First Days in Chile

We made it! And what a long trip. It went a little like this:

1) Three hours to Mexico City;
2) Eight hour layover on the floor of the Mexico City airport (I had my sleeping bag and the floors were immaculate);
3) Eight hours to Santiago; and
4) Four hours to our hostel from the airport.

In truth, No. 4 shouldn't have taken four hours, but tired as we were, we got a little lost. So lost, in fact, that we hopped on a bus to the neighboring village of Maipu. We should have realized this earlier, but again, tired.

This is approximately what our trip to the hostel looked like (our route in black; no need to depict the preferred route):

So here we are, finally, at Hostel La Chimba. It is a peaceful place in an Artsy district nestled at the foot of San Cristóbal Hill. The area is cobble-stoned with tree-lined streets, outdoor restaurants, and plenty of heladerías to take our minds off of the heat. The hostel is enormous, with three separate buildings surrounded by large walls. It has two courtyards and a stairway to the roof where you can look out across the tin tops of the local houses. Here's a picture from the front.

I write this as we relax on a couch in the courtyard after lunch. This morning after a breakfast Rachel and I hiked a good four hours up San Cristóbal Hill. At the top, there is an enormous outdoor church and a statue of the Virgin Mary. We stopped, relaxed for a time, and then proceeded down the other side of the Hill into another district of the city. There was a dirt path and the view of the city and the Andes was beautiful.

The sun was up in our faces, but in the background you can see the outdoor church.

...And after four hours of walking we went back to our hostel for a lunch of empanadas, some sort of beans with pumpkin, and meat.

It is Friday and we hope to find some live music tonight. We won't be in Santiago long since we'd like to make it to Patagonia before the weather gets too cold. So we'll be off to Mendoza in the next few days.

Cheers for now,

Tom