The journey time on the bus from Pucon to Santiago is 10.5 hours. We've splashed out and paid for fully reclining seats, which actually go totally flat. We are given a blanket and pillow, some snacks and the bus conductor comes to close the curtains for us. It's really good value at £30 each and as it's a comfortable ride we are soon sleeping. We stay horizontal for most of the way, waking occasionally but generally slept for most of it. It's still dark when the bus stops and we rush to gather our stuff and dive off - we were soon diving back on as we realise we are not yet into the centre of Santiago and this is not our stop. Twenty minutes or so later we are in the central bus terminal and hail a taxi to take us to the apartment we have booked through Air BnB. It is 6.30am when we arrive and Rod(riguez), the owner, has kindly agreed to meet up at 8am to give us the key to the apartment. The apartment is a studio, but is a good size, modern and tastefully decorated. We love it immediately.

It's in a red light district and we later find out that the cafe's with dark curtains and dirty fingerprints on the door in our neighbourhood are known as coffee and legs bars! Traditionally, the girls in these bars served coffee wearing mini-skirts and heels and would often cat-walk along the bars for a buena vista (good view)!

We have planned a wine tour through Kylie, an Australian who we met in the Puerto Varas hostel. She is living in Santiago and runs wine tours to the Maipo Valley wine region to support the English teaching job she also does. We meet up with her and a family of three, who are also Australian, and head off on the minibus. It's about an hour out of the city and our first stop is at a winery where we are shown around the house and grounds that belonged to the Carrerra family. Colonel Luis Florentino Carrera was a military officer who fought in the Chilean War of Independence. Together with his brothers José Miguel and Juan José, they were some of most important leaders in the Chilean struggle. We were also shown inside the old barn where there are said to be secret tunnels used to escape from the Spanish forces. They have since been closed off. They are thought to go in to the village, but no one is sure where they led to or whether they have been destroyed by earthquakes.

History lesson over, we go into the production area, and as the latest harvest was being processed, we got invited to observe. In most countries you would be required to have hairnets and hard hats on but we are able to walk freely through the area where various bits of machinery are chugging away and fork lift trucks are nearly backing in to you. Angelo, one of the workers, explains the process and shows us the grapes (with dirt, stalk and wasps attached) that go into a huge press that squeezes the juice from the grape, this is then put into huge vats to ferment and we get to try some new stuff that has not yet fermented and so is really just juice at the moment. He then shows us the more gentle process that happens to squeeze the juice from the red grapes. Anyway, bla bla bla...what does it taste like?! It's a boutique wine company who exports the majority of it's wines, as we are told that Chilean's don't really appreciate the finer wines. We are poured generous measures and the wine is very good. We purchase a bottle of delicious Merlot for about £3. We go to a local restaurant for lunch and have a traditional Chilean dish called Porotos Granados (bean and corn stew) that is delicious. We continue on to two more vineyards with the last one being a mass producer where we get taken around and shown vines that were mistakenly planted east to west instead of how they should be north to south. Once they realised their mistake they kept the vines to produce fruit juice instead.

There was a large store with wine fermenting in clay pots sealed with a clay lid. These were organic wines, using the same process from biblical times, but we did see employees experimenting by adding different powder to the pots - so maybe not so organic and authentic! We go for a wine tasting set in a huge room where there are various awards and certificates on show. The cellar at the back is impressive and full of many dusty old bottles. The wines here are not so nice, but by this time of the day they are going down easy enough. There is a full bodied wine they nickname Pamela Anderson (for obvious reasons) and we end up taking her home with us. We drop off the Aussie hen pecked husband, his wife and daughter at the airport and sit in lots of traffic to get back into the city. Here Steve is gasping for a beer so we go into a beer bar before eating in a great tapas restaurant washed down with a local Malbec. A great day out.

We go to the Bellas Artes Museum which is set in a beautiful building, however, we are less impressed with the exhibits and don't linger too long.

We visit the Museo de la Memoria y los Derechos Humanos which translates to the Museum of Memory and Human Rights. It tells the story of Chile's history under the junta rule. There are some harrowing stories told by those who were tortured by the regime. The fact we got there an hour before closing is maybe a good thing, as we didn't have time to dwell on anything for too long, but we still left with heavy hearts.

The Museum of Pre Colombian Art had some interesting pieces including an explanation of 'Psychoactive snuff' that is a hallucinogenic substance that was carried in cane or bone boxes or leather pouches then pulverised in a miniature mortar then scooped into a snuff tray with a tiny spoon. The shamen consuming the snuff held one nostril shut and inserted one end of the tube into the other nostril before inhaling deeply to take in the powder'. The things they used to do in them olden days...would never catch on now.

We also go to the house of Pablo Neruda, a famous poet, diplomat and politician and also Nobel prize winner for Literature in 1971. During the 1960's he built the house so he could spend time with his mistress, who he later married. There's a lot of character to the house which is built in three seperate sections on different levels with gardens in the centre. He loved the sea, so themed the dining room as a ship's cabin and the main living area as a lighthouse and it has huge windows overlooking the city. After Neruda's death the house was vandalised during the junta and some of the artefacts taken. However, the house is full of colour and vibrancy with the objects there now. After his death in 1973 his mistress continued to live in the house until her death when she bequeathed that it be opened as a museum.

There are a couple of hills in Santiago that give great views of the city. We go to the top of Cerro San Cristobal by a funicular train that chugs up the near vertical line. We had thought about walking up, but a story was published on Trip Advisor the day before about some tourists being mugged and beaten with sticks which put us off a little. There is a huge statue of Virgin de la Inmaculada Conception at the top, a church, and tiered seating covered in foliage. It's a clear day and the views out to the mountains are stunning.

We also walk to the top of Cerro Santa Lucia, but it's a smoggy day and we can just about make out the mountains in the background. Talking of making out.... the park is full of couples laying on the grass and groping each either in full view or under blankets

Lollapolluza is the big two day outdoor festival held every year in O'Higgins Park. The main acts we want to see are on the Sunday, although Jake Bugg is playing on Saturday. We then find that he is also playing a gig in a small venue on Friday evening so we book tickets for that and just for the Sunday at Lollapolluza. The underground venue is full and the Chilean crowd love him, as do we, a very talented lad. We get chatting to a couple next to us who ask if Suzanne was his mum!

On Sunday it's another beautiful sunny day and we head off to the Lollapolluza festival. We watch Portugal the Man, Johnny Marr (The Smiths), The Pixies, Arcade Fire and New Order. The Chileans seem to love US and UK bands and it's a great atmosphere, despite them not selling any alcohol. Must be the fact that so many people are rolling up and are high on their joints man!

We also see an advert for another night of live music with Rick Astley, Debbie Gibson (no relation), Samantha Fox (who's biggest asset(s) is not her musical talent) and another gig with Alan Parsons. As we may have mentioned, Chile is obsessed with 80's music. We hestiate for about a nanosecond on whether we will go to these and think there may be better things to do with our night.

Turner &Townsend have an office in Santiago and it was good to meet up with old faces. Steve worked with German (silent G) and Rory in London and then again with Rory in Dubai. Steve went into the office to meet them and talk some business while Suzanne made herself scarce in a shopping mall. There were so many things she could have bought, but the backpack is far too heavy as it is.

We had a great night with their wives too at an amazing fish restuarant in the Providencia area (the more upmarket area of Santiago). We also met up with Rory and Beth and met their daughter Chloe and Beth's mum and went to an amazing Italian restaurant for lunch.

Another of Steve's old colleagues was in town so we met with him and his wife with German and Teri for dinner at a small French bistro in Larristeria area.

As it's our 16th wedding anniversary we've booked in to a good hotel. Sad to leave the lovely apartment, but happy to really get some luxury. It's set in a renovated mansion and we have a beautiful room overlooking the gardens. It's a bit of tranquility in a busy city, in a good area with lots of bars and restaurants. The next day we are due to get the bus out to Valparaiso, which is on the coast about 120kms from Santiago. As we put the news on in the morning we see that there has been an earthquake about a 1000kms north in the city of Iquique (the same city to have suffered an earthquake recently). People were evacuated from the city as there is a tsunami warning, which reaches as far along the coast as Valparaiso, in addition we hear news that there are power outages and some disruption in Valparaiso. We decide to postpone a trip there and luckily Rod's apartment is available for us to move back in. We are not too sorry as we feel we haven't fully seen Santiago yet and we've also realised that the disk inside the camera is faulty and the last two days of photo's have unfortunately been lost so we get a chance to take some more.

As Valparaiso is only an hour an a half bus ride away we go for a day trip. It's a port city that is set on a steep hill with a maze of roads heading upwards. We catch the trolley bus that dates from the 1940's (and looks like it!). It's old and worn, but still used as public transport in the city. The lower part of the town seems to have had better days and there is a faded glory that is evident. The port suffered a huge decline in shipping following the opening of the Panama Canal up north and also a huge earthquake that destroyed a lot of the city. There is some great architecture in the town, but the only building that looks to have been cared for is the naval museum. The intricate design on some of the buildings is now crumbling and dirty. There are a number of external lifts, some over 130 years old, that take you part way up the hill. Naturally, the one we want is out of service. Instead, we walk up the winding streets that are covered in graffiti, although urban art seems more appropriate as some of it is very creative and professional. There is a mural using bottle tops and glass set in the pavement on the hill and even the recycling bins are painted in bright colours. There are two cemetries here one for 'dissidents', mainly British and European immigrants, who were Protestant and therefore, not accepted in traditional cemeteries. The other is for the influential and infamous Catholic residents of Valparaiso, where the tombs are on a much grander scale. On one interesting tomb we read the epitath of a Mancunian named HE Swinglehurst:

This was Swinglehurst

Whose kingdom was his own

Now his earthly bubble is burst

He lies beneath this stone

Where freed from every mundane strife

He mingles with the sod

Who ne'er did titivate his life

To try and hoodwink God

Coming back down the hill we find some steep steps that went on forever, but eventually brought us back in to the plaza below. We then got the train out to Vina Del Mar, which is a short metro ride away. It's more affluent than Valparaiso and we walk by the dried-up river bed down to the beach. There we stop for a couple of well deserved pisco sours and watch the setting sun before getting back to catch our bus in to Santiago. It's Friday evening and the hour and a half bus journey turns into a frustrating two and a half hour journey, as we are stuck in local traffic as we hit downtown Santiago.

NB just heard today on the news that there has been a huge fire that has swept through Valparaiso where the colourful houses are on the hill. From the news it looked like most of that area was alight. 10,000 people evacuated and sadly some fatalities.

We enjoy Santiago, it's a nice city, the sun is always shining, people are friendly, there is plenty to do and a great nightlife. You can also buy a slab of good cheese, a kilo of strawberries, a punnet of raspberries, two bottles of wine and a litre of beer for under six quid! Our kind of city!

The downside will be the 5.8 tremour we felt one evening in the apartment. We suddenly felt the building shaking, the furniture swaying and the hanging cutlery clanging together. We opened the door to the apartment to see what other people where doing and there wasn't much of a stir. We looked across into the apartment block opposite and we could see people still laying on their sofa's watching the TV. Although it alerted us, apparently it's a common thing and the locals don't bat too much of an eyelid.