There's a part of me that could keep traveling down the road forever and never look back - but it's currently outweighed by the part of me that would like to stop taking overnight flights, switching timezones, and realizing (again) how badly I packed for this trip. It's perhaps laughable how badly I misjudged - usually I'm pretty well prepared, but since I was working/celebrating/drinking until the bitter end before my trip, I didn't even start thinking of what to bring until the morning of my departure. So while I was well-prepared for Bora Bora, I put basically no thought into Easter Island or Santiago - and the result is that it's going to get down to 37 degrees tonight, and my best options for our wine tour tomorrow are sundresses. Ooof.
But this is all eminently survivable, and I'm looking forward to tomorrow capping off a glorious trip before leaving (likely hungover) for the States on Monday night. Last night and today were somewhat painful, but we made the best of them. After I blogged last night, we finished getting ready, sat around, and sat around some more wondering when the owner of our hotel would decide to take us to the airport. He had been mildly late picking us up, but we had confirmed with the whole family that morning (or so we'd thought) that they were taking us back that night. But when he showed up around the time we guessed he would show up, he looked extremely surprised to see us - and then totally panicked, let us throw money at him to settle the bill (which was not the correct amount, but whatever - it's getting sorted), and then shoved us into his truck. When we got to the airport, he let out a huge sigh, said, 'the plane is still here....mi corazon was...', and then thumped his chest to simulate a heart attack while laughing. I think he thought the flight was an hour earlier than it was, but it all worked out totally fine.
What wasn't fine was that we were somehow in the last row of the entire plane, which was a real fall from grace compared to our business class experience. But we didn't have anyone between us, and we both slept most of the flight, so it could have been worse. When we got to Santiago, everything went flawlessly - our bags showed up, our taxi was waiting for us, and the hotel greeted us with bottled water and the v. welcome news that we could check in even though it was only nine a.m. We're in a tremendously hipsterish hotel in a very cute area of Santiago, and it feels like I'm back in SF (even if I still haven't found great coffee, but I'm going to try tomorrow). We spent the first couple of hours sleeping, since I knew I needed a nap if I had any hope of exploring.
But we actually rallied for the rest of the day, which was mildly impressive. We started with lunch at Nolita, which was an excellent Italian place; we each had a salad to start, followed by gnocchi for Joann and seafood risotto for me, and the risotto, at least, was pretty much perfect. The other perfect thing was learning how to order una copa de vino, since I can't drink a bottle - and the copa de vino at lunch was a delicious carmenere, v. generously poured, which made my excitement for tomorrow's wine tour only grow.
After lunch, we walked off the meal by wandering around the streets and markets of the Bellas Artes district, which is near where we're staying. We didn't find anything to buy (although I had an eye out for a coat, for reasons enumerated above), partially because many things were closed since this is a holiday weekend (more on that below). But we ended up going to the Museo Chileno de Arte Precolombino, which was a pleasant surprise - after they charged me a student entrance fee for no obvious reason, we explored a variety of artifacts from the pre-Colombian Central and South American cultures. They had some excellent stuff, all of which made me wish I knew more about those cultures (even if I'm glad that I don't currently live in a culture where it's so common to carry around the heads of your enemies that you need a specific type of rope for it (although if I did live in that culture, I have a list of heads I'd start collecting asap (but I digress))). I was most impressed by their textiles room - they have some truly ancient stuff, and it's a wonder any of it has survived, but the weaving and dying are extremely impressive and possibly better than anything I've seen surviving from European cultures. Or perhaps I was just ashamed of my own ignorance, since I had no idea the textile arts were so well-developed in Central/South America so many centuries before Europe.
sssanyway, I'm a dork when it comes to textiles, but you've stuck with me this far, so let's move on. After the museum, we walked back to the hotel, where we engaged in some research/debate over what to do for dinner. We were both tired, and we'd walked a lot, but I didn't really feel like eating a hot dog for dinner (even though that's a thing here), so we ended up going to Tambo, which was very close to where we had lunch. We asked the hotel concierge to call ahead in case we needed a reservation, but when we got there, we were the only ones in the restaurant. This is likely for two reasons:
- people here don't eat dinner until 8pm - midnight, and we chose to eat at 7:30 (late for us in comparison to most of the trip, but depressingly early compared to everyone else in this country).
- as mentioned above, this is a holiday weekend in Chile. While sitting in the restaurant, I looked up what holiday it was, and it turns out that 21 May is 'la dia de las glorias navales', which commemorates a specific battle in the war between Chile and Peru in 1879; Chile lost the battle, but it was considered a turning point, and Chile went on to win the war. As it turns out, Tambo is a Peruvian restaurant...and so while the chicken dish I had was v. tasty and Joann enjoyed her seafood stew, it's *possible* that a Peruvian restaurant might not be the hottest ticket in town tonight.
So after that (and after a copa de vino for me and an ice cream for Joann), we came back to the hotel, and I've been hanging out and indulging my inner internet-addicted hipster in the lobby since then. But now I really need to get ready for bed; I want to be well-rested for the wine tour tomorrow. These time changes have wrought havoc on my body - Bora Bora was three hours behind California, and Santiago is three hours ahead, so I've basically been just jetlagged enough to be confused this entire time. Or maybe it's the copa de vino talking. Either way, it's been a fun trip, and I intend to enjoy every last bit of tomorrow before we have to get ready to go home on Monday. Goodnight!
But this is all eminently survivable, and I'm looking forward to tomorrow capping off a glorious trip before leaving (likely hungover) for the States on Monday night. Last night and today were somewhat painful, but we made the best of them. After I blogged last night, we finished getting ready, sat around, and sat around some more wondering when the owner of our hotel would decide to take us to the airport. He had been mildly late picking us up, but we had confirmed with the whole family that morning (or so we'd thought) that they were taking us back that night. But when he showed up around the time we guessed he would show up, he looked extremely surprised to see us - and then totally panicked, let us throw money at him to settle the bill (which was not the correct amount, but whatever - it's getting sorted), and then shoved us into his truck. When we got to the airport, he let out a huge sigh, said, 'the plane is still here....mi corazon was...', and then thumped his chest to simulate a heart attack while laughing. I think he thought the flight was an hour earlier than it was, but it all worked out totally fine.
What wasn't fine was that we were somehow in the last row of the entire plane, which was a real fall from grace compared to our business class experience. But we didn't have anyone between us, and we both slept most of the flight, so it could have been worse. When we got to Santiago, everything went flawlessly - our bags showed up, our taxi was waiting for us, and the hotel greeted us with bottled water and the v. welcome news that we could check in even though it was only nine a.m. We're in a tremendously hipsterish hotel in a very cute area of Santiago, and it feels like I'm back in SF (even if I still haven't found great coffee, but I'm going to try tomorrow). We spent the first couple of hours sleeping, since I knew I needed a nap if I had any hope of exploring.
But we actually rallied for the rest of the day, which was mildly impressive. We started with lunch at Nolita, which was an excellent Italian place; we each had a salad to start, followed by gnocchi for Joann and seafood risotto for me, and the risotto, at least, was pretty much perfect. The other perfect thing was learning how to order una copa de vino, since I can't drink a bottle - and the copa de vino at lunch was a delicious carmenere, v. generously poured, which made my excitement for tomorrow's wine tour only grow.
After lunch, we walked off the meal by wandering around the streets and markets of the Bellas Artes district, which is near where we're staying. We didn't find anything to buy (although I had an eye out for a coat, for reasons enumerated above), partially because many things were closed since this is a holiday weekend (more on that below). But we ended up going to the Museo Chileno de Arte Precolombino, which was a pleasant surprise - after they charged me a student entrance fee for no obvious reason, we explored a variety of artifacts from the pre-Colombian Central and South American cultures. They had some excellent stuff, all of which made me wish I knew more about those cultures (even if I'm glad that I don't currently live in a culture where it's so common to carry around the heads of your enemies that you need a specific type of rope for it (although if I did live in that culture, I have a list of heads I'd start collecting asap (but I digress))). I was most impressed by their textiles room - they have some truly ancient stuff, and it's a wonder any of it has survived, but the weaving and dying are extremely impressive and possibly better than anything I've seen surviving from European cultures. Or perhaps I was just ashamed of my own ignorance, since I had no idea the textile arts were so well-developed in Central/South America so many centuries before Europe.
sssanyway, I'm a dork when it comes to textiles, but you've stuck with me this far, so let's move on. After the museum, we walked back to the hotel, where we engaged in some research/debate over what to do for dinner. We were both tired, and we'd walked a lot, but I didn't really feel like eating a hot dog for dinner (even though that's a thing here), so we ended up going to Tambo, which was very close to where we had lunch. We asked the hotel concierge to call ahead in case we needed a reservation, but when we got there, we were the only ones in the restaurant. This is likely for two reasons:
- people here don't eat dinner until 8pm - midnight, and we chose to eat at 7:30 (late for us in comparison to most of the trip, but depressingly early compared to everyone else in this country).
- as mentioned above, this is a holiday weekend in Chile. While sitting in the restaurant, I looked up what holiday it was, and it turns out that 21 May is 'la dia de las glorias navales', which commemorates a specific battle in the war between Chile and Peru in 1879; Chile lost the battle, but it was considered a turning point, and Chile went on to win the war. As it turns out, Tambo is a Peruvian restaurant...and so while the chicken dish I had was v. tasty and Joann enjoyed her seafood stew, it's *possible* that a Peruvian restaurant might not be the hottest ticket in town tonight.
So after that (and after a copa de vino for me and an ice cream for Joann), we came back to the hotel, and I've been hanging out and indulging my inner internet-addicted hipster in the lobby since then. But now I really need to get ready for bed; I want to be well-rested for the wine tour tomorrow. These time changes have wrought havoc on my body - Bora Bora was three hours behind California, and Santiago is three hours ahead, so I've basically been just jetlagged enough to be confused this entire time. Or maybe it's the copa de vino talking. Either way, it's been a fun trip, and I intend to enjoy every last bit of tomorrow before we have to get ready to go home on Monday. Goodnight!
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