Currency - Chilean Pesos

Highlights:

Shaun & Al's Chilean dancing, the steak, wine tour, shopping (with Georgie's new laptop as the best proof)...

Our Adventure:

Santiago was lovely but it was definitely a comedy of errors! Starting with our whole little airport experience where Al and V ended up in Santiago a day before us... Georgie, Shaun and I arrived in Santiago late Friday night and were met by a million cab drivers rashing us at the airport before the apartment owner, Florus rescued us and took us back to our very cute little apartment in Santa Lucia, downtown Santiago where V and Al were waiting for us.

First things first we decided to head out for some Chilean festivities which were served up right round the corner from our apartment in a very lively Chilean restaurant with lots of local dancing. Well, there were some 'gauchos'( cowboys ) on stage and then some hula dancing which seemed a lot more Hawaiian than Chilean but we weren't going to question it. Dinner consisted of some superb steaks and papas fritas accompanied with our first few bottles of Chilean wine which went down just as well as expected! But then came the real entertainment... Not in the form of the local dancers but more our own Saffa brand of the Bumblebee and the Ladybird unleashed in Chile! Both Al and Shaun tried to resist but the ladies clad in green and pink honed in on them. I would try to describe the dancing but I think this video best describes the brilliant handkerchief twirling and attempted flamengo/tango!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jcqPKYf9c_I
Not to be outdone, Georgie was soon up there to strut her stuff alongside Mr. Tash... And then V was up there shaking it joined shortly afterwards by Shaun and Lara doing the train... Definitely a fun night had by all!

The comedy commenced again on Sat morning as we desperately continued trying to book the bus tickets we needed for Santiago-Mendoza the following week. After numerous attempts at entering all our information in and hitting send, they would just not process. Several broken Spanish phone conversations later, we still didn't manage to get tickets so the boys ventured off to the bus station to buy the tickets and managed to master the underground system in the process. We were so impressed by how efficient and clean Santiago's metro is!

Sadly the rain seemed to follow us from Rio which somewhat put a damper on our wine tour plans. Someone then (and we're still trying to remember who to blame) suggested the 'Turistik' bus we had seen advertised which appeared to be like the 'hop on, hop off' of London. So off we headed in search of this bus. Thereafter ensued an extremely boring half a tour of well, not much. Santiago reminds me a lot of Colorado - small city surrounded by snow-capped mountains. It's a very modern city but has a very prevalent mall culture. We decided to embrace this and set off shopping at the biggest mall in South America. We were very happy to purchase those much-needed items that had been axed from the backpack like a waterproof jacket - and at much better prices than Londres. After shopping, we rewarded our effort with some divine nutella waffles which unfortunately contributed to our demise... We missed our last Turistik bus back into the city and the 2nd half of the tour by 5 minutes!! Aaaah - this meant that we had basically paid GBP 20 each for a trip to the mall with some boring commentary on the way. Not so good for the budget!

Luckily the evening picked up after we made our own way home in the form of a massive football match - Chile vs. Colombia. Chile won 4-2 which meant that qualified for the World Cup next year (first time since 1998). Mass partying in the streets ensued!! We couldn't believe our luck that we had been in Rio for the Olympic announcement and in Chile for these celebrations. We were overwhelmed by the passion that the people exuded as they all stormed the streets waving the flag and singing songs. They shut down most of the main streets to cars as there were just so many people and those streets that weren't shut down had cars driving down crammed with people and flags and hooting like crazy. Our unplanned timing has proved to be even more impeccable in that we will be in Argentina this week when they play their qualifying match for the World Cup on Wednesday. I sense another mass celebration on the horizon!!

We had dinner that night in Bellavista, a charismatic area dotted with lots of bars and restaurants. We couldn't resist it when we walked past Venezia - we had to join Venetia in Venetia to accompany our being chilly in Chile - haha... It was an awesome local restaurant where more steaks were enjoyed except for Georgie and Lara who decided to try the chicken instead. Note to self - don't choose option Venezia special if this ever appears in future as it means lots of peas on top of the chicken - hmmm, not too sure about that one. We are however all in mutual consensus though that the salsa they serve before dinner in Chile with bread is absolutely amazing - just enough of a kick in it to keep one wanting more!

On Sunday, we got to do our much-awaited wine tour. And although it sounds cheesy to say, it truly was a dream realized to attend a winery of one of our favourite wines in London, Cailldo de Diablo at the Concho y Toro winery. It was a mission getting out there and we surprised ourselves that we even found it after venturing out on the local bus system (no more being tricked by tourist buses for us!). The estate was absolutely stunning -it was founded in 1883 by a wealthy Chilean diplomat who brought some vines back from France and started it just as a summer house. It soon grew into a huge enterprise and now they are the biggest importer of wine in South America. The tour was the perfect length - very informative and we got to walk around part of the vineyard and see the barrels where the wine matures. We then learnt about the legend of Casillo de Diablo - the story goes that the family used to keep their own stash of best wine in their cellar and when they noticed that it was going missing, they spread a rumour around the town that the devil ('diablo') inhabited the cellar. This proved successful in keeping the locals away and the belief is still held by many local people today. The tour ended off with us being able to sample 2 of their best wines which went down a treat and then lunch which was the best lasagne ever!

We made it back from our tour just in time to pack up and leave for our next adventure - Mendoza, Argentina here we come!

Photo Albums:

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=329872&id=713415257&l=42f79b2557
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=329873&id=713415257&l=854a9e5e72
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=329875&id=713415257&l=4b234c43bb
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=329878&id=713415257&l=258f11c9ed
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=329880&id=713415257&l=511adb8244