Landing in Santiago promised quite a change from NewZealand. The view from the plan revealed a yellow-brown dry landscape. And yes temperatures finally allowed to retrieve the short thoursers from the bottom of the backpacks again.

Anyway, in a very nice way many things reminded us of Warzaw. The heat, the parks, people on city bikes, the straight forward working underground train, and the funny and informative free walking tours around the city.

Carlos alias Wally guided us around the corners of Santiago, that you probably will miss on your own.

Tio Willy (located in the fish market) made Tom trying his first real Mate, not this sweet Club Mate stuff he is drinking back in Germany.

The tour led through Santiagos cemetry, which is as big as 117 soocer fields so you can easily get lost here.

Finishing the tour with a drink is quite a nice style and after all the talk about earthquakes in Santiago a „Terremoto“ is the obvious choice. Made of Vino pipeño with pineapple ice cream the second glass makes the earth shake in deed.

And then we headed back to Tio Willy to try some of the famous fish. I head soup made from conger eel.

A substantial difference in Santiago from Warzaw however were the huge number of stray dogs. They are just everywhere and some even adopt a lordling, as the one following our guide around the city. Though we never met one being aggressive towards us.

Red following the tour until we reached the Undergound train. He knows he is not allowed there.

Christoball (the mountain with the virgin on top) was quite close to our hostel so we made it up there almost twice. On our second time the top was closed due to the fact that it was close to sunset and people get robbed there when it’s dark. But aside from all the stories you hear we felt pretty save in Santiago. When I lost a 5000 CLP note in the underground train a girl even came after me handing it back.

The virgin on christobal can looking over Santiago.

The view from christobal during sunset unfortunately reminds a little of china. The smog hanging over the city is reaching as high as the surronding mountains.