29th May 2008. After all final tears were shed it was time to get out of New Zealand. Made our was to the Airport for our flight on LAN Airlines. Having done a little research on the airline we thought it'd be like any other modern day flight. Oh how we were wrong. Random is already back. Got our first intro into the new language when all announcements were made in Spanish first and then broken English. The plane was packing an old school one TV at the front setup. After we took off at about 8mph (honestly we're still wondering how the plane actually left the tarmac) we were treated to 2 films in just over 11 and a half hours! Different. To say it was a slightly tedius flight would be accurate and having to ask four different hostesses for a tourist card made us slighty nervy as this was supposed to be the easy bit! However we landed safe and sound it what turned out to be a really smooth flight.

Out the airport with the taxi already pre-arranged we coasted in to Santiago eying up the stunning mountains surrounding the city. These bad boys are probably bigger than that we've seen so far, all snow capped and looking completely surreal dwarfing the city. It looks like our scenery days are far from over! Pulled up at our hostel for the night - Hostal Forestal - having yet to crack out any of our finely polished Spanish. Checked in and realised we're packing some laid back attitudes in Chile which is cool with us. Don't really have to give any info, don't get a room key an didn't even have to pay until we fancied it! Certainly a bit of a change! The place was a quirky little hostel, stone based set on 3 different un-even levels. Dumped our stuff and decided to chill as all jet lagged like mofo's. Chris went for some world record based sleep. Luke and James went for a little venture and can confirm that KFC is not the place to be dining out in Chile. Very late evening the lads all awake now quickly had a look in the bar (that doesn't sell alcohol) and watched a bit of Superbad. Classic. Then it was time to catch the rest of those Z's!

Up at a reasonable hour the next day our main task was to get some sort of route mapped out for Chile! Headed out for bruch first into Santiago city centre. After a coffee that can only be described as TNT (they like it strong over here) we found a nice little restaurant called Arcos Dorados. A brief walk into the main square and it was into the tourist info centre. Off to a flier as this was the wrong one. However we were armed with directions to the right one! A quick stop back at the hostel and it was onwards. Some good map reading and a little help from the loacals we found the place we were looking for. A really helpful guy pretty much singled out the must see's of Chile so we were set and booked on a bus out of Santiago for Valparaiso at 09:00 the next morning, which basically meant only a day for us in Santiago! Some snaps of the city on the way back as well as a stroll through Dirty Get Off (DGO) park where a guy was watering the plants without a care in the world we now know South America is going to be funny based on what we're going to just see let alone do! Had quite a bit to sort out but as we only really had one night here we had to go and check out Bellevista (a highly recommended area). After a little detour we ended up amongst an array of top class places to eat. Dived into the best looking one and for about 12 pounds each we had a ridiculously nice meal. Luke went for a naughty looking chicken number whilst James and Chris popped down two of the nicest steaks they had probably ever had (matching that of skippie in Oz) on a whiskey sauce with a cheese topped jacket potato and some onion rings. Throw in a beer and a stonking desert each the boys were rubbing there hands at the prospect of the fact this is a five star meal in a city - how cheap is it going to be everywhere else???!!!!! Thoroughly impressed the lads thought they'd check out at least one bar for a second one pound eighty beer. Rocked into a posh karaoke number and wet themselves for a good 45 minutes. The DGO's flying around was unreal not to mention every song was being murdered especially Queen's I Want To Break Free! The locals were lapping it up however no matter how bad. Different but seriously funny. After that the boys had to call it a night. Still a little jet lagged and trying to refuel after NZ it was an early start tomorrow! Consigamos esta exposicion en el camino!