On my way back to Santiago I stopped off for an afternoon at Valdivia. It's a town close to the sea side famous for its seals that hang around the fish market waiting for the fisher men to throw them some fish leftovers. I took a video of that which I uploaded.

Anyway, it was Sunday and this town was quite dead, but there was an organised boat tour that I went on. Initially fearing I was the only one on the boat, I was joined by about 30 men all ages. It was a group of guys on a work do but there were two other guys there from Australia who were also there by themselves. I spent most of the time chatting to them. We went on a trip around the rivers and visited a rather remote village where we got some free coffee and blueberry cake. We found a bar in this village too where I had some Anticutcho which is basically meat on the stick and it was grilled over a BBQ - very tasty especially with some Piscola (Pisco schnapps and Coca Cola).

When we returned, the 2 Australian guys and I went for some lovely seafood in town before I had to leave with the next night bus back to Santiago. The one guy, Christian, had Locko which is Abalone in English and told me that this is a shellfish you pay a lot money for in Europe or elsewhere - one must have loads of it here. I had it the following day, my last day, in Santiago at the fish market restaurants. Very yummy!!

That day I decided to take the tube again to get around Santiago. Yet I haven't found a system as well kept, comfortable and lit up with idiot proof signage everywhere, apart from London, although Santiago comes very close.

However, during rush hour the people there are a lot more radical when getting on or off. I also have never had such close body contact with others on the tube as I experienced on that Monday morning. After all, it isn't perfect anywhere!

On the airport I surprisingly ran into Turtle, a friend from the last Gap tour I did. He had just returned from a week on Easter Island which he said was amazing but excessively expensive. It was very nice to have seen him again because you kind of say good bye forever. I have to visit him in the US sometime; he was so much fun to have around!

Well that was it: my South American journey. I had a great time though I missed a few things I would love to see some other time. That includes the Cocal canyon in Arequipa, Peru, the La Paz Prison in Bolivia, and the LaucaNational park in the very north of Chile. Surely I haven't finished with Chile yet as there is still Chileo island, the glaciers at Torres del Paine and the fjords at the very south!