We said our farewells to Matt, Hannah, Lisa, Heather, Edi, Amir and Will in Santiago, and took on 7 newcomers to the group:

- Will & Claire (England)

- Gareth & Sian (England)

- Martin (England)

- Breanna & Nimue (New Zealand)

They are nice folks, although Breanna and Nimue have kept to themselves mainly; they are young lasses and not seasoned travellers, and are a little nervous of venturing out on their own.

I spent most of the first day exploring the city, and the next day visiting Valparaiso and Vina del Mar.

I thought the wine tour at $40 was a bit of a rip-off, so I decided to find my own way to the Concha y Toro vineyard. Either my 2001 edition of the Footprint guidebook is outdated or the info is wrong, as there are no buses from the O'Higgins metro to the vineyard. I sought help from one of the chaps at the bus-stop and he was extremely helpful, rattling off a bunch of instructions to me - none of which I caught, so I got him to write it down. It was at that point that I realised that this was going to be a lot more complicated than I thought, involving 3 bus changes. I could see myself getting seriously lost in Santiago, as I was already outside of the limits of my city center map, and I had no clue in which direction I was heading and where I had to change buses.

If I had any sense, I should have aborted my trip there and then. But my new friend would not hear of it, and he insisted it would be a straightforward journey. After the pains he went through in figuring out my route, I felt obliged to go through with his plan against my better judgement. He got me onto the first bus - this bus does not accept cash, only prepaid Metro cards, which I did not have - so he spoke to the driver asking him if he would take me down to Avenida Vicuna Mackenzie without a fare, and to direct me to where I would catch the collectivo to Puente Alto. About 15 blocks later (and myself in a rather heightened sense of wariness), the driver indicated my stop and provided me with instructions to cross the road and walk around the corner to catch my collectivo.

Challenge #2: What exactly is a collectivo, and how do I go about catching one? From the chap's earlier description, I gathered that it was some sort of black vehicle with a sign posting its destination. There were 2 dodgy looking characters at the bus-stop, who I was not prepared to approach. So I waited a few more minutes before a young lady appeared. "Excuse me, how do I catch a collectivo to Puente Alto?" "Yes" she replied, obviously misunderstanding my attempts at Spanish. I tried again: "What is a collectivo? It is black, right?" "Yes, it is black and has a sign posting its routes." Great - I was no further enlightened. But she was very helpful indeed - she spotted one and tried to flag it down, but it was already full. At least I now know what a collectivo looks like - it is essentially a taxi operating as a bus with a fixed route. You can flag one down, and the collectivo will continue to pick up and drop passengers along its route, up to a maximum of 4 passengers. Very clever, actually - and so much cheaper than a taxi. I flagged down the next collectivo, and told the driver that I needed to get to Puente Alto (which was at the end of his route) so that I could catch a bus to the vineyard. The driver was also very helpful - we arrived at Puente Alto, some 30 mins afterwards, and he indicated to the 2 buses ahead, telling me that either would stop by the vineyard. He overtook the buses at the bus stop, and sure enough it was Metrobus 73 (just as the first chap instructed). I thanked him and jumped on the #73, again asking the bus driver for help in telling me where to get off. It was only a 10 minute ride, and I managed to successfully arrive ahead of my 3:20pm English tour! The tour itself was unexceptional, but the journey was an experience and made it worth my while!