Santiago and a Side Trip to Little San Francisco

Before we left on this trip, everyone we met raved about the buses in Chile and Argentina. After multiple bus rides all we can say is, really????? Clearly everyone is paid by the hour as it is extremely important that we go as slow as possible and stop for a good 45 minutes at each station, even in a town of 3,000 people. In addition we seem to always get the two seats that had to have been occupied by really messy eaters before us. Not just a few crumbs here and there, I would be surprised if any food actually made it into their mouths. Not that we are complaining, we have been on some bad buses over the past year, but bad usually equals entertaining. These buses can just get frustrating.

We bought a connecting bus ticket in El Bolson, taking us through Bariloche where we would change buses and continue on to Osorno, Chile where we were hoping to catch an overnight bus to Santiago. Our bus left El Bolson 30 minutes late, arriving in Bariloche late as well. We were worried about our connection time, but it turns out there was no need for that. When we went to check on the bus they told us it was an hour and a half late. So we waited….and waited. Turns out the bus was 4 hours late. When it finally showed we drove to the border, waited there for awhile and finally arrived in Osorno at 11:30pm. Luckily we were able to catch the last bus out of town at 11:50, and arrived in Santiago the following day at noon.

Our long travel day continued as we wandered around Santiago for 3 hours with our full packs on trying to find a hostel that had a bed open, turns out they were all full. As we sat on a street bench wondering what to do next a man approached us and told us about a new hostel in an unmarked building right behind us. We figured we had nothing to lose and checked it out. Not sure if it was really a hostel or someone who was just renting out one of their three bedrooms, but we ended up staying. With a place to sleep we were finally able to check out Santiago. We spent a lot of time walking around, touring the plazas, presidential palace and people watching. We also went on some long runs, exploring some of the many parks in the city. After 2 nights in Santiago we decided to head out to the port city of Valparaiso. We had two more return trips scheduled for Santiago and wanted to move on to something a little different.

Valparaiso definitely satisfied our interest in finding something new and different. It is a town of 250,000 people, just 2 hours away from Santiago and some call it “Little San Francisco” due to its physical attributes as well as the port traffic it received prior to the opening of the Panama Canal. I am not sure how much it resembled San Francisco, but we loved it. The city has loads of character. All of the housing is perched on steep hills and cliffs surrounding the port and there are funiculars (part elevator part cable car) that carry people up and down the inclines. The city has multiple cafes, restaurants and bars as well as open air graffiti museums and best of all, a running path directly on the water where the local dogs met us each morning to enjoy our runs with us. Most of the lodging options in town are unique, and ours did not disappoint, with wooden spiral staircases and a trapeze in the middle of the common hangout room. Valparaiso turned out to be a great place to experience some Chilean culture for a few days including really good but affordable Chilean wine!

We are now off to Patagonia, something we have been looking forward to since we started planning this trip. There is a certain sense of solitude and adventure that comes to mind when you hear the word Patagonia. We will update on the journey when we get the chance.