Santiago

After deciding to cut our time down in New Zealand we contacted the company to find out about moving our flights. We were however shocked when we found out we either leave in 18 hours or not for another month as they were the only flights available. As a result we had a mad panic rushing from Roturua to Auckland and not getting to explore the city before leaving for South America. We arrived to blazing sun in Santiago, much to Angie's delight. We found a nice hostel and spent our first few days trying to get over the jet lag we got from crossing back over the date line. We left NZ at 5pm on Sunday and arrived in Santiago at 1pm (four hours earlier) after a 11 hour flight! We managed to see a bit of Santiago, taking in all the sights before we headed to San Pedro.

San Pedro

We arrived in San Pedro and after Australia, New Zealand and even the European style Santiago, it was surreal to be back in a small 1 storey town with sand and dirt roads. It really hit home we were finally in South America as this how we expected much of it to look. We visited the museum of artefacts and also the town church as well as finding some nice places to eat. The highlight of San Pedro however, had to be watching the Chilean international football team against Portugal in a bar packed with locals. This was the first experience we have seen of the passion South Americans have for their football teams!

We met a pair of sisters from Liverpool who were catching the same bus as us out of San Pedro. They however, had to get off early as they had their bag stolen on the bus whilst one was asleep and the other was in the bathroom. This was a timely reminder to us that we have to always be 100% careful with our belongings and take nothing for granted. They had to get off and we left them with the police trying to sort everything out. We carried on with our mammoth journey and after 39 hours, four buses and two nights sleeping in really uncomfortable positions whilst the bus drivers carried on in their crazy ways, we arrived in Bolivia.