, traveling, food, etc while driving to Temuco. She happens to be a 25-year-old sponsored semi-pro skier who has competed in the X-Games and lives at Squaw Valley in Tahoe. She is currently based at El Colorado near Santiago for a couple months to get some summertime skiing in, but when she saw the snow report for Pucón she couldn't resist coming down. Wow, I'm swimming with the big fishes now. We arrived at almost midnight, then had to search to find a hostel with open beds. Our taxi probably drove us to 8 places before anyone could take us. This morning, we slept in before hopping on a bus to Pucón. It was raining when we got here, so the 8 block walk to Paradise Pucón with my suitcase, ski bag, backpack and purse was not fun at all. Eventually, I arrived, and met Daniel's father, Leo, who is running things right now while Daniel's mother, Gloria, is in Santiago. She should be back around Sunday/Monday, when I will work out more of the details of my stay here. Chantelle decided to stay at the hostel next door because we ran into some other folks staying there. Paradise is a small hostel, more like a guest house, but it is nice. Welcome area, wi-fi, kitchen, dining room, big backyard for BBQs in summer, equipment area for hikes up volcano, 3 bathrooms, a few rooms, 3 dogs, 1 cat. Next door is bigger, slightly more official, and more social. I hung out there after dropping off my stuff and using internet for a while. (Side note: Gmail now offers free calls to the US. This means I can call anyone at home anytime from my computer. Yay!)
Next door I met some new interesting folks: a couple Aussies (Lauchlan/Locky just quit his job and is traveling in South America for a whole year), an American homeless landlord who started a charity teaching snowboarding in some disputed land between Pakistan and India, a Canadian (here partly to see a Shaman in Peru to cure the melanoma in his eye), 2 mountaineering guys who split their time between Utah and Alaska, and 2 Chileans who I will most likely spend much time with (a girl working next door who was eager for a friend, and the guy who Daniel has a partnership with for adventure tours).
Tomorrow, the guys will drive us in their rental car to the volcano, where they will trek all the way up and ski/board down. Chantelle and I will just take the lift and ski, although she already warned me that there are no friends on pow days and she will not wait if I slow her down. Yikes. After, probably some hotsprings.
Chantelle has an Argentinian friend in Tahoe whose brother lives in Bariloche and offered his house if we come visit. We are both tempted, especially because the guys next door are also planning a trip there in the next week.
I'm both so incredibly excited and nervous to go out tomorrow and see what this much snow is like. My short little narrow Volkls from 5 years ago may not be able to handle the conditions, but I'll give it my best shot. Definitely need to sleep. More tomorrow.

Chillán

I am currently at an internet cafe next to the bus station in Chillán. Chillán was great. I drove down with the group from my hostel on Tuesday afternoon-Daniel (driver and owner of hostel I will work at in Pucón), Tim (Australian snowboarder who works at La Casa Roja in Santiago), Niall (19 year old Brit on gap year travelling around the world), and Steve, Rob and Willf (3 British friends on a 2 week holiday). We squoze into a van with all of our gear and luggage, and arrived at night at an eco-cabin guest lodge in the woods outside of Chillán. We were welcomed by Vicente, who I later learned is the equivalent of the green party candidate in Chillán. Amazing chicken soup for dinner, much wine and revelry, then bedtime in cozy bunks next to a woodstove. Wednesday up bright and early, breakfast with Vicente, then a long drive into the mountains, stopping along the way to rent gear. We weren´t actually on the slopes until later than we had planned, but it was still pretty icy in the morning anyways.


Chillán is probably the best mountain in Chile. It is on a volcano, and you can actually see smoke coming out of multiple natural hotsprings, and you can even sometimes smell some sulfur while riding the chairlift. It has the longest chairlift in South America and the longest run. It has more trees than other mountains in Chile and gets more snow than the mountains close to Santiago because it is farther South. Again, this season hasn´t been great, so they need more snow, but I did get a taste of the famous powder. Unfortunately, the day was really really windy, so some chairs were shut down and a lot of the powder blew away. I can only imagine what the mountain would be like with the 3 feet of powder that Tim described there being on this trip last year.


I skied with Tim and Daniel a bit, then on my own for a while, then accidentally brought the beginner Brits all the way to the top, where they considered riding the chair backwards to avoid having to go down some blacks. Everyone survived, but I went back to skiing alone for much of the afternoon, with brief stints on the blues to be social. At the end of the day, we wanted to check out the hotsprings, but they had closed 5 minutes before we arrived. We went back to our cabins for dinner, more wine, more revelry, some poker, some beer, some dirty jokes (partly prompted by the coincidence that this week is Gay and Lesbian week at Chillán), and eventually bed. We woke up this morning, ready to hit the slopes again, but immediately Vicente and Tim knew that it wasn´t going to happen. Weather was not on our side. It was windy even at the cabins, which meant that higher up on the mountain it would be too windy to open. It was colder and it began to rain/snow, so we made the best of the situation and decided to soak in the hotsprings, then the rest of the folks would head back to Santiago earlier and arrive at a decent hour. 3 of the 4 Brits didn´t want to suffer the pain of exiting the hotsprings in the freezing cold, so they hung out at the bar while Tim, Daniel, Mike, and I braved the elements. Totally worth it. Despite the slight smell of sulfur and the howling winds stinging our faces, the hostprings were amazing. I still hadn´t figured out my plans for after they headed back to Santiago, but I was leaning towards going to Bariloche, Argentina on my own for a few days before going to Pucón on Sunday/Monday. As we were leaving the hotsprings, some Americans came in and one girl shouted,¨Anyone going to Pucón?¨ I ran back and talked to her briefly. Chantelle is a fellow solo female traveler, so I decided I would rather have a companion and go to Pucón now rather than lug all of my stuff to Argentina. I can settle in Pucón, and if I decide to go to Argentina I can bring only what I need. I left her at the hotsprings and gave her my number before heading back to the cabins to pack up my stuff. La Casa Roja folks are on the road back to Santiago, and Chantelle is meeting me here at the bus station in about an hour. We will take a bus to Temuco, a transport hub, probably spend the night there and head to Pucón tomorrow morning. Apparently, Pucón is supposed to get 5 feet of snow in the next few days, so even though the ski area is a lot smaller, there could be some epic days on the volcano. I am glad to have a buddy on this leg of my journey, and I´m sure the protective folks at home are too. I should go buy Chantelle her ticket so I make sure she makes my bus. Not sure when I´ll write next, but all is well!

Adios, Santiago!

I am about to leave La Casa Roja with others from the hostel for Chillán, the ski area about half way between Santiago and Pucón. We will ski Wednesday and Thursday and probably also go to hotsprings. When everyone else returns back to Santiago, I will continue South to Pucón where the next leg of my adventure will begin. I'm not sure what the internet situation will be in Chillán, so assume I will next write from Pucón.

Santiago: Cerro Santa Lucía y Viña Cousiño Macul

Today it rained in Santiago, so I decided against the day trip to coastal Valparaíso. I thought a good replacement activity would be to check out one of the vineyards on the outskirts of Santiago. To kill time before my tour, I walked to another mountain park in El Centro called Cerro Santa Lucía and climbed up the ancient stone staircases to a castle overlooking the city.




Apparently, Darwin said in 1833 that the view was "certainly most striking." There were no skyscrapers in the way or smog in the air then, but I would still agree. Then a bit of a commute to the vineyard, Viña Cousiño Macul, which is the oldest in Chile. Now owned by the 6th generation of Cousiños, most of the production has moved to another area of Santiago and what I saw was more of a museum. But, still really cool. I tasted a young white wine with "hints of citrus" and an old red wine with "woody undertones". I'm pretty clueless about wine, but I liked both of them. And for the record, my vineyard tour including 2 tastes and a souvenir wine glass only cost $12. Beat that, Napa!

I'm back at La Casa Roja now, and it might be my last night here. I haven't seen Daniel in a couple days, so I need to check with him about leaving for Pucón from Chillán. I heard that it snowed in Chillán 2 days ago, so I am very excited to go check it out. I just said goodbye to Aileen, but we both agreed that it is not really goodbye because we will be climbing together in 2 months. 1 week down, 8 1/2 to go!

Santiago: Mercados y Museos

Today was exactly why traveling alone can be great. Because sometimes you meet the most wonderful people, and you can't help but think that the world is small and some things are meant to be. Yesterday I met Aileen while climbing. She is from San Jose, lives in Berkeley, and was as eager as I was to be friends for the couple days we are both in Santiago. She has been in South America for 1 1/2 months, first teaching English in Peru and then getting her Wilderness First Aid certification in Patagonia (Southernmost Chile). We made dinner last night after climbing (we were both craving just some plain old stir-fried vegetables as a change from the pretty heavy Chilean staples), and I told her that I wanted to check out the free museums today and walk around Santiago more. She decided to join me, and I am very glad she did. Turns out, she has a good friend who went to Lowell and might know Rael and works at Sports Basement, she climbs at Mission Cliffs every Thursday (and I am definitely, definitely going to join her), and we were just perfect companions today.
We started off walking to El Museo de Arte Precolombino, which is the best in South America, to see artifacts from Incas, Mayas, etc.

From there we walked to El Mercado Central, where we bought fruit and learned about all of the crazy seafood they eat here. If we had been hungry, we would have tried enormous King Crab, sea urchin, or one of the other dishes in front of us. After the seafood market, we crossed the river to another market area, where I wanted to try everything. I tasted some olives, bought a new kind of avocado, then spotted the most beautiful potatoes I had ever seen. At first I just took pictures, but eventually decided to buy some. They were very small, and pink and yellow with spots.

The girl at the stall also had a bunch of salsas in small dishes, and she let me dip my finger in each one to decide which one I wanted to buy. We continued to a stand with many types of empanadas, probably the most common snack in Chile. Most of the time, there is only queso (cheese) or pino (beef, onion, and olive), but this stand also had champiñon (mushroom), which I had been seeking out. Delicioso.

We kept walking along the river to El Museo Bellas Artes. Beautiful photography, paintings, drawings, sculptures. El Museo is part of a large park, where we wandered for a while before I stopped for a churro relleno (fresh out of the oil, then filled on the spot with some nutty caramel and sprinkled with powdered sugar).

Eventually we arrived at Pablo Neruda's house that he built for his mistress/eventual third wife. He designed part of it to be like a ship's cabin, another part like a lighthouse, and had the most random collection of trinkets. The tour was in Spanish, but I understood basically everything. Every day, I feel better and better about being basically bilingual. I don't mean to brag, but people here are so impressed with my accent and really appreciate that I would rather speak their language than mine. They have a hard time identifying where I'm from (someone guessed Portugal, a few have thought Chilean), which makes me feel like a citizen of the world.
After Neruda's house, Aileen and I walked back to the hostel to make dinner again. I sauteed my special pink potatoes and we ate them with the salsa as an appetizer, while our experimental leftover vegetable/noodle/tomato casserole cooked. We both love that our hostel has a huge full kitchen, because I know that cooking makes me feel relaxed, grounded, self-sufficient, happy, and healthy.

Tomorrow, I might go to Valparaíso as a day trip since I didn't go this weekend. It is only an hour and a half by bus, and I think I can see enough of the town and beaches in one day. Then, Tuesday afternoon I leave for my hostel's trip down South to Chillán to ski Wednesday and Thursday. Instead of taking the bus back to Santiago, I might go directly from Chillán down to Pucón, because it is almost halfway there. I need to check with Daniel to see if that would be okay with him.
I have basically done everything I wanted to do in Santiago. I'm sure I could keep myself occupied, but I am ready to move on. I love this city and could actually see myself living here, but of course I said that about Norway, Paris, Barcelona, and sort of Ghana. But, Pucón is where I can stop paying for lodging, nest a little bit, and also keep getting my outdoor adventure fix. On my Pucón agenda: hike and ski the volcano, white water rafting, hotsprings, rock climbing, horse back riding, as many national parks as possible, and hopefully a trip into Patagonia. I might even make it to Argentina if I'm lucky. Scratch that. I am already so so so lucky to be here.

Piedras Román

Last night while at my hostel's bar, I finally tried Chile's famous pisco (35% alcohol grape brandy) and I made friends with a guide leading a rock climbing trip today (instead of going to Valparaíso, which I can do another time). Very good decisions on my part. Pisco was good, although I managed to drink little enough of it to avoid the notorious hangover, which meant that I was awake and ready to go climbing at 8am. We took the metro to a sort of commuter rail to a shared taxi to a trailhead, then hiked for about 45 minutes to a spot with huge volcanic rocks next to a gorgeous stream (and of course the snow-topped Andes always in the distance).

The group: Jesus (Peruvian working and living in Santiago, who is a guide employed by the hostel and who invited me while at the bar), Marko (Chilean hostel employee and novice guide), Aileen (fellow hostel guest from Berkeley who rock climbs 3 days per week), and myself. Needless to say, I felt a little out of my league, but I was up for the challenge and couldn't wait to scramble up to see the epic views. The first climb was "easy enough anyone could do it," according to Jesus. I'm not sure I agree with that, but the volcanic rock has enough random holes that it was easy enough to find footholds and handholds. And the first route was at least vertical or at a slight forward angle, whereas the others were not. I was proud to reach the top, enjoy the view, then head down to learn how to belay. Very cool.

The second route I was more comfortable and sped up, then the 3rd was intense. The face was at a backwards angle, so you had to unclip yourself as you went up and cling on with your arms since your legs and body wanted to hang off. Also, we were climbing up to an edge, then trying to swing up to reach some of the holds. I fell off a few times (squealing even though the ropes and harness caught me), but kept trying and impressed Jesus with my tiny biceps. Eventually, my legs were shaking and my arms were shaking and my fingertips hurt and I had gotten to the highest point, I just hadn't swung my body around the edge, so I went down.


Defeat didn't taste good, but then we ate amazing tuna sandwiches with avocado, tomato, and bell pepper while sitting on a boulder in the river. I looked around and said, "It really doesn't get any better than this." Marko said, "What doesn't?" And I said, "Life."

After lunch there were 2 more routes. I was exhausted from my repeated attempts at Route 3, but gave it my all for Route 4, then took a nap in a hammock for Route 5.

We hiked out as the sunset tinged the snow on the mountains pink and the almost full moon rose. What a day. What a life.

Tomorrow, I am taking advantage of Free Sundays to visit Santiago's museums. Something slightly less active for a change.

Valle Nevado Otra Vez

I went back to Valle Nevado today for another day of skiing. This time, I swapped out goggles and fleece for sunglasses and sweatband. It was another blue-bird day on the mountain, but this time I knew what to expect. I also feel a little chummier with the staff. Daniel is the driver, and one other guy Reeve is also staff at La Casa Roja and goes on the ski trips. I skied with the two of them all morning, even hitting a few jumps that they were trying. There was a freestyle competition at the neighboring mountain, El Colorado, and we could watch the contestants from our mountain, but they mostly just looked like tiny moving dots. The two guys have vouchers for the staff cafeteria and invited me to eat with them, so I brought my bag lunch and hung out with them. They wanted time to digest, but I wanted to hit the slopes for as long as I could. I went off on my own, and loved it. With my music blasting and the sun shining, I couldn't help but smile, even just sitting by myself on the chairlift. One difference here in Chile: singles don't often ride together on the chairlift. I have attempted to join groups of 2 or 3, but they end up letting me sit alone and they catch the next one. Of course there are a few exceptions, which make for nice conversation and Spanish practice. Daniel found me in the afternoon and showed me an area that I hadn't hit yet that was the closest thing to powder I have found. It was a little heavy as it melted in the sun, but I still got that wonderful floating feeling as I lifted all of my weight onto my downhill ski and let the snow turn me. Mom, don't get scared, but I have been "jumping" a little bit more. What I mean is, when I go over a lip or an edge, I make an effort to get a little air. Harmless fun in my mind. But, at the very end of the day, I did something to make Rael proud.

They have one real jump set up with an enormous inflated air bag where you land. You leave your poles at the top, then take off and no matter how you land you don't get hurt. I had watched it from afar all day, and finally decided: now or never. This is a trip about pushing my limits, challenging myself, and taking advantage of every opportunity. My first time down, I just went straight forward and landed kind of on my face. Both skis came off and I slid along the big pillow until plopping off onto the snow. The next time I tried to tuck more and landed better, keeping both skis on but still kind of face-planting. Even if I wasn't attempting 360s or summersaults, I was happy to just jump. All day, I was just sooo happy. I truly am living a dream.





Tomorrow I am going to Valparaíso, a sister city to San Francisco that is famous for colorful houses perched on steep hills, nice beaches, and being home to some of Chile's famous authors and poets. I probably won't blog until Sunday or Monday when I return to Santiago, then I will be leaving again on Tuesday to go to Chillan (another mountain hopefully with more snow) until Thursday.
Besos!

One more thing: I'm adding a few photos per post, but I'm adding lot's more to Facebook. I think anyone (meaning family without accounts) can see the album by following this link:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2051981&id=1055040014&l=168f0e72db

Santiago: Cerro San Cristóbal y Parque de las Esculturas

Last night after skiing, I convinced myself that I wanted to go to some International party that happens every Wednesday night, but I had no one to go with from my hostel and fell asleep at 10. Oh well. I slept in until 10am this morning, which was much needed rest. The night before, I was so nervous that I wouldn't wake up in time to catch the ski bus that I tossed and turned forever. I took the Metro to the entrance to El Parque Metropolitano de Santiago, also known as Cerro San Cristóbal. I paid $1.50 to ride a Funicular up to the summit of the mountain, where there was a large balcony overlooking the city and a statue of Virgen de la Inmaculada Concepción.







After snapping some pictures of Santiago (amid it's notorious smog), I made my way along the trails to wander the park. I told myself, go ahead...get lost. What else is there to do? There are endless picnic spots, stone stairways, and trails in every direction. Eventually I stuck to the paved road to find the (now closed for winter) beautiful outdoor swimming pool, El Jardín Botánico Mapulemus, and El Jardín Japonés.



I had packed an apple and also treated myself to a chocolate ice cream bar along the way. I brought my large canteen, but was pleased to re-fill it in the gardens. This is not Ghana! No filtration necessary! After the Japanese Gardens, I continued along the paved road and exited the park on the opposite side of the mountain. I walked for a little while until I came to El Parque de las Esculturas, a stretch of park filled with sculptures along the bank of the river that runs through Santiago. All of the statues are made by Chilean artists and make for the perfect spot for young local couples canoodling in the sun.



I continued to walk into the neighborhood called Providencia, where I sought out a pocket dictionary (unsuccessfully) and the correct converter for my laptop (successfully). Rush hour traffic on the metro reminded me of fighting for a spot in a tro-tro, but I eventually made it back to my hostel's neighborhood, Barrio Brasil. I bought some sandwich supplies for my lunch on the mountain tomorrow on my way home, then plugged in my computer with much relief and uploaded pictures. Hope you enjoy them!