Wed/Thurs/Fri – 22/23/24.10.14 – Santiago – Sydney – Melbourne – Moe.

Up at about 6.45, fiddled and blogged and packed and blogged, showered and breakfasted and checked out and blogged, then final pack, bags taken away and down to the lobby at 10am for taxi to the airport for our 1.35pm flight. Arrived and checked in by 11.00.

Costanera centre, with sun
shining behind.

Morning view, farewell Santiago.

The Metro station.

Drinking the last of new fave drink
before we go through security. 

Waiting in a queue. God airports are
the biggest waste of time. Passing
through Chilean immigration.

We both had remaining Chilean Pesos burning a whole in our wallets, so we parted at duty free, to meet later in the lounge. I blogged again and when Suzie arrived I went to spend the very last of the Peso’s.

Boarded at 12.55ish – oh boy I could get used to turning left onto the plane rather than right. Plenty of room, no worries with overhead lockers, you basically have you own, no jostling for room near your seat. Set up devices to charge and generally phaffed around. We have received our PJ’s and amenities bag with freebies kit and socks, oh and I almost forgot our Champas. Selfies done and dusted, good to go. Our hostie is Lionel and he is lovely. Aussie papers have just arrived, getting all the goss on Gough and that poor kid with ISIS. Have had a little facebook news, but really no time to go into things deeper. I think we turned a TV on twice…

On board and champagne in hand.

Plenty of room.

Leg room galore.

PJ's on and ready to go. It's great, your clothes don't
get all wrinkled and yuk.

It’s weird to hear the Aussie accent of the Captain and crew and to stop saying Gracias etc. We have had an announcement 5-10 minutes delayed due to a technical glitch in the cockpit. Given the delay, we have donned the PJ’s and Captain has just announced, replacement of part did not fix the problem – now in discussions with maintenance team here and staff back in Sydney – another delay, but at least we are comfortable. I am ready the Australian which is broadsheet…and I can! Time for another Champagne.

2pm, now 25 minutes delayed and technical hitch still not fixed. Latest announcement that as part of troubleshooting process they are going to shut down the electrical system for a short while. I’m just sucking up this business class, after our last 9 flights have been in economy, which makes you appreciate this more.

2.20pm problem sorted with the reboot, just like any technological problem, when in doubt, shut down and start again…same with planes it seems. Still 15-20 minutes till we can go, will be late into Sydney, despite trying to make up time on the flight.

Finally off the ground about an hour late.

Lots of smog over Santiago, but some interesting farmland patchwork and great clouds over the coast…enough room here to have big camera out, takes a much better picture through the window than I thought it would.

Taking pics, cos I could. Some of the planes at
Santiago airport.

Air Mexico tail.

Lionel, doing the safety stuff, he looked after us
very well.

Turning onto the runway.

That pink colour is a pigface looking plant,
brilliant pink from above.

Little boxes in a pattern.

Smog over the valley and Santiago, snow capped
Andes in the background.

Flying over the Chilean coast.

Great patterns on the ground.

Amazing cloud patterns over the
Chilean coast.

More cloud patterns.

Ordered our lunch and light dinner.

LUNCH:

• Prawn Salad with tofu, shredded cabbage, ginger and shallot dressing.
• Roast pork with slow cooked capsicums, pan fried polenta and spinach.
• Selection of cheeses served with accompaniments.

LIGHT DINNER:

• Lamb shepherds pie.
• Caramelised banana cheesecake with mango sauce.

Had a bit of a sleep after watching The Bucket List, then some podcasts and snoozing, woke to watch Frozen, then a slightly longer snooze, before waking up. Nice cuppa tea from Lionel, then he mentioned we were flying over NZ, really clear view of the mountainous terrain and some snow capped peaks. I think we were flying over the North end of the South Island, not many cities to be seen at all.

Flying over NZ.

It’s getting a bit tricky now 2.10am for our bodies, but it’s 4.10pm at home, so need to stay awake in order to sleep when we finally make it to Melbourne.

Touched down in Sydney at 6.45pm (4.45am in Santiago) So almost 14 hours on the plane.

Off and into pick us Suzie’s duty free and grab last minute bits. Bags are getting really heavy now, but we are almost done. Sydney was hot, very hot, air con was not coping. The luggage carousel was terrible, way too small for the large plane, the bags were jammed in and really hard to lift off.

The Heads at Sydney.

The Bridge.

Bridge, Opera House and Darling
Harbour.

Sydney city.

Into customs where we both had things to declare, two different guys, I got mine through, Suzie lost her some of hers.

Then the pain of moving via bus from International terminal to domestic terminal, still hot.

Our last plane was a pretty old one, a bit crappy comparatively, but still business class, so at least a bit more room.

Keith is coming to pick us up in Aunty Sue’s new car. Going to be a tight squeeze with all our luggage, we reckon, but photos have been sent so Keith can work out the logistics.

Off the plane after a bit of a delay in terms of traffic congestion at the airport, but we think we were out to meet Keith about 10.45 and home to St Kilda about 11.20.

A big hello to the dogs then make up my bed and hit the hay.

So it really is all over, I now have the day in Melbourne, plans to catch up with Bronwyn and Mike and Mike’s Dad, Colin, who arrived in Australia the day after we left, he leaves soon, so taking the opportunity to meet him. Then Sue and Emma are coming down and we are off to Les Mis, before heading home to Moe tonight.

Managed to stay awake for BOTH
acts.

Out of theatre and into car about 10.45, home to Moe just before midnight I think.

Got the luggage in and dumped, Snug and Aero were busy snoozing, seemed happy enough to see me. Janine has done a magnificent job of house and pet sitting. So considerate, she had left a coffee scroll and other food for my breaky etc tomorrow, just lovely.

Dumped the luggage. Bonded
with the critters.

Got the clothes out and soaking in the bath.

First load on and a load that Janine had done out
on the line.

Picked some roses, had a cuppa -mmmmm. Real
teapot tea, gotta love my T2 French Earl Grey.

Finally into bed a bit after 2am, but feeling better for having made a start on the unpack.

And now it's back to reality, with time to reflect and absorb over the weeks and months ahead.

Tuesday 21.10.14 – Santiago, morning walking tour.

Up and out from breaky about 9.00 this morning to hit the metro to catch the Tour for Tips Wally morning walking tour.

It was quite warm early when we left the hotel. The metro was decidedly busy both this morning and yesterday morning. Luckily we were travelling against the flow.

All those people spewing out from the Metro.

Max our Wally guide arrived and promptly chatted with one of the Kiltra (stray dogs) and then fed "princess" a pouch of dog food. He was lovely with her.

We found some shade to sit in while waiting for tour start at 10 .15.

Taking some time in the shade to write the journal.
© Suzie Sloan.

Waiting for the tour to start. © Suzie Sloan.

We learnt about the diverse range of architecture due to terramoto - earthquakes. Buildings wrecked and replaced with new styles. So many periods within one area.

Here's Max, plus the tour dogs
who joined us for the start of the
tour, Princess on the left. The
other Wally was a tourism student
learning the ropes.

This other dog, followed up all the
way through the markets and left
us as we went onto the Metro.

We visited the fish market and farmers market. All on the chimbre? side - the other poorer side of the river.

We tried sopaipilla’s (Pumpkin fritters) and very nice it was too. Also learnt a bit about the Nobel prize winner Pablo Neruda and a visit he made to the workers (10 000) of the market. He didn't prepare a speech, as he thought he would be walking around chatting to people. So when they had a podium set up he read some of his poetry and then froze, there was silence for several minutes, before the audience were seen crying. No Chilean celebrity or anyone of importance had ever given these workers the time of day. They were so touched that he took time out. These folk from the 'other side of the river' are very generous and help out the poor and down and out.

Typical fish shop in market.

Conga eel.

Barnacles, the contents were
crushed and sold as a natural
aphrodisiac.

The roof of the market, which
also held a number of pretty fancy
restaurants.

A couple of spires.

A smaller cafe in the market.

Getting some further explanation, our dog guide is
still with us.

Dried puffer fish.

Translates to something like "After God there is
La Vega" (which is the name of the market) Max
explained it as meaning the workers in La Vega,
will take care of those who
God does not.

Artichokes

Liked the bags in the market.

A cat amongst the advocado.

Fungi.

Another dog looking down from
upper storey window.

Then caught the metro to Cementarios where we visited the general Cemetery. Lots of poor and rich mausoleums and nichos.

The metro.

These 'trains' run on tyres.

Looking down onto the tracks.

Looking up to the statue on the hill.

Part of the cemetery.

Each of these nichos can contain up to 12 bodies.
This is the cheap part of the cemetery. Once a coffin
has been in there for five year, cemetery workers, will
remove the bones into a smaller container so another
coffin will fit in front.

The Military Mausoleum.

At the Cemetario we learnt about:

Animitas - people who were innocent and died in brutal way. Often children. Their nicho is filled with evidence of people who have  are asked for favour. If it happens the asker must return to the nicho and put a plaque at the grave of the animitas.

Animismo - keeping memories alive particularly of children whose graves are decorated with the celebration of the time. Another grave had bottles of beer and alcohol, empty on top. The wife came and had two bottles, one for him and one for her, something he liked to do in life...keeping the habits alive.

A nicho of an Animita.

Terramota (earthquake) damage. The mausoleums
are all private property and families are responsible
to repair any damage. Some are not repaired.

The Allende Gossens grave. He
was buried in Valparaiso and not
moved back until after the Pinochet
era.

An Aztec themed Mausoleum,
no Aztec history in the family,
they just tried to outdo the next
mausoleum.

Finished tour at a bar with a Terramoto cocktail.

We then trained it back to Baquedano station and Bellavista barrio for lunch and to find some silver shops.

On the Metro.

Finally found the river, we had
crossed somewhere this am.

Then Suzie returned to hotel to pack and I went in search of Very elusive birthday cards. Ended up at Costanera centre, which has a huge shopping centre, had a wander, bought Suzie an SD card reader for ipad (some amusement for airports and plane time), then eventually back to hotel, via a heladero shop.

The Costanera centre, the shopping
centre is the middle building.

Another river.

Statues in the forecourt of 'Sportinglife' building.

Another green wall, this was the
Intercontinental Hotel.

View from the room.

Did some packing and re arranging, before heading out to dinner around the corner, I was determined to go Chilean tonight so went for the Lomo o lo Pobre – basically a mixed grill, with steak, eggs, onion and chips followed by postres tres leches – a three milk dessert. All ok.

Our last evening meal on Chilean soil.

Then home to bed, that’s it for Chile, tomorrow we do the final pack and depart our hotel for airport at 10am.

What an adventure we've had!