Vina del Mar to Santiago, 80 miles

It was an easy ride back to Santiago in the sun. I’m glad we decided to stay another day in Vina, even if it was at “Chifa” (what we’ve named our hotel there). We pulled back into Santiago and began looking for the Acecargo office we were at two days before. Our plan was to find it, then find a place for ourselves in the same general vicinity, or at least near the same metro line so we could get back and forth easily.

We did the hotel shuffle for a bit, and ended up in the Paris Londres neighborhood. Its very nice here and the majority of the hotels are budget. I guess this used to be Franciscan Friar territories, with awesome homes built in the 1920s. It really is very pleasant. Unfortunately, our hotel isn’t. We had to settle on the only one of 4 that would allow us to park our moto inside. And boy was it a pain shoe-horning it in the front door, and then around two tight corners into its own room deep in the house. The idiot hotel employee brought me a piece of sheetrock two use as a ramp for the 3 steps out front. I mean really…. Sheetrock? Are you kidding? He wasn’t…

We struck out to do some shopping in order to prepare us for the next leg of the trip. We visited the central station shopping area and the Mall de Centro near Plaza de Armas. The central station shopping area felt like we were in Latin America again. Lots of graffiti, beggars and buscars, Pirate CD vendors, imitation gear, pickpockets (one tried me), etc.

The pickpocket attempted went something like this. Amie and I were walking through the crowd with our arms around each other. Two guys approached from behind and one bumped into me pretty good. I had my wallet deep in my front pocket turned so the wide side was perpendicular to my leg, basically as deep and as difficult to get out as possible. He then proceeded, dramatically to distract me by yelling and gesturing that I bumped into him and hurt him, or knocked his drink on him or something. While I was assessing the situation, his partner was hovering me from behind very closely trying to make the grab. Amie and I didn’t miss a beat, I kept my arm around her, ignored both of them, put my other hand in my pocket and pressed on. The two start shouting at us, but we just ignored them.

From what we saw today, our mind hasn’t changed on Chile. Not that great a country. Very American feeling, very expensive, not that clean, not that friendly. The only place we really like here was Torres del Paine, and that’s a natural park—hard for humans to screw that up.

Leaving Vina del Mar - Clear skies

A view of Valpariso

Driving through Santiago...the hotel shuffle

I sure wouldn't want that job

Yosh awaiting her parking spot

What a pain it was to get her in here!

Thumbs down to pushy people and pickpocketers!