Arriving early in the morning to Valparaiso on a cloudy day after a 23 hour bus ride, one would expect that my first impression of the city would not be favorable. However, once we decided that we wanted to stay on one of the many hills which provide the backdrop for the city, we hopped in a cab and began driving down fabulous palm lined boulevards, passing european style monuments, and weaving our way up the steep hills into the brightly colored, corrugated metal metal buildings that give Valparaiso its charm and gave me the enthusiasm to want to explore. The neighborhood we in which we stayed was called Cerro Concepcion, and it was lined with two and three story, corrugated metal buildings painted in various shades of yellow, green, blue, purple, and red. The streets were paved with cobblestones, and the buildings alternated between atisans' shops (where they were actually making the various pieces), Bed and Breakfasts, and quaint cafes.One shocking aspect of this quaint little place on top of the hill overlooking the city and the harbor below was the amount of grafiti. One would suspect that the grafiti would detract from the ambiance of such a picturesque place, but the opposite was true. The neighborhood seemed to embrace the grafiti artists and encouraged a good extent of it. However, most of the grafiti was unlike that in America; where it is normally just someone's name or something profane scribbled on the wall. These were fantastic grafiti murals that took you to other lands and worlds. The turn of every corner was exciting because you wondered whether it would be a scene of Valparaiso, a funny cartoon, or a picture of another world. It was not hard to see why the famous Chilean poet, Pablo Neruda, made his home here. The whole experience of the picturesque coastal city set at the base of several hills, the funicular railroads that acted as elevators to lift people to the hills, the extremely creative and talented grafiti artists, and of course, the nice temperatures actually inspired me for the first time to renew my old talents in art. So, I went and bought a pad and some utensils and sat out with the college students on the main avenue sketching the enormous palm trees, cafes, and people walking by. Connected with Valparaiso is another city called Viña del Mar. This place is more like Naples, FL or Boca Raton. It is full of large condos, expensive mansions, and five star hotels and restaurants. We decided to make a trip over there for one day to play at the beach and celebrate my brother's birthday. It was a beautiful day and the long, golden sanded beached were lined with the upper class from Santiago and elswhere, and we strolled down the beach a few kilometers to the end with the intention of moving on to Reñaca, another beach town. However, we found a small cove along the way past the main stretch that had a restaurant and was filled with the locals of the area and decided to stay. The beach culture there is interesting because they have small restaurants along the beach that put tables and chairs out in the sand, and the people sit around these tables eating all day till the sun goes down. Then, they leave the beach and go directly to eat and drink more at the restaurants just off from the beach. In short, they have an extremely relaxed local culture...not to mention this was a Wednesday! As you can tell, I thoroughly enjoyed my experience in Valparaiso. So much so that we extended our time there by three days, and would have probably done more if we did not have a flight out of Santiago. The art, the vibrant city, the people we met, and the culture we experienced were enough to warrant a second trip there. From Valparaiso, we are traveling to Santiago for one day and then head out to the mystical land at the bottom of the world, Patagonia. Till next time, Cheers.