Chile
I decided to talk about Chile next because it was kinda a rough way to end our trip. So it was the last place we went but you all get to hear about it now and I'll save my favorite place for the last post. Below are the andes mountains as we flew over them.
From Iguazu, Argentina we flew into Santiago. We got there in the evening. Since Santiago, the capital, had been the biggest location for protests Logan booked a hotel next to the airport and we just ate at the airport before getting our rental car. That pizza was so good! It was chicken with truffle oil and corn. Sounds odd but I loved it!
The side of the rental place had this poster up. Logan and I are big fans of the show "Parks and Rec" so it was funny to see a phrase from the show in spanish.
This was the first time getting a rental in a foreign country (it made us feel very grown up and turns out they take US driver licenses so we didn't need Logan's international one). It was nice that Logan can read all the signs in Spanish and driving was the same side of the street as the states. They did give us a manual but Logan said it was like riding a bike he did just fine after we figured out how to put it in reverse. This model had a lock out ring on the stick shift and we both hadn't seen that before. It was also nice because it had a phone hook up and screen so we were able to use google maps to get around.
The hotel was under construction so it was a little rough looking on the outside but we slept fine.
So the plan was the next morning to drive up to La Serena a cute beach town to get away from most of the protests. It also was one of the locations they pick up for astronomy tours that we had planned that night. Chile is one of the best places for telescopes because of the high desert mountains so we were excited to check them out.
Look how fast Logan was going!! JK its in kilometers per hour and the speed limit was 120 kph (about 75 mph) on the highway.
Here was our route. Just a little section of it. Chile is really long!
Driving the whole length of Chile would be like driving from California to New York.
I thought that Chile looked a lot like the mountain southwest/utah. We passed lots of crops including avocados, olives, oranges and grapes.
They had really nice rest stops the whole way up. Also stands with people put waving sticks with white fabric tied to the end to get people's attention. There would be lots of them all in a row on the side of the street with cheese, empanadas and fruit it looked like.
Sand dunes.
Driving through Coquimbo.
Made it to our hotel. After a long drive we used the restrooms and I did have to ask Logan what one was for women! (I took the picture right after I exited).
While we waited for check in time we walked the beach. It was spring there and further from the equator so it was a little too cold to run around in swimsuits.
Other then Argentina, it is generally safest to only drink bottled water in South America. So we headed to a supermercado for supplies. I love seeing foreign grocery stores. So many bagged pickled items. In the water isle - always make sure that you get the water "sin gas" or without carbonation. Luckily Logan figured that out for the both of us. I thought it was so awesome that they sold pre filled baby bottles with water. If they sold them in the US I would have totally used them when travelling.
Snacks!
So much yogurt I thought I was in Wisconsin!
You can even get it in a bag! haha
Driving back to the hotel we could see that La Serena definitely was not spared from the protests. Spray paint on the Chuck E Cheese, broken glass and stores with sheet metal and plywood over all the windows. A lot of the local stores were closed.
View from our hotel room.
We ate at a place next to the beach. Super yummy gnocchi and Logan got 3 different flavored empanadas but they didn't have enough cheese for me. We were going to eat and go right to the astro tour but while we sat there we got an email saying that we were delayed to the second group for the night so we had several extra hours.
Obviously the astronomy tour was going to keep us up late so we went back to the hotel for some short naps. I laid down and heard something. I asked Logan who checked out the window and there was a protest going right down the road we were just walking and eating next to. It was all peaceful.
When we went to the lobby to wait for our tour bus they had literally rolled out the red carpet for a special event for a mining company (or so thats what Logan said the big banners said). All the people were dressed up super fancy. Later when we got back at 2am they were still partying strong. I decided to take a walk of my own.
I don't think the first group was done up at the observatory so they stopped the bus at this random city center for us to wait. It was actually warmer up in the mountains then the coast so it was nice. We even scored at finding an ATM because we needed a little more cash.
There were so many people at the observatory. It is not for scientists but build just for tourism. It was great that we signed up for a english tour because instead of being in a group of 30 there were 3 couples. One from Australia and the other were from Holland.
So we got to take turns looking through two types of telescopes. And for good or bad we almost had a full moon. So the moon looked super cool in the high powered telescope but we couldn't see most of the stars or milky way. booo
Two other things we got to see were Saturn and a star cluster called 47 Tucan.
Remember we were in the southern hemisphere so most of the sky was different but our guide showed us orion, taurus, and the pleiades. And all were upside down. I knew all of them and the guide was really impressed. He asked if I had by own telescoped. But I've taken a class in high school and in college so I wan't a total newb.
Orion
Orion Nebula and moon from a reflecting telescope.
The tour was supposed to be 4 hours total ours was over 6. It was fine because we didn't have to get up early so we slept in. Breakfast the next morning. Not a great pic of the spread because they were refilling the pastries. I'm a new fan of the pancake making machine!
Driving down to Vine Del Mar there was more evidence of civil unrest.
On our way up the day before we saw this beach and decided to stop the next day. It was beautiful and we nearly had it all to ourselves.
Not a lot of whole shells.
We found this guy upside down and helped flip him over. As soon as Logan put it down he used his back legs to bury itself in the sand.
Bird eggs! Just sitting in the middle of the sand.
Back on the road. Our GPS took us down this super random dirt road that cut over a mountain and then let out right in the middle of town and down to the coast.
We got to our beautiful hotel and found the front like this. The hotel staff assured us it was just for precaution.
The view was amazing though!
From our room window
Not pool weather but we walked around out back.
Weird hairlike seaweed.
The only thing next to the hotel on that side of the street other than ocean was this old run down hotel that was completely abandoned.
Aaaannnnnnddddd then another riot started going by right outside our hotel! We had tried so hard to stay away from all the excitement and couldn't believe our luck. They were a lot of young adults and even a lot of kids at this point. We did see some really drunk people as we waited for our food.
Here is a picture of a picture I took of the hotel. I think the biggest reason I felt so uncomfortable with the protest was that there was no where to go to get away from it other than the ocean or right into the crowd. We decided to eat in and ordered Thai food to the hotel (they were not serving dinner - no doubt they let all the staff go home that wasn't essential).
Our thai food was delivered and so good. We went to our room to eat and watch the sunset. It was nice but there was an uneasiness in the air know what was going on out front.
The finished eating as sun went down and Logan said he wanted to go out to check on the rental car. After a several minutes I didn't want to be away from his side so I went looking. As I walked up the stairs I could hear yelling and glass shattering. Up in the lobby one of the hotel workers was holding the doors shut with a big padlock and chain around them. It didn't make me feel good. We watched the monitors behind the front desk for a while. I think what made the whole situation worse was that everyone was talking in spanish and I didn't know what they were saying.
The hotel worker said they had left and the other people staying in the hotel went out to see the damage. So much destruction. The police were walking by and throwing the stuff out of the street and the riot stragglers just came back by and threw it back out in the road again. A van with the doors open and stereo blaring went by throwing glass bottles into the street behind it.
Everyone of the cars had at least one window smashed out. We saw fires in the distance and sirens going off everywhere. We met a couple from the UK named Andy and Jan. They were really nice to us and helped keep things calm. I knew that Logan would keep me safe but a mother figure helped me feel better. Jan was really nice and talked with me for a while. Below andy pulled out the rock that shattered his driver side window.
Another round of police went by and set off tear gas so we had to go back inside when it started to spread down to where we were. I could feel it in my throat. The British man Andy saw some people come back up the cars and yelled from the door for them to get away. In perfect detail I remember the hotel manager coming around the counter yelling at Andy he had to stop because if we let them know there were people inside "they will come in with 15 men and kill you. They will kill all of us". It was an over exaggeration but in the circumstance it was really scary to hear words like that.
We were lucky only a small window was taken out on ours and we had gotten insurance. We went back out when normal traffic resumed. Logan went and picked up the pieces of the hotel sign that had been pulled off and thrown into the street. We watched one car hit some debris and totally take its bumper off. The hotel staff helped all of us cover up our broken windows with trash bags and duck tape. As you all know I did not sleep well that night.
We found out the next morning that at the start of the riot a bunch of people had started to accost a security officer and he felt threatened enough that he opened fire into the crowd. That was the catalyst that turned the peaceful protest into a mob. Down the hall we saw men taking out glass from a guest's room and on the outside you could see they had thrown something all the way over to the side of the hotel.
I walked up to the front and this man was painting graffiti off the walls. He told me something very animated in spanish but I didn't have a clue what it was other than about what people had vandalized the building.
We had almost a full day we could have used to sightsee but were told there was a labor strike happening that night and decided to get back to the airport so we made sure we could catch a flight. Also we needed to take care of the damage on our rental car. Driving to the airport it was like seeing people picking up after a natural disaster.
So our last day was spent at the airport. We used up the rest of our cash buying a few souvenirs for the kids and were happy to get out of Chile but sad to say goodbye to our South American vacation.
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