Santiago Chile

For those wondering, my stomach did not do well on the flight to Santiago.  However, by the time we arrived the medicine had kicked it and I was feeling better. Our time in Santiago was going to be spent with friends.  Over the years Matt has kept in touch with his first missionary companion and has become good friends with his whole family. This is actually Matt’s 5th time visiting Chile and my 2nd.  Matt and I came together almost 20 years ago in October 2005. Our friends -Alejandro and his sister-in-law, Naomi were waiting for us at the airport. 

When we got to their home Naomi fixed an amazing dinner while we all got settled in. We spent the rest of the evening, just sitting around the table enjoying each other‘s company.

After a nice relaxing morning, we headed out with Alejandro his daughter Mariapaz.  We went to an area of Santiago called Los Dominicos. This area was an old pueblo that was now a traditional craft market. 

We spent time walking around the stores and had a nice lunch of empanadas.  It was hot, but there was a lot of shade.  

Bonsai tree exhibit 

Riding on the merto

On Sunday after a breakfast of fresh bread and avocados (the traditional breakfast and “once”, Alejandro’s niece Vicky and her husband Smiljan came to take us on an excursion for the day. They drove us all around Santiago showing us different cool areas Asha the diversity of Santiago. Then we visited the Baha’i temple. The temple is set up on the hill at the edge of Santiago. The view from the temple of the city was incredible. It was a very hot day, however, and climbing up all the stairs to get to the temple was very hot.

After visiting the temple, we drove about an hour away to a Pueblo called Ponaire where they had a traditional craft market.  However, our main reason for being there was a restaurant that they really wanted to take us to called San Antonio Casa de Campo. This restaurant had a lot of traditional Chilean dishes. It was a really cool restaurant. They had a bunch of plants hanging from the ceiling and had traditional singing and dancing that we watched while we ate. The food was delicious. We stuffed ourselves. We had empanadas and Chilean soapapillas. Matt and Vicky had a traditional dish called pastel de choclo and I had ribs and of course, Papas Fritas or french fries. We also got to try a couple Chilean drinks. Matt has had his Chilean pisco sour and I had something that Vicky picked out for me. I think it was called vaina. Anyhow, it was delicious just like everything else at the restaurant. 

By the time we got back to the house, we were exhausted and called it an early night.

On Monday we got to hang out with Anna Maria and Mariapaz. They had a great day planned for us.  We began by taking the metro to San Christobal.  Then we took a bus up to the top. Sadly on Mondays the funicular and tram are closed so we couldn’t take either of those up.  There was a group of LDS missionaries on the bus to the top with us.  We got to stop and chat with them for a while. That was fun.  The view of Santiago from the top of the hill was pretty impressive. It was fun just to walk around the area for a while. Matt walked a little higher up to the statue of the Virgin Mary while the rest of us were more than content to sit in the shade and rest for a bit.  It was a very hot day-mid 90’s.  

Next, we took a bus to the tallest building in Santiago, Constanera Center. With 62 stories, it is the tallest building in South America. The first six floors of this building are filled with a gigantic mall. We had a yummy fast food lunch in the mall food court (not at one of the American places though like McDonald’s, Taco Bell, KFC or Burger King). Then, it was to the top of the building we went.  Naomi’s son, Sergio, works at the observation floor so he was able to show us around. The observation floor is floor 61 and the floor 62 is open at the top. Talk about amazing views! Goodness Santiago is a large sprawling city. 

When we got back to the house, Naomi had another lovely dinner ready for us. Goodness we have eaten well here. Then it was another night just talking with each other. 

Tuesday morning we got up and drove to the airport to pick up a rental car for our next adventure.  When we got back to the house, Alejandro’s sister Beby and her daughter were at the house to visit us. We had tried to visit her the day before but ran out of time. While we were all chatting I happened to pull up a photo we had taken when we were visiting the family 19 years ago. We stayed at the same home all those years ago.  When Naomi saw the photo she laughed because she still had that traditional dress.  We decided a photo recreation was necessary.  Hummmm, think we look just a bit different (a few more pounds on me). 

All too soon it was time to say goodbye to Beby, Josefa, and Naomi to begin our roadtrip with Alejandro and Mariapaz to Algarobo-the beach town where Alejandro’s brother lives.