Of course I ended up staying in Valparaiso for longer than planned, not that I really had a plan but I didn't think I'd end up staying 6 nights! On the Sunday having arrived at about 8am after the night bus I was keen to get out and explore and enjoy the lovely weather. I had seen a little bit of the local area while looking for a hostel, typically for me I hadn't booked a hostel…..being Easter Sunday morning quite a few places were full but luckily there were a few hostels in the area on Cerro Concepción so I did find a bed. Turned out to be pretty much a private room as though it called a dorm it was 2 interconnecting rooms with the entrance through my 'room'- even better for all but one night there was no-one in the other room!

Valparaiso is a Unesco World Heritage site and it's easy to see why. It's a beautiful city of hills (cerros) with old 19th-century houses and buildings, brightly coloured, some redecorated and/or refurbished, some looking their age. The best thing to do here is wandering around, looking and taking photos. There are stairs to get up and down the hills and old furniculars (kind of like big wooden boxes!) which date back to the start of 1900s. I tended to get the lifts (furniculars) up and walk down! From the hills you looked out to sea and also over the busy port and along the coast.

I had two or three of days wandering around, up and down hills, taking lots of photos of the different buildings and the street art of which there was a lot. It really is the kind of place where you can just get wander in its many streets and you see the same places from different perspectives around the city. You also notice different things walking the same route a second time so when I walked around with Matteo (from my hostel) one afternoon I saw things I hadn't noticed the first time!

I spent an afternoon at Vina del Mar which is about 20 minutes from Valparaiso- it has beaches (whereas as far as I know Valparasio doesn't) but it wasn't really a beach weather day when I went. That was ok though as I mostly just wanted to have a wander around and visit the museum which had an exhibition on Easter Island- a place I would not be visiting due to the cost of getting a flight there. I found out the Moai statues on the island range from 2 metres to 22 metres tall- that's huge! The museum was only small but had another couple of interesting exhibitions and upstairs a collection of stuffed animals, insects and butterflies. The most bizarre thing was a 2 headed lamb born in 1950, which only survived a week but is here stuffed in the museum. I had a walk then sat in a café by the sea before continuing the walk along the sea and getting the metro back to Valparaiso. Vina del Mar is a nice enough city but in comparison to Valparaiso is nowhere near as (visually) interesting, though it is probably a nice place to live.

The rest of my time in Valparaiso was spent hanging out with some nice people and doing cultural things, if we can count trying out the local food and drink as cultural!

I had previously met Matteo on my day trip of Torres del Paine in the south of Chile and there he was in my hostel in Valparaiso! One day his friends from Valparaiso kindly invited me to join them for typical food. It was a great afternoon- we went to this restaurant which was really local and authentic, not another tourist in sight! It wasn't the kind of place you'd find by yourself as it was up an alley, so I'm glad they could show it to us. We had a typical dish of 'Chorillana' which is chips with kind of scrambled egg and onion and meat- I had mine without the meat! The restaurant had lots of old 'stuff' and writing on the walls and tablecloth-of course I took the opportunity to draw my rabbit! :-) Afterwards we all went for a walk then later in the evening Matteo and I went out for a drink- to try the local drink 'terremoto'. Well, he had already had it with his friends but I wanted to try it! It's a drink of wine, a spirit called fernet and pineapple icecream. It came in a jug and you mix it all together. It sounds strange but is actually quite nice, though people warn that it is a strong drink! The bar was nice too, full of locals, even though it was a Wednesday night, with cool decor, especially the mobiles of origami type birds, the bar being called 'parajitos' (birds).

Thursday I got up late and decided not to leave, which turned out to be a good thing....Tom from Australia from the Navimag and who I had bumped into in Pucon arrived in Valparaiso and thanks to the wonder that is facebook I saw this and we arranged to meet up. A 2pm meet for coffee turned into an afternoon and evening out….firstly we ate a late lunch 'chorillana' again in the same restaurant as the day before- passing on my 'local knowledge' to Tom then we sat chatting for hours. Later we went for some 'terremoto', one jug turned into three, not such a good idea! This then meant I delayed my departure again for another day as I woke up late again! Oh well never mind, I really enjoyed my stay in Valparaiso, a lovely place, and hanging out with some lovely people :-)