The longest entry of all time...

The longest entry of all time...

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Santiago, Chile

I�ve decided to take on the task of recapping 3 weeks in one log. I know, it sounds crazy....some say it can�t be done...but I say it can!
(Sorry to repeat some info. to... but since I was lame and my emails haven�t been going out to everyone I decided to start from the beginning again. Feel free to skim!)

Although I am alone now, my travels began with my sister. For those of you who know me well, you know that I love my sister to death, and think that I never get to spend enough time with her. Well, Chile means two weeks of traveling together...exciting!

I began in the city that I am current ally in...Santiago. Santigo is a huge capitol (home of over 6 million people). Santiago has lots of little cute parks (with hills and zoos and gondolas and incredible views of the city). The first day is full of exploring.

All seems to be going well as I begin the first night. I decide to reorganize my bag, and then I realize what a complete MORAN I am. I was really stressed when packing but decided that I shouldn�t worry about it. Things are cheaper in Chile than they are in the US, so if I forget anything I can just buy it here for cheap, right? Well, that sounds like it would work, unless the thing you forget is your ATM card!!! Yea, thats right, when leaving the country for four months I did not bring a way to get money. Smart, huh? I want to freak out, but remember the one thing of advise that my sister told me before traveling. �Things will go wrong when you travel, count on it. Things will get lost, things will get stolen, you�ll get homesick. Just don�t go crying home everytime some little thing happens�. Well, I�m proud to say I didn�t freak out and cry (although this could just be because my sis was there to help me). I called home and found out yes, my ATM card was sitting snugly in my wallet that I decided to not take with me, great!
Don�t worry, I�m not currently begging for money on the streets of Chile. Carolyn (as always) saved the day and I�m taken care of. Assuming my package doesn�t get lost in the mail, I�ll be okay!

Before leaving Santiago I convinced Carolyn to go skiing with me. Let me tell you, the mountains had possibly one of the best views that I�ve ever seen before, it was almost spiritual. After a private lesson, we went down the practically empty slopes, white all around us, looking at tons of dark brown, snow-capped mountains with clouds hovering overhead, while spots of sunlight shown through them. Amazing!

Well, a few days later I found that the mountains were not the only breathtaking things in Chile. Two hours north, the cites of Valparaiso and Vi�a del Mar (connected) were awesome as well! It�s cool that both cities are right on the water. We went horseback riding one afternoon for four hours, and it was soo incredible! We started out in the mountains, rode to tons of huge sand dunes, galloped on the beach, rode by a river, and then hearded cattle on the way back up the mountain. Yea, thats right...Herding cattle. That�s something I never thought I�d do (but so fun and easy!)

Next was a trip to a very non-touristy town. We tried to work for Habitat for Humantiy (building houses for underprivileged families) but we could�t since it rained :( Kind of sad that our one volunteering thing didn�t work out, but at least we tried!

The next and final city together was Mendoza, Argentina. Man, Argentina is cool, I definetly hope I get to come back sometime. I thought Chile was cheap before, but I�m learning that it�s SUPER expensive compared to all the countries around it. Argentina�s economy crashed recentally, so it was ridiculous how inexpensive it was. REALLY good steaks were like less than four dollars. I could really get used to that type of living...

When making it back to Santiago I was SO sad to see Carolyn go! I knew that I�d have fun traveling alone, but I remember thinking, :if only I could fly back home to Cali and until my program starts, that�d be great: It was so weird to feel so alone in such a big country that is so far from home! Luckily, the sadness passed and I survived!

Hope you�re still with me, you�re half way there!!! Now begins part two of my trip.

I flew up to the most northern city (Arica) right after Carolyn left. The town is known for good waves, so I decided I had to surf some for myself. Well, it was fun, but I learned that surfing while the sun goes down isn�t the best for two reasons. 1.It gets cold! 2. The waves are definetly NOT at their prime. I am still super glad I went though. (And don�t worry, I did�t go by myself! I met a Peruvian that day at the museum that told me a lot about the history of Arica...Bolivia, Peru, and Chile all fought over it through the years. Of course, the US got involved when some people thought they shouldn�t and pissed people off, BIG SURPRISE. But yea, anyway, I went with him and a instructor, so I was safe!

Next was the most toursity city that I�ve ever seen in my life, San Pedro de Atacama. All the city is a few restaurants, hotels, stores, and tour companies in the middle of the desert over like one square mile. Not much to see, but there�s a lot of cool tours to go on from there. I went on one that was hiking up a huge sand dune to watch the sun set over mountains (which turns the mountains red). It was really pretty! I also went sandboarding with an instructor (the fact that this involves hiking up sand dunes a lot...hard work...and putting wax on the bottom of you board EVERY time makes this not the best sport ever). My favorite trip out of San Pedro was a 3 night trip to Bolivia. We drove around in jeeps and saw a ton of georgous scenery (and I took like 5 rolls of film). The first hotel was shitty with non running water (flushing the toilet involved dumping a jug of water in it to push the other water down...doesn�t work) and not really electricity. The second night we staying in a hotel made completely out of salt, so that was a LOT cooler. I got a little homesick on the trip, but it was fun!

After San Pedro was my favorite city, Iquiqui. This beach city was SO cute. I wanted to go paragliding there (it�s known for great paragliding) but I was too chicken/thought it wasn�t smart to do it alone. Next time! I did see the coolest beach ever though (with palm trees, cactus, llamas, seals, turtles, alligators, and other little exhibits right in the sand.). I also went to the casino there....SO fun to be old enough to gamble! If you guys are ever in Chile, I definetly recommend checking out Iquique!

Well, these are all of the cities that I�ve see. After that I went up to Arica to fly down to Santiago(which was a scary bus ride back to Arica because on a mountain we passed a totaled bus that looked just like ours but was SO smashed up...it looked like it had rolled down the hill.....NOT comforting).

Although snowboarding in Santiago wasn�t the best (I met up with a girl that lives in Chile that studied abroad at Davis last year) it was still nice to see the snow. However, there was SO much snow that the road to the resort was pretty much blocked, and we got up there in time to go down a run like twice and the come back. SO frustrating! (and expensive for only 2 runs!) My day today in Santiago was really fun. I hung out with the EAP people that are currentally studying in Santiago. THis made me SUPER excited for my program to start.

I fly down to Concepcion in a few hours. This means my month of traveling is over. I pretty much survived. I kinda of feel like my vacation is over, and I should be going back to Davis, but I`m also really excited for what lies ahead. I hope my family is cool and I hope I meet fun people! I can hardly wait for the program to start on the 9th!

So that�s it; a short view of my traveling ( tried to condense it!!!) For those of you who made it through the whole thing, I hope I didn�t bore you too much, and I hope to hear from you!

Hope you�re all having a great time, wherever you may be. Ciao!

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