Santiago

So we arrived nice and early in Santiago, and after having to take a wee wander to find Sarah's rucksack (someone had removed it from the carousel), we ignored the usual taxi hustlers outside arrivals, I got out some local money from an ATM and we hopped on the local bus to the city. From there we hopped on the metro (which is brilliant in Santiago, although often very crowded), for a couple of stops and then checked in to our cosy hostel.

At first, as usual when you arrive in a new country, you have no idea what a good price is for things, so initially I thought our room was quite expensive, but the place was lovely, so we took it for the first night. It turned out to be a fantastically good price in fact, as every other place we checked out was significantly more expensive, and nowhere nearly as good a location. This was all very convenient, because we ended up staying there for the best part of two weeks.

Most of this time was to allow Sarah to complete a 6 day beginners course in Spanish, consisting of an intensive 20 hours. Again we were in low season, but of course that provides many advantages - in this case, very small class sizes for Sarah, often having the teacher all to herself - i.e. private lessons.

Each night we'd eat out and stroll around, and I really liked Santiago - it has a brilliantly lively feel to it, with loads of funky restaurants and bars, and everyone seems to eat out too, which was something missing in many places we'd visited. All the food we had was great, although we did both have a bit of tummy-trouble for one night after eating in one of the city's better restaurants (only the second time for the whole trip so far, the other time being Kenya).

When Sarah was in classes I'd stroll about the city, checking out the museums, galleries, parks and hills (including going up the cable car to San Cristobal Hill which I'd done with Hanno 8 years ago, and which has great views over the whole city and the snowcapped Andes mountains).

One of the afternoons, as I was having a wee rest and a read of the guidebook in the huge main cathedral, the place started to fill up, and then a big 'show' started (I had no idea what was going on, it all being in Spanish). Basically about 300 priests walked two abreast up along the length of the church and congregated on the ´stage´, followed shortly thereafter by a procession of the big-wigs, including what I assume was the bishop or arch-bishop, who was all very grand, solemn and very important-looking of course. Then what seemed a fairly typical catholic mass kicked off and I left shortly after, not understanding a word of what was going on. But I was strongly struck by the pomp and ceremony, the solemn self-importance of it all, and especially the fact that not a single women was involved in the entire procession - something just felt very wrong and sexist to me about that single fact. The choir singing before and during all this was truly mesmerising though, so it wasn't all bad!

When Sarah's course was finished we had a day trip to the coastal town of Valparaiso. It's a funny town really, as the Lonely Planet rightly points out. Downtown is grim and grimmy, and not a little threatening, especially at night. But up in the neighbouring hills (where we stayed for one night), was a really charming district with brilliant little higgledy-piggedly streets and lots of individualistic cafes, bars and restaurants - and of course great views of the town below and the sea.

But we only decided to stay the one night, as the town is quite small, and you can walk around it quite quickly. So the next day we got the local bus to the next town up the coast, Vina del Mar. This is Valparaiso's much cleaner and greener neightbour, but of course it lacks the distinctive character of the the former's hill districts.

We spent the morning and early afternoon strolling around pretty Vina del Mar, checking out some of the lovely gardens, the impressively modern casino and hotel, a restored colonial house (in a very opulent French style, but disgustingly gaudy and ostentatous I thought - how did people actually feel 'superior' living in these places back in the day?).

When we got back to Valparaiso we headed back up to the main hill district for a fancy lunch at a highly recommended restaurant run by a 'mad' French guy. The city is littered with loads of cool old lifts and funiculars to help people get up the many hills, and so of course we took the funicular. The restaurant was packed, and we had to wait a few minutes in the short queue outside, but we were soon seated. It actually turned out to be another disappointment really, but apparently the chef is notorious for experimentation, and maybe we just happened to arrived for one of his not-so-successful experiments.

Strolling back to the bus station to get our bus back to Santiago we passed a place the guidebook highly recommended, and after peeking my head in the door, I was mighty disappointed we hadn't had lunch there instead of the French place - it too was packed, but seemed to have a fantastic atmosphere and a completely mental interior decorator - loads of glass shelves packed with trival and tacky bits and bobs.

I also took a wee detour to check out one of the more usual escalators in the town, the Polonia. You pay your few cents and walk through a long horizontal tunnel to a lift, which then ascends straight up (I think all the other escalators move up steep slopes), straight up through the solid rock of the hill, and then up through a square tower. You get out at the top of the tower to great views, and walk along a gangway to the hill district itself. It seemed a rather run-down area (well, very run-down in fact), and so we didn't linger long before walking straight back down the hill to where we'd started, and then straight to the bus station to head back to Santiago.

Next morning we got to bus to Argentina - first stop, the wine region of Mendoza.