Happy holidays everyone!

The last week has been a great one because my family has been around - my sister flew in about a week and a half ago and my parents flew in on Christmas Day. Tomorrow we meet my brother at the airport in Santiago and then fly directly to Temuco. From there we rent a mini-van, and for about a week the six of us will drive around what is called the Lakes Region of Chile for a week. We're very excited, and we're hoping to have some pretty spectacular pictures for our next post. There should be some amazing hiking to be done and we are really excited.

We've spent the last few days exploring around Santiago. On Friday we drove to the coast and visited Valparaiso. One of the coolest things about Valparaiso is that there is some really intricate graffiti and murals. Lots to look at as you aimlessly wander.


Valpo is full of cool street art. Here's a particularly interesting piece:


Here we are in front of Pablo Neruda's Valpo house (beloved Chilean poet/politician/collector). Very cool house - built overlooking the harbor, and designed to be like a boat. He was of extremely eccentric tastes and his houses are amazing.


Here's my sis and mom hanging out with Neruda in a park after the visit:



On Saturday we got back in the car and checked out some vineyards about 60km west of Santiago. We toured an organic winery and it was very cool to learn about how they are able to keep the growing chemical-free (llamas were part of the process!). Amazing wine and amazing food. I guess the family knows how to deal with a generous wine tasting...



We spent today around Santiago - here we are with my dad, checking out the view from San Cristobal (the hill that has the huge statue of Mary on top).


We miss everyone back at home, especially now that it's the holidays! It was great getting to check in via skype with Justin's fam over Christmas, and we're looking forward to seeing more of our nephew Jacob's army-crawl! We'll be traveling for much of the next month and a half but we'll blog when we can!

Chillin' in Chillan

Hola amigos!

Last weekend we headed south to Chillan with our friends Ian and Lissa. We couldn't make the whole 400 km on Friday night, so we stopped and camped along the way. The site was right along a river, so one of the first things we did while it was still light out was take a quick swim. Because it's Chile, there was a dog hanging out at the site that followed us around (even into the water):


The campsite had a cat too, and Claire was pretty delighted at its moustache (the complete opposite reaction, in fact, that she had to my Top Gun moustache in October):


We found marshmallows at a store a couple of months ago and were excited to roast them around the campfire, but it is HOT here these days and by the time we pulled the bag out of the car it had become one giant marshmallow. We were undeterred.


We also made the most out of the campfire by using a long-exposure to write a message in fire to everyone at home...


On Saturday morning we made it to Chillan, a city about 6 hours south of Santiago and surrounded by a chain of volcanoes. We stayed further into the mountains, but on Saturday we stopped in Chillan to check out their market. Lots of stuff (fruits, vegetables, alpaca sweaters, zubaz/hippie pants that tons of people wear around here, and a muppets "Animal and the Electric Mayhem Band" t-shirt that fits Claire perfectly).


The Plaza de Armas in Chillan also has what I'm pretty sure is a statue to fist-pounding (which, by the looks of this guy's hat and sideburns, people have been doing here for a couple of hundred years):


We stayed at what ended up to be a pretty great hostel in the mountains. Here's the view we had from our bedroom:


The landscape was really incredible - the town was in a valley that looked like it had been carved out by a glacier, and on both sides there were volcanoes with very visible lava flows. On Saturday we hiked a mountain one side of the valley. In the background you can see the mountain range that we hiked the next day.


When we got back to the hostel we took advantage of their pool (and wood-powered hot tub!). The days are getting long here in Santiago, and they were even longer in Chillan. It's probably around 8:45pm in this picture, and you can see how bright out it still is.


Sunday morning we got up and headed to the other side of the valley for another hike. This one took us right along a lava flow from about thirty years ago. It was like being on another planet or something - everything was black lava rock, and there weren't any plants anywhere near us.


The lava rock was incredibly porous and so even big rocks were really light (the one below is probably only about 2,000 pounds).


Eventually we parked the car and hiked the rest of the way.


The flow stopped really abruptly right at an old, abandoned ski lodge.


There was another family hiking around the lodge and the son was particularly proud of a catch he had just made:


We started up a climb that ended up being about 1,500 meters in elevation gain. Chileans don't seem to be big fans of switchbacks on paths, so a lot of the climb was pretty steep.


Lots of really great views along the way up:


A pretty cool lagoon at the top of the mountain:


Finally, to the very top...


Right near the peak we found a really weird-looking grasshopper/scorpion/thing that probably only a biology nerd would find cool (I thought it was awesome):


The way back down:


We had Monday off for a Catholic holiday, and so we had time to investigate some waterfalls we had spotted on Saturday's hike. Here they are:


Then... back to work on Tuesday.

You'll notice that I am NOT including a mullet shot in this blog installment. This was done intentionally to build up anticipation for the next mullet. It will possibly be the best one yet: the mullet I will have after school gets out this Friday.

I hope everyone is doing well.

Happy Holidays!