We descended.

Our ears popped.

Palm trees appeared, followed by houses on steep hills.

Then the bus pulled into the bus station. We'd arrived in Valparaiso!

We exited the bus station onto a busy street full of vendors. Right away, something about the city made me hyper-aware. Nervous, even. But we kept moving. Although tempted by the street empanadas, we focused on finding our way to the center of town. The internet said to look for the 505 bus. Luckily, Bex spotted it! A mini-bus. We threaded our way through the people and boarded.

I asked in my mediocre Spanish if the bus went to Plaza Sotomayor (a name I easily memorized thanks to a certain supreme court justice) and he gave me the thumbs up. For 410 Chilean pesos each (about sixty cents), we boarded. Lots of seats were available, but they were all scraped up, as if someone tried to remove the graffiti. About ten minutes later, we arrived at the plaza, which was fenced and under construction, so we couldn't actually go in. So we headed toward the water, which we could see a few blocks away.

Happily, the clouds were moving away and the day was looking nice!

The waterfront was filled with tourists, concrete, pigeons, and boats, and was not particularly photogenic. We purchased postcards, said hello to the street dogs, and stopped by the tourist center where a girl who looked barely older than a teenager gave us map and pointed out the places we asked about. On our way back to the street, we had to say "No, gracias" to people selling us stuff. Interestingly, they didn't try any English. Either they don't know it (indeed, even the tourist center ladies struggled) or our skin color doesn't peg us as Americans. Yeah, probably the former.

But the empanada street vendor spoke English! We bought a huge chicken-and-cheese from her. Yum.

We passed a friendly-looking coffee shop and went in, partly for a beverage, partly for the facilities. Loved this place! Felt like home! The ladies who ran PaniniCafe were tattooed and pierced (which seems less the norm here) and friendly. I got a pineapple smoothie for $2.50. After we used their tiny little toilet (with paper towels as TP), we sat and planned, noting that almost all the patrons walking in were foreign like us (or looking for a bathroom, like us).

While I sipped my smoothie, my grandmother called, a nice surprise. She was worried about bothering me at work and I had the delight to inform her I was actually on the coast of Chile.

After we were fed and watered, we headed out in search of a...

...funicular.

I'd never heard of a funicular before I researched this trip, but these are apparently a thing in steep cities. Valparaiso has several. We headed toward the oldest (1883) one, which was in walking distance.

Luckily, there was no line. We paid 300 pesos, walked through the turnstile, were joined by one other passenger, and then the creaky, wooden rail car started up the steep hillside.

The views back to the waterfront through the smudged windows were gorgeous.

Several minutes later, we reached the top!

Only, there isn't much up here. Just houses. So, after consulting the map, we turned around and walked right back down. We enjoyed the street back not only because of its narrowness, curviness, and steepness (how do cars make it up here?) but also because it was our first example of the main thing Valparaiso is known for:

Street art.

Santiago's walls have some murals, but are mostly covered in graffiti. Here, it's the opposite. While Valparaiso has its share of graffiti, no question, art is everywhere. This city is a gallery.

And it's amazing.

We even saw some art in action, artists in progress. I wonder how the logistics of street art work. After my time here, I'm certain that no blank surface is left in any Chilean city. Do they paint over old or ugly art? Who decides what is old or ugly? Is it legal or, at least, overlooked?

We walked back toward the Plaza Sotomayor looking for... you guessed it... another funicular! In general, funiculars both lead to cool neighborhoods and are (cheap) tourist attractions in and of themselves. Worth tracking down. We enjoyed the art as we walked the several blocks back. (Didn't enjoy as much this one creepy, empty block where our eyes suddenly started burning as if the area was filled with remnants of tear gas - yikes. More graffiti than art. Did not feel safe. But sensation disappeared the next block.)

Despite the map showing the funicular to be right along the plaza, it was hard to find! I had to use my (very) mediocre Spanish to ask a random vendor. I heard the word "edificio" (building) so I looked at the buildings along the perimeter.

Turned out we had to go through a not-largely-labeled doorway among the buildings into a sorta-spooky-looking alley, but it did lead straight to the funicular turnstile!

It was a bit surreal, the attendant standing at the end of the corridor, waiting to take our small payment of 100 pesos.

The funicular itself was quite nice. Much newer than the last one! The wood-paneled interior looked recently refurbished. It filled to its 9-person capacity and up we went!

This time we stayed at the top which had a cute, colorful neighborhood and much fewer people (most of them tourists.)

At this cool platform, we admired the views. Seriously, Valparaiso has some beautiful views. You think I'm posting a lot of photos? You should see how many I DIDN'T post. Couldn't stop taking them. I bought some art (and a fridge magnet) from nearby street vendors, displaying their wares on rugs on the hot stone. Not sure why these called my name, but they did.

We wandered around the neighborhood. At one point, we walked past a tour group, so we knew we must be in a good spot. On a whim, we walked into an art shop and gallery because we liked the sign on the door.

Being the only customers was a boon. The proprietor was friendly and turned out to speak near-perfect English because he'd lived in California. He offered to show us the view from the balcony. Yay! He said "these houses lie" because from the entrance, it looked like a one-level store on the ground floor, even with the road.

But from the balcony, this is what we saw:

Bex bought a print. Further up the neighborhood, I found a little shop selling glassware and made another purchase, wondering if I could get it all the way through the rest of my trip and home without it breaking. (I was already attempting to bring the wine glass from the vineyard home. Yikes.) But, they made it:

More wandering followed, vaguely looking for a way to get back down to sea level. On the way, we re-applied sunscreen, kept hydrated, and enjoyed the colorful houses and gorgeous street art!

We were soon at the bottom, back in the thick of things. More people, more street dogs (cats, too), and more a sense of unease. Though we spotted a lady feeding a dog and smiled at each other. Chileans are good to their city dogs.

Our next destination: Pablo Neruda's house (one of three in Chile). Pablo Neruda, a famous poet and diplomat, also commissioned unique, colorful, and beautiful houses. They're all museums now.

So we went in search for a taxi...

Right after we had the thought, a taxi drove down from the hill, lit up and open. I hailed it and off we went. His house wasn't super far (a couple miles maybe). We paid 3,000 for the taxi (about $5) and 7,000 to get into Pablo's house.

And... no photographs allowed except for the outside (or looking outside). So this is all ya get:

I'd been hoping a well-attended tourist destination like this would break my 20,000 bill. But, alas, they didn't. I find that in many countries, the bills you get out of ATMs are too large for most vendors to deal with. I'm constantly strategizing how to break big bills into small bills. (And, thereafter, hoard my small bills.) Restaurants can sometimes be good places, except they often don't split the check and the total tends to be about the size of said large bill...

I paid with my credit card.

The audio tour was actually quite interesting. Despite making us many tourists look like blank-faced zombies in headphones wandering from room to room, listening to voices only we could hear, the descriptions of the reasoning behind Pablo's choices was quite fascinating. He liked good food, good company, good jokes, and decorated with whatever struck him, regardless of perceived "campiness." He loved all things mariner and his water glasses are always thick and colored red or green. He also didn't seem a fan of right angles...

After our tour (from bottom to top!) we decided to walk back down instead of taxi. Downhill is easier.

On the way, we spotted a restaurant that advertised a meal with a view of Pablo's house, heh. We decided to go for it. But we were so early for dinner (before 5pm) that we were the only patrons there. The attentive waiter served us a full dinner with drinks anyway. The meals felt American style (meat-and-potatoes) and were overpriced, but were plenty and satisfying. The salads were unimpressive, but the caramel tort for dessert (made by waiter's wife, the chef) was lovely.

We saw lots of colorful houses, fancy lampposts, and street art as we made our way down. We also had fun checking out the new and different models of car available here. Very few we recognized.

As we navigated downward, we encountered more people and more pups. Then a LOT more people.

The workday had ended. The streets were full. I affected my super-alert confident walk and followed Bex's suggestion to head in the direction of the water. We almost bought tickets for the light-rail along the waterfront to get closer to the bus station, but then we'd have to pay extra for a re-usable card, so we declined. Then we tried to get a taxi, but after a driver spent a long time explaining why he couldn't take us there, we gave up and walked. Finding the bus station we'd arrived at to get our "Turbus" back to Santiago wasn't easy. We cross-referenced the tourist map with the directions from the internet that mentioned Plaza O'Higgins and set out on foot.

We discovered park blocks! Made the walk much friendlier. Random statues, students, intertwined couples, more dogs, in general, a nicer walk than the industrial waterfront. Quote after walking past yet another statue: "There must be a lot of admirals in Chile." "And all on this block." Then we headed north, straight into a street market. Toys, gifts, handicrafts, your standard fare. When Bex's phone map showed that we overshot the Plaza, a helpful waiter pointed us back in the right direction.

Along the way, Bex gave her leftover dinner to a beggar. Good deed of the day.

Finally, the station!

We bought a ticket, got seats 5 and 6, got on our bus (which kept changing gate numbers, gotta pay attention to that), and headed back to Santiago!

When we arrived back in the middle of the capital, night had fallen, we had no idea where we were, and there was no sign of a metro. Gah! Luckily, Google Maps worked, even though we weren't entirely sure which direction we faced. As we walked along a huge thoroughfare back and forth in search of the nearest metro station, we suddenly saw hundreds of bikes appear on the road, as if part of a race or event, covered in reflective gear. (I later wondered if this was part of the 50-mile Immaculate Conception Pilgrimage I'd heard about, but we never did figure it out!)

On the subway, we first heard a reggae rapper (who brought his own mic and amp to perform for a donation) and he wasn't half bad! He only lasted a stop. Then a guy selling small bars of chocolate out of a bright pink backpack set up next to me and gave an intense spiel that I didn't understand. When he looked at me, I didn't know what to do, so I pointed to the sign that said people aren't allowed to sell things on the subway. He shrugged and the guy behind me reached across me with a coin to buy a bar. Two more salesmen made their way through the subway car after that during our standing-room-only journey back. Then someone else with candy. I guess this is a thing here. It was about 9:30pm midweek.

After exiting our metro stop on the correct side (and walking the correct direction! We are experts now!) we got some gelato. Very tasty! Bex left some of her hoagie meat for a dog in need. Another good deed.

Today, I went full tap water. I'd heard the tap water was safe to drink here, but it took me a few days to convince myself. Turned out fine! Also, the hot water was plenty hot, just fun to re-purpose the faucet letters above, that's all.

After sleeping in past 11am (Hey, we walked 18,000 steps yesterday!), we hopped on the metro toward Baquedano Station (an apparently well-known metro stop??) where we got out and searched for a post office and a bank.

Easy, right? One would think.

After asking directions from a couple locals, struggling to figure out which way we were facing on our google map, and learning the word correo (post office), we finally found a place to buy (Xmas-themed) stamps and send some postcards! Whoo!

Then, we looked for a bank. The Santander branch we walked into had no reception desk—weird! Okay. Following yet more using-my-crappy-Spanish direction-asking, we entered a funky indoor mall that entirely consisted of music stores, except one motorcycle store and a somewhat sketch money changer tucked into a corner that used a calculator and didn't give me a receipt. Well, we did exchange dollars for pesos (and although the rate wasn't as competitive, we didn't get charged a fee) so good? Seemed so.

We were trying to kill time before Peumayen opened (remember, the restaurant that the nice couple from New York recommended?) so all our walking in circles made that venture a success. We walked to the Bellavista neighborhood. But not before catching sight of the below:

We entered into the dim, wooden interior of the restaurant not long after they opened. Even given that we were only the second party there, she asked if we had a reservation. Apparently, the place gets packed in the evening, but for late lunch, pleasantly empty.

There was a regular menu and a taster menu. From the latter (which clearly is the way to go), we could choose a Meat, Fish, Veg, or Mix. We both wanted the mix. Almost every item listed on the taster menu described something I'd never heard of (or never eaten) like "Rabbit causeo" or "Beef belly". We both ordered some pisco-related fruity drinks (me a pisco-strawberry-coconut-milk smoothie and Bex a pineapple-and-avocado (!) pisco sour) though looking back, I wondered if I should have saved the room in my stomach...

...because we were served at least a half dozen courses!

We expected three, but then we got a selection of breads, several "palate cleansers", and a "gift from the kitchen." One of the tastiest, and most guilt-inducing of these, was horse tartar, cured in vinegar. Hate to say it, but it was delicious. Granted, almost everything was.

This meal blew my mind. Even the items that didn't suit me as much (usually fish related) were still fascinating. The desserts, oddly, weren't the most awesome, notably the "trick" dessert with seaweed in it—I like seaweed, but not for dessert. But it could have also been that, by then, I was too full to really appreciate them. (Desserts are the lower right corner photo.) That said, I finished my favorite: the red wine gelato. Mmmm.

Cool things about Peumayén Ancestral Food:

• The food!
• The presentation, and descriptions of, the food!
• The perfect English of all the waitresses we spoke to, such flawless American slang that I'm pretty sure they are not local
• The bathroom had a hook!

You're laughing at that last one. Even though our public toilet experience has generally been positive (i.e. clean, hand soap available, plentiful TP), none have had a hook for one's purse. A first-world necessity!)

We had a bit of a surprise halfway into the meal. The bottles started rattling and we felt a tiny heave under us. Sure enough, an earthquake had happened! We looked it up later. Santo Domingo on the coast had a 5.5 at 2:12pm!

When we were full to bursting, we got our check. Yep, that New York couple that recommended this place? Definitely the 1%. Our lunch came in at about $110 total. Still, TOTALLY worth it.

We spent some time relaxing on a park bench, digesting and watching the pigeons. Silly thought of the day: "Look, that pigeon walks with his feet turned inward... Oh, I get it, pigeon-toed."

Only a few blocks from the restaurant was Pablo Neruda's Santiago house. No photos allowed inside, but it was a neat and unique, curvy-walled place. Again, we listened to the audio tour, though this one painted a slightly different picture. Instead of a life-loving, whimsical writer, we heard more about how he cheated on his first wife and how his house was looted near his death. Still, the ivy-covered walls, the gardens, and especially the secret spiral stairwell were fun to wander among.

Our next stop was something we had seen towering over us since we arrived. San Cristóbal Hill. With a white statue of someone (St. Christopher?) on top overlooking everything, it was hard to miss. The hill (cerro in Spanish) was one of many tourist attractions within walking distance of our hotel and very close to Pablo's house which gave us the impression that Santiago was not all that big.

Yeah, a good illusion. Santiago is in the top 50 biggest cities in the world.

In true Chilean fashion, the way to get up the hill was... a funicular!

This one, however was huge (could hold at least 20 people comfortably), open-air, and had a line to get in. The couple in front of us got pulled out of line, unfortunately, because they couldn't take their cute dog up.

The tour operator did compliment Bex's hair, though. "It's a great conversation starter," she acknowledged.

Then, we reached the top!

Wow, this city is huge! Buildings to the horizon in every direction, pretty much, even behind us.

The clouds looked ready to spew rain, but we luckily didn't get more than a few drops. Along the overlook, we spotted this little dog bowl. On our first day here, we learned that the Chilean city authorities actually feed and vaccinate the street dogs! And we could tell. Although the dogs are a little ratty from living on the street, they aren't very aggressive and seem well fed. And here is more evidence!

We almost bought "moto de huesillo," a peach-and-rice drink from one of the booths at the top since it was listed on the "drinks in Chile" card we saw on our city tour the first day, but we were still too full. Next time! So we kept walking. We interpreted the hard-to-read map and eventually found the stairs up to the statue, which turned out to be the Virgin Mary. Not St. Christopher or whomever the hill was named after. Definitely the place to hang out. Lots of people up here. And continuing amazing views, of course.

After a nifty path of seven artistic crosses (people are serious about art here), we followed the ambiguous signage to the cable car (teleférico) that leads across the hill to the other side.

Although we avoided serious rain, the weather was windy, so I can't say it wasn't a *little* nerve-racking when the cable car swang back and forth during our ride. Also nerve racking but kinda fun was when we decided to switch seats. The lines weren't crowded, so we had the cable car to ourselves (and so did the smooching couple in front of us) so we had enough room to simultaneously stand (bent), walk across, and sit on the other side, Mission Impossible style.

Conveniently, the cable car went in the direction of our B&B, so the walk back, among a well-to-do neighborhood with nice cars and less graffiti (though still barbed wire fences and barred windows), was not long.

We ate dinner (still recovering from our ginormous lunch) in a strange bar/restaurant near our home metro station. The place was all dark wood, mirrors, liquor bottles, and old movie posters like The Godfather. Nearly no attempt at English was made by the large man in an apron, whose gestures we kept misinterpreting. The menu was mostly drinks with random food choices scattered within. I picked an item (only able to guess at a couple words in Spanish for every option), but the guy looked at me like I ordered something wrong. (How is that even possible?) He said, in broken English, "This is pig," and suggested something else. I shrugged and went with his suggestion. I still have no idea what the problem was, especially since there was a pig at the top of the menu (so, not a surprise) and the plate that eventually came had triangle-shaped pieces of meat that tasted like pork chops anyway. Better than Bex's food which literally looked like a plate of melted cheese, though she got legit chicken soup with it at least. He had no trouble understanding my drink order (a glass of red wine) and the food tasted fine, but nothing explained why this place (Liguria) got such high reviews.

We took a whole-day tour today so we could check out the stunning Andes.

After breakfast (where we hoped the lone dude in the dining area didn't mind our frank discussion nearby comparing birth control methods), we were picked up at our B&B and taken to the tour office. We had to walk through a jewelry store to get to the TurisTour desk - ah, the upsell - but eventually hopped in the van with the other six people (mostly Brazilian and Argentinian folks, but one Indian lady) and off we went! A little under an hour later, we hit the foothills. (About how long it takes to get to the Rocky Mountain foothills from Denver...)

About halfway up, we stopped at a cute little town with a cute central square and a cute red-and-white church that is almost as old as the U.S. No graffiti and extra friendly street dogs. We also spotted a street vendor selling that peach drink "Mote de Huerillo" that we kept meaning to try. Next time.

After spending about half an hour here and making a pit stop at a nearby restaurant (a restaurant we would stop at on our way back so we weren't completely abusing their mediocre toilets), we drove up a bit and pulled off the road. Our guide led us to abandoned train tracks and we explored an unused tunnel! A neat surprise stop. Apparently, this is an infamous tunnel. Someone died here twenty years ago (some say suicide due to a broken heart) and there's a shrine on the other end, but not on our side. Though she explained the railroad was closed due to economic reasons, not because of that. Either way, we did see our share of graffiti and art decorating the walls.

At one point, ten or so minutes from the tunnel, we made another stop at a white building labeled "Carabineros de Chile" (national Chilean police force) where our guide got out and gave someone inside a list of our names and passport numbers. Why? I have no idea. We didn't need the passports themselves (luckily, since they were in our room safe) and we didn't need to present ourselves, so maybe it's a tourist van formality? I wonder if we would have needed to stop (or known we were supposed to) if we had driven up in a personal rented car? No idea. But it didn't take long and we continued our drive.

The Andes around us were rocky and fairly green with lots of deciduous trees but saguaros, too. We turned off onto a steeper, narrower road and at one point, drove through a river. Granted, more a stream than a river, but driving a weighted van through running water, gah!

Finally, we came to the first of many scenic views of the amazing mountains. Our guide and driver prepared us a nice snack! The weather was warm and lovely, but the mountains still had plenty of snow. Apparently, we timed our trip perfectly! This same tour had to turn back a day or two ago for the snow and, before that, the mountains were dry! The girl from India on our tour was one of the unlucky ones who had gotten turned back. But today was perfect.

The road turned to dirt shortly after.

Bounce bounce. We drove up the windy road, closer to the snow-capped peaks. At some point, we went beyond where we were supposed to. Beyond the sign warning of official vehicles only past this point. According to our guide, everyone drives beyond where they're supposed to - including the Google car! See below.

A few minutes later, we reached the dam!

The blue lake beyond, besides setting off the mountains beautifully, provides a source of water for Santiago residents, but is prone to landslides, so they plan to add some trees.

We parked near the entrance with a bus, but some cars kept on going down the road. A narrow, precarious road. We got out, stretched, took photos, and walked along the water. The dam is an active working zone and the trucks don't want to dodge tourist cars. But tourists squeeze their way through anyway. All for a pretty view that they are too lazy to hike to.

We made sure to stay out of the way of the tourist trucks.

In the meantime, I enjoyed catching up with the woman from India, partly since she spoke perfect English.

While we waited for our group to re-gather at the van, we watched (and some people fed) the birds.

On the way back, we stopped at the same restaurant we made a pit stop at. (They appeared to have refilled the toilet paper since our last stop.) The place was large but we were some of the only patrons. Looking at Street View, I think we stopped at "La Calchona."

Random remarks about this restaurant:

You be the judge
• The waitress gave us a bread basket. It had two pieces of bread in it. Then she grabbed another piece of bread from a nearby basket and put it on top to make three. Maybe we looked hungry? Or we were just Large Americans
• There was rabbit on the menu! (also a lot of "cock")
• There was no English spoken, but our menu was in English (ish) so how would they understand our order?
• To settle confusion, I asked for the Spanish menu. It was completely different in style, length, and quantity of choices. No way to correlate the two
• In the end, we needed help from our bilingual guide to order
• But even though it was written in Spanish, repeated by the guide, repeated by the waitress, the "iced lemon tea" I ordered came out as a mug of hot water with a lemon rind in it
• The food wasn't bad. But we had to be cautious of olive seeds & chicken bones

We were dropped off at our B&B (and tipped the guide and driver) then had a conversation with the manager behind the desk. He suggested that we change our taxi reservation to 4:00am instead of 4:30 to give us ample time to check into our 6:00am flight to Easter Island the following morning. Our phones were not checking us in ahead of time, so I went back to the desk and agreed (though at first, he joked, deadpan, "Wow, that's early, 4:30 would be better.")

Amazingly, the laundry we gave them was done, dried, and delivered! After some chill time, we decided to repeat our delicious first night and went again to Galindo's. But, feeling lazy, we didn't want to walk.

So Bex ordered an Uber! And it worked!

How awesome to just be picked up and dropped off without having to depend on our (almost nonexistent) foreign language skills with everything paid for automatically, woo! (Though, the app put a dollar sign in front of the peso amount which made it look like the ride cost over two grand.)

Once again, we got an outdoor table, ate shrimp and cheese empanadas and some smoked salmon, and enjoyed the entertainment.

We wandered Bellavista, and observed its active nightlife, afterward. Slightly sketchy, though looked like a good time. A few proprietors wanted us to patronize their establishments. One gave us a long spiel, the only word I understood was 'mojito' but we declined, soaking in the atmosphere instead.

As we Ubered back, we saw a guy at a stoplight. On a unicycle. Juggling knives.

Best red light entertainment ever!

We gave him a 1,000 bill.

Then we finished packing (that wine glass from the vineyard was tricky) and went to bed for our final night in Santiago, Chile!