Chile - 26 December, 2001

.

Travel Distance

Leg 1 Total:

9,010 km

Galapagos:

771 km

Grand Total:

9,781 km

Today is the last driving day of this leg of the trip - we are heading down to Santiago.  We have a long drive ahead of us, so we have a relatively early start (remember, we have been eating and drinking too much over the last few days) and leave only 30 minutes late at 9:30 AM.  We stop for lunch at a closed weighing station.  We try to finish off all the leftovers, but are not quite able to do it.

We arrive in Santiago just after 6 PM.  In this leg of the trip we have covered just over 9,000 kilometers and we have had a great time doing it with all modes of transport, including Priscilla, plane, bus, jeepney, foot, inner tube, horse, etc.  We check into our hotel - a youth hostel.  Boy, do they have rules and regulations.  Papers to be filled out, sheets to be collected, bills to be paid in advance, gates to get through ...  But it is not too bad (except for the bed bugs we encounter in the middle of the night).

After settling in and figuring out how to make our beds with their odd bed sheets, we go for a stroll around the area.  we find the laundry and a few shops.  Then dinner.  We decide to try the Fat Cow (well, that is the translation we were given).  It is an amazing meal.  We have huge steaks and a couple of bottles of wine amongst three of us. We ate late (for us), but people were still strolling in around 11 PM.